summer reading list

where the sidewalk ends is quite possibly the greatest combination of paper and ink ever created. that's why i'm giving it to nephew alex for his sixth birthday this weekend and that's why i'm reading his copy now. i'm reading these poems and looking at the illustrations and each one is taking me back fifteen years and conjuring up vivid memories of sitting in the b.b. rice elementary school library being read these poems and shown those illustrations in the typical 180-degree-make-sure-all-the-children-see-it fashion. good god it's like yesterday. damnit "iclke me, pickle me, tickle me too" is beautiful.

so you can see why i'm turning off the endless everybody loves raymond and friends blocks to actually read a bit more this summer. i've already run though the da vinci code (very interesting topic, very horrible writing) like the rest of america and spent a good couple hours at the laundromat last sunday starting a "brave new world." i raided my closet in conroe for all the old classics my dad had stolen from libraries of all the schools he's worked at since the late sixties and with that i rediscovered my love for that old book smell. after those i end my harry potter protest, and after those i should begin my correspondence course on creative writing which takes care of my elusive humanities credit, and after all that i write my own great american (or in most cases, britsh) novel and hopefully, just hopefully learn to communicate a complex thought without resorting to overly-hyphenated and drawn out run-on sentences.

i think i will name my son shel.

hallelujah

you could say i'm now situated and full on into the routine of work, eat, sleep like all the other little adults. granted i do love my job so the hours kinda fly by and friday afternoon i stayed there a bit longer before heading back into my one room isolation chamber.

small things work well to break up the normalcy like winning nba championships. immediately after the game thursday i witnessed what seemed to be a southern texas apocolypse complete with car horns, car crashes, fireworks shooting at me on the freeway, and a giant neon star of david which i think means the second coming of jesus christ.

this evening was the parade and enough player introductions to get me caught up with the san antonians. tomorrow i try again with the bike pump and see if i can explore beyond my front porch.

stir crazy in spanish america

i made a trip to HEB for the second night in a row to pick up a new box of floss and to simply see other living beings after the sun went down. box of floss? or is it floss container? am i having conversations with myself?

the nights only get longer from here...literally!

go spurs go?

i can't really hear the game from the computer too well cause the window unit is on full throttle and they're losing quite badly anyway. it was neat to see from the time i first interviewed in april to now that the ubiquitous "go spurs go" signs have become more ubiquitous and the entire city seems to be naming their children manu.

i gave the riverwalk a few attempts today in search of the perfect father's day gift but unless dad want's a don't mess with texas tshirt or a cd of peruvian flute music, i got nothin.

also today i finished the 3 day training of the CAD program that lf bought back in the reagan administration and i swear bears a striking resemblance to LOGO. if you don't know what i'm talking about then maybe you didn't take keyboarding with ms. parsley back in fifth grade and you don't know to not "copy that floppy." seriously i think that film introduced the idea that we were even capable of copying that floppy.

saint anthony and me

hola. i'm quickly learning what's it's like to live alone, work a full time job, and be a san antonian. basically it's really quiet and you get lost a lot.

but hell i like it here. i live in the historic tobin hill neighborhood just north of downtown. i say it has a lot of character, yet my parents say don't go outside at night. i've filled the hardwood floors to the brim with empty seats and now the fridge is full of HEB produce. THIS is the HEB mecca.

work is good even though i failed to learn many of the 50 new names. i can't even remember the company dog's name. i think when i get my own desk and do more than play with scotch tape all day, i might meet people. i foresee great things.

and then while walking through downtown a family asked me how to get to the alamo. tourists! but i guess that means that i'm a local now even though i'm pretty sure i pointed in a completely wrong direction. i want to keep on exploring and eat in every restaurant i come across but the first round of bills has left me bankrupt so i think i'll just stay in and keep eating soup left over from austin.

both the irish and the scots had magical powers. the irish made pots of gold and the scots made tape.

here i go

conroe. austin. castiglion fiorentino...san antonio.

985 miles from nowhere

cabin fervor

my dad and I are out to find the end of the mississippi. not the minnesota end of course but the vast delta, marshy, louisiana end. conquistador style. it's good cause i need an escape from all things cable tv and central air conditioning. i came down with some nauseous headache the other night i think cause i had been inside all day.

just for a dramaic touch, imagine this as huckleberry finn's escape from the tedium of st. petersburg only my dad isn't a large black man named jim and the river raft role will be played by a 1999 honda accord.

check the papers and the tv

the oasis is gone. that definitely is a sign it was time to leave austin, with all it's beauiful sunsets and huge burning decks and all. i know they'll rebuild it eventually but it's just sad to see. watch the video.

at the same time i saw that in my inbox, the AIM ad reminded me of a little show premiering tonight on WB called Beauty and the Geek. Read more here. Fans of this blog will remember Lauren B. and her rise to fame in the Lingerie Bowl 2005 but this one is big and she'll be mostly clothed this time. oh wait i was wrong, watch the video.

making conroe even prouder and again proving that CHS cheerleaders turned homecoming queen candidates turned underwear models can make a difference, '00 graduate Blair T. is apparently gracing the pages of playboy, earning co-ed of the week honors. i guess that means she actually followed through with college. i'd link to a picture but i try to keep this blog parental advisory free.

other than petty gossip and yellow journalism, i do use my time in conroe to catch up on the world. deep throat has revealed himself and my dad's long standing belief that it was Bush (41) is wrong. my parents we're in DC when it happened and remember reading the washington post in the morning and wondering why someone would want to steal campaign buttons. i don't know but apparently it changed america.