july 7 2000
a note: this entry ends with platonic cliche. that is all.
another, more involved note. actually, it's more of a makeshift errata section. yesterday's riff on the ant and the aardvark was actually done while thinking of the focal characters from tijuana toads, another depatie-freleng celluloid wonder from the pink panther show, which i found today was actually titled the pink panther laugh and a half hour and a half show. thank you, vocational irresponsibility, for allowing me to pursue such integral cultural truths.at any rate, if you go back and read it, please "tijuana toads" whenever "the ant and the aardvark" is mentioned.
this is them.
so after various logistical fumblings, i went to see scary movie with pj tonight. i was, and i reveal this with trepidation lest he take mortal offense when he reads it, disappointed. see, i'm gonna git you sucka was some classic genre parody, so keenen and his clan gave me reason to expect great things. great things were not what i found. i've said it before and i'll say it again; satire doesn't work when it's broadbrushed. female gym teachers are butchy? whoooo! give them an oscar. still, much like moments on in living color and even to a lesser extent the younger generation's wayans brothers show, there were moments that approached the sublime. first, testicles cannot be overutilized in movies. second, penises cannot be underutilized. third, making fun of white people is the essence of what kept def comedy jam fresh through its first three hosts (we miss you, joe torry. please write.). last, with the full knowledge that i'm puncturing any aura of progressive maleness i have sporadically tried to cultivate, carmen electra running around in a bra and thong makes for great cinema.
on the walk home from union square, i happened across two curious things. both were human, and one was decidedly more pleasant than the other; i'll leave it to you to decide which was which. on fifth street between third and second avenues there was a giant bearded man-mountain leaning back against a car. his pants were around his ankles, and his shirt was up under his arms. to answer the question that need not be asked: too-big briefs, which were on, though barely. i couldn't ascertain whether he was aware that his pants were around his ankles rather than his waist, and his incoherent mumblings into his chest didn't clarify the situation too much. as i walked down the block, there weren't many streetlights in that particular area, and so i didn't see the half-naked man-mountain until i was maybe two car lengths away. "huh," my brain said, "he's almost naked. and he looks like he don't smell too nice. and those two girls right there don't look thrilled to be walking right by him. maybe you should do something about that." "a fine point," said my legs, and they walked me right across the street. then, on fourth street between second and first avenues, there was a man sitting on the sill of his second-floor apartment's window, wearing a jacket and nice pants, singing karaoke for neighbors and whoever stopped to listen. i don't generally stop, so i didn't, though i think he might have been singing nat king cole's "unforgettable" when i passed.
about half a block later, i realized that in the space of three minutes two things had happened that i should, if not would, remember. man-mountains and domestic troubadours don't pop up every day, despite what non-new yorkers think. still, their uncommonness doesn't mean that dozens of similarly unique things don't happen every time i walk home from somewhere. and so, the platonic cliche.
consider the sum of things, of things that happen in the course of a normal evening. nothing special, no out of the ordinary events, no melees, no revelations. please trust me when i tell you, when you get home, to examine it. i don't mean rolling it over once or twice or peering at a vertex as though it were a brancusi sculpture; i mean actually sitting down with it and gauging its knotted weight in your hands. finding its pulse, pressing lightly its rounded nodules of vitality. pulling at it lightly, resisting its wholeness, freeing some of its slighter tendrils. when it's just begun to fray, put it down and take note of how its constituents fit together. i swear to you, you'll be surprised.
to recap: testicles. not smelling too nice. thank you.
p.
and yo. my full-on venture kneejerk.net is up and running, though not nearly full. go and getcha read on. for me.
props to darkcounter.com
and sitemeter