THE ARTICLE

Ginsberg:

angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night

Me as much as the rest but maybe not, the way everyone’s calling everyone a hipster these days, and I don’t think it means what they think it means.

There’s a movie about Howl, and it’s good.

I haven’t read this all the way through yet. Still. You should probably read it too. Especially if you know where Modesto, California is.

Traffic was heavier than usual after work today. I don’t know why. I came home almost the whole way on surface streets. Each time I went past a way to get on a freeway it was backed up enough that I didn’t want to bother. First was Montague Expressway from Zanker. Backed up. Then Charcot getting on 87, backed up far enough to back up the light before the ramp. Then down First Street, same story at 101, at Skyport, at 880, at Taylor. After Taylor I’d finally convinced everyone that I wasn’t trying to sneak onto the freeway, and the traffic south relented. Made the compulsory left that becomes Julian after Coleman, and followed that past Stockton to the Alameda. Gave up and got on 880 there. Took almost an hour.

The rest of the day was like this:

“The tears of the world are a constant quantity. For each one who begins to weep somewhere else another stops. The same is true of the laugh. Let us not then speak ill of our generation, it is not any unhappier than its predecessors. Let us not speak well of it either. Let us not speak of it at all. It is true the population has increased.”
- Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot

Finally found this again, after losing it to a World Wide Web that doesn’t like it as much as I do:

Paradise
by Arthur Smith

I used to live there. Every morning
The downtown streets were cobbled with gold, honey
Flowed—all that stuff. I’m not kidding. Summers
Lasted a lifetime, broken by Christmas
And New Year’s.
Mornings were like waking to someone’s scent
You hadn’t yet met and married for life,
Though I didn’t know that then—the night-cooled
Muskmelons rolling belly up to the stars,
And by late afternoon the dusk-colored
Dust of apricots on everything.
From that earth, my body
Assembled itself, and when the veil dropped,
I tried to say what I saw. The light winds
Around me died, the sheers of summer wavered
As though all of it were mirage. Cantaloupes,
Grapes, clusters of ruby flames like champagne,
Though I didn’t know that then—
Nectarines like morphine—didn’t know that either.
Oranges, almonds, rainbows,
Tangs—rolling in all year long, that bounty.
You tell people that, over and over,
And it’s really crazy, they won’t believe you.
All that sugar coaxed out of clay, and you
Can’t even give it away—and each dawn
More is just piled on. I took in as much
As I could, like larder, and walked away.

In the PBS special they did about the Reisner book Cadillac Desert, for a few seconds they show footage of the Owens Valley before it was drained away by Los Angeles. Wonder if it was like this.

Even if it wasn’t. Great verse. Especially the end.

Bandit: “When you tell somebody something, it depends on what part of the United States you’re standing in as to just how dumb you are.”

Frog: “Mr. Bandit, you have a lyrical way of cutting through the bullshit.”

Bandit: “And you have a unique way with the English language, Miss Frog.”

The internet, and just the ensuing decades, have blown that up, but only mostly, thankfully.

A friend sent me this today. Going to go try to visit the gallery this weekend. Cool stuff.

Campbell Water Tower artwork by Stone Griffin Gallery.

After the book DAM!, about Hetch Hetchy, then reading this, it seems like San Francisco has an abusive relationship with water.

See also lots of other cities, but still.

There’s a tower crane in Campbell, on Winchester just south of Campbell Avenue. I thought I saw it on my run last Sunday, from the Percolation Ponds near Camden, but I wasn’t sure. Today I drove right by it. Wonder what they’re building.

Forty-Niners lost in overtime. Pro football is ridiculous in it’s expectations. Brings out the worst in broadcast radio, brodcast TV.  Watching the commercials during the game though, maybe it’s easy to bring out the worst in broadcast TV.

There’s been a playlist, lately–

Africa. Yes the Toto tune, but covered by the Wellington Ukulele Orchestra. Shut up. Just go to iTunes and dig it.

Josie, by Steely Dan. Watch the VH1 Classic “Classic Albums” episode about Aja, then try not to buy the album. I dare you.

Life On A Chain, Pete Yorn (The KCRA live thing, from the reissue). Saw this show last spring. Ben Kweller opened. It was all really, really, good.

Revolution, by Gil Scott Heron. “The revolution will not go better with coke. The revolution will put you in the driver’s seat. The revolution will not be televised, not be televised, there’ll be no reruns brothers and sisters, the revolution will be live.”

Twilight Zone, by Golden Earring. Great tune, but how the hell is it plus-seven minutes long?

My Sexual Life, by Everclear. Dig it. Sounds like the Beach Boys kind of, if you’re me.

Samaritan, by the Long Winters. “This is what they mean by standing in for the sane.”

Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way?, by Waylon Jennings. “Somebody told me, when I came to Nashville: “Son you finally got it made. Old Hank made it here, and we’re all sure that you will, but I don’t think hank done it this way.”

Billy Green Is Dead, another Gil Scott Heron thing. “Is that familiar anybody? Check out what’s inside your head. Because it doesn’t seem to matter, when it’s Billy Green who’s dead.”

Grease, by Frankie Valli. Yeah. Shut up again. “There ain’t no danger we can go too far, if we start believing now, we can be who we are.”

Hold on Loosely, by 38 Special. “And my mind goes back, to a girl I met, some years ago, who told me…”

I’m Impressed, by They Might Be Giants “When that gorilla beats his chest, I fall to bits. I admit, I’m impressed.” Great running music.

Ace of Spades, by Motorhead. Had a bunch of stuff on the Shuffle for 10 miles on Sunday, but just ended up blasting this over and over. Great run.

Happy new year.

Three runs last weeekend, chasing the end of the new year. Sixteen miles at Rancho San Antonio on Saturday morning, 6 more at Campbell Park Saturday evening, and the same 6 again Sunday morning, on New Year’s Day.

Rancho was as crowded as ever. We met there at 6:30 AM, and it was as if there was a race going on. Getting parking at Rancho in the early morning is getting more and more difficult. It used to be, five years ago, that we got there at seven to get parking. Then it became 6:45, and Saturday it was 6:30. We were more than early enough to get parking, but it was filling up. A friend who knows the park better than anyone else I know was there to run too, and when I asked he said the gate is opened at 4:30. I’m pretty sure someday there will be a line of vehicles waiting. The first time will be in the summer.

It’s not that I don’t understand why. We ran to the top of Black Mountain and back, and all but the last two miles of ascent was perfectly run-able, and the whole descent, even the steep stuff near the top, was a great cruise back to the farm, and then the cars. I’d never run all the way up Black Mountain before, but I had hiked from the Rhuys Ridge entrance off Moody Road, up the hill a little from Foothill College and Highway 280. As a 16-mile run from the Cristo Rey entrance, it is a friendly uphill challenge and a perfect cruise back down. Explains the crowds.

Six more co-leading a TNT run hurt, on Saturday night, but it was a nice way to keep the new year’s blues away. Sunday morning, another sparsely attended TNT run, that hurt a little less.

January 1 was Sunday, so the world ignored it in favor of Monday. Today Guadalupe Parkway headed to work was empty like I’d made a very, very bad mistake, but no, everyone was at work except the folks who had been smart enough to take the day off. Impossibly light traffic coming home too. Gym closed at 6:00, so no mental-health cardio tonight, writing here instead. I bought a bike trainer used on Friday, but I haven’t tried setting it up yet. It’ll be interesting to see how loud it is. If I can get away with it, neighbor-wise, I’m going to ride a lot at home on days like this, when only I’m pretending it’s Monday.

Thank you notes, new year’s resolutions, trying to make things new, and keep things new. The leaf-trap that is my balcony is still catching some holdouts. No snow in the sierra, no rain in Lexington, and the d-word made the papers a few days ago.

2012. Insert sarcasm about the Mayan thing here. Every year sounds more like a science-fiction movie than the last one, and looks less like a science fiction movie than the last one. There’s some things to do though. Like writing here. So.