After being off since Dec. 22, I’m back to work tomorrow.
I realize with mounting dread that I don’t want to go back, especially with the Fugue State poem on the cusp of a breakthrough.
I think I’m getting closer to admitting that I want to go into full-time writing, and I haven’t got a clue where to begin.
I also know I’m not making any rash decisions until I feel less shaky.
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I skipped the Worcester Indy competition tonight. I’m down right slam-free these days.
Next thing you know, I’ll be wearing tweed.
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Tweed Antidote: A musician I know, Bob Jordan,is bugging me bigtime to do a CD with him providing music for my poetry.
Jordan is a local lunatic, a hugely gifted musician who’s played guitar with all sorts of cult and fringe figures from Eugene Chadbourne to Michael Hurley and the Fugs.
We’re old buddies who occasionally haunt flea markets together looking for cheesy guitars (he’s a fan of ’60s Harmony Rockets, while I prefer Teisco Del Reys), and we also share a common interest in Portuguese fado music and its characteristic instrument, a mandolin-sized twelve-string guitar called the “guitarra de Lisboa”. (You prog-rock fans may know it as the instrument Steve Howe plays on several Yes albums. No, neither Bob nor I play any Yes songs.)
I’ve been putting this off for a year or so, but it promises to be big skronking fun, so I think it’s time. Bob’s solo work is a sort of cross between traditional folk music and the Butthole Surfers, so God knows what this will end up sounding like…especially if (as we’ve discussed) I decide to write specifically for the CD.
Stay tuned…

January 5th, 2004 at 3:05 pm
Re: Eugene Chadbourne!
Yeah, I think this will be cool. Get back to beginner’s mind with it, y’know…do something I’ve never done before.
As for the office…well…
January 5th, 2004 at 2:50 pm
Eugene Chadbourne!
Saw him play at a little indy record store in Austin, very cool.
This project sounds great– I like the poetry/music thing a lot, and there’s almost always something interesting that happens when old runnin’ buddies work together.
I’ve made up my mind about alam for this year: I’ll keep slaming for fun, but I’ll be taking the year off from seriously competing. Plenty else to do with my OCD energy, y’know? Like if I got peak-slam-level-obsessed with Spanish, how well might I be speaking it next year this time?
Hope the first day back at the office doesn’t suck too bad.