Monthly Archives: March 2010

What A Wonderful World

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A new week, a new day, a new entry for johnozed. Isn’t life grand? Today was the first day since last week that I had actually walked around Hoboken, besides the supermarket and Washington Street. Oh and the library. Nothing has changed it’s still the same. And as usual I’ve got nothing to say but it’s OK.

I got a nice St. Patrick’s Day card from my cousin Theresa. That was nice. I would have sent her one in kind if I had known and it’s not too late to do that I suppose. It just won’t get to her by Wednesday.

That is what actually got me out of the apartment and into the damp streets of Hoboken. I bought a St. Patrick’s Day card for Bill and wanted to get it to his office, hopefully by tomorrow. He won’t be in on Wednesday since he has something MAJOR going on, something that he asked me not to talk about.

So getting it in the mail to be delivered across the river within 24 hours is the goal. Then again you hear of people mailing letters decades ago and never making to the receiver, and I hope that’s not the case this time.

But if it doesn’t get there by tomorrow I take comfort in the fact that he’ll have something nice on his desk when he returns on Thursday.

I also stopped by the Guitar Bar and said hello to Jim Mastro. I hope he doesn’t think I’m a nuisance. I just pop in for a quick chat, say hello and I’m out of there. If I’m headed to the post office I usually ask him if he has any mail to be dropped off, but today I was going in the opposite direction.

He was playing Booker T & the MG’s McLemore Avenue, which is their take on Abbey Road. I bought it last year from iTunes and hadn’t played it since so when I came home I made sure to play it, as well as burn it so some people (maybe you) might get a copy somewhere down the line.

Despite the gray day, overcast skies I’ve been enjoying myself somewhat. Posting a lot onto Facebook. Found a hero and friend to LGBT people in young Will Phillips.

He’s the young man from Arkansas who got into trouble at his school when he refused to recite the Pledge of Allegiance sine gay people are not afforded liberty and justice. 10 years old and he recognized that liberty and justice was only for some, not all.

Posted a video from YouTube and commented on his YouTube page. Of course there are the usual wankers who wrote, people will marry their dogs, their children or have many wives. You know, the usual ignorant bullshit.

In a retaliatory move, I posted a clip of Mandy Patakin singing ‘You Have to be Carefully Taught’ from South Pacific on Facebook. I tried posting the video on the YouTube page but was unable so I posted the lyrics instead.

Last night I posted an interview from the Village Voice with Henry Rollins. Ol’ Henry’s a great guy, and quite a few people dug the interview. In the interview it’s mentioned that Henry is friends with RuPaul and will be a guest judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race, which is a fun show in itself.

Well according to Joe Jervis of JoeMyGod, that show is on tonight so I will be watching that.

Last night I watched The Pacific, the story of the battles in the Pacific theater of World War II. As I watched it I couldn’t help but think of the men that my father drank with at the VFW when I was growing up.

Like I’ve written previously, I spent a lot of time, perhaps too much time at the VFW. I didn’t mind then and looking back I still don’t mind. Gave me insight on how these men were.

Like how they saw atrocities, perhaps performed atrocities then came home and didn’t really say anything about it. Going to a psychiatrist or psychologist was a sign of weakness.

And don’t forget, men don’t cry.

Which is bullshit.

I know this is a Hollywood version and nowhere near as horrible as it actually was, but it’s a glimpse nonetheless. It was well made and when it was rebroadcast at 11:00 Bill and I watched it together and Bill was blown away as I was earlier.

Will Phillips is my hero!

Will Phillips accepts the award for Outstanding TV Journalism Segment at the 21st Annual GLAAD Media Awards in New York on March 13, 2010. Phillips appeared in the award winning segment “Why Will Won’t Pledge Allegiance” from CNN’s American Morning.

From Rogers & Hammerstein’s South Pacific: Carefully Taught

You’ve got to be taught/To hate and fear,You’ve got to be taught
From year to year,It’s got to be drummed In your dear little ear
You’ve got to be carefully taught.

You’ve got to be taught to be afraid Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff’rent shade,You’ve got to be carefully taught.

You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late, Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate, You’ve got to be carefully taught!

St. Elmo’s Fire

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Man my processor is slow today. At least I think it is the processor. I spent the past 20 minutes trying to open up a new Open Office document. And it’s taken me 15 minutes to write those 2 sentences. Yes, it’s infuriating.

Something that I cut and pasted onto Facebook 2 hours ago, just reappeared when I tried to paste the previous sentence in it’s proper order. In fact I am writing this and nothing is appearing on the screen. It’s taken me about a half hour to write the above lines.

I hope you think it was worth it. It’s fucking pissing me off. At this rate I should be done writing, hitting the 500 word quota by midnight.

Maybe it was because I had both Firefox and Google Chrome browsers running. Now that I closed Google Chrome everything is going as it should. Won’t do that again (yeah right).

I just watched Moon, directed by Duncan Jones. Very low key and very good. Sam Rockwell is basically the only actor in it. I thought about seeing it in the theater when it came out, but as usual I never got around to it. It is haunting though.

It’s been a good weekend to watch DVD’s. Last night I watched I Love You Man which was as dumb and as funny as I thought it would be. No need to watch the extras on that.

After that it was Saturday Night Live which was an improvement over last week. Jude Law was the guest host, miles ahead of Jennifer Lopez. The digital short was spot on, Pearl Jam was the music guests.

I watched the Street Corner Mourners videos on YouTube instead of the band named after semen. I like Pearl Jam’s politics, how they fought for the fans against Ticketmaster more than I like their music, which has always left me cold.

No, their debut Ten didn’t do a thing for me and I never saw the videos from it including Jeremy.

Bill came home as I watched the last half hour of Lost on ABC. He was telling me about the play and how well it’s going. I plan to see it on March 26.

Bill offered me a ticket for March 19 but I will be at the Park Theater watching the Street Corner Mourners that night, rescheduled from February which was snowed out due to the blizzard.

During the day I sometimes write down various things to include in this here blog. I wanted to write about how the heater in the kitchen was not working making things a bit cold. A few times I would lay on the floor trying to get the pilot to stay lit but it would invariably go out.

Being insane and doing the same thing over and over trying to get a different result, I actually was able to get it lit so it’s nice and warm once again. I am surprised at how handy I could be sometimes.

Also tried up loading songs into iTunes by clicking Add Folder to Library. It wouldn’t take. So I tried dragging the folder into iTunes and it worked just fine. Once again I was handy.

The other night as I was flirting with the blues I actually watched part of St. Elmo’s Fire. I am embarrassed to admit that I actually saw it in the theater.

I went with Hiroaki Kimura at the Hoboken Cinema when it came out and compared some of the characters on screen with our friends in the Colgate crew. Mainly the Rob Lowe character resembled a future roommate of mine who moved to Austria.

And it was a fleeting comparison since that future roommate was not the asshole that Rob Lowe seems to play in just about every role he gets. Maybe it’s typecasting.

Most of the cast were loathsome, or at least the actors were with the exceptions of Mare Winningham and Ally Sheedy. It really is a terrible movie and one can’t help but wish the worst for the characters on screen.

See Moon.

The title of this entry is from a Brian Eno song and has nothing to do with that horrid movie.

Moved the clocks ahead last night before I went to bed, making it 2:50AM when I went to sleep. Woke up at 8:00 (or 7:00) to the sound of thunder which sounded like a building was being bombed in Manhattan. Got me out of bed to look out the window.

green carnation