Pete Holmes Silly Silly Fun Boy

 q-tips bit: delightful. wonderful

shoes off bit: divided the room and divided me. I like how he had fun with it but didn't land with me. I think you should take your shoes off. The ending was strong though. Gotta give him that.

"I ate ants. The insects. Not lady-uncles."

scorpion bit: 

"I can't have my last meal be ants!"

13th floor: Not my favorite. I thought the scorpion bit was still going.

phone bit: meh

office bit: OOO was funny

I'm pretty sure he did the dad phone bit when Crab and I saw him live.

Boston bit: good story. I like the Boston fantasy accent

Parent bit: I liked it. funny voice. 

Carousel bit: funny

Last words: IT SHOULD BE YOU!

"I kept yelling I'm okay but no one was checking."

closer: fun and sweet in a Pete Holmes way

Overall: I liked it! Very well put together. He's good at what he does.

if I was a god

 Me, personally, if I was a god...I would think it's really fun when people try to tempt fate by invoking my name. I would find that humorous. And then yeah maybe if I was in a bad mood one time I would make it come true. Just to let em know. Just to keep them on their toes. But usually I would ignore it and just laugh. 

And so I think you should tempt fate. That's cosmically funny. 

I still need to watch the Pete Holmes special crab recommended

 I still need to watch it. I will. I will watch it. Tomorrow actually. And I will post my thoughts. Here!

And! I'll say this.

What if every night before you went to sleep, like your last moment of consciousness every time, without fail, a little bug would appear in your mind's eye and say 'ben'. And you would call it the Ben Bug. Every time. But only at night, when you're actually going to bed to sleep. Not for a nap. And if you wake up early it doesn't happen again. And sometimes if you're hovering between awake and sleep it can glitch and you'll get this extended 'beeeeeeeeennnnnnnnnnn'. Would your life be different in any meaningful way if that was true? For you only? 

I've got an idea for a restaurant

 It'll serve food. And the whole gimmick is that we say "We can eat as much or little as you want!"

And all the portions will be regular portions. It's a regular restaurant in every way. But all the marketing is about how much choice you have.

"You can eat the whole plateaor just eat a couple bites!"

"If your first order isn't filling enough you can order more food and we'll give it you!"

"Heck, you can eat none of your first order and we'll still make you a second order."

We just really want people to appreciate how much freedom they have at this restaurant. We don't make you eat food you don't want to eat that you pay for. 

And we also don't tell you what order to eat it in. Guess what! You can drink as much or as little of your drink as you want too!

Your choices matter. And we will do everything to not get in the way of those choices.

scene

 The stage is totally dark. The house lights are off. The room is totally dark. The light outside and the neon sign is off. The night is totally dark. The moon is out. The stars are out. 

Not "out" in the sense that they're visible but "out" in the sense that you can't see them. Keep up.

The space behind your eyes is dark. Your guts are all completely dark. All you've ever known and come to expect is dark. Your future is dark. Your past is dark. The present? Also dark. Stay with me.

The owl hoots darkly. The frog peeps darkly. The dog howls darkly. The puddle sloshes darkly.

As dark as the inside of your shoe. As dark as the oven when it's off and closed in a dark kitchen with no lightbulbs in it. A clear window pane above the sink that separates darkness from darkness. 

Will there be a spark? Will there be a flicker?

The show begins in the dark. The show ends in the dark. Somewhere in the middle it was supposed to happen. Afterwards people are sure they saw it. Or, they're sure they saw it at least one time. Or, they're sure that they know someone who is sure that they saw it a long time ago. They're sure of it. It's definitely happened. Why would we all gather and hope and cheer if it never actually happened? Why would it all be set up this way if it never actually happened even once?

I was sick on Sunday and monday

 

Depending on whether you look out of the South or North windows in my apartment you either see trees or a dystopian landscape of buildings and roads and concrete plants. 

So the other day when I startled out of a restless 30 minute congested 'nap' at 4 in the morning and saw nothing but bleak concrete and steel I thought, 'I give up. I just give up.'

But then I looked out of other windows and I un-gave up. It's really just one specific angle you have to look out of to lose all hope. As long as you can avoid that you're okay.

 where my mind goes when I think about wanting to write. Remembering watching rented VHS movies that we would get on the way to Timberville. Still seeing the building on the side of the road on Route 42. Remembering the glow of the lamps and the static fuzz of the TV and feeling safe and warm. Remembering eating corn on the cob under the big tree in the green backyard. Asking, 'did I eat all of it?' and Maw Maw saying, 'a bird could clean the corn better than that.' Remembering the smell of the firewood in the basement and the heat of the furnace in the dark corner. The treadmill and the rowing machine and being tall enough to pull the metal cord of the lightbulb. The weight of the door to the basement and the creaking of the steps. The tartness of the cherry trees and climbing on top of the new shed to left of the old metal shed. The smell of oil and gasoline and seeing spiders and wasps. The light coming through the grape vine and learning to throw a frisbee and how to hit a ball with a bat and running laps around the horse. The feeling of not wanting to leave on Sunday afternoon. The taste of ice water from the tap and the heavy blankets that I would always kick off in my sleep. Each memory is precious. Each is a step on the path I have taken. 

hyacinth

 I think words are like a costume. You say certain words because you want to appear a certain way to the people around you. You want to reinforce that image to them and maybe even yourself. I guess that's what affirmations are. 

Some words aren't for me. Some words aren't for me to use. No not that word. I mean words like hyacinth. 

Every once in a while in my life I've encountered people who are entitled to the word hyacinth. Usually women. A man who uses the word hyacinth is incredibly dangerous. I should clarify that I mean outside of its strict botanical meaning. I mean a man who uses hyacinth in a figurative sense or to evoke a specific image. 

Women who use hyacinth are usually well-read poetry types who probably had a few close friends growing up and had enough emotional intelligence to realize that other kids didn't like them or understand them but they themselves were okay with that and accepted it for what it is. 

Today my fake burger meat was like a pink puddle instead of the normal patty shape consistency but I ate it anyway and so far it seems like I got away with it.

my sister got the pharmacy residency she wanted!

 yay Erin! I'm so proud of her! She works so hard and is such a great person!!!

here's what happens to plastic bottle caps

 a plastic bottle cap is born when it is pooped out of a machine and then mechanically attached to plastic bottle. then it sits in a store for what feels like forever because a plastic bottle cap has no sense of time. but it's also no amount of time and also forever. Then the drink gets purchased by me Andy and I consume the liquid and turn it into me but get rid of most of it where it ends up in the water cycle and probably the carbon cycle a little bit too. And maybe the dirt cycle. Anyway I keep the bottle cap and put it in my junk drawer by my coffee machine to mature and gather energy.

Once it has sat long enough and the weather gets nice then I take it out of the drawer and use a sharpie to inscribe an ancient and future rune on it and put it in a bag with other bottle caps that have undergone a similar process.

Now that bag sits on my shelf until I decide to take it to the rock climbing gym where it sits in the setter's closet and gathers energy there. 

I know what you're thinking. How's he going to save the world? How will this save the world?

Guess what, idiot. The world doesn't need saving. Because the world is the world and can't be destroyed in any meaningful way. That's where the bottle caps come in. One bottle cap is special and will be cast forward into time where it will absorb energy from the sinister sun that will appear next to our regular sun out of nowhere ten thousand years in the future. The sinister sun can destroy the Earth in a meaningful way.

But because I've sent the bottle cap forward in time to absorb energy from the sinister sun, it can return back to the present and incubate inside the Earth like a vaccine. And the Earth will develop antibody bottle caps that will sprout out of trees when the sinister sun radiation hits. Those bottle caps will destroy the sinister sun and fulfill the prophecy.\

I don't really know though your guess is as good as mine.

thank you crab! I do help the children be in the sky!

For the past two weeks I've felt like I've been on the verge of getting sick but it never fully hit and today I feel like I'm out of it and more in my body and brain than I have been. So that's good.

good good good.

was coaching all weekend

 Definitely my proudest moment in coaching with the comp team. This feels like the first year where I really understood what the Regionals competitions test and was able to apply that directly to the training. The kids work so hard and care so much and they were able to do their best climbing on the day OR they've gotten so good that even having an "off" day still let them reach their goals.

It was a big moment and I think the team is only going to get better while staying true to having fun. 

a true mark of distinction

 is to wear socks adorned with the likenesses of animals upon them. For everywhere you tread you will signal to all with eyes to see that you are aligned with the beasts of the earth, and the flying things, and the critters of the deep.

I hate crowds. I like people.

I ain't down with the plague but I'm cool with the beetles and bugs.

-Jesse Welles 

here's my anti-infantilization message

let's stop acting like we can't believe it when one day it's hot and the next day it's snowing.

I know. It's a big change. It feels sudden.

But surely we can imagine more. Surely anyone over the age of 12 or so has seen enough weather changes in the Spring to know that this type of thing can and does happen.

Let's broaden our imagination a little bit to consider a world without cars perhaps. Or not paving over large swaths of land to create heat islands and useless stupid infrastructure. Or put plants on roofs and stuff. 

I don't want to keep playing the tutorial and level one every time. Let's get to level two. Maybe try out level three? I don't know. Could be fun.

crab likes the dwelling series!

 thank you, crab!

here's a little amateur zoology lesson for you all, crabs are natural dwellers.

Recently I have devised what I call the 'dwelling index' which is how far a given creature travels from its home. Crabs score very high on the dwelling index because my understanding of most crab species tells me that they like to lurk in a safe spot and then rush out when opportunity comes along. 

And that's the way to do it.

Liver propaganda would have you believe that if you want to achieve something you can't just expect it to show up on your doorstep one day.

Um, excuse me, livers. Millions of years of evolution would beg to disagree.

Look at the noble eel, for example.

How did this proud creature make it to the top of charts of the animal kingdom? How did this beautiful beast become nearly synonymous with the word animal itself? 

Oh I don't know---by hanging out in a rock until it seems something cool and then lunging out and biting it!

I feel you hearing but not listening. Let me show you a picture:

Ignore the words for right now. This is a picture of a pyramid. And everybody falls somewhere on the pyramid. A lot of people, because of delusions of grandeur think they're probably close to the CPR SCORE zone. Wrong! 

You, me, crab, and eels are all down by Gross Margins and SG&A. The eels know this. And that's why they stand to triumph over the Monthly Overheads who walk around thinking their CPR Scores in their empty chasm skulls. 

I want to be clear. I'm not saying you shouldn't strive to be the best version of yourself that you can be. You should always strive for personal excellence in what you do. That's the dwelling way. Hone your craft. I'm saying that all of history and mythology and storytelling tells that the CPR Score zone is the death zone. Look at this:

The Story of Icarus. The story of Prometheus. Any Shakespearean Tragedy. Any Greek Tragedy. Scarface. That weird little movie that Donald Glover made like 10 years ago where a bloody golden tooth comes out of his nose. It's not compatible with being a human. 

And then you say, 'well I think eels are gross and weird and I want to be a hero!' 

Not the perfect analogy but close enough.

I don't know I feel like I got too serious. I feel like a person who showed up at school one day and made a presentation you never really understood but kinda thought about for a long time after and the teachers were clearly upset because this isn't what they thought they were getting.

I fancy myself a golden buffoon

 buffoon comes from the medieval Latin word 'buffo' meaning clown. 

A clown is someone who seriously undertakes the act of being foolish. What better thing to set seriousness against than fun and silliness?

a continuation of my dwelling series

 hello welcome back to my series on dwelling where I talk about why you shouldn't be focused on living you should be focused on dwelling and what that means.

today's episode is about dwelling like you're from earth. The planet earth. You are the thing the planet earth made. Alan Watts talks about this. Like rocks and oceans and volcanoes and trees, humans are a thing the planet made. You should dwell like you are a part of the planet.

Don't be allergic to things. Whatever it is you're allergic to, stop it. What are you, an alien? What do you mean your immune system reacts to something that won't harm you. Cut that out. 

Touch dirt every day. What a gift to touch dirt. The dirt and the sky are the two most important things. 

Be thought of as a bum. Today the children I coach told me I look like I could be a hobo. I say, 'yes. this is a sign that I am dwelling correctly.' My appearance and the impression it makes matches my values. Do you think yourself stylish? Do you think yourself well put together? Then you are a slave to images and figments. Aim to appear in all ways to have risen up from the dirt with breath inspired.

When you say words, think of the earth as burping them. Because the earth delights in itself and so should you.

a toothsome meal

 Gosh em golly I could really go for a toothsome meal right now. A toothsome meal to replenish and strengthen my hamstrings for I yearn for powerful hamstrings. The time stealer has once again purloined an hour from the day and now my inside clock is jumbled and I long for a toothsome meal and might haunches. 

Yes yes. What a day to be alive. In the 16th century the word 'toothsome' changed from meaning generally attractive to tasty food.

And now it is time I go to purchase grocery store time. The time when I think about how growing up, I was always told by adults describing the past that 'there weren't grocery stores back then'. Which should say something about how much grocery stores have impacted our lives. In a good way? Who can say?!

But I must continue my journey to get powerful legs because in the words of Socrates, "Get jacked, bro."

Look it up. He really said that.

Not really. He met this guy once who was out of shape and was like, 'you should be in good physical condition so you can be useful in war. And also it's pretty neat.'

 One time I remember I was taking this Shakespeare class with my favorite professor I had in college and we were reading Othello and this guy Othello ends up lying to his wife, Desdemona, and his life kind of unravels from there. But I remember there was a specific point in the play that our professor pointed to that was the moment Othello distrusts his wife and he talked about all the implications of that moment. I ended up emailing the professor because I found an earlier example in the play, maybe the first moment Othello speaks to Desdemona, that he could be considered lying. 

And I gave him the example and he responded with something defending his point and the logic of it and I was like 'yeah okay you win.' But I'll never forget that I saw him in class and he asked about it and I said, 'yeah you made a good point.' and he said, 'you believed that?'

Something to that effect. It never occurred to me until that moment that I could've been right or that I could have challenged his response. 

The other thing I loved about that professor is he would give very short quizzes on tiny slips of paper about the assigned reading and he would ask about the tiniest, seemingly trivial, details. Stuff you would never think of as important. And then during the lecture he would show how these tiny details were actually crucial to the themes and messages of the work. I remember it was annoying at first but then I took it as a challenge. He also loved to talk about etymologies and ask about obscure words in the text. 

He was a cool guy. Professor Savage. One time a student used the word 'savage' and he immediately interrupted them and said, 'that's an unfortunate choice of words'. Like he was really hurt by hearing it used in its normal context. 

you're like an apartment with plants inside of it

 One way to approach being a human is thinking about yourself as an apartment with plants inside of it. 

The apartment is your outside body and the plants are your inside body aka your spirit, your soul, your internal experience, your organs, your innards, and your viscera.

Isn't it kinda crazy that there's a little electrical current or spark or whatever that keeps your heart pumping and makes your brain work. electricity?? in your body? how'd it get in there? how do we pass it on? Electricity comes from a wall outlet not from your body. 

Anyway you gotta arrange your plants to get the proper amount of sun. Too much sun, plants get sunburned and shrivel up. Too little sun, plants don't grow as good. 

Are your blinds shut? Has the roof of your apartment been torn off and is completely exposed to the elements? Have you completely blocked off all entrances and exits to your apartment so nothing can get in or out? Do you have the right kind of plants for growing indoors? And let's not even start with watering. 

Andy why do you think you make so many analogies to plants and why do plants play such a large role in externalizing your experience? 

You'd probably think it's because I take care of them and there's a clear relationship between what I do and how the plants are doing but you'd be wrong because that's not the reason. The reason I do it is because it's correct in an absolute Kantian sense. 

But don't you think self-help is a kind of bankrupt genre of writing that is trying to put a band-aid over atomization and the loss of community and shared cultural experience? It's just another example of putting risk and responsibility on the individual. In what world does it make sense that a person born into a world and community without their consent be judged insufficient and denied community and food and water?

Growing up this idea of personal responsibility was very important and I agree that it makes sense in a lot of ways but I have this memory of it being set against the idea of 'you can't just give people things without making them work for it or testing them some way.' Society is a pyramid and the people at the top are at the top because they're the best people. If you tried to make it a square or a rectangle or whatever it wouldn't work. And it's so blatant and undeniable now that the excesses we were warned about are all at the top. We didn't filter power and responsibility to the most deserving. The most powerful hoarded it all for themselves. None of this is new, obviously. I think part of me wanted to be in denial. 

One thing I'm trying to process is the difference between personal responsibility as it relates to being a productive part of a system that lets a complete idiot become the richest man in the world and personal responsibility that participates as much as needed to still have a life that is meaningful to me. 

I got called 'a shiny light of happiness' today at work

 And where I come from THAT'S PRETTY GOOD!

A favorite bit I like to do at coaching is saying 'that's pretty good where I come from!'

And they say 'where do you come from?'

And I say, 'Harrisonburg.'

Responding to Crab's Comments:

March 2nd: I can fix you. The blog can fix you.

February 26th: I'll check out Caligula's Horse, specifically In Contact!

February 23rd: This guy is still doing BAD.

February 23rd: I think they're cancelling taxes this year on account of the government actively casting off any possible credibility and legitimacy.

every season can be split into two distinct halves and the halfway point is a holiday

Winter: Early winter starts after Thanksgiving and is before Christmas and New Years. Late winter is after and runs until roughly St. Patrick's Day or Daylight Savings starting.

Spring is split by Easter and runs until Memorial Day.

Summer is split by July 4th and runs until Labor Day.

Fall is split by Halloween and runs until Thanksgiving.

For Summer and Winter, the early part is a fun time of transition and change. 

As I'm writing this I'm also realizing that the solstices and equinoxes also play similar roles to everything I'm describing but I would argue that those are slightly off and the real noticeable changes happen around the holidays. 

Late half of Summer and Winter is where they really go whole hog.

Is this anything? Season commentary? Talking bout how late summer feels? 

Here's my new idea. If you've stuck it out this far. 

Early Winter- everybody works. We've gotta get ready for the holidays. Commercial activity has to take place. Whatever we can get done from Thanksgiving to New Year's. That's working time.

Late Winter- No working. Work shuts down. It's too cold. The days are too short. You have to rest and recover and sleep.

Early Spring- No working. The weather is too fickle. You've gotta wake up slowly. Maybe a little bit of work. Maybe. 

Late Spring- Working. Nature is reviving. Blooming. The world is green again. Full of energy. The sun has returned. Time to be passionate and thriving.

Early Summer- No working. You've gotta have fun. If not now, when? When will you have fun? 

Late Summer- No working. It's too hot! Are you kidding? No way. Keep having fun. It's growing season.

Early Fall- Working. Harvest time. It's cooling down just a little bit so you can think again. Be productive.

Late Fall- You could make a strong argument for working here BUT you gotta remember that we already committed to working in early Winter and so if we work in Late Fall that's three working periods in a row and that's crazy. Maybe you can choose if you would prefer to work Late Fall or Early Winter but not both.

Anyway so that's my 8 blocks of the year: 3 of which include working and 5 of which don't. I think if we implemented this system everyone would be more meaningfully productive and happier and everyone but the bloodsucking demons would be better off.

today I learned about professional wrestler, Ryusuke Taguchi

 AKA Masked Horse

His origin story is that he was abandoned by his parents and raised by horses. Then, he was abandoned by those horses and raised by a professional wrestler.

And isn't that really the story of everyone's lives? At some point you move out and leave your parents and work and/or live for some thing and then eventually you have to leave that thing and be with some other third thing. 

Baker Mosquito: guy who was taken in by mosquitoes and then abandoned and taken in by Baker mosquitoes.

Croc Fisher: Guy who was used as bait for gator fishing gets eaten by gator and ends up fishing for gator bait in gator's stomach.

Whale Salesman: Guy who sells whales ends up being sold to whales to sell guys to other whalesman.

Bird Porch: Guy builds a porch for birds on his regular porch but the birds build a bigger porch on the bird porch and rebrand his porch the man porch.

Italian Werewolf: Guy is bit by an Italian and cast out from society for his transformation and falls in with a werewolf commune who use him to help invade the were-italian base.

I met a woman today who was mad about the state of the world

 but she also wanted to be mad. she would've been mad no matter what state the world was in.

I am sometimes reminded by the world that you can never go 'full bitter'.