6/30! Jesus Didn't Die for You to be a Beggar!

If you can't get down with redemption-- If you can't get down
with resurrection, if you can't heal with an egg or crack for
children's paint---


then tell me about the way fjords burn under pagan rituals.
tell me about the aurora borealis scattering sky to everyone
in gaping wonder.
Give me a shaking excuse for why your aunt just wants to
point and laugh, why your uncle shouts "praise jesus" every
eight minutes. We don't need church fans out on the street,
we don't need reinterpretation systems for our favorite
music, we don't need a swab down for job interviews,
though it probably won't hurt--

--a day is just when you are off
work and you trust the boss
the pastor
the savior
the entrepeneur
hand greasy with coupons,
opportunities. Parents always nudging.
may recognize
beer/
or shots/
or nothing

and a crammed up road, tell me about the
persons shaking their fist out the side of their
vehicle, blocking my bus

burning my skin,
but the warmth

keeping me from cussing them out
once
again.

My Year in Lists Part 1

List number one isn't so much a list. It's sort of a list. But not entirely. That's the sort of day i'm having, so, dear reader, fuckin' deal with it.
I tallied the total and over the course of 2010, I did 14 readings. Which is like, one and an eight per month. Or something. Granted, two were at residencies where I lived (one at Warm Beach house on the deck, one here in brighton) and a couple were at Gusta's Your Hands Your Mouth readings in B'ham.
Still, that's still a solid amount, especially considering I didn't do any tours or have any new shit I was trying to make people buy. This is sort of a form of bragging, but it is also a way of feeling less generally unaccomplished in the face of various successes (both deserved and un-) around me. I tend to hold it's better to compare yourself against yourself than others. Because there's always someone doing better.
The last reading I did in 2010 was at the Lights Of Christmas coffee shop. Trying to explain the worlds-collide nature of having performance poetry at a christmas-light display in North Snohomish County is too much for right here (and would rely on way too many simplifications) but I successfully wrote some borderline-uplifting stuff that I don't hate and people dug the reading.

other than that my fave readings were: Portland: Beer and Cookies Cabaret. . . oh man. so many chocolate chip cookies and sessions lager and a film about robots and comedians and country music. Eva Suter can throw an art party.
Swansea: The Crunch . . . need I say more?
Seattle, U-District: New Crompton w/Deerseekingheadlights, My Printer Broke We broadcast this on chatroulette and there was dissonant sludgefolk and sweet noise and songs about cats.


There are way more that roughly tie these, but I don't want to screw the economy of reading-status with inflation.

The other thing I did artistically, and perhaps most significantly, was start to visual art in an official way again. Also, verb words. Look at the pics here.

maybe next year there will be some longass post about a new book (or at least chapbook) that someone else is putting out (a goal of mine) or Conspiracy Agogo's east coast tour or my new found life as a regional-humour standup. The future, like they say, unwrit.

JCMSUP, a couple of shows, a Saturday night with no set plans but to have no set plans.

Yesterday I observed in an e-mail to Gusta that I "am so tired it's like being jetlagged." this was doubtless partially just in anticipation of November 17-23rds complete whirlwind, but also a pretty accurate look at how time has been moving for me as of late. Even after my Big Art Show-- which was just two weeks ago-- I've done two readings, sat in on some crucial communications-policy meetings with Vera, begun my exit proceedings and been working my regular shifts at the Cafe and Loft. So even without my ZAPP hours, I'm still going at least six days a week. Even the most mellow-day three-hour cafe shifts still take a round trip of at least two hours on our city's beleagured Public Transit system. but yes. build a new deep-bore tunnel . . .

Civic politics ASIDE. . .

Jesus Christ Made Seattle Under Protest went really well. We had about 90 people through in three hours; I don't know if that's a ZAPP-at-artwalk record, but it was enough to get some nods. Wanted to post some pictures up here but still don't have a working computer and while I'm sure there is an equivalent of the "right-click" function on a mac, I dunno what it is.
Plus, right now there aren't a lot of pics of the artwork itself. A bunch of people standing looking at walls is not a great rep of an installation.

The following week I did a spoken word gig at the Rendezvous with Police Teeth, Connecticut 4, Garden Variety Tsar and the Mill Kids. The usual MC with a piece or two between each band. Katrina Miller bought me inappropriate amounts of whisky for a weeknight and I pulled out a few pieces I hadn't done in guite some time. It was a good good-bye for Keenan, who I'm coming up on 10 years of friendyness with and she and her fiance are heading to Athens, Ga.

Setlist
Rock Radio
___
Little Red Corvette
My Emergency's About to End*
___
When Saying Mean Things About Strangers
Like Taking Communion
___
Sex Standing Up*
Get Smart!
*It is amazing to me how many times I edited this one back in the day and how LONG it still is and not in a way that is particularly great.
*Debut. I got a lot of laughs and I think I made people uncomfortable. Which is what you want from Sex Standing Up? Heyo!

Then on Sunday I went with Brielle, Emily W, Elissa W up to B'ham for a Your Hands Your Mouth reading. There were lots of readers so my set looked like this:
What Reunions Are Often For
Tunnels
Extra Wide Bathtubs
Flicking Ash

In two weeks there's a reading here for YHYM; the last one here at the house was one of the highlight memories of this year that didn't involve being out of Washington State. I'll be probably busting out a rehearsal set for my Nov. 18th set at the Crunch, which I'm pretty excited about.

Now if I could just write some new stuff. . .

Breezy dismissal of the last 9 months.

grinding down/ramping up.

"Oh, like the downtown street acronym."

Here is what I'm working on now.

I haven't committed myself to drawing in any capacity since a few of the Lobster Manor show posters, and this is way bigger than that. This is kind of huge and terrifying.