I'm 28 Today.

I downloaded my first movie and watched it – totally subverting the Hollywood machine. I
logged on to Kazaa and was shocked to find a copy of Phone Booth ready for download
in MPEG format, split into two parts. The picture quality was alright
and the image was pretty small – the audio was nothing stellar –
definitely not quality for a movie that depends on lush sound
engineering. But it was a good movie – I really just liked the whole
concept behind the movie – I love time/space limits in dramatic works –
like Rope, Lifeboat and my current obsession, 24.

There have been a few
B- episodes this season but for the most part the writers and producers
have kept Ron and I in a tight bind. We get so worked up during the show
that the commercials are a welcome break from the constant tension. When
Michelle Forbes fell down the stairs last night and then is being
dragged out on a gurney by the medics and she’s sobbing in a neck brace,
unable to speak – only able to point an accusing finger at the
President’s right-hand man (who is plotting with the vice prez to
overthrow President Palmer). She slowly lifts her arm up and points the
finger at Mike – totally reminding me of the dinner scene in Macbeth.
Mike clutches her hand in mock comfort and off they wheel her. Then the
previews always leave me giddy with delight as Kiefer screams into a
cellphone at his daughter: ‘KIM, SHOOT HIM NOW,’ and you see his
daughter blowing somebody away with a gun. The daughter’s plotting this
season has been for shit – it doesn’t seem to intersect at all with the
main plot – though I’m hoping hoping hoping the writers were just
creating a lot of backstory to throw us into the final five
episodes.

I also downloaded Veruca Salt’s ‘Leave Me Lying Here.’ For some
reason I totally love that song – I think it’s the banshee singing at
the beginning. I also downloaded Tracy Bonham’s ‘Mother, Mother’. That
song, along with Oasis’s ‘Champagne Supernova’ album take me back to my
fateful summer in a summer stock crackhouse in Shithole, Indiana. My
stoner roommate who would smoke weed and stare at me while I slept, just
knowing knowing that I was his perfect love. ‘Adam, I’m not gay – go
back to sleep.’ I’d torture him by sleeping in my underwear. (this was
the summer I had the huge crush on the set designer Beth but was bound
by duty to Amy – who was cheating on me with her rock star ex-boyfriend
– alright, rock musician – alright, rock ‘musician’. Sidebar: that
reminds me of Brian’s hysterical habit of adding bylines to people’s
names – especially if he doesn’t think they are legitimate artists. It’d
be Mark Smith, Actor for somebody he likes and then Debbie Gray, Student
of Acting. Totally funny)

I think I’ve written before about my habit of driving a song into the
ground – I’m sure it drives my neighbors crazy. I’ll listen to the same
song 12 times in a row – I think it’s my puzzle solving self that wants
to dissect why I like the song so much – the dynamics, key changes and
et cetera, the build, release and bridge.

Ron and I had a big asian adventure yesterday. We walked up to Howard
Brown Health Center and then up to the mini-Vietnam town north of where
I used to live. There’s about six square blocks of dense asian shopping
and dining. Ron was hell bent on finding these little lychee pudding
treats (I kept thinking he was saying ‘light cheese’). We ended up at
huge asian supermarket and I got these little sesame treat candy
crackers. We immediately ate the whole package and it was only 40 cents.
We went to another store and bought more of them to eat on the bus home.
I think next Christmas I want to go to asian supermarkets to buy candies
and treats for Christmas baskets – the packaging is so colorful and
cartoony.

We went down Argyle and almost went into one restaurant but we
weren’t sure where to go once we got inside. ‘You should know – you’re
the asian,’ I demanded of Ron – we exeunted and ended up at a nice place
called Thai Binh – surprisingly not a Thai restaurant – Vietnamese. We
were the only customers and a little girl named Linda seated us. The dad
took our order and cooked up some burning hot and sour soup that left me
coughing. A woman came in – evidently a tenant of the family’s building
or something and this mid-20s woman is arguing with a six grader about
money and a work crew that presumably only new Spanish (and Linda’s
dad presumably only new Vietnamese). Totally cracked us up.

We finished or meal and Linda asked us if we were good at math. She
had geometry homework and would we help her – of course we would (after
all Ron was salutatorian and I was a National Merit Finalist). We helped
her with 1-20 of polygons. Funny thing is – she knew all the answers
already. On the way home we were giggling because Linda really just
wanted to make sure she was absolutely correct before she wrote the
answers down (in pencil). And when she sketched a rhombus is wasn’t just
drawing four lines, but actually sketching it perfectly. That and I
think she was glad to have somebody she talk to. She delighted in Ron’s
flight attendant stories and then told us how her mom was visiting in
Vietnam and figuring out how to get back to the States with out going
through Hong Kong because of the SARS. How many sixth graders know about
SARS? How many sixth graders talk to adults – hell, talk like an adult?
We finally asked for our check and then came home.

My birthday is today. I’m 28. I got up early to workout. Not doing
much tonight – the big dinner is on Saturday and then we’re going to go
see Company with Charlie and Matt in it. I saw it last Saturday and had
a panic attack for the entire first song – I know it’s a good show when
I have a panic attack (I once flop-sweated through an entire production
of West Side Story at the Stratford Festival in Canada – by the end I
was sobbing and sweating. I was human salt lick by the curtain
call). I saw Charlie play this role nearly 10 years ago in college and
now he’s actually the right age for the part.

This past year has been alright – lots of false starts. Building
projects out and things and having them met with indifference and non-
participation. I’m not a patient person. I’ve grown a little distance
from my usual crew. Ron’s employment difficulties have been draining on
him and on me some as well. Dad’s father (and step-mother) passed away.
Andy S’s mother passed away. I finally got out of my corporate job. I
tried to leave in the fall but ended up going part-time and then finally
got out this year. I got a stress fracture in my ankle that still hurts
– gotta check back on the health insurance search. I moved to a new
apartment – closer to all the fun.

The fish death rate seems to have leveled off – have figured out that
they’re shy so they always fly to the bottom of the tank when I come
overhead. I got six more goldfish so now there’s more movement than
before. The bubbling water sound keeps my bladder awake, too.

The beard is going well – Marco at the gym said I look like a G. I. Joe character. That’s the best thing since this other guy thought I was Cuban.


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One response to “I'm 28 Today.”

  1. philtre Avatar
    philtre

    beard?!?!? cuban!?!?!?

    COMMENT:
    man…ur handsome as hell….
    i stumbled across this and didnt know what it was.

    yea, ur pretty damn gorgious 🙂

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