Josh used to play bass with my boyfriend and me. Now he plays keyboards in Waterlaso. I took this photo in an apartment building on Hollywood Bl that was once owned by Peter Falk. While Steven and I were living there, we spotted Ron Jeremy in the building several times. He didn't live there, but at least one time, he was clearly there filming a porn movie. He was in the lobby coercing some poor woman who kept saying 'I don't want to do that with that guy here'.
So, as much as I enjoy the idea of keeping an invented person's blog in my link list, we all know the JT LeRoy thing is way played out, and sadly, 'his' truly insane blog hasn't been updated in forever. Time to scratch it from my sidebar, but I definitely encourage everyone to read that thing while it's still online. Choice quote: 'dude, you DO not even compete with this ape.' Ref to? Peter Jackson's King Kong movie. 'I saw King Kong and it just hammered me.' Aw.
So yeah, today I added Ollie's blog/journal to the sidebar as the link Commonpeople. I met Ollie on Livejournal and happened to notice his blog because he had especially pretty drawings of Morrissey and Egon Schiele as his avatars. Far and away, he's got one of the best blogs on the web. He lives in London and writes about things like the Hampton Court maze, the current performance of John Cage's Longplayer, and one memory for each country he's lived in. He also writes a lot about theatre, TV, film, and his boyfriend Kevin. Fantastic shit. Check him out.
Incidentally, since I've never introduced the other fine kids in my sidebar, this is probably a good time to do it. Ship Erect [livejournal rss feed shiperect] is my boyfriend Steven's blog. Epicly Later'd is Patrick O'Dell's photo journal, one of the prettiest sites on the web. I met Patrick at a Morrissey concert in Oklahoma, and we both live in New York City. And Dennis Cooper's belongs to the esteemed American writer of the same name. He and I grew up in the same part of L.A., at different times. We've never met in person. He lives in Paris.
- edit: whoa, not five minutes after i changed the link list, i came across this AP story ['Writer behind JT LeRoy comes clean']. weird. synchronous.
The most fascinating thing maybe about Matthew Barney is this tremendous feedback from people who've actually known him that he could be doing something 'even better' if he had any 'real competition'. My god. Like what?
Somebody needs to engage him. He was originally in wrestling, a competitive sport. Please, bring on the Art Fight.
wanted for immediate viewing: Matthew Barney's med school personal statement.
Your time on... something. What to expect: anything visually rich. Struggling with academics? Your time is too important. Texts. If you've read A, same problems. In other real OO design principles... most importantly, on your team.
Singleton isn't as simple as a brain, in a way that sticks. A book? You want the latest research
learned by those (and impress cocktail party guests) who support your own code. This will load patterns into your sounds, how the Factory designs problems, and better science. Learning theory? Look 'in the wild'.
You want to learn about a design paddle pattern.
You want to learn to know how they, Head First Design Patterns...
You want to learn the more complex. You want in a way that makes you alone.
At any given moment, so that you can spend: an adapter. With Head First, own your co-worker's brain- in a way that sticks! As for the experiences of others: Head First Book. You know you also want to learn about patterns with others (and impress cocktail party guests). So often this wish is misunderstood. With Head First Book, you know them to work immediately. Also want to learn why he casually mentions 'real OO design principles'?
So you look to Design in a way that makes you up a creek without.
The next time you deeply understand what to do instead.
You want real OO design principles in their native design patterns. You'll avoid worse. Most importantly, you will use the Java API (and impress cocktail party guests) (or worse, a flat tire).
About inheritance you might have: you know you don't want something somewhere in the world. You want to learn alone. At any given moment, work immediately.
Words, in the real world (and impress cocktail party guests), will load patterns into your stunningly clever use of Command. In their native look; 'in the wild'.
You want in a way that lets you put problems elsewhere.
Something more? You'll easily counter with your learning. Singleton isn't as simple (and too short). Spend and experience: others.
Your boss told you about the stuggles with the academic format designed for the way. This is more complex, like the Trading Spaces show. A book? You want design problems used in the Java API brain- in a way that makes you have.
You know the next time... well, someone who struggles is so often misunderstood. When to use them? How to use them? And what environment?
In other want: to see how.
In between sips of a martini, design problems and better advantages can hold you up a creek without. Decorator is something from.
--
i'm not impressed by the title, although if i get to personally 'propose a title', i like Up a Creek Without, or You Want in a Way that Makes You Alone.
the piece came to one of my work-related email addresses, unedited and a little bit more nonsensesque. i fixed the punctuation and reformatted it and such. i didn't add any ideas to it. the ellipses don't indicate parts that i left out [nor were the ellipses in the original text]; they're just there to lend structure.
obviously, it's just spam, presumably drawn from 1-3 preexisting pieces [among them, an ad for a book by one of Singleton's competitors, whoever he is]. but shit this thing fusses me to the extreme. i know it's always, 'always already' too late but
When I purchased it online, I didn't get to see the cover art. Whoa. I'm hoping for something along the lines of Transformer by Victor Bockris. This looks awesome.
In the first place, I'm writing this without the magazines at hand. I'm in a room where musical instruments are scattered upside-down, empty glass bottles crowd every surface, and a busted trampoline faces me directly: my view. Not exactly how I planned it but at least Storz+Bickel are present.
I encountered this girl in the apparently final print issue [2001] of Propaganda Magazine, an enterprise of Fred H Berger, a dude whose cultural role I have never quite gleaned. He takes photographs [which are pretty good]; reviews minor music releases. For a time, I guess, he was behind a print magazine called Propaganda. I always find that the most unexpected people know Propaganda Magazine, so if you know it, you know it. If not;
Early issues were goth-oriented and 2 steps above Xerox. As years passed, it grew into a reasonably glossy... 'scene magazine'? 'Fictional photoessay' magazine? Basically, these really hot, androgynous boys and girls would pose for clearly made-up Life Magazine-type photojournalism pieces. Or would you call the pieces porn? The narratives were similar. The pictures were generally sexual, but didn't have nudity.
For example, in the photographs below, The Girl, dyed blonde in black leather looking like a boy, is acting the part of 'Dmitri', a Russian street hustler. Dmitri's words are briefly quoted; he mentions his girlfriend 'Zosia' [the other girl below]. He actually says 'I'm not a faggot' with reference to his invented profession, and this gets a block quote. Seriously... at whom was this magazine aimed?
So yeah: The Girl. I don't know her name. My feelings for her are singular... unlike, unlike, unlike...
One time I tried to explain it by saying I didn't know whether I wanted to fuck her or to be her. It wasn't a flippant expression; it was an honest attempt to reduce the conflict, to aim it at a 'central tension', chill the situation out. I asked other people, who is it for you? You can't decide whether you'd prefer to be or fuck who? And I mean really, like if you actually gave it a lot of thought?
I got gorgeous answers: Egon Schiele, Kim Gordon, Morrissey. But I realized that my friends played the game differently. To the names that attracted them, enormous lives and myths were attached. No one proferred an anonymous photo and said, That One. Instead, they felt a pull, more or less, between Fucking That and Having That Career / Having Made That Art.
It's true that with the girl in the photos, I don't know if I'd rather fuck her or be her. I know that I'd say yes to either and both. The former, of course, is unremarkable: you can all see that she's boyishly cute, self-aware, and involved in some kind of weird art project. But as for being her, I don't know what her daily life is like now, or what it was ever like; I don't know where she lives; I fundamentally don't know what she does. Further, if I were to be her, it wouldn't be so that it was me in these photos in Propaganda Magazine. It's not that I wish I had been the one to make that art- art that's totally unobjectionable and quite sexy at turns, but not the sort that makes me jealous.
I guess I see: The Surface of The Girl. If she walked toward me, in a mirror or on the street, and said, Do You Want To Switch?... and she would become me and I'd become her and we'd walk away, each into a new life formerly belonging to the other... I Would Say Yes. No doubt, I would probably try to fuck her too. So basically this makes her... a point of entry? I see the other side already.
Some people want themselves. Some people want you. Some people want boys or girls coaxed halfway into existence; some people want light; and some people want the whip. Me;
Today I had the shitgiggles-deskdance honor of having a piece of writing posted on the Great Dennis Cooper's blog. Dennis is hugely generous with that coveted space he captains, and he frequently allows his readers to 'curate'/write blog posts on specific topics- pieces that Dennis calls 'Days'. For example, Australian Music Day, Werner Herzog Day, and Derek Jarman Day have been some recent [and super] reader contributions.
So mine is called 'Fucking Poets: A Day for Research Chemicals'. It details the Research Chem phenomenon from roughly 1999-2004. If you don't know what Research Chemicals are, they're a subset of 'designer drugs'. They're not particularly chemically related as a whole, but they're grouped together because they all enjoyed faddish internet popularity around the same time.
The idea of crafting a Day for Research Chemicals arose when I happened to mention, on Dennis' blog, that I took some 2ci at Matthew Barney's recent Drawing Restraint retrospective at SFMOMA [which, by the way, is where I first saw Barney's Hypertrophy, which, by the way, effectively shattered my brainscape with its genius sloganeering and absurdly sexual fascination with Harry Houdini- given, of course, the particular character of my brainscape at the moment I happened to walk near the wall where said piece was hanging].
So yeah: Dennis returned that he'd never heard of 2ci and asked for more information. Aside, perhaps, from 5-meo-dmt and 2ct7, 2ci struck-and-strikes me as the most famous Research Chemical- at the very least, it's in the top 5. I thought hmm: if you don't know 2ci, I guess you probably don't know Research Chemicals? As any reader of his non- and fiction knows, Dennis Cooper is no stranger to obscure drugs or internet sensations, so I was surprised that the grand tale of Research Chemicals hadn't yet made its way to him. While the Research Chemical phenomenon has never been one of 'my stories', I was certainly there when everything happened; I feel like I remember the events with reasonable clarity; and, on several in-person occasions, I've done my best to explain the whole deal to flabbergasted strangers. Mostly while hosteling.
As I went about writing the Day, the appellation 'Research Chemical' grew rapidly comic, because I had a pisspants-difficult time conducting any real 'research'. There's Erowid.org [one of the Great websites, period, on any topic], Mdma.net, Bluelight.ru, Good Old Google, and, kinda, not much else. Naturally, 'trip reports'- accounts of what it's like to be on these drugs- abound. But I was trying to tell the story of an industry boom, the rapid expansion and subsequent contraction of a particular scene. About each individual substance involved, an entire book could be written to detail effects, dosages, common uses, locales of popularity, and so on.
To make a long story this: I did my best to read everything I could, but I largely wrote the Day from memory, and from some notes I took in the early 00s while the whole thing was on.
Thus this post. If I made errors, neglected interesting or important tidbits, or really whatever, here's a place to enlighten me and others. It's also a place for general discussion, q+a, speculations, attractive myths, really whatever; about the Research Chem boom, the drugs involved, related substances, Etc Etc Etc Nothing's Off Limits. So please: fire away. Like I said, 'trip reports' were basically outside the scope of the particular article I wrote, but if you'd like to leave a brief note or extended treatise regarding your personal experience[s] with these [or related] chemicals, I'd be honored to read whatever you have to say, not to mention very excited to engage with you.
Here's the Day at Dennis Cooper's. It's the same text. If you're reading the piece over at Dennis Cooper's, to continue the article after the first section, click the text in the 'Previous Posts' sidebar- 'So, somebody somewhere set up some labs?', then 'Rolling Stone published an article', and so on. [Dennis' readers obviously know how to navigate his blog already, but not everyone who surfs here reads Dennis' blog. I know, I know- too bad for them.]
If you're so inclined, you can also read some initial comments on Research Chem Day from Dennis Cooper's readers by navigating to the Previous Post beginning 'p.s. Jesus fucking christ, there's more than 140'. Needless to say!, however!, there's no prerequisite to read that before posting anything here.
- A: American 15-year-olds are worse at math, generally speaking, than their first-world peers. B: Overall math scores improve on an American standardized test, particularly among students in the 4th and 8th grades [~age 10, age 13; respectively]. C:Google: 'Poll Shows Math Most-Hated School Subject'. Google's link now dead; couldn't find another. D: On the SAT, America's most common university/college entrance exam, math scores reach a 36-year high. E: Compared to other first-world peers, Americans in the 4th and 8th grades are now doing a little better in math. Results in reading, however, when compared to international peers, are 'mixed'. F: George W Bush singles out math and science as 'economic tools'.
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points to Steven from Ship Erect for introducing me to Google Trends, which generates line graphs to represent various search terms' popularity, from 2004 to present. you can enter any combination of terms you want. i was hooked immediately. granted, that Google Earth stuff is pretty fun, but this is the shit!
as you can see, Google also gives contextual markers [the letters], but since they're represented by headlines on the actual Google Trends page, they're often baffling. not to say that's bad of course! we all love The Baffling. on Google, the markers for the graph above say things like 'A: Morrissey sparks Net furore' or 'C: Duran Duran bring back Save a Prayer' [accurate, i guess, but Duran Duran had been playing Save a Prayer a whole bunch around that time; it was nothing new at Live 8]. also, several of Google's letter-marker-explaining linx were dead, so i found new ones for these graph posts. they're too tempting not to make.
just like RJR-Nabisco, one day Google will have an addiction for everybody. not that i was looking for one, per se; oh who am i fucking kidding and so on.
why does the vertical axis lack any markings? i do not know.
2+2=5 by Radiohead Fretless by R.E.M. Rebel Rebel by David Bowie John, I'm Only Dancing by David Bowie If You Love a Woman by Dirty Pretty Things Say Hello, Wave Goodbye by Soft Cell Driving Your Girlfriend Home by Morrissey Handsome Devil by The Smiths Waiting for the Sirens' Call by New Order Some Kinda Love by The Velvet Underground Satellite of Love by Lou Reed There's No Other Way by Blur We Are the Pigs by Suede Brass in Pocket by The Pretenders Ever Fallen In Love? by The Buzzcocks The Escape Artist by Ludus (You're the) Devil in Disguise by Elvis Monkey Gone to Heaven by The Pixies The Teenager Who Won't Sleep with Me by Waterlaso
Driver 8 by R.E.M. Ceremony by New Order Do You Remember the First Time? by Pulp Babies by Pulp The Boy with the Arab Strap by Belle+Sebastian Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues by Bob Dylan Frederick by Patti Smith It's Her Factory by Gang of Four Mr Brightside by The Killers Mute Witness by Morrissey Pregnant for the Last Time by Morrissey Exit Music (for a Film) by Radiohead Beat on the Brat by The Ramones Pinball Wizard by The Who The Killing Jar by Siouxsie + the Banshees What She Said by The Smiths Ecstasy by Lou Reed Daddy's Gonna Pay for Your Crashed Car by U2 France by Carl Barât [Dirty Pretty Things; The Libertines]
