as originally proposed, the first show of julius caesar was last night, and went pretty well except that part of my role as narrator / guardian involves meeting the audience in a train station and walking them to the space, and as anyone who knows me IN REAL LIFE could tell you, my map skills are… curious? lacking? selective? what i’m saying is, we, meaning a group of 120 people plus me in corpse paint, got lost. but in the words of the immortal bard, “it’s cool”.

my part is pretty good, because i wrote it good, with lots of good spiels and a comedy smoking routine (NB: i only smoke in a comedy setting, or after a birth (cigars) or during a delivery (cigarettes, waiting room)). also in a funny twist, my decision to pronounce “pompey” as “POMP ee” rather than “pomp AYY” has been ratified by metrical analysis. AYYYYYYYY!

philadelphia seems nice although mostly i just get ready for the play, or walk around chinatown looking for vietnamese coffee, or eat breakfast, or be asleep. probably going to cough up the $14 to go to the art museum, where there’s a big picasso in paris exhibit, and they have that great cy twombly’s the odyssey room, and more to the point, that’s where they got those duchamps. i feel like seeing “the originals” is more than a bit of a farce in duchamp’s case, but also, what am i gonna not go? i’m right here.

the play is going good, and the first show is tomorrow by hook or by crook or hopefully by neither but anyway by somehow. tickets still available i think.

my role as “the crypt keeper” has been changed. now, i have become death. which, i learned earlier, is not something mothers like to hear on the telephone but what do you want form me, the weather or the news?

my recent dreams have been pleasant and satisfying, simultaneously dreamlike and ultramundane, with the satisfaction of someone who is at least making a decision. last night someone complemented me on my handwriting. the night before i did a crossword puzzle and for no reason decided to half-erase all the words afterwards. the night before i was playing gin rummy with very ambiguous cards. also there was a desert in rib-form. can someone work on this for me? curved cakes wrapped around some sort of thick handle, goopy.

“tell a dream, lose a reader”. anyway i’m stressing out about this caesar thing and preeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeetty much wasting time. listening to tapes.

i’m at the coffee shop in worcester, eating cold pizza and hot coffee, preparing for next week’s turn in julius caesar. one problem i’m having is that when i see “brutus” i think “bluto”, of popeye fame, who was officially “brutus” from 1960 to 1962.

wikipedia presents us with these further distinctions between the characters of bluto and brutus:

• Brutus is obese rather than muscular
• Bluto was often portrayed as a fellow sailor who also sought to win the heart of Olive Oyl, Brutus was portrayed as a generic villain, or bank robber, who showed no romantic interest in Olive.
• On December 28, 2008 and April 5, 2009, the Popeye comic strip added Bluto in the capacity of twin brother of Brutus.

in short, while neither of them are
honorable men”, bluto is a hair moreso, brutus rather less.

this year for lent i’m giving up movies made after 1965. it’s been going pretty good and people have been amenable, switching plans to fit my restriction, or not and i just do something else, who cares? queenie hates it because that’s one of her methods of being involved in things, but how can you hate anything that results in an easter morning date, queenie and me, to watch “mommie dearest” (1981)?

remember years go when i had totally totally no money and made a deal with myself that as soon as i got out of the red i would get a package of english muffins and sonic youth’s “murry street” cd? and i got really psyched thinking about it for so long? and only the muffins held up to that degree of expectation/scrutiny? sort of having that situation with the movie “silence of the lambs” which like i said i’m not allowed to watch right now. i’m certainly inventing things into it in absentia, but at least i know that i already like it.

also, purtle is giving up swearing, which is going hilariously- a lot of this: “…that’s fucked up. SHIT, i said ‘fuck’! FUCK! SHhhhhhhhhaaaaaaahhhhhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!”

section from an unfinished qulit

kokisa’s secret recital was pretty great, playing shostakovich at joe’s house, aka the house over oakie st.. naturally the performance was on point like open office, but the piece itself was also pretty brill- very cartoony and frantic, replete with tip-toeing around, shots fired, mirror routine, spooky ghosts in a graveyard, evil skull fountain, and revolting eyeball. the house was warm and bright, and sonically warm and bright as well– it was pretty amazing to hear such fire so close and so well and so full and rich. also everyone (piano, violin, cello) had a few dramatic “get this shit out of here” page turns, very ESPN.

the next day i raced off at 8am to boston for the 24 hour sci fi marathon, which was totally good. amongst other movies, they showed moon, colossus: the forbin project, giant gila monster, labyrinth, famous monster (documentary about forrest ackerman), john carpenter’s the thing, night of the creeps, rabid (cronenberg), night of the comet. great line up, although lots of people were bummed about labyrinth, being that it isn’t sci-fi, but fantasy. the surprise hits (or rather, the ones that i didn’t know about that i really liked) were night of the comet, a fun 80s teen “after the disaster” movie, and colossus, a *great* computer movie from 1970 about NORAD and Mutually Assured Destruction. great cast, music sound, sets, everything. everything that involved interacting with the computer was a little silly, but had a solid foundation and besides, you have to abstract certain details about computers in a movie just to move things along. a lot of the movies had depressing endings, which i like in a movie, and a lot of them had cool dogs, which everyone likes in a movie.

this was my 4th year in a row going to the marathon, and i packed four bananas (ate three, gave one away), three oranges (ate only one), a bottle of gatorade (purple rain, naturally), two bars of nice chocolate (ate one), and a light blanket (too light). i bought a bottomless mug of coffee, which was $12 including mug, and i really only drank maybe 4 cups, so next year i might just bring an empty thermos and fill up at dunky donuts just before they close. i also bought a burrito at dinner time, and next year i have to remember that the burrito place (anna’s) charges $1 each extra for sour cream and guacamole, turning a good cheap burrito (~$4.25) into a too-expensive burrito (~$6.25). i did fall in and out of sleep during two movies- rabid and day the sky exploded. also i bought a tiny bottle of whiskey to drink during the thing, because me and shawn k used to drink whiskey and watch the thing whenever we’d get really snowed in at the go go.

worcester magazine “people on the street” feb 2004

james pleaded with me not to post yesterday’s discarded drawings, and i acquiesced. or to put it another way, i kowtowed. anyway, here’s a picture of his that i animated, from “human hair week“. an animated GIF is the GIF that keeps GIFing!