Spent yesterday rehearsing with Faro, finally seeing some of “The Return of the King” (not bad), replacing my cranky printer, and judging at the Worcester semi-finals.

I’ll leave comments on my judging to others, other than to say that people should realize by now how many slams I’ve seen, how many slams I’ve judged, how many I’ve emceed, and how many I’ve competed in. I’ve probably seen every great slam poet in the world by now, and I keep up as new ones arrive and old ones evolve. That should tell you something about what I bring to the table when I’m watching a slam, and some insight into how I judge them.

Tomorrow is the show at the Bowery Poetry Club…

Duende will be at the BPC, 308 The Bowery, NYC, to do the full “Americanized” suite. Doors at 7:30, tix are 7 dollars at the door. We’ll be recording live. It’ll be cool, and you should be there if you can.

Seacrest out. Me, I’ll probably be around later.

I really hate the following things everyone seems to adore:

— lolcats
— most Facebook apps
— unsolicited requests to participate in Facebook apps I dislike
— having to explain to people why I don’t want to bunnyfight, be in a mob war, or (shudder) play Scrabulous on Facebook and how it doesn’t mean I don’t like them personally
— YouTube surfing for funny stuff. I don’t think much of it is very funny.
— receiving multiple requests to look at YouTube funny stuff
— iPods (well, not entirely; but I dislike having no chance to be surprised, and I loathe headphones, earbuds, etc.)

You may commence the hating now.

I merely present this. I have nothing to say about it. I just think it needs to be…presented.

http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSN2319603620080423

mongobear, everybody’s favorite promoter of performance poetry recordings through his work on Indiefeed, has come through with a truly flattering podcast of Duende this week. It features our cut “Mayans and Aztecs” and also offers his thoughts about our show at the Bowery Poetry Club this coming Tuesday.

Check it out if you are interested, and I hope it encourages you to see the show.

http://www.indiefeedpp.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=331392

Thanks, Mongo! We’re honored!

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/04/30/palace.takeover/index.html

I have indeed won the title of Poet Laureate of the Blogosphere.

Thanks to all of you for all your support, with special thanks to my spiritual mentor javabill and my erstwhile negative campaigner theklute; to january_embers for the original nomination; to theryk, ocvictor, wormtown_mensch, vakira, drgeorge, johnpowers, and loudpoet for exhorting the various masses; and to everyone else I’m too sick to remember right now.

As soon as I stop coughing, the fun begins. (That should give me time to figure out a funnier way to milk this.)

First decree: a blog focused on poetry is now a “plog.” This allows me to change my title to the “Poet Laureate of the Plogosphere,” or more informally, the P.L.O.P.

Ok…I’m still sick, although it seems to be getting a little better. I’ve got a bunch of work to do today and won’t be here terribly much so I’ll compile a few things into one post and have done with it.

The Laureate election continues to be a tight race. Right now, I’m up by some 20 votes or so over Rob McLennan. That’s not enough of a margin if there’s a big push at the end. Every vote counts in an election this silly!

So once again (and for the last time — I’ll not mention it again until the final tally’s done) here’s the link.

http://bloggingpoet.squarespace.com/bloggingpoetcom/category/poet-laureate-of-the-blogosphere

Spread it around, send your friends to vote, etc., etc. The larger the margin of victory, the more dramatic and heartbreaking it’ll be when I renege on all my campaign promises. Hey, I am an American, right?

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GotPoetry Live tonight is our monthly Poetry and Music night. I’ll be hosting with a separate mic so no one will catch the creeping crud I’ve got. Sharon Wolfenbarger is our feature, Faro will be crunching out the tasty bass, and who knows what else will be cooking?

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Next Tuesday Duende will be doing the full “Americanized” show for the first time in NYC! We’ll be at the Bowery Poetry Club, 308 the Bowery, at 7:30 (in the time slot where it’s usually the Urbana Slam). Come down if you’re in town and we’ll help stir shit up.

We’re hoping for a large turnout. Please come if you can! We’ll have the merchandise and everything, and we’d love to see you.

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OK, enough. I’m going back to bed for a while to rest up for tonight.

symptoms have, ahem, migrated south to some degree. 😦

spent a lot of today asleep; going back to bed soon.

if y’all are so inclined, feel free to keep pimping the laureate election. I haven’t got the energy right now. thanks to those who have. here’s the link:

http://bloggingpoet.squarespace.com/bloggingpoetcom/category/poet-laureate-of-the-blogosphere

as of right now, I’m ahead by 20 points with one day of voting left.

With no let up, which both irritates me and makes me sad.

Andrew, if this keeps up I won’t make it tonight. Sadness.

I’m sick. Really. Throat is on fire, achy…grrr.

I’m sure it’s airplane related.

As much as I would like to go see Amy Steinberg tonight at the Q, I doubt I’ll make it.

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I’m still in the lead over at the Laureate election, but only by four votes.

Right now I’m too ill to care much, so blah blah vote, blah blah haiku, blah blah thanks.

That’s probably as coherent as anything else I’ve said lately.

Time to start cracking down on rehearsals for the May 6 “Americanized” show at the BPC. I’ve also got to send flyers down to them. Will print some later.

The Laureate election is close — damn close: I still lead Rob McClennan by ten votes at the moment. If you’ve got time and inclination and haven’t voted yet, it would be great if you could go do that here:

http://bloggingpoet.squarespace.com/bloggingpoetcom/category/poet-laureate-of-the-blogosphere

The margin is slim, and the election only goes through Tuesday. I don’t want to start having to court superdelegates, especially when I don’t have a clue as to who they might be.

I’ve posted this whole very silly campaign to the Yahoogroups slamlist, and I need to get it onto the regular slam forums today too…gonna go do that now. I have to be honest here: I certainly started treating this as a joke and it still basically is one, but now that I’m in the lead, it would seem that the joke must now be carried to its natural conclusion, which is to go all out to win. Destiny is hard.

So go — spread the word. Get people to vote, and let’s make this a surge that will actually be over at a clearly defined time.

One Last Poem About Prejudice, Class Warfare, Privilege, and the Like

You are kidding me —
all this breath expended and
it’s not clear? Shee-it.