My Blog

a March 21st Party (that's equinox & fullmoon at the SAME TIME)

Absalom — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 07:48:48 GMT

soooooo, looks like the speakeasy will be host to a sexy sexy little lingerie dance party on friday, march 21st. (the date is only 80% certain... but i'd say it's pretty freakin likely) the reasons for this fabulous ghettogether are many, and here are a few of them: we like to see all our sexy friends in one place, clad in hot finery we like to DANCE! we have friends that make awesome music that you should dance to! we wanna set a sexy precedent for springtime, so that the season knows EXACTLY what to expect from us. we are also hoping to raise some funds for a project that has been in the planning stages for what seems like aeons. now that we are progressing, there are some unavoidable expenses that must be met that are a bit daunting. Mary, Kurt and I are creating an interactive sculpture to play with. help defray our costs by participating in the raffle! we will have a few things to raffle off, including a flame thrower construction tutorial, courtesy of ian baker (thanks ian!), a chunk of time in a recording studio (a real one, not your friend's closet), jewlery, brownies, and maaaaaaybe* even Absynthe. and more! so we look forward to turning over to spring while dancing in our undersexies with you at the speakeasy! this party will probably not start or end very early. lemme know if you have any questions, or any things that you'd like to donate for raffle, or any random ideas that may or may not be relevant. actually, scratch that. relevant stuff only, please. *=included for legal reasons, seing as how that particular item may or may not be legal. i guess it's not really an issue though, now is it, since we won't really be having any...

a game i'd actually play

Absalom — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 22:19:30 GMT

ok.. so you may or may not know that group games (card games, board games, monopoly-type games, etc.) usually make me bleed violently from my eyes whenever they are pulled into the light of day in a crowded room (balderdash excepted). HOWEVER today boinboing posted a link to this site: http://playthisthing.com/gloom-game-inauspicious-incidents-and-grave-consequences which contains a review of a game that i would actually play. now, i'm not asking for this game. in fact, PLEASE don't get me this game. i still shudder in fear at having games too close to me, probably a result of too many traumatic deathmatches of monopoly where members of the family were not allowed to leave until they knew EXACTLY how screwed they were by the arbitrary economic microcosm that we all foolishly agreed to participate in. all i'm saying, is that if SOMEONE happened to have this game in their house, and i HAPPENED to be at a gathering where this was whipped out, well... maybe my eyes would just turn kindof dry and red instead of bleeding hideously. in fact, i think i might even like it.

suggestions for getting a laptop... by whatever means necessary.

Absalom — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 05:28:56 GMT

ok. can anyone tell me a great way to get a really good laptop without a huge loss of dough? unfortunately i would like a relatively decent laptop. here's my situation: i'm working a pretty chill position in a studio where my responsibilities are sporadically intense, but on the average pretty low. i get to sit for hours on the internet and do whatev. here's where the pain comes. the computer that i have access to is mind-numbingly retarded, and gets easily confused when more than 3 tabs are open in firefox. i'd be suffering less frustration and agony if i had bits of ground glass being tossed in my eyeballs every 5 minutes. at any rate, i'm having a really hard time looking up circuit schematics and info on electronics. my boss happens to be an electrical engineer, so i'm trying to find schematics and whatnot so that he can help me design a project that has been mostly theoretical for a year now. how the hell can i get a decent laptop, which i can use to run some good audio software, maxMSP, and browse the internets wirelessly? i have no money. should i throw a benefit party? can i sell my body? should i make toe-socks and sell them on the internet? egad! help me out people, what can i do in my deliriously boring and frustrating time here in order to get a good laptop (a mac would be great)? i tried posting for a sugar momma on craigslist, and no takers so far. ach. any ideas?

thank god i'm alive

Absalom — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 22:48:22 GMT

ok. so, i work in a recording studio, and that makes no money at all. essentially, i need to make dough on the side in order to work this job. so, some of my philanthropic friends decided to pay me to drive up north to his place deep in the northern california mountains and pick up a bunch of stuff of the farm, and come back. he can't drive, his license is suspended on multiple counts. so, i being the fabulous (broke) friend that i am, agreed. well, the cabin is about 2 1/2 hours from the nearest stop sign and paved road. it was raining lightly. the road was mud. at the last 15 minutes of the drive, the road degenerates even further than just mountain road. it is a private road, and therefore not maintained by the county, and therefore extremely sketchy when wet. Soooo, we drove/slid the last bit to the cabin, and arrived a little scared, but safe. Organized most of the evening, went to sleep in the most beautiful of areas known as 'the palm of god,' woke up, finished organizing/packing, and stepped in the car to leave. then came the rains, on cue. put tire chains on the car. drove 50 feet from the house. jeep slid off the road into a ditch. my friend rode around on a quad for about 1 1/2 hours, trying to reach neighbors for help and/or call a tow truck. well now, should you ever be far out in the mountains, know that a tow truck will cost you about $600, and crossing locked gates and fences to get to a neighbor's house to ask for help could potentially be a very bad idea. you have no idea who people are, and what they're up to out there. aside from a few threats, nothing came of house visits, and it got dark quickly. being completely unprepared for thick mud and heavy rain, my friend returned soaked and near sick, and we retired to the house to warm up to the fire and sleep. the next day was a bit drier, and upon inspection it was decided that we could dig the car out. so, after about four hours of digging and placing boards and plywood, filling the ditch and unbottoming-out the car, we physically pushed the jeep back onto the road, only to discover that the brake line had been broken in the process. yeesh. thanks to the fabulosity of modern cars, if you lose fluid in one set of breaks (rear or front), you still retain a bit of fluid in the other pair. so, with crippled break system on a hairy mountain road, we set out. i was way overdue at work, and we made it to the one cell phone reception-capable spot for hours just in time for me to call in and say "i'm screwed in the mountains, and if i survive i'll be back in to work on thursday" while hoping it wasn't the end of my job. so. we drove approximately 39 miles on sketchy ass roads, VERY slowly, and now here i am to tell you the tale of my muddy adventures in the backlands of california. hoo-ray. and i am even writing you from my job that i luckily still have, where i get to spend oodles of time on the internet writing things just like this. hoo-ray!

party spam!

Absalom — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 02:12:51 GMT

ok ok, i never do a damned thing on tribe. i swear, though i'll start one of these days. really! see? i'm doing it right now, by posting this awesome advertisement for a retarded (as in retarded crunk) party. here it is: you know it. your highschool sucked. it probably still does. thank god you're not there anymore. at the speakeasy, we don't give a isht about your dmaned football team, your fckuing uniforms, or your full-contact remedial ballet team national championship medals, dig? we just plan the party, and you come to override all horrible memories of formals, dances, proms, or whatever the hlel your sorry high school had. (people coming for other reasons will have to fill out a questionnaire) therefore: the Speakeasy is proud to present: the Winter Formal @ the Speakeasy (surprise) Saturday December 15th there will be dancing in fancy (or pseudo fancy) attire, cocktails & champaign, live musical entertainment, and absolutely NO jocks. maybe there will be a yule log. The emotional soundtrack of your idyllic high school years will be ruined by: Build 128 & The Reverend Micah Disparition & Others come shake it like you've evolved past your awkward adolescent foibles! i'll even post a new blog with photos of my woods adventure from the last month if you promise to come. no really, these pics are THAT cool that you want to do it. yep. yeah you do! oh yeah!

YO MAMA! eeeevvveeent

Absalom — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 22:00:16 GMT

Yo' M.A.M.A. !!! (Muni Action Musical Adventure) dig these here facts, my refined and exclusively chosen homies: on august 17th friday, there will be a bus show. the deal is, you get on the muthafukin bus. the bus is huge, and will have bands playing whilst in transit. the bus will be making three stops. at these stops there will be more bands than you can shake your gansta cane at, plenty of space for you to strut yo gansta lean, and some funky sheit to make your bum gyrate in a fashion approved by even the most republican of americans. bus leaves from genoa & arlington street, oakland at about 3:30 pm. just walk to that intersection, you'll see a whole host of people that you obviously want to hang with. approach with wild abandon and throw yourself on that bus. you won't regret it. after several stops, the bus will end up that night at the speakeasy. as if you hadn't had enough already, there will be more bands, because we've decided that it's what's good for you, dig? you need this like pigeons have to poop all over everything. it's inevitable. FRIDAY 8/17 4:30 PM-??? 3 bus stops of music! catch a free ride 3:30 to stop 1 @ Genoa st/Arlington st. in N. Oakland 1 4:30 ALBANY LANDFILL (the end of Buchanan St./highway 580 in Albany/Berkeley) Andy from Maleficia Daniel Flores Typhoon 2 7:00 Ashby Bart Station @Ashby and Adeline st. (Berkeley/Oakland) Loyd Family Players The Unit Breed The Last Slice of Butter 3 9pm-late....SPEAK EASY house/ bus show @604 56th st./shattuck in N. Oakland <------ THATS MY HOUSE PEEPS! The Why Because heliotrope menagerie Beat Beat Whisper The Switch Scabies the Musical Puppet show Shayne Keator Clar Mooncalf and more!!!!! FREE FREE FREE donations for gas encouraged.... COME and ENJOY the ride!!!

RECORDING SESSION!!!

Absalom — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 01:17:46 GMT

ok, so i have been recording capoeiristas from the capoeira arts cafe in berkeley, and on saturday april 28th i'll be in the studio doing a little bit of editing... the upshot of this whole thing is, i could just check out 3 hours and sit there for 1 hour actually doing any work, OR i could check out 8 hours (which i've done) and randomly bother people to come in and record some shit! thus, this post. do you want to record some music on highly sexy (read: expensive) equipment? eh? anyone? c'mon, you'll be in a pro recording environment, you'll get to hang out with ME, and we could go get a beer in the afternoon. or maybe wine. so, the only catch is this: we'd have to do the session from about 8 am until noon or 1pm... if i could put this in fine print, i would... i know, 8 am saturday morning is hellish. but really, it's not so bad considering how much you really want to come in and record your hottest new single that was inspired by britney spears, right? oh yeah! hit me up if yer innarested

shuttlecock!

Absalom — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 02:44:29 GMT

what better way to spend sunday than to play shuttlecock and consume burritos in a fabulous artspace? if there's a better way, i don't want to know.

maxMSP and my brain

Absalom — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 21:46:06 GMT

oh. my. fucking. god. someone take my computer away. anyway, i've been twiddling with maxMSP recently, and it's caused an upwelling of goodness in the form of addiction in my brain. the only problem so far is that i'm an obsessed beginner who is frustrated at hitting walls. i know, it's just because i haven't learned to think around problems instead of barging through them. but damN! i'm totally addicted.

a dream in which w. bush addresses his apparent faithful

Absalom — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 14:47:38 GMT

i just woke up from a dream, and laying on my side plainly awake for the last 10 minutes i've decided that you too should know about this dream: (it's pretty long and very detailed. but also hilarious. i think its worth the read. but then again, i liked it so much apparently i thought it would be worth it to dream it, so hey...) i am at burning man, in a small room with skippy, and we are sitting around a hooka whose base is full of lavender plants, rosemary, and some other exotic fragrant herbs that i am unfamiliar with. they are fresh, green and pungent, giving the room a very lush but light quality. skippy is telling me about how she saw someone nearly poison themselves with toxins through improper hooka technique. in walks someone who we greet as a friend, and i get up to go out to use the bathroom. i notice that the floor is all grass. when i get outside, we are actually in a forest, and green dominates everything. apparently we are also in a pasture, because there is shit all over the ground. as i tip toe through it (i am actually forced to walk only on my big toes like a ballerina because the shit is so widely scattered. at this point i am slightly proud of how well i am tiptoeing through this field of shit. i don't step in a single pile), i notice that although there are many different shades, shapes and textures of shit, they're all human. i reach the outhouses, which skippy and friend had explained to me while laughing. apparently there were five, and the second one was the least offensive, and the fifth one was simply referred to as 'chicago.' the outhouses look precisly like a san francisco muni stop, with no front doors and just tiny little bench seats with dividers. 'how dehumanizing,' i think. this being a dream, i do not actually go through the ritual of defecation, but suddenly find myself walking on the other side of the pasture, and towards a small tent. i enter the tent and lay down on the grass inside. there are about 15 other people laying out on the grass in a row, and on the opposite side of the tent is a table set up in an L shape. on the short leg of the L is president bush, dick cheney, and some other government functionary. on the long leg are assorted white house characters that all really just blend into the same person with multiple and annoying facial expressions. w. bush is telling us about his time in office, and exactly what it has taken him to be president. 'you know, in these 6 aught years, i've done...' huff huff heh heh shrug 'well, uh, i mean.. i really haven't done much of anything, you know?' huff heh gesture head shake 'like no one really tells me what is happening in this country, and i think i'd like to know' serious pause 'i mean, really, our spending budget, our government expenditures? i don't know how it all works!' huff heh huff 'really, one third of our entire spending, as a country,' huff smirk huff 'i don't know where it went! how it got spent! it just disappeared!' w. bush is up and walking about the table, saying there needs to be a 'unifyment,' and begins passing out a book or two, saying he is going to be reading from the two towers, the double by dostoyevsky, and one of the books from c.s. lewis' the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe series, and also a book on tarot. 'if we can just come together for two hours tomorrow morning, it would mean so much. it's what we need at a time like this' he says, ' could you find it in your heart to come out?' and i'm thinking 'yeah fucking right, i'm going to take two hours away from burning man, let alone my life, to listen to president bush read to me from dostoyevsky? this is somehow supposed to help?' next, w. bush is saying 'listen, i know what you really all need, and you're probably thinking "what is our rallying point going to be this year, with so many grim facts like the ones i've just laid out?" well, you want us to govern you because you LOVE us! thats what is really important! and thats all we really want from you' and at this point either a giant pink banner drops down, or the walls of the tent have been pink with fluffy clouds the whole time and i just didn't notice, but a huge message appears on the wall which reads: "we LOVE our president!!!" with four stars underneath it and cute little hearts all over. w. bush follows up with 'listen, we know what you all really want. you are all just children! you just want to be taken care of, isn't that right? you just want to be told that it's all going to be ok' the meeting has apparently come to it's point, and he starts walking over to us, walks to our line of resting people, about two people down, and leans over a childhood schoolmate of mine in a familiar and friendly way, and he places his feet on dubya's thighs, so dubya leans over him and he laughs and takes his weight slowly, and then pushes him back up. everyone is getting up, and the two next to me ask what i thought, and how did it go, etc. etc. and i am fucking flabbergasted. someone shoves a bright orange piece of paper in my hand, which is typed and says: 'warning! colin powell was seen to leave this meeting moments ago at a fast pace and seemed very upset. he was last seen running rapidly downhill. be sure to stay out of his way, as everyone knows how much he hates to be in a huff!' and then i am no longer in the dream, but in a dark place which i will soon be waking up from, and the dream lingers slightly. i reach out and can feel the minds of a small mass of people, maybe a hundred and fifty or so. and i think, 'why so few? are these the only people who saw that?' and they are all grumbling, we were all just witness to this blatant message of total disregard for... for... jesus it's so fucking huge i can't even put it into words, and everyone else is shocked, and the minds are starting to yell, but it's all a mess, everyone is saying something different. and i know we need a rallying cry, something concise and memorable, which gets the point. but all i can sputter out is the most necessary word, and i shout it at all the minds in range, while simultanously wishing it were catchier. i yell "IMPEACH!" several times before waking up.

FIELD TRIP

Absalom — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 23:06:40 GMT

anyone know of any good places to observe/record bird sounds? by 'good' i mean 'quiet' and by 'quiet' i mean 'undisturbed by urban noise pollution and/or obnoxious campers' if you know of these places, and want to take an awesome field trip, we can go and get naked in the woods, pile mud and plants on ourselves until we blend in with the landscape, and then stalk quietly up to bird areas and record them on ridiculously rad recording gear. or we can skip the nude part. come to think of it, it's kinda cold. but we can still be quiet and record things. in fact, i think this whole endeavor is really just an excuse to hang out in the woods and be calm for a while. sound good?

um

Absalom — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 04:42:29 GMT

insert witty self-referential monologue here