Category Archives: Beyond My Scope

Stevie Wonder

How do i get this far in my life and not get exposed to certain things?

I got my hands on Songs in the Key of Life and listened to it while i was helping heather with some crafty-work. I couldn’t believe it, i just couldn’t. All i ever hear is reverence for Stevie, but i’ve really only heard a few of his singles like “I just called to say I love you” and “Isn’t she lovely”. I pounded this album and wanted more, it was mind blowing. The way this album listens, it almost sounds like a greatest hits compilation. I also had no idea that Coolio straight jacked everything but the lyrics to Gangsta’s paradise from Stevie. This album contains everything i love about music.

Which brings me back to the original question i posed at the beginning of this post, and the answer is obvious. It’s because discovering things like this and appreciating it on your terms is what makes your life wonderful. Finding culture, new or old, and realizing something you hadn’t before. The timing behind finding something and integrating it just has to happen naturally, but that drive to find things and stay open is the part that takes work.

You stay open because the reward can be something shining like this, something beyond anything you ever expected.

Of course being that open inevitably leads to posts like the previous one.

It’s worth it though, it’s so worth it. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here. It wouldn’t be worth the bother.

Overdrive

a quick note to self before getting to the topic at hand: filthy beers had it’s first semi-public tasting and did a bang up job, and even though it’s been going on for a year, it feels like things are finally starting. and now back to said topic.

It may have been being sick for the past month, it may be a shift in the moon’s gravity, it might be a slight switch in brain chemistry. Whatever it is, i feel like i’m in overdrive. I want to go out and be interacting with people and life at every moment of everyday. I feel like my creative juices and mental acuity are at the highest highs they’ve had in awhile. i feel like i should be striking while the iron is hot.

i’m busy all the time, but i want to be, it feels exhilarating. i’m flirting very closely with the line of too-many-things-syndrome, but i feel the most purposeful i have in a long time. it’s directed at beer, friends, family, life. i want to be out there in it, interacting, doing.

this happens occasionally, but i feel like i’m gearing up my mind and body to really make a go of it in the brewing game. because if i want to be successful at it, i’m going to have to be running at this pace all the time, no foolin’. it’s a strange mindset of truly knowing failure is not an option. not in the sense of the phrase where it’s do or die, but in the sense that nothing is going to stop me.

apparently, if i can direct it properly and justify it to myself, i am a force to be reckoned with. fingers crossed.

I Exist In A World Of My Creation

A way of life?

A subjective idea?

A bitchin’ band name?

A what-you-think-is-clever written expression?

All are possible. Everything is possible. Jesus, why not. Nothing crazy, nothing out-of-the-ordinary, just weeks of regular life cumulating. What do you expect? You think things are out of your control ALL  the time, and when that idea tries to rear its ugly head itself, you point and laugh. It proved its existence by trying not to exisit. and your brain hurts a little. maybe more than a little.

so you try and tip the scales by mentally rejecting this. You compare this to receiving the Rikisihi Stink Face from life. Bound to happen, but now you associate it with a pseudo-sumo wrestler’s ass with your face, getting rubbed in by hyperbolic announcers. you grew up with this, it makes too much sense. all you know is this is something to avoid, as far as you know.

but maybe getting over the stink face is the accepting. But the idea of it happening is too well-established in your subconscious. Scotty-2-Hottie and Grandmaster Sexay point and laugh while you get the stink face. and that’s the bridge too far.

god, that show was ridiculous. there is no defense for watching professional wrestling. no defense besides the pure joy of surrendering to that which is so understandable.

so it comes full-circle. there is no defense. but you know that’s not true because there’s always a defense. Life is such. Yin to yang, idiot. So why the title? why does it ring so true?

(surrender)

why not?

(surrender)

nice point, idiot. that is a really good title.

Something New

I like ben’s last post.

The idea of striving for something that is really nothing is something that’s always struck me about life in general. Water flowing to a pool by any means necessary, the easier the better.

The irony of escaping systems always cracks me up as well, it’s like trying to escape life without dying. What’s the first thing you do after breaking out of a system? Set up a new one. Bonuses being that you at least get to be in charge, and it tends to be less violent these days. There’s some serious issues of control buried in there, though.

Just some response thoughts, i’m not here to get terribly deep today, but we’ll see. I got no plan, just a two week gap in posts and some downtime.

The two weeks is strange to me. I have done alot in my life since my last post, but would be perfectly content to not list any of it here, when really it’s what i should be doing. I’ve been having some rocking times over the past few weekends, and in the long run, this blog is for me. If i end up living to be 80, i want to be able to read about things i did back in the day when i was young and actually had to go places to interact with people. I’d rather just list them bullet style, since hopefully my memory will be good enough to fill in the gaps.

-Making an awesome, nothing went wrong batch of beer out at my parents house.

-Going with a co-worker and my wife to the showbox for the sasquatch line-up announcement party and jetting after mad rad and das rascist, only to find out macklemore got some stage time later in the evening.

-Running around with the filthy beer gang and going to see Mark Farina kill it live at neumos, where i danced until my entire shirt was a much darker shade of green.

-Hanging out with new law peeps around beltown where i found some jolly roger on tap, then managed to get dick’s later in the night after having the window shut on us after seeing farina.

-Having an awesome valentine’s day with my wife where we urban hiked, napped, and saw Rock of Ages.

-Getting into the groove of the bi-monthly event of taking my grandpa to the snoqualmie casino, then wrapping up the day playing hours of video games and drinking homebrews with the filthy crew.

Putting it all in list form like that is such a great reminder. I have so much awesome stuff going on in my life, all the time. Just like i need to remind myself of how superfluous and insignificant i can be at times, i can also remind myself of other things less existential. swing that camera around to point at whatever i want.

ebb and flow, baby…so it goes.

Art

Again, i apologize for the last post, sort of. sometimes documentation is more important than content. on that note, let’s get started!

so here’s the counter-point, ideas running fresh and anew, somewhat un-ironically. apparently, i need outside influence to get out of idea-ruts. this version came in the form of  a documentary (mockumentary?) of epic proportions called Exit through the Gift Shop, done by infamous anonymous street artist Banksy. This film does an amazing job of blurring the line between fiction and reality these days, reminding you how much you have to hone your ability to question reality and what is presented to you. or just reality and what aspects of it you choose to believe. that’s the highfalutin vision of it, but you could just as easily look at it as the highbuffoonery it is.

in this regard, it really shows art for what it is, reflection of society be dammed. you watch shit like this and see just how important, and unimportant it is. how much you, as the viewer adds to the final piece. the creation of something this deliberate and high-concept is nothing short of amazing. yet the fact that i consider it as “high-concept” is already talking out my ass and out of my depth.

here’s the thing. for a moment in my life, Banksy made me care about an idea. as brief and limited as that moment was, it happened. it hit me hard enough to try and respond, to react. damn you, artists. is this your purpose?

Swirl

This is going to be bad, i can tell already.

It will be recorded, regardless.

The anxiety is killing me. Anxiety over nothing, over everything, over ideas i turn in my head and wonder about. I don’t even know what to think about them, it just feels so worthless. All i do is sit and observe, with occasional creations. When thought feels worthless, i can come here and dole it out. Expressing ideas about the inherent worthlessness they contain. The irony is not lost on me.

They come into my head and get turned around up there, examined. A distraction, an exercise in futility. You keep pulling back and the picture gets smaller, the relevance, less.  Sometimes it’s fun to analyze ideas, and other times it just seems ridiculous. You do it anyways, because there’s not a whole lot else going on.

You get distracted, and you roll with it.  Sometimes they are sought after, sometimes they drop in your lap. Sometimes you are amused, sometimes indifferent. As far as I can tell, it beats the alternative.

So it goes. You can run from yourself, but you can’t hide. Always there in the corner of your mind, pulling strings you can’t even fathom. This sounds worse than it is, really this is some stupid venting. but that was realized at the conception.

so get on with it already. daylight’s a wastin’.

Ween

A couple of months ago, i had a friend buy tickets to a show that we had missed out on 3 years previous. I had never heard of them , but they are his favorite band, and I was intrigued. The band was called Ween, and apparently they’ve been doing goofy rock for decades now.

I listened to some of the music nonchalantly, and saw the silly genius behind their music, but still never really got into them. There’s a ton of music out there, and not all of it goes into heavy rotation.

We went and saw them last night at the Paramount, and I was summarily blown away by the performance. There are some acts that can only be captured in a live venue. It was nothing about their stage precense though, nothing about the visuals or the huge amounts of smoke from smoke machines or anything that did it for me. It was their musicianship, their ability to play tightly together, despite slugging beers and hitting “jazz cigarettes” onstage the entire show. They were serious chameleons of classic rock, with good song writing and solid playing.

I know I’ve always felt a deep affinity for music, but much like everything in my life, i hold it at a distance, and never take it too seriously. That was the vibe i got from the crowd and the performers last night. It’s just music, but let’s do it really well. Let’s have fun. That’s a philosophy i can always get behind.

The fact that this was probably the first show my friend has ever plunked down any amount of money for gave me some perspective too. You gotta figure there’s something special about a band if someone who isn’t that into music (or live shows, anyways) pays to go to a show where the floor sells out overnight. There’s so much music culture I’m not a part of because I can’t pay attention to it all. But if i pay attention to people who appreciate music (or art of any kind, actually) i’ll end up somewhere i didn’t plan. my life needs more of that.

Of Love and Bicycles

For once, I come here with a point to make, an idea to flesh out.  I’ve never really sorted out my feelings as a bicyclist in the city of seattle, even though i’m pretty avid about my biking. There was a show about it on KUOW today, and both sides of the issue were being argued by idiots on either extreme, so i felt it was time to iron out my thoughts on the matter.

Here’s my philosophy for bicycle riding, especially in an urban setting: I am invisible. Too many times have I made eye contact with people in cars to establish some form of right-of-way only to almost be hit. I’ve avoided being doored so many times because you have to watch parked cars like hawks while riding along side of them. I can’t expect these people to see me, even in full reflective getup, covered in blinking lights.

I have to make sure I’m not the one getting myself hurt. I feel this is my responsibility because the big inequality in the relationship between bicycles and cars is the size/weight ratio. When the two collide, the most that’s going to happen to a car is some form of body damage. To the bike rider, you can total your bike along with seriously injuring yourself. There’s too much at risk as a bike rider to care about what’s right or lawful with stakes like that. if you get hit on your bike and it’s proven that the driver was at fault and you had the right-of-way, guess who’s still in traction.

So there’s a balance to be struck on how people bike around a city that wants more people to ride but has no money to put in any type bicycle infrastructure. Hell, Seattle has no money for any of it’s infrastructure, period. So yeah, i ride on the sidewalk, sometimes it’s necessary. I have no problem riding on urban streets, but only when the speed limit is 25, and there’s some way to pass me. I’ll sometimes ride the wrong way down a one way, on the sidewalk. I’ll sometimes cut through a median i wouldn’t be able to if i was in a car. This annoys alot of drivers, but i’m invisible, i’m not getting in their way, and i’m not hurting anyone. having a little license to go places you couldn’t in a car is one of the perks of riding a bike. you respect pedestrians, and watch your ass, it’s not that tough.

On both sides of the equation, there are assholes. There are drivers that will yell and throw things at you, there are bike riders who will clog a major arterial by riding three abreast during rush hour. I’ve always dealt with asshole drivers while on bikes but i never realized how bad bike riders could be until I got roped into critical mass once by some people i met at a riding event, and saw the depths of what assholes bike riders could be. It just comes with the territory of being extremely self-righteous with a feeling of superiority, i think.  that attitude is a part of both camps, though.

One thing that really bugs me about bike riders is that they complain about getting pushed around by cars when they ride on major arterials. Sometimes you have to ride on an arterial to get over a highway, hit a specific bridge, or get to a specific street.  most of the time, there’s at least a shoulder or a sidewalk to use because there are lots of vehicles and pedestrians on these routes. But more often than not, you can head one block over and be in much more bike friendly side streets. You avoid lights, heavy traffic, and the chance of hitting a pedestrian. It’s also a lot more pleasant, and allows you to find better ways to get around the city.

Seattle is a city connected by cars. The metro system is decent, but just barely. Walking is discouraged through few or extremely dilapidated sidewalks.  Without the infrastructure, there will be conflict. And just like drivers, there are idiots that ruin it for everyone else. I think that’s the bottom line. Willful or not, uninformed riders are just as bad as uniformed drivers. If you head out on a bike thinking that you always have the right of way due to your on-a-bike nature, you’re gonna get angry when you see not everyone thinks that is so, and most likely get yourself hurt in the process. You can head out in a car thinking the same way, but at least the road system around here is designed for cars.

Everyone just gets it in their heads that drivers treat riders with no respect, and vice versa. When in reality, there’s a few idiots on either extreme out there,  making it happen. My bike riding is always a pleasant experience, because i’ve ridden long enough to have common sense about what i can and probably shouldn’t try to get away with, and better routes to take.

I love riding my bike and will continue to do so. Even if we get some of the best infrastructure in the world, i’m not going to start thinking cars can see me anytime soon. I can get away with more if i’m invisible.

Surreal

So I’ve been avoiding posting for awhile, despite the heavy need to do so. There’s alot going on right now, and I just haven’t felt the need to sort it out yet. If i don’t force myself to, then I probably won’t, so here we are.

Here’s the seed that got me here: Over-hearing a conversation, with this comment being the point I jumped in:

“Why is it that these things are discovered after i’ve done all this work?”

Immediately the response that struck me was “Becuase of your narcissism and self-involvement. You notice these things because they affect you directly.”

That would have been really mean and uncalled for though. It also would have been over-simplification on my part. But the statement doesn’t ring  untrue to me, although it may be an oversimplification.Part of that idea still resides in that statement. Many things we say about ourselves contain that nugget of narcissism. How can it not? So what is this seed i wish to define? Anger, of course. Directed at myself and others due to circumstances outside of my control. you narcissistic asshole.

This is more accurately described as a rhizome cut off of a root system that is already there and is crying out for water. This week has been tough, yesterday especially. You don’t see the saddest sight of your life everyday.

Here’s something my uncle read at my grandmother’s funeral. It’s called Plan For Life, by Mother Teresa. I know i have heard this piece before, but sometimes, you’re more ready to listen.

people are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centered.
forgive them anyway.

if you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.
be kind anyway.

if you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies.
succeed anyway.

if you are honest and frank, people may cheat you.
be honest and frank anyway.

what you spend years building, someone may destroy overnight.
build anyway.

if you find serenity and happiness, people may be jealous.
be happy anyway.

the good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow.
do good anyway.

give the world the best you have, and it may never be good enough.
but give the world the best you’ve got anyway.

you see, in the final analysis, it is all between you and god;
it was never between you and them anyway.

To me, most of the quote is good, but almost overly-earnest in prose, and almost redundant. But the last line is big. God or not, it was never between you and them anyways. it was never between you and them anyways. jesus, what a line. you and yourself…and love in-between. it’s all there waiting for you, if you can tolerate yourself.

then your friend has a near death experience and you are just beside yourself  with surrealism now.  You wonder what you can type as a holder of information without maybe over-stepping your bounds, but then it’s all over face book. And yet you are the person concerned with yourself  so deeply, the one you referred to after overhearing a conversation. Think of how this effects you, and then try and empathize, right? why else would you try and understand yourself so well if not to empathize with others? this narcissism runs so very, very thick.

With some reflection though, all that seems to be done is empathize, as much as you can muster. Everything seems bad, but it’s not as bad as it could be. For that, you are thankful. It could always be worse. You could be completely alone with yourself in this environment. But you don’t have to, your world is populated by those you care about. You narcissistic asshole. Navel-gaze some more, get the self-hatred out of your system, and then carry on. do something you can be proud of, be someone that you admire, live awesomely.

it sounds good when you say it like that. then the awful truth comes through. let’s do this anecdotally. it takes you three weeks to write this. a tidal wave of  ideas regarding mortality left you stunned, and you backed off, telling yourself you needed time to let it sit. but between you and yourself, you were hiding. what was it that brought you back here again?

you went to an excellent Christmas work party which overflowed with joy and touches of nostalgia. after hours of decadent eating and drinking, out of nowhere you won an ipad by the plucking of your name from a santa hat, by your beautiful wife. despite being ridiculously lucky and blessed all-around, you’re a little miffed that you have to install itunes on your computer, just to use it. this is the life you retreat to. these are the problems you deal with. this is your life, for better or worse.

so what? you can at least come here to scream about what made for such a great night tonight, just talk about it, point to it and show that it existed, give it some words.  breath some life into it, if only for you. the thing about death is it happens. the thing about life is it happens.

be awesome in the meantime, i guess.

Important

Sometimes everything seems important.

Sometimes nothing seems important.

What’s the difference, where does the delineation lie? Sometimes my breain tells me that ideas are important. New ones, old ones, ones that pique my interest, or not. Then it turns around and when i start picking at the idea, it immediately jumps straight to “what’s the difference”. Not just idea picking though, all incoming information gets passed through that filter, first and foremost.

This idea is always within ideas, but at times like these, my brain is more apt to agree with them, rather than point out how negative and unconstructive it is. It really bugs me because I know I’ll get over this feeling and things will go back to normal. But that whole idea of changing perspective on a time continuum lies near the foundation of this “what’s the difference” idea.

Commit to something and change your mind. Think one way about something then change your mind. Change your mind about something and then change your mind. It’s inevitable, like alot of things going on in life.

So since there’s a choice, the obvious way to go is the one that causes less pain, right? Right. Of course it doesn’t work that way though, i can only force my brain to embrace so much joy, without going to check on how pain’s coming along. Interest in one grows, the other wanes. It has to be like this, but I’m also supposed to be this construct of a person that deals with others. I guess it fits in because it has to.

Deep.