Poetry Bailout Will Restore Confidence of Readers

By Charles Bernstein

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you can get tickets for the Roller Bettie bout at Brown Paper Tickets.

http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/28223
for the inaugural bout - $12 in advance.

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http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/28158
for Season Tickets - only $45

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You know you're gonna go. Buy your tickets already!

wwbd?

I'm just sayin...

I need to get my bike tire fixed in time for this event:


What you’ll need:

Your bike and a lock
Pen and paper
Messenger bag or backpack
Some cash money
Map (optional)

The event also promises an after-party with prizes, a raffle and other surprises at 3:30 p.m. I'm told there will be live bands. Friend told me it's put on by the "underground" biking community.

But why wouldn't you just go get him after the first day?

Apparently Roller Betties will be involved in an expo bout in Seattle on Saturday. An all day event. I just found out about it today.

Things I DO know about in advance:

Next Wed, Savage Henry will play at Fantasia for another "save us we're not making any money selling coffee" fundraiser for the coffeeshop. I hear there may be 5 bands. $3 cover.

Next Friday, Savage Henry will be opening for The Growers at the Wild Buffalo. The buffalo website, once again, gives the bio of the Denver Savage Henry band.

On George Washington's birthday, The Gallus Gals, The Gallus Brothers and Wisconsin Slim will be at the Wild Buffalo.
(side note: Sarah the Songbird told me on Wed that she liked my hair. I guess it's staying long now. If she said she liked clown noses, I would be wearing one of those too.)

Chryslers will be at the Buff on Valentines day but I think I will miss that. Much as I love the Chryslers and they love me, I think that VD has lost it's appeal. That didn't sound right but you know what I mean. But that doesn't mean YOU can't go, Clayton.

also a website: http://www.farmerfootdrums.com/demos.html
Local guy who sometimes plays in the Gallus Gals shows. Shouldn't we all own footdrums?

tonight: laundry and pizza. Though something might come up later.

They say the test of literary power is whether a man can write an inscription. I say, 'Can he name a kitten?' --Samuel Butler

Interview with CR Avery from 2006

I'm taking Geno in to the Cat Clinic today. I haven't dealt with them but his old vet is in Blaine and I wasn't real enamored with him anyway. I've heard some decent things about the cat clinic. Plus they're just a few blocks away. The difficult part is always getting Geno in and out of the cat carrier. He's a fighter. You wouldn't know it right now as he's purring and laying on my right wrist so I can only just barely type.

I guess I've been neglecting him a lot lately. I don't think he likes it when I don't sleep at home. Moving him into an apartment has been a difficult adjustment for both of us. My long term plan is to get to a position where I can buy another house in town and let him roam in a fenced yard. But that's long term. My short term plan is to have enough money at the end of the month to buy a beer. So far, that's still a dream. Payday is tomorrow though.

Tom came over for homemade chili and potato soup yesterday. Alex should be coming over tonight. I think Tom and I are getting together on Sunday to cook something as he has expressed some interest and liked my chili. If he can cook and enjoy it at 16 years old, he'll be decades ahead of me. I'm just starting to enjoy it and thinking in terms of wishing I had a particular pan or pot.

I rewrote my knock knock poem finally. Not bad I think.

Geno is still chasing his tail. Now he's catching it and then crying. I don't know if I can properly describe this. He seems to be poking it with his claws and hurting himself. A couple times he looked like he actually caught his claw on the tail or at least in his fur so he couldn't let go. He jumped off the rocking chair and started walking off with his tail in the air. then he caught sight of the tail and it scared him so he ran into the bedroom. He's a very smart cat so this is not his usual self.

Dr. Ruthless just dropped off two bettie shirts. Kim, I'm talking to you!

It's been nice to just sit at home alone. I haven't really done that in a while. I do enjoy my down time. Sometimes it's hard to say no I don't want to go out or have someone over. You don't want people to feel rejected. And most of the time, if you start explaining why you want to be alone, you might just as well give in right then. And when I say you might as well, I mean, of course, I might as well. And when I say you don't want people to feel bad, I mean, of course, I want to be liked. But I held firm tonight. So here I am alone and happy.

Funny, I thought I would spend a lot more time alone when I got divorced. Thought I would get a lot more done. Things are not as I thought they would be. I hope they are how they should be.

Geno is calmer now.

In case you're near a radio and care anything about the Kurzweil piano or "the singularity", there's an interview with Ray K. on CBC 690 am right now. We use some OCR software he developed at the school district to help special ed kids focus.

He's also a cool philosopher. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Kurzweil.

Just one more thing I'm doing instead of what I should be doing.

"As powerful as information technology is today it will be a billion times more powerful in 25 years."

I'm watching the cat chase his tail like a puppy. He's eleven. That's like 46 in human terms isn't it? You don't see me chasing my tail. Have a shred of dignity man.

Tomorrow we conquer Seattle with all the power that Bellingham can muster. We shall be introduced as Robert Smashley, Kim Von See You In Hell and Neil Before Zod. We will stand back to back to back and rotate on the stage reading three poems simultaneously and randomly spraying ammonia into the audience from squirt guns. I will bring the cat and let him loose.

I wanted to take Thursday off due to coming back into town late after the Slam but I have back to back meetings and stuff all day. It's going to be a tough day.

What I need to do today is rewrite my knock knock poem to suit a seattle winter crowd. And decide what else I'm going to read for sure. And cook some food. Maybe sweep the kitchen floor. And start my taxes. And go jogging. And cure cancer and establish world peace. And work on the Roller Bettie website.

This is how much I resist doing things I should:
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Thats not bad considering I wrote it just now listening to Bruce Springsteen. Original is on my perpetually unfinished website (physician, heal thyself) if you want to compare.

Ryler called me yesterday to invite me to feature with Kim and Robert Lashley at the Seattle Slam in what he called a "Bellingham Sampler". Should be fun. I have a tremendous amount of respect for both Kim and Robert as poets and I like them as people. I've never read at the Slam, even in the open mike so I'm not sure how well I will do but I hope I can carry my weight for the reading.

Poems I'm probably going to use:

Second Grade Socks ("like standing on kittens")
Hail ("to me that was cool, like the cyanide pill hidden in a secret agent's ring. The Methodists next door had nothing like this")
What I Should Have Said Was ("I'm ordering hookers and pizza, want something?")
Notes Taken at a Mandatory Class at St. Joseph's Hospital ("casual sex with casual acquaintences is the maple frosting on the maple bar of shame")
Knock Knock poem (which I will have to rewrite once again to be topical and relevant to the crowd.)

I think they'd like Uncle God but I think it's too long.

I'd like to do Underage Cats but I just don't have the confidence that that audience will respond to such a quiet and simple poem. Maybe I should add a stanza:

Underage cats shout "Fuck George Bush!"
Get chinese characters tattooed on their ankles
Post movies of their friends on YouTube.

My own old cat is being a pain, crawling on me when I'm typing and trying to eat my poems. Yesterday he fell asleep reading:

The book was open to a James Thurber essay but I have reason to believe he was really reading Thoreau's Civil Disobedience.

Does it count as healthy if I jog a mile downtown at noon to pick up my truck which I left in front of Boundary Bay Friday night?

I saw the awesome Wisconsin Slim last night. Sound was awful as it usually seems to be inside Boundary Bay. But he will be at the Buffalo on Feb 22 (Geo. Washingtons' Birthday if you care)

Tonight I've been asked to go to the Rogue Hero to see the DTs. I accepted with trepidation as I have prejudices about that place. But I've never gone to see a show there so I have an open mind. it's a led zep tribute which also gives me mixed feelings. Woman lead singer though so that's cool. Best cover of Led Zep's Rock and Roll is by Nancy Wilson and Heart.

Gotta run downstairs and put my clothes in the dryer.

The Beatles' "Yesterday", sung to the tune of They Might Be Giants'
"Particle Man".

Seriously. You have to sing "yesterday" twice though:

Yesterday,
Yesterday,
All my troubles seemed so far away,
Now it looks
as though they're here to stay,
I believe in
Yesterday.

Suddenly,
Suddenly,
I'm not half the man I used to be,
There's a shadow
hanging over me,
Yesterday,
Came suddenly.

Why she
Had to go,
I don't know she wouldn't say
I said
Something wrong,
Now I long for
Yesterday.

Yesterday
Yesterday
Love was such an easy game to play
Now I need a place to
hide away
I believe in
Yesterday.

Apparently, when I put my location as work in LJ, it shows a map of the town of Birchwood which is between Cleveland and Soddy-Daisy. I have no windows in my office so it might as well be true.

1. Solid high five from Kat
2. Solid hug from Robert
3. Solid poetry from Kim that avoided the standard cliches of slam
4. Solid "Roller Betties!" yell from Matt when everyone else was yelling "Don't Apologize!"
5. Robert Lashley's solid line "The temples of Hell are built with column's of "I"s

reasons for staying home which were outweighed by the above items:

I was really tired.
Kendricks was closed for a staff party so I didn't get to see my favorite bartender
Still not warming up to the new owners and baristas of Fantasia
Have websites to work on

Sometimes I make the right decisions.

Today is my old friend Clayton's 47th birthday. Not to be confused with my current friend Clayton. Old Clayton was the subject of my poem about freebird quoted in this cut if I can do it right: ( Read more... )

Some of that is true. I knew Clayton since kindergarten. He lived across 16th Avenue South and was the friend that was a thorn in my side for years. There was a period of time (the entire 4th grade, I guess) when he punched me in the stomach every day on the walk home. In 5th grade I decided to stop hanging out with him and that lasted until I discovered beer. By then he wasn't punching anymore and we did drink like our lives depended on it. Maybe they did. Clayton was a very unhappy person and bottled things up like a "real man". I was a largely unhappy person as well and bottled things up like a "real McKay" (no gender differences in how my family avoided talking about difficult or uncomfortable things.)

Clayton's mom left his dad when Clayton was in high school. That was my first close experience with divorce, my parents having stayed together until my dad died, some 35 years). Clayton was stoic about his mom running off to Alaska with some guy until one drunken night when he cried like a baby over it. He was angry with his mom for leaving, angry with his dad for doing whatever he did to make that happen.

When I moved out of Seattle to Bellingham on my 18th birthday, Clayton and I had gotten in some fight about him being a drunken asshole in front of my other friends (Clayton was the friend who none of my other friends liked, and often, neither did I. But he was closer to me than any of the others. Like what I imagine a brother should be like) I moved out and never told him. Six months later he got my phone number from my old roommate in Seattle and called me asking, "What the hell?"

We got close again and eventually I moved back to Seattle for a couple years til I got married. He was the dj at my wedding and when I moved back to Whatcom County we lost touch again. He got married and ten years later, divorced. (that was probably 4 or 5 years ago.) He is still angry at a lot of people.

I think of clayton now like the dog I once had who I watched get hit by a car. When I went to pick him up off the road, he bit me. I still had to help him though he was trying all the time to take a piece out of me.

Am I talking myself into trying to connect with him again? I guess. Eventually. There are other things to tend to first I think. I hope.

PS. There's a fishing story about Clayton that some of you might remember. That was more true than the Freebird poem.

PPS. My secret shame is that Clayton and I would get drunk and listen to Barry Manilow and Andy Gibb and sing along.

PPPS. It was really my friend Monty and the song was really "Smokin'" by Boston.

Next time: The Monty story!

Last night when I left the apt, there was an RV parked by my truck that is apparently equipped with a hot tub and rents itself out under the name of Sugar Shack. It was still there when I returned this morning. Must meet my neighbors.

Today I'm making chili from a recipe. That may not be a big deal to you but getting more comfortable with cooking is a big part of my finally growing up and becoming an independent adult. I made turkey noodle soup after thanksgiving and twice I've made potato soup like my dad used to. Soon I will move out of the genre of soupy foods into solids.

My new years resolution of drinking less has become spending less on beer thanks to the noble and cute bartenders at Kendricks who won't let me just hang out and flirt with them.

On the Roller Bettie front here are the dates for the bouts:

March 15th
April 12th
May 17th
June 21

I'm trying to come up with a clever hook for the March 15th bout. Currently I have "Et tu, Bettie?". That's it. Consulted my rhyming dictionary and came up with the peroxides of march that might make a nice visual. Also the backsides of march but that's more obvious.

tomorrow is the tryouts though. If you know someone who is on the fence about trying out, encourage them. A bettie who shall remain unnamed sent me a picture of her torn open toe on my cell phone. This is how I imagine that thought process:

"Hmm, that really hurts and looks awful. Hey, I should take a picture of it with my cell phone. But who could I send it to? Why, Neil, of course!"

update, I forgot to send this when I wrote it a couple hours ago. Chili is coming along nicely. Aforementioned unnamed Bettie came by and made a couple suggestions.

In my role as roller bettie web slave, I have finally gotten photos of the Expo Bout from October and posted them on the Bettie site

The photos are small and there are only 16. Next bout (in february) I'm going to bring my own photographer.

...but for  now, this will suffice.

Good to be back.  Talk more later.