rock over London. rock on, Chicago.

there’s a really interestng article about the Kansas GOP’s civil war in the Washington Post. apparently, moderate Republicans and their far-right, righteous cousins in the conservative wing of the party are having a nice, calm debate. the topic: should we push farther to the right, even after voters clearly repudiated the party in the polls? apparently, they think they should. fuck Jefferson County. Phil Kline for president, man.

I went down to Mexicali last night with the roommate after work. he asked me about halfway through my shift if I wanted to go, and I was down. when I got home, he was already a couple beers into the evening, which is a lot for him. he’s a lightweight. and he doesn’t seem to recognize that.
either way, last night ended up pretty lame, as I had to stay sober for his sake. he’s a creepy, irritating drunk (for example, he’s said “slit your throat” on a few separate evenings now). and it’s getting fucking old.

so I guess today is Day 01 After Hussein. heh.
anybody see the video yet? the full one? the grainy, cell-phone camera one?
well, get the popcorn and lube. welcome to the internet generation.
it’s basically a snuff film, and I think it raises a lot of questions. here’s a couple.
why did all of his handlers look like fucking mafioso? everyone’s wearing leather jackets.
why did it look like it was done in someone’s basement? this was a state execution, so why were there a bunch of onlookers yelling at each other? where was the formality?
I’m asking, becasue if you take out the hanging and have everyone speak in spanish, this might as well have been a fucking cockfight.
also, if this was some Iraqi government affair, why did some asshole pledge allegiance to Muqtada al-Sadr, the portly cleric who heads a massive, heavily armed militia?
I don’t know. I don’t know why I’m being picky, or critical. but this entire thing looked bush league, and it makes the US, by default, look like a bunch of assholes.
the death penalty gets me moving.
I’ll say again. beyond the victim’s relief, there’s no argument for capital punishment. you could say it’s too expensive to imprison someone for a lifetime, but that’s debatable. and neither argument is acceptable, anyway. I gotta be honest, fuck the victims. of course they want him dead. but they probably wanted to rip his balls off and set rabid wolverines on him, too. but the Iraqi courts didn’t allow that to happen. I mean, come on. that would be inhumane!
I’m not saying let him go. I’m saying they should have locked his ass in prison and moved on. it’s a copout to say he was the worst of the worst, because that’s not true. it’s not like he was the only asshole in the last 50 years. I mean, check out my boy. this guy met with Rice a few months ago, for fuck’s sake.
and, this point has been beaten into the ground by college-age pseudo-intellectual hippies about a million times now, but all of those weapons he used on the Kurds? all of those brutal crackdowns? done, with American blessings, as long as he kept the bloodthirsty Persian occupied. so please. enough with all of the selfrighteous “he had it coming” talk. he was a prick, and he had it coming. but so do a lot of other people, and a lot of them will never get it.

so somebody. please tell me why this was a good idea. come on. I know one of you fuckin’ scabs thinks its alright.

Pat Riley is throwing a tantrum because he can’t handle how real Kirk Heinrich is.

I bought “Harvest” yesterday.
I went to the record store looking for “Honky Chateau,” but ended up with Neil Young instead. I’ve never really listened to this album before, but it’s pretty slick. “out on the weekend” or, you know, “harvest,” are the best tracks, I think.

Gerald Ford died.
well, what a fuckin’ coincidence that is. I was just about to write about what an interesting conundrum Oliver Sipple presents to journalistic integrity.
well, apparently, it doesn’t matter if you’re at odds with your sexuality if your queer ass will sell newspapers. and also, it appears Harvey Milk wasn’t gay Jesus. man, fucking everybody did wrong by this guy.
even Gerald Ford.
but enough about Oliver Sipple. let’s get back to Gerald Ford. the only president in the nation’s history who wasn’t elected.
you know, nothing really momentous happened under his administration besides the Nixon pardon. but apparently, that’s all anyone ever wanted … I mean the calm, not the pardon. no one wanted the pardon.
but seriously, after Nixon basically acted like a fucking mafia boss in the Oval Office, calm, boring, Neanderthalesque Gerald Ford took the reigns. nothing flashy. nothing exciting. just a steady, soothing calm. which, in the mid 1970s, I’d imagine the nation needed.
I wasn’t alive, so, you know, I can’t really have my pulse or draw from my own experiences, but that sounds about right.

I lost my copy of “Dracula.” I think I left the fucker at the laundromat, so I’m going to go over there and ask around. but that’s assuming that they speak english (they won’t) and that the book was turned in to the attendant (it probably wasn’t).
son of a bitch, I was two hundred pages into that book. I’m not going to lie and say I was in love – Stoker’s voice almost reminds me of Jon Lovitz hosting “Tales of Ribaldry” on SNL – but it was an interesting story, and it was actually beginning to go somewhere.
so instead, I’ve got two other books to start cracking: “Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72″ by none other (props, Mike) and Solzhenitsyn’s “The Gulag Archipelago.” that should take me about six months, so I’m all tied up. again.

also. I bought a plane ticket for Orthodox Christmas.
the word is out.
I was about to buy the ticket, and I called home. Mar told me to think on it before I bought it.
so I called Mike. he said there’s nothing wrong with going home. just think on it.
so I said “fuck it,” and called mom. and she immediately had that concerned voice.
“I don’t know, Matt. it’s an awful lot of money.”
then I explained to her that it was because I won my fantasy football league that I was considering it.
and then I felt guilty about going home, like I’m tapping out, and kind of embarrassed
…
good god fuck. why am I reading so much into this? I’m going back for three days. it’s not a big deal.

I normally go to this bar downtown, kind of a dive, for lunch. the Owl. it’s got a lunch counter.
the woman who works the counter at the Owl now recognizes me.
the woman who works the counter at the Owl knows I get the cheeseburger and fries and a Pepsi.
“you get de chee burger, yes? wit de Pepsi?”
that means that I’ve fallen into a lunch rut. but still, the woman who works the counter at the Owl rules.

that’s a snazzy little layout, if I do say so myself.
lord knows how I did it…
I have a digital camera. which means I document the most asinine shit you can imagine, like the multiple stages of giving myself a haircut.
I should have stuck with the mohawk.

I made rum balls tonight.
they need to be chilled overnight once you put them on a tray, so I’m not sure how they’re going to come out; I imagine poorly. but that didn’t stop me from getting rum drunk and smashing vanilla wafers with a beer bottle in a futile attempt to make holiday treats. consequentially, I’m loaded and sleepy.

however.
it has come to my attention that my blog is going all “Livejournal.”
first I’d like to point out that I beat Mar to the punch (get fucked, Mar).
secondly, if anyone’s going to criticize the blog, it’s going to be Mar; the only day-in-and-out faihthful reader amongst you legions of scummy little trolls.
and lastly, in an attempt to appease the angry Mar god, I offer this.
civil war in Africa! hard news! in a country that you last thought about when Ridley Scott made an overcelebrated war movie based in its capital!

tomorrow’s Christmas Eve.
who would’ve thought?

vegetarian lasagna
1 medium eggplant, fresh
1 pkg. frozen spinach
1 pkg. lasagna noodles
1 pkg. (pint, sm. one) low-fat cottage cheese
1 jar favorite meatless sauce
1 sm. pkg. Mozzarella lite cheese
salt and pepper
several plump tomatoes
parsley flakes

Defrost spinach, drain as much water out with a colander as possible. Cut eggplant in rounds thinly sliced, lay on paper towels and lightly salt, lay another paper towel on top and continue layering with eggplant rounds, salt, paper towel etc. Place a heavy pan on a cookie sheet on top of stack, let sit for at least 1/2 hour to 2 hours. Cook lasagna noodles until tender. Mix cottage cheese with spinach in a bowl, salt and pepper and season to taste. In a casserole pan, spread a light layer of sauce. Add layer of noodles, layer of eggplant, sauce, layer of cottage cheese, spinach mix, another layer of noodles and repeat process until pan is full or desired height achieved. Top with remaining Mozzarella cheese, tomato sauce and cover evenly with thinly sliced peeled tomatoes. Sprinkle on parsley flakes.
Bake at 350 degrees for 45 to 60 minutes, until eggplant is soft and has changed a brown color.

rum ballz
2 boxes (12 oz ea.) vanilla wafers, crushed
2 cups chopped pecans or walnuts
½ cup unsweetened cocoa
2 cups confectioner’s sugar
2/3 cup light or dark rum
2 cups light or dark corn syrup
8 oz. container diced dried citrus fruits (optional)
shredded coconut or jimmies for coating

Stir vanilla wafer crumbs, nuts, confectioner’s sugar and unsweetened cocoa. Stir in light or dark rum, corn syrup and citrons (optional) until well blended. Shape into 1 inch balls.
Roll in either coconut or jimmies.
Makes approximately 9 dozen.

I’m totally going to, you know, post pics.

I listened to “No Code” about a dozen times at work tonight.
I will spare this journal the lyrics to “present tense.” because, you know, no one else has ever gotten anything intensely personal out of a Pearl Jam song, and I want to play this coy.

I watched “Little Miss Sunshine” just now. the fact that the plot had a half a dozen paper-thin moments was overshadowed by the wonderful performances turned in by the cast. also, it would be entirely impossible to imagine either of my grandfathers snorting heroin.
well, maybe Grandpa Leo. I guess.

so this is it. holiday weekend, and I’m working through it.
it’s not so bad right now. I live a pretty straightforward existence out here as is. I get up, go to work, go to lunch, go back to work, eat a taco, drink a beer, go to sleep. as such, I’m out of shape.
but none of that has really changed. half of the neighborhood has hung Christmas lights on their apartment buildings, but it’s almost easy to forget that it’s the holidays.
I’ve got nothing going on. I don’t see anyone anyway. I don’t have a tree in my apartment (they’re a little hard to get a hold of in the desert, anyhow). so while I’m missing it, it’s not slapping me in the face. I don’t really like it here, and that’s not new, so I don’t feel especially horrible right now. we’ll see in a day or two, though.
I’m going to try and make lasagna, because irregardless of how little I do it I actually enjoy cooking, and it’s not like I’m going to be able to go buy anything to eat anyway. everyone here’s Catholic. no one’s doing shit on Christmas. so why not try my hand at burning an Italian casserole?
I got a text message from Mar and presumably Mike tonight. “Capitalism sucks, don’t it?” cause I’m at work.
yeah.
I know what both of you’re thinking. you’re thinking I’m sitting here miserable, complaining and moaning about how bad I’ve got it. I’m sitting here, stewing in my own pessimism.
not exactly. but the idea of you both thinking that and considering me so predictable pisses me off. and the fact that it’s pissing me off pisses me off moreso. because, alas, I am often so predictable.

this, all of this here, it isn’t so bad. I know this.

I’m trying, god damn it. I’m trying real hard.

this is Mar, mom, and mom’s perm.

this is “industrial office worker Mar.”

this is mom with some of her charges. she teaches special education at an elementary school.

I work tonight.
and so begins the long, hard road through Christmas. I’m sure I’ll have all sorts of things to talk about later.

Virgil Goode. congressman. patriot. American.

also: huge dick Rich Lowry acquiesces painfully, slowly.
that, after saying this last year.