I bang you with chains of Iron!

Just like I thought, salt water (the sea, Pee, the sea) has amazing healing powers. Why, it was even able to draw the string out of my leg, Jack. Yep, after a few days submerged in Panama City, my leg spat out some of the guitar string that should've come out over a year ago. Problem is that it's just hanging out on a loop and I can't seem to pull it out. Or if I gave it a good pull, I'm not sure what else would come with it, so I have to trust the medical "professionals" again. Still, I feel like I'll be exorcised at last, the nightmare over. This probably means more antibiotics, too. Well not til after my birthday, goddammit. When you say no to champagne, you say no to life.

More and more I understand the fountain of youth appeal of the Sunshine State. In the film, Network, William Holden talks about death having discernible features. I don't think I'm there yet but it feels that summer hovers at the apex and prepares to ease in to another slow decline. I missed fall last year. In L.A., fall is you notice that it rained for ten minutes one day, and you can't remember the last time it rained, just that it was back in the spring, so this must be fall. And the daylight recedes. The full moon on Tuesday will be the tipping point.

Above the sawgrass prairie I was aware of the sacred dunes, every flag flying at some point, the last rumblings of a hurricane expiring at my feet, the sun and salt feeding my soul.

I Lost the Hat

This is a photo taken in the summer of '81. That's me, middle left, wearing the hat, peace sign. I had finished a shift at Six Flags, airbrushing t-shirts, and now it was party time. I'm only sixteen here, so this was the first "adult" party I'd ever been to and I was pretty jazzed. I even got to drive one of the cashiers home and made out with her in her driveway in my Kharmann Ghia. Then I went back to the party and stayed there til about six. I'm still very close with a lot of people in this room so it shows that we were a lucky group to find each other. Anyway, thanks to my pal Clay Croker for passing this photo on to me.
Please watch my entry in the Top This TV Challenge from Heinz ketchup. It's entry # 2622 or go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbYT6HriNw4. Hopefully I'll get thousands in prize money and be able to make bigger and better movies. Meanwhile, the oppressive heat continues but I just roll in it and wonder how long til it's emergency time when the regular rules no longer apply. Somehow I've got to find a way to view the Perseid meteor shower which is just starting but is going to peak on Sunday night. Hopefully I'll find a hole in the haze, in many ways. I stand by my dish. And with Jonny Cat.

Thick, thick nights

Wow. These are brutal times. It's hard now to remember the gentle July with August providing some of the most intensely thick heat in recent memory. I mean, the low temperature for the next few days is 76. That means you never stop sweating if you're in the elements. I'm no baby, but how did they do it back about fifty years ago when central air was almost science fiction? Did that ultra suffering produce some ultimate character or did it serve to melt the class lines, I wonder.

When I open the door

A cascade of steam tumbles onto my feet
Someone jumping through glass
O' evil sheriff
Give me some swamp romance
The fire goes down to my belly
Affirming my place in the sequel
In need of the southern toughness
Each kiss a fresh baptism
The next touch, flowing life

I stand by my dish.

I just got around to doing this today, about a month late. Drawing with the mouse is actually a good substitute for painting and there's no messy cleanup. I'm taking one good, deep breath and then I'll open the tubes and get on to the next painting. I've been cutting a video project which was a lot to chew and I'm gagging, but it'll get done. And then there's the business of choosing a vocation. I'm getting out that astronaut application form again. I don't need the diapers and I can do anything drunk that I can do sober. Throw in adultery and cross country humiliation and it can't be too different from the job I used to do. Twenty years ago tonight, I packed into a '73 VW Bug convertible and took off on the road. We drove through the night and stopped in the early morning in Port Neches, Texas. The next destinations would be more exotic. Although, one morning, Joe's cousin, Tammy, woke me with a kiss and whispered, I love you in my ear. So there can be a few good memories to come out of the inferno.