The Irony of Last Chance to See

So I have finished reading two books since last we spoke, but tonight do not feel like giving long, drawn out reviews of my readings, so instead will leave you with the short versions.

Leviathan, the last book in the Illuminatus! Trilogy ended well, albeit rather confusingly. I tried very hard during my reading of this tome to relate to the 60's and early 70's in which the majority of the novel took place. Try as I might, the hippie mysticism, drug induced insights, and the gathering sense of urgency to do something became almost anti-climactic for me and left me feeling like I was the only one standing in a room of people that was not in on the inside joke that had just been told. I look back on those decades with a reverence of some type of dramatic change having occurred, but then look at the present and my childhood in the 80's - the product of parents who lived through those times and struggles - and wonder if this was the future that our parents were struggling so hard for back then. How much has complacency, greed, or sheer laziness shaped the ideals of those who grew up or struggled for some elusive freedom during that time effected the world that we are now living in? Maybe I am naive or ungrateful, but I don't know what I don't know.

The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul was the last compete Dirk Gently novel (not counting the partial amalgamation I am currently reading in The Salmon of Doubt) written by Douglas Adams. For those of you not British or fans of science fiction, you may have heard of Douglas Adams through is most popular book that was also made into a movie, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Having read almost everything that Douglas Adams has written in novel form, I have grown sad while reading The Salmon of Doubt because it is the last we will ever hear from him.

I had the opportunity to see Douglas Adams speak at the University of California Santa Barbara on April 5, 2001. He was speaking about a book he had written, which I had just finished reading before I went to see him, called Last Chance to See. The book detailed his journeys around the world in an effort to "see" and document encounters with endangered species before the became extinct. Adams was a rabid conservationist and environmentalist which, when mixed with his particular brand of intelligent British humor, made Last Chance to See a hilarious and extremely enjoyable book to read. Now here comes the irony: this speech on Last Chance to See became literally the last chance to see Douglas Adams; he became extinct by means of a heart attack on May 11, 2001.

I look at the autograph that I got from him in my Hitchhiker's Omnibus and remember being hungry even then for more to read from him. When I met him to get the autograph I asked him when The Salmon of Doubt was going to be released. At the time, Salmon was only a rumor, a vicious perpetual "Coming Soon" title which over the better part of a decade had repeatedly failed to manifest itself. Like the Loch Ness monster of the book world, there would occasionally be rumors leaked of a sighting, but in the end there was nothing that you could shoot at or put up on an operating table and really dig into. He looked up at me somberly (I have the feeling that I now know why from reading the beginning of Salmon) and said simply, "It isn't. It's been scrapped. Repeatedly. Put on hold indefinitely." I thanked him for writing so brilliantly and giving me a new way to think about comedy in a more intelligent way than dick and fart jokes could offer. He shook my hand solidly and I stepped aside to let the two hundred or so people behind me have their own private minute of access to a genius.

I found out through reading the beginning of Salmon that the question of when that book was coming out often pained him when he was asked it. Almost ten years later I cringe at the thought that my question might have depressed him in even a little way. After all, this was a man who had brought laughter and pleasure to my life through his writing for so many years. Douglas Adams knew his fans wanted another book. Douglas Adams also knew that he would not let said book be released unless it was perfect. Douglas Adams was also a monumental procrastinator of the type that I would have loved to have learned from when I was in school. The third fact aside, post-mortem, we finally got the book that we had all been waiting for but we got it at a price that none of us would ever have wanted to pay for it.

I will probably never be rich, or famous, or even moderately well known in certain circles. I may not even be a good writer. But I always think of the impact that the authors of the books that I read have on me - some amazing, some good, and some negligible - and always come to the conclusion that for the best of them, to reach people, to affect lives, to give reason for thought, and in some cases be the only reason for someone to smile or laugh during the day, these are powerful things. And so I write. Amazing, good, negligible, possibly even bad, I write.

Sometimes its the only way to get out of my head for a while.

Remembering My Journal

I was rummaging through some of my old stuff and came across a journal that I used to write in. Upon reading it I realized that The Randomness of My Crackhead started around 10 years ago on paper and I am just continuing it on in web format in front of you who travel to this corner of the blogosphere. Excerpts from my prior ramblings follow:

As Bill Cosby once said, "I started out as a child." My addition to that is that it's pretty much all gone down hill since then. I just wonder sometimes if that hill is just a little bit steeper for other people. Like a cliff. They start out as a child and then fall off a cliff. Right onto their head. It seems to me that because of that fall some people grow up stupid.

Things go through my head sometimes that scare me. Now these things aren't necessarily bad all the time, just weird to the point of being scary. I daydream too often for too long sometimes. My mind works in weird ways. It's like my brain chooses to jump out of my head and do LSD when I'm not looking and sit back and laugh at me while my body deals with the effects.

I wonder what it would be like to live in my mind. To me it's pretty boring, I guess, because it's my mind. But I think it would probably kill someone else. I've heard it theorized that if two people ever actually did switch bodies, the slight changes in perception, height and other things that may just seem minor to us, would drive a person insane. Maybe that's what happened to me. Someone put me in another person's body and that's why I'm insane. I don't know. Maybe I was just born that way.

Once upon a time on another world far away lived a boy with nothing to live for. In the darkest of times he fought wars with no purpose other than to die. He didn't want freedom, he didn't want his homeland, those had been taken from him long before. He just wanted a release from pain that he could never give himself.

I don't know what is worse, being bored, or being bored and alone. When you're bored and not alone, the person or people you are with keep you from doing anything stupid. When you're bored and alone you start thinking about lining up the drinking glasses on the couch and seeing how good my aim is with my BB gun.

I wonder how well I'd write on drugs. I wonder what would come off of my pen if I was sitting on the couch all cracked out with a strobe light flashing in my face and over the paper. Would it be brilliant? Psychotic? Or would I just be curled up fetal screaming about bugs? Probably the bugs.

Hippies really kick ass. They smell kind of funny though. That's all.

I wish I could fly. I think it would be cool just to be above everything and look down. I wonder what the birds would think. When you come to think about it, that's the only advantage they have over us. I mean, sure, we have planes and gliders and stuff, but we can't just take to the air of our own accord. We need jets and wings and propellers and stuff. We don't have any of that crap built on to our bodies. But seriously, if we could fly, do you think the birds would be pissed? Would they all, just like, band together and give everything a gooey shit bath from above? That's what I think would happen. Deep thoughts.

No, I'm not on drugs right now.

I've heard that a person could swallow his or her own tongue. I don't know about that. I've tried this a couple of times and it just made me feel like I had to throw up.

I just got a tattoo about two weeks ago. It's a dragon on my right arm. I suppose that makes me hardcore now, maybe like those guys on Harley's that go from town to town visiting strip clubs and breaking beer bottles over their heads. My head is now bleeding and I've still never been to a strip club.

Gymnast girls. God damn. That's all.

I have a confession to make. I'm really a man. And a total lesbian. Total lesbian.

I remember my Nona sitting in her wheelchair behind the kitchen table watching soaps on TV. She always had a warm smile for whomever walked into her home and would never let you leave without eating a plate of food. She always thought I was too skinny. I miss my Nona.

I am a ghost. Maybe not in the conventional sense of the word, but then again, maybe I am. I live, if that's what you could call it, among normal people, if that's what you could call them...I breathe, walk, bleed and cry just the same as everybody else around me. But I am dead. I breathe stale air, walk in a perpetual daze and bleed lifeless, contaminated blood. I infect and am infected by all around me. Supposedly when your body dies, your soul lives on. But what happens when your soul dies? Is that when you become a zombie? I am hungry, but not for flesh or brains.

Let go of the pain. It's okay to hurt, but let it run it's course. Don't hold on to it. Let go of the anger. Do you even know why you are mad anymore? Find peace within yourself. You know where you need to be. Go there. Don't settle for good enough. Demand the best and be the best. Have patience, but don't let a good thing pass you by.

I erase everything in my brain so I don't think and I don't feel and most importantly, so that I don't ACT. It's better that way. It's safer that way. It's so I don't hurt myself or the people around me. I just go into my brain and shut it off.


Between all of this mishmash is crammed a comic book that I was working on at the time (never published or to see the light of day), the ups and downs of past relationships, a bunch of songs that got me through the day written out on paper, and finally the log of my messed up financial situation of many years back. It's funny how I look back on all of these entries now and it seems so long ago, almost like another life that happened to another person, or a plot line that I would dream up for a character in a book. I am a firm believer in not looking backwards and regretting the things that have happened or the mistakes that were made, but sometimes it is nice to steal a quick glance over your shoulder and realize just how far you've come.

Good night dear readers.

The State of the Economy

The world is a scary place right now. I wanted to take a second out of my normal incoherent rumblings to talk about my life as it relates to the current state of the economy.

My father started his own business when I was four or five years old. I always wanted to go to work with him and help him out and when jobs permitted the presence of a small child, I was able to tag along and do little things like bring him tools or help clean up. My parents divorced when I was seven, and my dad relocated his business up north. During the summers when I went up to visit, I would work for him on a part-time basis, helping out on jobs and earning spending money to buy baseball cards, comic books and clothes, fix my bike, go to the movies, the local skating rink, or to the miniature golf course.

My mom always got up early, generally before the sun came up, to go to work. She found a job with the local school district working in the central kitchen making lunches for elementary school children. She has been there now for over 20 years and has woken up and worked and come home because she had two children to support. Her long day was never finished when she left work, she came home and started her second job as the mother of two more-often-than-not bratty and growing children. I know now that she was truly exhausted when she was finally able to go to bed and as I hit my teenage years, her nights of sleep were often short and fitful. We lived with my grandparents and while we always had everything that we needed - a roof over our heads, hot meals on our plates, clothes on our backs - I saw while I was growing up that she did without a lot so that my brother and I could have what we wanted and needed. I felt that if I could work and provide for my wants - clothes, going to the movies, going out to eat - I wouldn't have to ask her for money and she would have a little bit more to spend on my brother and herself. My grandmother had an older friend that lived at the end of our block - a retired school teacher - that she would help to do various things like go shopping, pay bills, and other things like that. She got me a job working for her around her house; yard work, mowing the lawn, doing dishes, cleaning floors, bathrooms, kitchens, vacuuming, making the bed, that type of stuff.

When I was 14, I got a work permit and a part-time job at a fast food restaurant and spent the last 15 years of my life since working and moving up the job ladder. I made it into mid-level management positions by taking any shift that was offered - days, nights, swings, splits, doubles - and finally wound up in a job that I liked with a good company that I really enjoyed working for. I bought a house at the end of November 2008 and was subsequently laid off at the beginning of February 2009 with 400 other employees when business at the company declined by almost 70% from where it was when I started in September of 2008. The layoff was seniority based and our only crime was being new to the company.

I was watching the news and kept hearing about the state of the economy. I kept hearing about the hundreds of thousands of people who were loosing their jobs on a monthly basis in the United States. I never thought that it could happen to me. And then I became a statistic. But hey, that's the state of the economy. I have been unemployed now for six months, and for a guy who has worked for the better part of his life, it has seemed like an eternity. I hit the streets and job boards on a daily basis looking for employment and suffering the same disappointment as millions of others. All the while I am collecting unemployment and hating myself for it.

I don't write this now so that you will feel sorry for me, I don't want or deserve pity for the situation that I am in, as a matter of fact, I have over 7 million other people that I share my predicament with and despite not working, I still have a roof over my head, clothes on my back, and hot meals on my plate. There are scores of others, I am sure, that are much worse off than I am and have nowhere to turn. I am one of the fortunate ones with good friends and family around me that have seen me through this and provide the support and encouragement to keep going, keep trying, and keep my head up. I am writing this to thank them. Without these people in my life, I don't know what I would do or where I would be. You are the ones that have kept me going despite the state of the economy and I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart.

From a listening ear and helpful advice, to smacking me on the back of my head to make sure that it settles on straight, to financial support, to food on my plate, to jobs for extra spending money, to the forwarding of resumes, I can't even begin to explain how grateful I am to have such wonderful people in my life that support me and make sure that I am taken care of. I have not forgotten how blessed I am to have all of you around me.

Thank you.

The Golden Apple

As mentioned in my last entry (so long ago, I know, and I would say that I was sorry if I thought that anyone actually read this thing...does anyone actually read this thing?) The Golden Apple picks up right where The Eye in the Pyramid left off.

The one thing that I happily noticed after the first handful of pages was that the storyline was much more coherent than in the first book. For the most part, the reader followed one character through upwards of 15-20 pages before a change of scenery and or character took place. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy a following a narcotics-induced storyline just as much as the next person but my brain can only endure so much cacophonous literary jarring in my skull before I need a linear chain of events to prevent a gradual mental overdose. While the authors do at times revert to their old evil ways of the first book but this time it is used more as device to move the story and add to the ambiance as opposed to causing a story earthquake to keep the reader off-kilter for the entirety of the book.

In any case, a very distinct chain of events is starting to develop and the characters that you know and love from the first book (as well as a couple of new ones - yes, the cast gets bigger - in addition to characters that were hinted at) begin taking their position on the chessboard. Here's a quick rundown of all of the poop that is being loaded in that cannon over there that is aimed at this here giant fan:

First off, we've got Fernando Poo. (Somebody is going to need to help me with this one, I think. I'm still a little confused about Fernando Poo and exactly what was going on...) As near as I can tell, the President of the United States thinks that the Chinese and the Russians have soldiers there and threatens to do something very nasty if they don't leave. Nuclear warfare seems too blah of a threat according to the president. Something nastier type of stick needs to be shook at the bad guys. Enter Anthrax Leprosy Pi, which leads us to our next major uh-oh.

Anthrax Leprosy Pi, the newest and worst form of Anthrax that was being threatened to be used against the Reds, has escaped from the secret lab that it was invented in via the contaminated inventor. Who passed it along to a prostitute. Who died while blowing her pimp. All of this in Las Vegas. Did I mention that it spreads to everybody the carrier comes in contact with? You can probably see where this is going. The government sees where this is going as well and is coming to the conclusion that Martial Law should be declared in the United States until this whole mess can be sorted out.

Fortunately on the other side of the Atlantic, a giant rock festival is being put together in Ingolstadt. No, wait, that's a bad thing. Why, you may ask, is a rock concert in Ingolstadt that in all appearances looks to be an international version of Woodstock a bad thing? Did I mention the leigon of dead Nazis at the bottom of a nearby lake that will be brought back to life when the AMA starts playing and kill everyone present thus immanentizing the Eschaton (read: "starting Armageddon") and helping bastards like Hitler (yes, he's still alive and hanging out comfortably in a nearby Ingolstadt hotel) achieve transcendental illumination.

Alrighty then, the poop is packed, the fuse is at the ready, now where's my lighter?

On the other end of the board, 00005 is in Fernando Poo, Saul, Barney, and John Dillinger are on the trail of Anthrax Leprosy Pi, and Hagbard, George, Joe, Otto, John Dillinger (huh?) Mavis, Stella, and anyone else on the Lief Erickson that I may have left out are on their way to Ingolstodt to watch to world burn. Or stop it from burning. Or something. Maybe.

Meanwhile the Dealy Llama is doing...not a damn thing. What is with that guy?

The review of the finale to this series, Leviathan, will be up shortly. Meanwhile, if you have no idea who the people are or what is going on in this review, go out to your local bookstore and pick up The Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson or you can order it online here: http://www.amazon.com/Illuminatus-Trilogy-Pyramid-Golden-Leviathan/dp/0440539811 because apparently you have some catching up to do. If, on the other hand, you have read the book and still have no idea who the people are or what is going on in this review, please let me know so we can compare notes, I'm still a little confused...