L: Lighten the air around me

I remember when I was about 9 years old. I didn't know much about anything really. My brothers and I had a family friend, one of those friends who is really just your parents' friends' son and you have to hang out with and you think "okay he's my friend." He was over for the night and around midnight we were watching MuchMusic. That was when the Smashing Pumpkins' music video for "Tonight, Tonight."

At the time, what I had known of the group was that they seemed to be a hard rock group like Nirvana. Their previous singles, which I might or might not have heard at the time, "Zero" and "Bullet with Butterfly Wings" bore this out. But it seemed as though they were somehow softening their sound, changing who they were. I liked hard rock, but I was a little in awe.

Now, time has gone by and I know a great deal more than I did then, but it's still a beautiful song. I haven't listened to a lot of recent music but it seems as though many modern bands owe their sound to the work of the Pumpkins, particularly on the "Mellon Collie" album. There's something so simple and sublime about the longing in the composition of that song, and the nostolgia in "1979" and the ominous fire in "Bullet with Butterfly Wings." And yet now, with our modern, or post-modern attitudes toward things, the insistence of being smarter, or at least trying to be smarter, prevails and suggests that it may never reach that place again. Or maybe I'm reaching.

Not that I have a particular attachment to the Pumpkins. They have those good songs but for some reason I'm not compelled to go back and learn more. Then again, Billy Corgan and some of the original members have reunited under that name, so maybe they remain relevant. I know my cousin was a huge fan.

I woke up this morning around 10:20. I had at one point intended to sleep in, but later decided to set my alarm (as is usual) because I arranged to meet Amanda J. at the mall on her day off today. So I went to bed and then woke up to the sound of no alarm. There must've been a power-outage early that morning since the clock was blinking. I had just enough time to shower and get to the mall for the agreed-upon time.

We went along like we always do, having coffee and talking about nothing of grave importance. She kvetched about her work, and I indulged her. I talked about the previous night, how great it was to see people and to be back grounded in soem form of reality, if even as briefly as this. We get along. She went shopping around and I followed along, making my usual wisecracks.

Eventually of course I had to get home because I knew Xena would be waiting for me to tend to her every whim. The ole girl is used to having a sweet old lady around all the time to care for her, and I am not that. I'm just the dude that lady pays to make sure the dog stays healthy.

I've been revisiting some ideas, revising some things I've already done, re-arranging... been thinking about Melancholy Catatonia a lot lately. The thing about that is, there is so much of it already written but the root of the problem I'm having with it is so deep that the volume of what needs to be re-written is severe, whether for plot's sake or style, or both. But beyond that, I'm doubling back on the concept of the prologue of Curiosities. Not that I honestly think anyone will want to publish it one way or the other, but I've got to get this written for my own sake. And if I'm lucky, someone will be interested in publishing it.

Kind of a big "if," I figure.

I haven't really got a thought to go out on. I wish I did. Okay, here's one.

My current MSN status is "Instead of dying, they go to Australia // She took off her gas mask and kissed me goodbye." The first half of this comment concerns an old X-Men storyline, where the world thought they were dead, but they were really just in the Australian outback hanging out for some reaosn. I joked that that's more or less the same thing. The second half is about something I saw last month while I was biking (back when my bike had tires - mwerf!) I rode past a woman who was wearing one of those surgical/SARS masks and I thought about a tragic goodbye kiss with such a woman.

I owe the world something. Let's get some good vibrations out there. I'm feelin' okay tonight.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto