"You got to give me, give me fever." - Jingo
old places, fresh faces: yeah boy...its all new and blue and good for you too. I finally learned the art of cascading style sheets and me likey likey. There's still some quirks...like the comments link has a habit of shutting down my IE 5.0 on the mac and its not formatted quite correctly but i'm working on it. If you read the new things you should know yesterday, you should read it again today. I added some new biographical tidbits plus some linkage. Its a fun little tour of my life in my head. I'm sure there are other odd problems running around...hopefully I'll get them fixed one day.
other things: I ran tings rude bwoy today, fo' sure. I set up my musicmatch jukebox 'ska-tastic' radio station with the following: Phyllis Dillon, Hepcat, Desmond Dekker, Lee "Scratch" Perry and The Skatalites. It brought me back music from Peter Tosh, Alton and Hortense Ellis, Black Uhuru, Ken Boothe, Jackie Mittoo and Bob Marley among others. The Tosh, Ellis, Boothe, Mittoo, Dillon, and Scratch stuff was just ridiculously good. But for some reason, putting in Hepcat also gets me some Rancid and some poor punk saps called M.E.S.T. from Chicago. I just was not feeling them at all. I also heard a few tracks from The Specials but didn't get into it too much...I might not have been in the right frame of mind for them today though. Ska had me hankering for some funk and soul too so I sprinkled in some Edwin Starr, Gloria Jones, Bootsy Collins and Bernie Worrell around lunch time. And of course some James Brown...you can't leave out the godfather.
Snail mail delivered by a postal carrier is so much better than email delivered by a dell server. Especially mail from folks visiting far away places or from friends who make envelopes out of magazine pages.
and now, since a few of you wanted to know more in the tails of the yet unnamed guy and girl from last post...the baked potato. FYI...while a lot of this is fictionalized, it doesn't work for me unless I use the people's real names. But don't get it twisted, while the emotion may be very real, the situations may very well not be.
The Baked Potato
"How do I look?" She stood before him in a simple but elegant black dress (she never wore dresses and it was really a shame, she wore them well), the heels (low of course but high enough to accentuate her powerful calves, her shapely thighs and her behind), and her cute little pig earrings. Because even underneath the glamour, she was still who she had always been, still Amy.
"You look beautiful, Sweetie. Is my tie crooked?" he said, tugging at his shirt. It felt a little more snug than he remembered.
"Of course it is." She straightened it for him and turned to fix her hair. He grabbed her by her waist and pulled her to him.
"Why do we have to go out tonight? We can have our own little party, here." He tickled her belly button. She giggled then pulled away.
"Because...we said we would go. I really want you to meet him." The smile on his face fell and he turned to the mirror, straightening his suit jacket.
"I thought you just really wanted to hear some jazz and eat the Giant Baked Potato?"
"I do, sweetie, but I just think it would be nice if you two meet and hang out."
"He's coming with a date?" He grabbed his pick and started to go at his hair. Perhaps a little too strongly.
"Yes, well, I don't know if she's his date. He says they aren't dating but that she wants him. She's kind of stupid. You know, just a stupid blonde wannabe lawyer."
"Oh, so he's not coming with a date. Does this jacket look tight to you? I feel like its shrunk."
She patted him on his belly. "Hmmm...or maybe some things have grown."
"Oh, so I'm fat now?"
"Don't start this, Jason. I want this to be a nice night."
"A nice night for who?"
"Just shush. There's nothing going on between me and David."
"Really? How do I know that? You keep coming home from that internship later and later. What the hell were you doing til 9:30 last Friday? You didn't call or anything."
She stopped brushing her hair, turned to face him and paused. He could see her mulling something over in her mind.
"Now, let me just say that I didn't tell you this because I know you're sensitive about him and I knew you'd overreact."
He didn't say anything. He just looked at her.
"We almost went to Cirque Du Soleil last Friday but it was sold out."
"Why wouldn't you tell me that? Why wouldn't you invite me? Isn't that something that you and I should be doing?"
"Oh, it wasn't anything planned. We were having dinner and he suggested it. It was right there so we tried to go. We just thought it would be fun. Why are you looking at me like that. See, I kne--"
"No, that's fine. I understand. I couldn't have gone last Friday anyway. But, you know what, since you and David want to go together so badly..." He put an envelope on the bathroom counter and walked out of the room.
She picked it up and silently said 'Fuck.' The logo gave way to what was inside: 2 tickets for Cirque du Soleil.
She sheepishly walked into the kitchen and hugged him from behind.
"Sweetie? How'd you know? Of course I want to go with you...I don't have to go with David."
"No, just go. I just want you to be happy."
"I am happy, sweetie. I'm happy because you love me." For some reason, those words didn't fill him with the joy they once had. His heart did flutter but it was because of fear just as much as it was because of his love for her. He turned to face her.
"Hey, I know we're not big on PDA or anything but can I just maul you at the Baked Potato tonight? Just ravish you under the candles and rhythms of the sexy saxophone?"
"No. That'd be gross and rude." He hugged her and kissed her forehead.
"Then can we at least hold hands all night?"
"Yes, sweetie, we can definitely hold hands. That's allowed." She kissed him. And then kissed him again. They kissed for a long while until she realized she had mussed what little make-up she was wearing.
And then they were at the Baked Potato.
And there was David Newman.
And they didn't hold hands.