I'm not nationalistic in any sense. Nationalism was a 19th century bad idea thought up by Kings and Prime Ministers to convince the poor and lesser nobility to die for the pointless, unending wars they needed to maintain an erection long enough to spew their syphilitic seed onto the widows and daughters of men with more honour than themselves.¹

Despite my abhorrence for flag waving nonsense, I have found an exception. I have found something that makes a little red, white and blue tear gently fall across my heavenward gazing face. It's BBQ sauce. God bless, America! I haven't given my old country a thought until a fellow ex-pat (thanks, Sam) brought back a bottle of "Sweet Baby Ray's", the dark red, smoky-flavoured blood of Christ himself.

S_ and I have been drowning everything in this stuff. We've had burgers three times this week for the excuse of dipping the already slathered burgers into the extra dollop on our plates. As soon as that furtive English sun reappears, there will be a sacrifice of fatten hen anointed in this liquor from west Chicago. Now if it was only possible to get the old style Shiner Bock, we could make proper libations to the gods of grilled meats.

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¹ Too much?

I feel like a winner today!

Any time you find yourself a 'them' amongst their 'us', a curious side effect is their presumption that you are an expert on what it is that makes you not one of them. So no, I don't know who is going to win the election.

"I still do(love America), though that feeling has changed in the face of it. I think that it is a spiritual disaster to pretend that one doesn't love one's country. You may disapprove of it, you may be forced to leave it, you may live your whole life as a battle, yet I don't think you can escape it. There isn't any other place to go--you don't pull up your roots and put them down someplace else. At least not in a single life-time, or, if you do, you'll be aware of precisely what it means, knowing that your real roots are always elsewhere. If you try to pretend you don't see the immediate reality that formed you I think you'll go blind." --James Baldwin

Let's talk about why it is impossible to be down when listening to 2tone records.

'That's not my Pirate' has to be the greatest book title I have seen in awhile. Four words that promise so much. So much story packed in four words. Amazing.
1) It's about Pirates. Outlaws and pirates are always interesting subject material.
2) The story is about someone who owns a pirate. That's an interesting idea. What do you mean your pirate?
3) This person who owns a pirate has lost him. Holy shit! How do you lose a pirate!? That's drama. You already had me when I thought the story was just about having a pirate but now you tell me you've lost him. Double holy shit! Do tell!
4) The plot thickens. Someone has proffered a pirate and it turns out that it is not the pirate being sought. That's narrative.

All that for the price of four words. This is why I adore writing and language. Imagine what could be achieved in a 100 word poem or an 85,000 word novel. Fucking dynamite baby.

This quote should be shared

Art should be approached with the care and respect due dynamite and if you don’t the last thing you should see before you die amongst fiery violence is your dick flying past your face.

quotes are like buses

"Philosophers -- except the few who are my friends -- drink beer and watch football games and defeat their wives and children by the fraudulent tyranny of logic." -John Gardner

There is something pathetic about people with coffees to go. I don't know if it is my irrational intolerance for my fellow middle-class honkies or just an understanding that a coffee to go is a metaphor for that sad state of almost-living that could easily be my fate.
When I was a teenager and had made a firm plan to do nothing with my life, I cleaned banks. I reconsidered this non-plan of mine, when my boss told me to go to the fourth floor toilets and bring gloves. My non-plan had kept me firmly fucked-up, happy and sated until this point. The ominous suggestion 'to bring gloves' cut straight through the haze of my irresponsible bliss.
Someone on the fourth floor had shit themselves and hid the crap filled drawers in the cistern. Each flush refilled the bowl with ominous weak-tea colored water. During the execution of this crime, the perpetrator managed to flick specks of poo-goo and make shit constellations all over the stall's walls. After that shift, I determined to do something with my life.

The day I am too busy to sit down and enjoy a cup of coffee I will reconsider just what that something has become.