Information Blues.

I suppose I’m a sensitive person; sometimes it takes very little to throw my world off its axis. Today it was just a visit to Emeryville to look at LCD computer monitors.

I went to Best Buy. Everything electronic looked so new but the humans seemed out of date. They were sauntering in sweat pants with bags under their eyes, shopping high definition televisions. I have a suspicion that I’m turning into a small scale Internet Buddhist; I feel at harmony with techonology, but I don’t want a two story entertainment console. I want to stream (steal) my entertainment—-chosen carefully!—-through Internet Protocol. Yes, I want to watch Criterium Collection ripped dvd’s on 22 inches of liquid crystal. I want to step outside the revenue stream; it’s beginning to feel like one must steal culture like a rebel. That does not (maybe) destroy the soul (the information wants to be free?) but shopping at Best Buy does.

I walked in CompUSA. They were also selling a vision: Windows Vista. The entire store was a petition to upgrade and the aura was desperate. The vision was being promoted by sales agents comprised of early 20’s urban youth. It was a swindle, a scam: buy the two year extended warranty. Upgrade now to approved devices bearing the proper seals. (I’d been reading about technology on the web. Sometimes it seems that if you can read and research on the web you have access to The Matrix, and armed with that information can see through the illusions. Like: all 22″ LCD panels are manufactured at 4 different factories in China. Realizing this makes me feel very uncomfortable; it bends my head. There are so many layers of abstraction between product and consumer.) I am an uncomfortable consumer.

I walk inside Office Max; why not, it’s next door! 20 LCDs simultaneously show the same utopian nature screensaver. It smells like plastic and toner and suddenly I feel like a ruffian and must get out as soon as possible.

The world outside is dark and oily, just after sunset rain. It’s the time of day when the gloom feels oppressive. Stygian. I am isolated in my car, far from home and off my axis: I should be riding my bike by Berkeley Bowl for vegetables. I should be at ease but I’m not, and the darkness is reflective—-I am losing hitpoints at the mall.

Last night at 11pm I reduced my bushy beard to a prototype I’d held in my head for quite a while: the musketeer beard/swashbuckler’s mustache. It’s a little unclear to me what this actually is, but I knew I wanted to try it.

The prototype shows a weepy mustache that dips a centimeter below the lip with a keel down the chin for balance. It’s the keel that’s the tricky part: it can’t be a strip—-that would not be debonair—-it must have curves. Starting from the soul patch down it must dip in like the waist of a woman, then expand again and resolve to  a tear drop. The bottom is not currently very round; it must improve. For if the bottom does not improve it risks existence on my face.

I almost chickened out this morning. I woke up looking like a joke pirate and while that made me fairly happy, my ego was not awake and I worried about how I’d face the world. It transported me back to my first mustache where I eagerly met eyes with the first stranger to see me: would they chuckle and stare? Gasp and point? Because I’ve gasped and giggled at a few mustaches in my time. But I’m hyper-aware and nobody else cares.

Well maybe Doctor GTI cares; he snickered and called me Captain Morgan. Drtboi looked at me sleepily and told me that the top and bottom of my face did not match up. There was a lot of pointing and a lot of giggling, but I did at least half the laughing so that was okay.

From my first day of life as an apparent pirate, I can tell you it makes one especially hungry for burritos. I plundered two burros today: one for noonday treasure, the other as late night tribute. The swashbuckler’s mustache is okay for pool; this evening I grimaced and overcame a 2-2 tie to take the next four. In situations like these it’s possible to use the mustache like a lever, to achieve mechanical advantage.

I don’t know how long my life as a burrito pirate will last, but that’s also part of the fun: onward! To new burritos and distant shores, more guffaws as I continue to try to see just who I am.

Marie Sharp’s and I are hanging out. She says:

“Marie Sharp’s Habanero Pepper Sauce is the finest product of its kind. This unique carrot-based blend achieves the perfect balance between flavor an heat. Nestled in the foothills of the Mayan Mountains, Marie Sharp’s factory still creates products the old-fashioned way: using the freshest vegetables and the finest ingredients.

Her secret homemade recipe utilizes the potent red habanero pepper. Produced in the fertile paradise of Belize, her red habanero is considered to be the hottest variety of pepper known to man, Marie has spent many years cultivating a habanero worthy of her recipe.

She has succeeded.“

She’s my kind of woman. It turns out her email address is actually fierylady36 at yahoo.com.

This is my Marie Sharp’s playlist from iTunes:

Absolutely Sweet Marie by Bob Dylan

Little Marie by Chuck Berry

Sleeping Bear, Sault Saint Marie by Sufjan Stevens

Marieke by Jacques Brel

Nightmarie Blues by John Lee Hooker–whaa? Somebody made an ID3 typo

I am hanging out with Marie Sharp’s and my playlist. My throat is burning as Bob provides the crucial observation:

Well, anybody can be just like me, obviously
But then, now again, not too many can be like you, fortunately.

Yes. Yes I say, yes. Well alright.

I remember the first time I drove Redwood Road from the stern of the Oakland Hills to Castro Valley. It was a sunny day, and the road was full of cyclists. It really impressed me; I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to be out on my own in the rolling hills, what kind of crazy pleasure: to drop in on a shady grade and climb up above the reservoir on ten miles of woodsy backroad! What heaven, and what hell: no normal person enjoys climbing hills on their bicycle, and of course I didn’t then either. I thought it would be way too tough to ride Redwood; when I thought about it, all I could imagine were burning lungs and broken resolve.

Times have really changed. Now I ride Redwood Road in a 40-50 mile loop (depending on how you go) as an average weekend ride. It’s not that hard to ride that road; I have a feeling that most anyone could do it if they wanted to– we’re all so much stronger than we realize. And furthermore, it feels so good to make that revelation! You can make it over and over and over again and it still feels good.

Today when I threw my leg over the bike and got into the hills the road felt like my secret. This was my back road, my route, my super-saturated moving picture. It felt hard, but this is what I’ve come to understand: when you start climbing a hill it feels tough, you feel stiff, you wonder what you’re doing but then you realize a new mode: your body takes over and all your mind can do is watch. Your body gets loud, it takes over all your senses, your body says: I’m going to climb this hill and your whole person becomes focused on the task. The rhythm of it is deafening; it’s nearly impossible to think about anything else.

I think that flesh enjoys the challenge. Our bodies would like to roar. Coming back over Redwood I threw myself at a rise in my big ring. It felt roughly equivalent to throwing a fragile object at a wall, but that’s what my legs, lungs and brain wanted: to feel broken yet strong, hurt and mortal, blazingly alive.

As I crested at a crawl, I cried out, “Owwww!”

I didn’t have much left to give, but Redwood had more hills for me. I saw a Varied Thrush hanging dead, upside down from a tree by one foot. Then I got passed by a strawberry. He waved.