the stars were out in number

since michael jackson's death there has been a shift, the world felt itself pause for a moment in the knowledge he is gone.  more polarizing than elvis, though he has twice the genius.  i hadn't read or seen anything that i identified with, until i read this:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cynthia-boaz/why-michael-jacksons-deat_b_227434.html

...he's the man we never got to know, because everyone thought they had him pegged already.

who's bad is a michael jackson cover band that plays at every wilmington downtown sundown, a free show on the river.  i had gone the last three years and it was packed like i had never seen it before, like i knew it would be.  it was already scheduled, michael just happened to die a couple weeks before.  his death has introduced his music to a new generation.  

how can it be that often you have to die to become great?

i wove my way through the crowd and witnessed it from all different angles and with all sorts of people.  most people weren't happy about my crossings, but many understood, and some were actually pleased.

all this after a yoga & chocolate session with my friends errrn & carol.  the night felt like, bliss.  everything is better after yoga and this chocolate was the best kind: guilt-free.  

in celebration of the inner goddess calories don't matter, and it doesn't hurt the chocolate was vegan.  (i tried a cocoa bean and i'm not a fan, but i can appreciate how it gives birth to chocolate)

i hope for many more lovely nights

while in the meantime

i dance everyday

spins

sins of the poet

oh little bloggy blog, how i have ignored you.  life has been blessedly busy and lately i have been painting to unwind instead of writing.  mea culpa.

so what curious misadventures have i experienced of late?

a new direction with school: i've gone back to university to become an english teacher.  if i'm accepted into the program i've applied to then i will be moving towards a masters degree.  i bike to my summer class, and hide inside the cool for my online class.  it is a lot of overlapping content, but from different perspectives.  

it's good for my brain.

jessabean, mi hermana, is currently in costa rica after a trip to panama.  i'm glad to see her traveling spirit alive and well.  some pictures of her journey are on my friend ickes' blog: radical sabadicals: the adventures of traveling dirtbags.  http://mobileliving2.blogspot.com/2009/06/panama.html

my sister is dearest to me of all things.

the beach has been drawing me in, reminding me of the beauty of life and nature when i swim the the ocean's currents.  i have been writing a poem about it, and am working on a painting of a sunset over the ocean.  different beaches loll me in with their various personalities.  

but in each piece of ocean i feel the same freedom in the waves.  the feeling of laying on my back, supported by the ocean, slipping over the humps of waves is pure natural bliss.  the only thing possibly better is riding the waves on a reliable board, with the weight of the ocean behind you.

special thanks to 'carol' and the reverend cav for allowing me to escape to their beach.

and to you lovely readers, thank you for checking back.  i shan't leaving you hanging so again.  

& happy day of exploding stars

spinsley

The heart has no brains

I was gchatting with Belltower, a friend I have only seen in person twice, and the virtual conversation came to his romantic woes.  I have given my heart to a girl who lives far away, he lamentedly typed.  I told him the heart has no brains without immediately realizing its truth.  Maybe this is the theme of my (and millions others') romantic lives.  He told me to use it somewhere.  Mission accomplished.

Springtime is a funny time for the heart; it dusts of its winter icicles and frolicks with the warmth from the sun.  You get more hollers from passing cars, like you catch more teenagers making out in darkened corners: the sudden friskiness brought on by shrinking hemlines and the warm-kissed air.  It's the classic season of twitterpation, romantic feelings flinging in many or one direction, and it's lively for not only humans but animals too.  Everyone wants to get freaky in spring.  In the animal kingdom there usually isn't much complication.  Unfortunately, this is not true in the human existence.  We over-think our urges.  It can get so complicated, the heart with no brain and the brain trying to speak for the heart, which it does not understand well but, you know, it can speak a few words here and there and they can get by in simple conversation.

How many odes have been written to spring, to love.  There will never be enough.  It can inspire poetry like I hope the spinning Earth rains days of joy onto your gorgeous face.  (Thank you, Jude).  Part of me loves the awakening of spring, the recklessness of feeling and fleeting moments of romance.  The heart willy nilly does what it wants to do.  The brain too often suppresses this in attempt to protect the heart, from what the brain is scared of.  It remembers heartbreak, it is the center of fear, the brain is full of reasons why to hold back feeling.  But why all the secrecy?  I don't understand it because I have little filter.  I often let my heart rule and people get startled by its openness.  My heart struggles to remain innocent.

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs sing, 

there is no 

modern romance.

And a part of me believes it's true.  But the rest of me closes its eyes and believes there can be.

With Love & Happiness,

SpinsCycle

before and after: grammar post-eec

even though i am in love with language, i do not always adhere to the laws of grammar.  like the life of christ was enough to change our western timeline, separating b.c. from a.d. ...

we are now living in a post- e.e. cummings world.

the rules have been bent unforgettably.  the direction of poetry has been altered forever.

i took one grammar course in college.  the professor of the class's greatest joy was that he was once in a jeopardy! question.  he once said something that stuck with me more than any of the 5,000 sentence trees we did.  he said the point of language was to communicate, and if the other person knows what you mean: what you're really trying to say, then you were successful in communication.  whether or not you say it "in correct grammar."

however you will rarely see me abuse this privilege of grammatical freedom.  i just live in a post-eec world.

know what i sayin'?

spinsley

I Vow to Never Leave You at HeartBreak Hotel

In honor of a wedding I will be attending today, I am posting my friend Ben's Vegas wedding video.  If you ever need a cheer up, this video is Internet Prozac.  

I love the spontaneous dance party, and the vows are classic.  Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fb7Q_tF15DM&fmt=18

no sleep for the sort of weary

oh i cannot sleep, my brain feels awake.  it is 12:30 a.m., and i'm tired, but if i lay in my bed i'll just toss and turn so i'll wait until my eyelids are drooping and hope for a nice slip into sleep.  

i tried watching kung faux vol.3 to no avail, and i was quite looking forward to watching it.  classic fung foo overlapped with gangsta speak.  i got it off a dude i know who is into ninjas too: a terrible burned copy that neither my vcr/dvd player nor my laptop computer would play.  both spit it out.  perhaps they have been spoiled by the real thing.  they just can't go back.

so tonight i sit in pajamas, listening to a new cd and flipping through flipping through my new-to-me book: TRIBUTE TO RELIGION.  [filled with pages of photos of the grand architectural works of man inspired by god(s).].  

are you a curious person like me?  

do you want to know what i'm listening to?  because i'll tell you, it's fucking great.  it's my first listen to a cd called since we last spoke by rjd2.  my friend auddy left it at my place after we attempted to go to a love language show over the weekend.  we missed the show because we got caught up in talking, catching up with her felt so real.  we understand each other, it's so special when you just get someone.  and happy ending alert i saw the band later that night, and they rocked it.

do you want to know more about the book?  i got it downtown, at a used book store that changed hands and reinvented itself.  it is no longer the musty old chaotic bookery, unvacuumed and slumming, owned by a very flirtacious old man who would give change from his wallet.  it is now bright and organized and monitored by hanging mirrors to a thousand unseen big brothers or perhaps just passers by.  while we stood in line a man in front of us spoke in the most beautiful accent.  a new friend leaned over, put her hand to her mouth, and low-spoke-whispered, i don't care what he says i just want him to keep talking.  i nodded slowly, not at all minding the conversation holding up the distracted book keeper.silently tapping.with his. beat.  we just listened to the rhythm and the soft twang of his words- swooning inside the room of the [less] dusty shelves and shelves of books.  

i left with evidence of what humans can do with inspiration.  the book notes 8 world religious architectures, all reaching up towards the heavens, trying to connect with a powerful deity: creators and sustainers, some blood-thirsty and angry, some all too human.  our ancestors tried to stretch as far up as they could like an outstretched arm, asking god to be near.  cathedral of san marco, venice.  notre dame, paris.  old-new synagogue, prague.  melk monastery, austria.  cologne cathedral, west germany.  hagia sophia, istanbul.  cuzco cathedral, peru.  angkor wat, cambodia.  i was surprised to see that i had been to the first three on this list.  looking at the pictures is so different from being there.  to stand beside it and feel the full scale of it all is irreplaceable.  i immediately decide i'm going to see as many places in this book as possible.  my next is angkor wat, i've been wanting to see this place for some time, and it is in the region of the world i want to visit next: the far east.

these talks of dreams are awakening my senses, and now i feel more awake than before.  the album has played a second time through.  

i remember how forty eight hours ago i was on a boat, dancing with friends, gliding on smooth water, dreaming of summer, hip hop hopping through our hips.  this was highlight two of the weekend, made better by the disorder of the surrounding night.  the energy was strange, a goodbye party and a birthday party, colliding emotions coming out sideways.  i was so glad for the simplicity of the moment, smiles, music, loud talking against the dark night, our boat the only thing cutting the stillness of the water, deep and dark, and still on the surface.

tonight it was back to business fine combing the obituary.  tomorrow i am meeting with a friend of superfred's to plan "his celebration of life."  this weekend: a wedding, next week: a funeral.  a scale equal on both sides.

rubber soul has been playing in my background, and my eyes finally tire.  they must break from the screen for

glorious sleep is near.

goodnight, bear

spinsley

Night o TeleVision

giggles is what i'm after. some good old fashioned brainwashing.

i had a bad date tonight.  one of the worst i've been on, the boy literally gave me a panic attack.  i had him take me home.  the pseudo-end of this story is i feel better alone.

so i took comfort in the office.  solece in 30 rock.  many laughs were expelled from me.  

then i watched jay leno.  i don't normally watch jay leno, and tonight he reminded me why.  to be honest i was surprised he didn't whip out his member right there and stroke it for the camera.  he hates women if they aren't sexualized.  it's evident by guests like the rock and some other dude.  (he did have a sultry young woman sing the blues for his musical guest, which goes with the generic  profile).  his jokes reflect how much of a man's man he is.  which is fine for him, but i don't relate.  bad women drivers, retarded 911 calls & police cam videos, a comic making fun of fat people on airplanes, blah blah blah.  it isn't that relevant, and it isn't charming.  i am a stranger to it.

and then jimmy fallon came on.  and get this: THE ROOTS is his band.  THE ROOTS: fucking score, jimmy fallon!  [i want to go on and on about the fact he features THE ROOTS on his show].  every one of his shows THE ROOTS will be jamming their little hearts out and i just have to say god bless you jimmy fallon and welcome to the charmed life.  [okay, for your: the beloved reader's sake, i'll move on].  fallon had some great guests and his little videos are funny and have great potential to the strongest part of his show.  his monologue was a little lame and  if that's reflective of his standard i would cut that traditional element of the show.  hear me, jimmy fallon?     hahahaha [jimmy fallon: yeah spins right on it].  

i will watch this show again if only to see THE ROOTS jam out.

i normally like watching movies in my bored down time.  but when i'm upset, i watch television, it calms me down like nothing else can.  when i'm sick, i watch romantic comedies.  (i am not proud of this).  we americans love our color boxes.

give me conan o'brien!  give me jon stewart!  give me stephen colbert!, and i shall be happy.

oh man, carson daly is coming on, i probably shouldn't waste any more time.  i have a super nintendo system to set up.  it's mine from third grade.  i had lost the power chord and a friend after finding this out, whipped out his magic iphone and went to ebay land proclaiming soonafter done! and a week later he's handing it to me.  the moment of truth is near, i can't wait to see if it works!  i don't plan on playing it tonight because i've had enough of staring at screens.  but i have to test it out!

i accidentally watched some of carson daly as i wrote that.  right now, korean doctor-comic "ken" is on who's actually kind of hilarious.  which is a nice contrast from carson daly.  oooo i'm fiesty tonight.  he's leaving so i'm shutting it off.  and signing off.

so dear reader, thanks for watching my brain empty.

spinsabelle**

(*variation attributed to Alain)