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[01 Jan 2017|01:44pm] |
All public entries made in this journal after March 25, 2007, are original poems (however bad they may be) by the journal's creator. All content of this journal is protected under a Creative Commons License. Do not use without permission.
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| Our New Website |
[31 Jul 2007|01:09pm] |
We finally got our business website up. If you have some spare time, take a look and let me know what you think. Feedback is welcome. It's always good to get an extra set of eyes and opinions. Plus, since I wrote all the content myself, it may not be perfect. If you find a mistake, let me know. I will be grateful because I can still make changes to the text. There's not much more I can do about the visual design, but I'd still appreciate hearing reactions.
The web address is:
http://www.bettergradestutoring.com/
There are about 12 pages total, I think. The testimonials have been adapted from notes and emails we've received from parents in the last few years as teachers. (Notice the Nigerian name.) It will take a while to get indexed on the major search engines. If you have a family-friendly website or blog and are willing to link to our site, that would be a great help. I am also writing a monthly education blog and posting to many blogsites to help get us higher in the ratings. We got our first client this summer and are looking forward to the new school year - for the first time ever.
The LJ blog for our business is at ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) bettergrades.
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| Townes Van Zandt clip from Heartworn Highways |
[29 Jul 2007|03:13pm] |
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| Various & Sundry |
[29 Jul 2007|01:13pm] |
I've been discovering Townes Van Zandt lately. You may know him. Folk/Alt country songwriter of the 60's and 70's, who self-destructed in the 80s, or whose self-destruction caught up with him in the 80s. I always thought Willie Nelson had written "Pancho and Lefty," so when I discovered it was Townes Van Zandt I started studying up on him. I've been learning lots of his songs. One of my favorites is "If I Needed You," which was made famous by Emmylou Harris.
I bought these two DVDs, one called Heartworn Highways and the other called Be Here to Love Me. They show lots of Townes, as well as Guy Clark (another great songwriter) and folks like Rodney Crowell and Steve Earl when they were in their 20s. Steve Earl once said, "Townes Van Zandt is the greatest songwriter who ever lived and I will stand on Bob Dylan's coffee table with my boots on and say that."
When Townes heard Steve Earl had said that, he responded, "I've seen Bob Dylan and his bodyguards, and I don't believe Steve Earl could ever get anywhere near Bob Dylan's coffee table."
So I'm going to be singing a few Townes songs at my 5th Annual Going-Away party this summer. I've never mentioned my going-away parties in my journal(s) before I don't think. I had my first one of course before I left for Africa and then I had one every time I came home for summer, and now they have just become kind of a tradition there in Texas for my fam and friends. They're fun. For this one, my friend Troy and I have rented some mics and speakers and a soundboard. So we are going to put on more of a proper show rather than just a campfire sing-along. We even got a set list.
I played at that wedding last weekend. It went well. Everyone liked it. Or pretended to. It was fun.
We leave for Houston on August 7. The party's on Aug 11, and the following week we drive to Oklahoma to visit Heather's parents. I did mention before that they moved to Tulsa? Well, they did.
I'm kinda looking forward to it and I'm kinda wishing to just just get it over with and get back here so that we can fully start the tutoring business and see whether we can make a go at this or not. I think it will be successful, but it will take a while to build referrals. I'm trying to advertise, but there are 4 fucking yellow pages directories in my area. I bought ads in 2.
The website is supposed to go live next Wednesday or Thursday. We'll see. I'm dealing with these German guys in British Columbia. They have strong accents, so our communication is not optimal.
My business cards also are supposed to be getting finished this week. I'm getting rack cards made as well. Got everything else ready I think. Established an LLC, registered with feds and state and city, got a business banking account, a business phone and fax, a home office, tax ID, Quick Books Pro, et al. It really was surprising how much I had to go through just to set up the smallest of small businesses. Anyhoo, wish me lucks.
I'll post a link to the site when it's ready o you can make the clickies.
Heather's in California the past few days. Back tomorrow.
Anything else? . . . Nah, that's it. Hope all is well with you.
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[12 Jul 2007|01:08am] |
Okay. Seriously. I'm putting AC in my house by next summer. This is ridiculous.
"Oh, you don't need AC but for a few weeks here, anyway. It's waste."
You lie, Northwesterner. You lie.
Crocs and Birkenstocks do not the genius make.
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| A List of Happenings Past & Future |
[06 Jul 2007|12:27am] |
1. Saw a bald eagle perched atop a tree branch while floating on the Kalama River yesterday.
2. Also saw the largest steelhead salmon I've seen swim right beneath me.
3. Spontaneously decided to dedicate and play the Bob Dylan song "Forever Young" to Heather's grandparents at their 50th wedding anniversary. Felt awkward following perfunctory applause.
4. Am going to see Willie Nelson on Saturday in Bend, Oregon.
5. While sleeping on a wood floor in a year-round tent in the woods, had the most vivid and strange dream about never being able to go outside because every time I tried people would shoot guns at me from their cars.
6. Had not heard from my business website designer this whole week or last week. Cursed at his boss through an email. Then found out he has been very ill.
7. Re-landscaped the front yard and garden.
8. Lost five pounds in two weeks. Gained it back in two days.
9. Going to Houston and Tulsa in August.
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| Cormac McCarthy on Oprah |
[05 Jun 2007|11:06pm] |
Cannot believe it. Flabbergasted, I am.
The man has done, what, two interviews in the last 25 years. Both in print. Both done reluctantly. Now I turn on my TV and see Oprah asking him what it feels like to be a septuagenarian father of an eight-year-old and why women are a mystery to him.
Oy vey.
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| Branded as a Criminal. From Birth. Literally. |
[24 May 2007|06:58pm] |
While subbing today, I was in the middle of a 6th GRADE class in which a student walked in late. His pants were sagging. He wore a puffy jacket despite 80 degree temperatures outside. He walked with a limp. He was rocking the jeri curl.
As he sat down, the other students started whispering. "Was he in juvey? . . . What'd he do?" The kid had apparently been out of school for a while, for I heard one student ask, "Is he a sixth grader? He looks too old." Jeri Curl was a big kid, indeed.
It was one of these double classrooms where two teachers "team" teach. The class was in the middle of a quiz, and when Jeri Curl saw that he sat down, looked at the quiz, and attempted to leave for the bathroom. The teacher saw him and called to stop him.
"Felony. Felony!" she cried. "You just got in here. You can't leave class just yet."
I wasn't sure that I heard it right, so I cruised by to look at his paper. Sure enough. F-E-L-O-N-Y.
After class let out, I asked the other teacher: "Was that young man's name really Felony?"
"Yes," she said. "And he lives up to it, too."
"That's his legal name? Seriously?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "He took a swing at a cop this past weekend, so he's been out of school. When he told the cop his name, the cop didn't believe it. 'Not your street name,' the cop said. But it was. It is his real name."
"That's child abuse," I said. "If I were his regular teacher, I would refuse to call him that."
She looked at me like I had offended her. Or that I had said something wildly unreasonable.
"Well, that's his name," she said.
I may be getting too old. Or too out of touch. Call me intolerant. Whatever. But that shit ain't right. Those parents should be arrested for child abuse. Plain and simple.
Would I be allowed give my child a legal name of "Criminal" or "Idiot" or "Faggot"? That is not individual liberty. It's child abuse.
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[21 Apr 2007|04:40pm] |
A Sinner’s Pride
Driving through vales
where oceanic rivers
once swayed toward the sea,
I feel the weight
of water’s ghost
heave on top of me.
In so lush a land
where no one lives
I hope no one shall ever be
more than a kindly visitor
en route to Innisfree.
The waters, more humble now,
more peaceful and more still,
inspire no less awe than then
and have no less strong a will.
From so lush a land
we have been cast
out to bear the chill,
let no man more than lightly tread –
no intruder but the sill.
So arduous the years and work
to say that we are free
So broad the strokes we had to use
to paint our gloom with glee.
So long the years we had to labor
as sinful Sheol shills
So why should we, for Heaven’s sake,
return of our own will?
April 2007
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[02 Apr 2007|12:20am] |
Easter Brunch
While dining at an eatery
at a table set for one,
a gentleman and family
came in from spring day sun.
Boys so smart in Easter suits,
girls in ribbon and pastel,
clicking by in heels and boots
like tolling Easter bells.
They took their seats quite gracefully
with postures all erect.
The waiter served them faithfully,
with more pomp than you’d expect.
The man’s requests were within reason,
good breeding on display.
He gave best wishes of the season
on this Easter day.
And as I studied all about
this kind good citizen,
I could not, for blazes, figure out
why I hated him.
April 2007
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[26 Mar 2007|05:52pm] |
A Limited Time Offer
Tell you what I’m gonna do.
I can tell you’re sad.
Nah, you don’t look it,
but I can tell.
Your dreams, your deep desire,
did not come to pass. It happens.
The man you once were,
full of moxie,
is no more. People change.
You have lost all capacity
for boyish
insouciance. All for the better.
You are a family man now.
You have promises to keep.
The harness bells have shaken
you awake to the quiet devastation
of acquiescence.
But it gets better from here,
I promise.
You can finally end your struggle upstream
And drift into the tepid pools
of pulchritudinous platitude.
Does that phrase not satisfy you?
But you like lilting alliteration –
Hell, you love that shit.
Tell you what I’m gonna do.
I’m gonna get you things.
Material things.
I’m gonna get you a job.
A real job.
All you gotta do is
talk sports with other men.
Throw in a few words
on market or real estate development.
Admire movers and shakers,
though with manly restraint.
Chuckle knowingly
at clichéd anecdotes on married life.
Mow the lawn.
But for godsakes,
stop reading those fucking books
and stop writing those fucking manuscripts,
ejaculating all over
perfectly good typing paper
like a teenaged girl
whose already embattled reason
is flushed away entirely
through her urethra
in a fit of blinding ecstasy.
Look, I do not dislike you.
I’m not angry with you, even,
but I refuse to pity you.
You just gotta let that shit go, man.
Tell you what I’m gonna do.
I’m gonna let you keep poetry.
How’s ‘at? You can have it.
I mean, the shit is harmless anyway, right.
Like locking a crazy man
in a padded room
and saying, go ahead, knock yourself out.
So go ahead. As hobby only.
Don’t turn the innocuous
into the ridiculous.
And in the meantime,
the in-between time,
I’m ‘a hook you up.
What do you say to that?
Don’t start thinking now –
that’s what got you
off-track
in the first place.
This could be big for you.
I’m ‘a do right by you.
Good things are coming your way
if you just chuck
that other shit to the curb.
Don’t test me on this.
I threw you a bone.
You ain’t got forever
to mull this over.
Tell you what I’ll do.
I’ll give you a few minutes alone,
but don’t pass on this opportunity.
This is a limited time offer.
March 2007
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[26 Mar 2007|01:00pm] |
A Place to Hear the Stillness of Water
There is a place I hear far away.
It is so far away,
yet I hear the stillness of water,
lapping, lapping,
hushed against the shore.
It is a place I smell far away.
It is so far away,
yet I smell life in the air,
wisping, washing
through the weeds
over the water to brush
whispering against my cheeks.
It is a place I taste far away.
It is so far away,
yet I taste salt on my tongue,
tingling, tangy,
settling as I wash it down
with a gulp of coastal air.
It is a place I see far away.
It is so far away,
Yet I see the sun in my eyes,
Blinding, bleeding
Into the shadiest corners of sand,
Washing over my skin with warmth.
It is a place I feel far away.
It is so far away,
yet I feel light shimmer inside,
broiling, bubbling
from my bosum with fear –
fearing that if I let it out
I might drown in my own sunshine.
Better to keep peaceful waters,
better to keep whispering weeds.
Better to kep the salt settled,
better to let the sun bleed.
Such is a place far away,
A place to hear the stillness of water.
2001
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[26 Mar 2007|11:32am] |
Good Teacher, Bad Teacher
There is a girl
in my class
with a wrinkled forehead.
She struggles with me
in the language and voices
of the dead and far away.
We think out loud
and nod and squint and say "Hmmm" together.
She will struggle the rest of her life.
She is why I am a good teacher.
There is a boy
in my class
with smug in his smirk.
He doesn't struggle.
Not with me.
He knows the language and voices
of the new and close at hand.
He knows what he wants in life.
He is seventeen.
He does it and gets it. He gets an A.
He will succeed the rest of his life.
He is why I am a bad teacher.
Spring 2001
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[26 Mar 2007|11:21am] |
There's No Such Thing As Rock 'n' Roll
Nietzsche and Lenny Kravitz said
that God and Rock 'n' Roll are dead.
And this I say is quite absurd,
for those cannot be that never were.
And to further questions again I give,
those cannot die that never lived.
By "those" I mean the silly names,
to label is a human game.
A silly game at that, indeed.
A game? Nay, a silly need.
There's no such thing as rock 'n' roll,
only that which sparks the soul.
There's no such thing as God above,
only that which lives in love.
There's no such thing as love and sin,
only that which lies within.
No such thing as history,
naming masks the mystery.
So put another dime in the jukebox, baby,
Doo wop, doo wop, doo wop.
1998
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[25 Mar 2007|09:42pm] |
Birth of a Memory
Putting away paper
in dusty files
atop a broken teacher’s desk
with handles hanging loose
on its too often-jarred drawers
I saw, briefly,
from my third story window,
the flutter of green and brown,
of West African fabric,
made by the Nigerian tailor
who came so often to our flat
that year in Lagos.
You disappeared
behind the adjacent building
in one second or two,
dragging the colors
not far behind,
and I mourned its passing
to memory.
Though I would remember it
a half century more,
I mourned.
And when my melancholy asked
if I should set it down
to verse,
I returned, perfunctorily,
to the putting away of paper.
Spring 2006
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[25 Mar 2007|08:59pm] |
This Is Not a Love Poem
This is not a love poem
though it is for you,
whom I love
like the sea loves sky,
which takes in infinitesimal essence
and gives in pure rain.
This is not a love poem,
though I write it for you,
mei sine qua non,
the Latin to my English,
mon raison d'etre,
the countryside in my French,
mia cara, la chiave di casa,
the pasta in my Italian,
mi esperanza,
the rolling rrrrr on my tongue.
This is not a love poem,
but its center is you,
mi capital antiguo,
la ciudad de mi corazón,
who could not be captured
by Greeks nor Turks,
nor Romans nor Celts,
nor Spanish,
nor any armies who clash by night,
for they could never reach you
where you’ve always been –
since before their tongues
uttered troglodyte grunts –
in a valley in which travelers walk
unaware of that which they pass
on nearby roads in the crepuscular dusk,
until, finally, serendipitously,
a most lucky traveler of all
stumbles around a corner
to find within himself
what he had not known was there –
the light to home,
my hometown true,
where no one needs a love poem,
but this one is for you.
January 2006
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| Pomes and Poeems |
[25 Mar 2007|12:11pm] |
Kids up here make fun of me for the way I say the word, "poem".
The way I say it rhymes with "coin".
Most people, I guess, pronounce it as rhyming with "tome".
But, also, kids in Texas made fun of me for saying it the way I do, so I don't know if it's a southern thing.
I was listening to Stoney LaRue doing a Guy Clark song, and he says poems the same way I do. So I'm not self-conscious about it.
I'm gonna start writing a poem a week. Just for the hell of it. Just because I need to be writing something. And I'm gonna start posting them here, just because knowing a few people might glance at one now and then will help me keep consistent and regular about it. Maybe I will even submit some if I turn a good one or two. It will also help me keep a database. I've lost dozens of poems in the last ten years or so. Like Willie Nelson said, I let the words of my youth fade away.
Here's a poem I dug up today. I wrote it in February 2003 from a hotel window in Tacoma, Washington. But I changed it to Seattle.
Three Meals for the Day
In Seattle, there’s a seagull
that floats above a dock.
Gliding at a stand-still,
he uses what he’s got.
Below there is a fisherman,
who fights against the chill.
The wind chops on the waters,
dragging waves ‘til they keel.
The seagull soars away,
the fisherman leaves the dock,
the waves rush to the shore
and crescendo on the rocks.
Night falls on the land
and darkens all the bay.
I pull the shutters closed,
three meals for the day.
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| Doggie Facelift |
[24 Mar 2007|01:33pm] |
One of my pups, Larry McMurtry, had to have surgery on his eyes. Not his eyeballs, per se, but the skin around his eyeballs. It was foldnig under and irritating his eyes. Now he looks kind of scary. His eyes are all swollen and red. Hope that goes away soon.
He had to wear one of those cones around his neck the first day home. Our other pup, Cormac McCarthy, did not recognize Larry with the cone and started barking at him and sniffing his butt. I dropped Larry off during my lunch break, and when I got home he, with the help of Cormac (I suspect), chewed the cone off his head.
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| Prius Outdoes Hummer in Environmental Damage |
[23 Mar 2007|09:38am] |
When you pool together all the combined energy it takes to drive and build a Toyota Prius, the flagship car of energy fanatics, it takes almost 50 percent more energy than a Hummer - the Prius’s arch nemesis.
Through a study by CNW Marketing called “Dust to Dust,” the total combined energy is taken from all the electrical, fuel, transportation, materials (metal, plastic, etc) and hundreds of other factors over the expected lifetime of a vehicle. The Prius costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven over a lifetime of 100,000 miles - the expected lifespan of the Hybrid.
The Hummer, on the other hand, costs a more fiscal $1.95 per mile to put on the road over an expected lifetime of 300,000 miles. That means the Hummer will last three times longer than a Prius and use less combined energy doing it.
So, if you are really an environmentalist - ditch the Prius. Instead, buy one of the most economical cars available - a Toyota Scion xB. The Scion only costs a paltry $0.48 per mile to put on the road. If you are still obsessed over gas mileage - buy a Chevy Aveo and fix that lead foot.
http://clubs.ccsu.edu/recorder/editorial/editorial_item.asp?NewsID=188
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| No Miller Light Tonight! |
[19 Mar 2007|06:41pm] |
Dinner with friends tonight (Heather's friends), and so I splurged on some Chimay Red. Mmmmm. I used to drink this in Rice Village when I used to go to The Big Easy and listen to old blues and jazzmen.
Ever had it? It's Belgian. It was originally brewed by Trappists monks. They also make cheese.
Check it:
http://www.chimay.com/en/chimay_red_218.php
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