This year will be better.

Marci & Michael got married 4 days ago.  Congratulations kids! Sorry for crashing the wedding, though.  Consider me not doing any damage to be your wedding gift from me and Andrew.

The wedding was a great way to start the year.  I love weddings.  I even had a date for this one.  Nothing went terribly wrong and the small things that did go wrong were just so adorable it might as well had happened, like Michael almost forgetting to lift Marci’s veil before he kissed her and having it brush against his nose while the guests laughed.  I’m not gonna lie, I almost cried when Michael’s dad gave his speech.

When I was in 7th grade, I told my teacher I don’t see the reason to have a new year’s resolution because if you truly want to change as a person, you should start the day you decide to change and make sure you change for good. But for some reason, this year I decided to have a new year’s resolution. There’s something about the years that passed that have made me see why a new year’s resolution is necessary, but I can’t explain why.

My original resolutions were simple and broad: be the best person I could be and actively make this year better than the last.  Then I stole one more from Leah:  never say no to an adventure (exception: I can say no if it interferes with an adventure I’m already having).

Two days after the wedding, I was lounging around in bed listening to Carla Thomas records when I got a call from Leah.  I asked her what she was doing.  “I think I’m gonna go back to Austin today. Do you wanna come?”  She threw a curveball at me so it took me a few seconds to say “Sure!”  She told me she’d pick me up at 2.

She pulled up to my house and I asked her why we were going to Austin.  She told me she was gonna pick up a bicycle.  I asked her how long we were gonna stay and she told me we’ll leave in the morning.  The soundtrack for the drive was “All Hail West Texas,” “The Sunset Tree,” and “Tallahassee” all by the Mountain Goats and Ninja Gun’s “Restless Rubes.”  We were in the city in no time.  We made a quick stop at her apartment and then we were on our way to some CraigsList dude’s house to pick up a bicycle.  It was a Motobecane.  She managed to get the dude to talk down the price and before we knew it, we were outta the guy’s driveway with a French bicycle in the backseat. She asked me if I was hungry.  I told her I could eat.  By using the process of elimination, we decided that we both needed to go to the Magnolia Cafe.

I ordered a mushroom and rice soup and she ordered a portabello sandwich and as we waited for our food, Leah asked me if I had any new year’s resolutions.  I told her mine and she told me hers.  Then I stole hers.

She asked me what we should do that night, I suggested a movie since we would pass I Love Video as we went to her house.  In addition to the video, I wanted beer.  Well, we are both underage and neither of us have fake ID’s so we had a problem there.  We decided to figure it out on the way to the video store.  I’d been wanting to see This Is England for a while so I asked the employee where I could find it.  As I went to go pick up the movie, I could hear Leah ask the guy, “Do you know where I can buy beer around here? I don’t have my ID on me so maybe some place that doesn’t card?”  He told her a convenient store on the west side of campus never cards him.  The thing is, the guy had obvious signs of male pattern baldness so it would make sense for them to not card him.  Anyway,  I found the movie, opened a video rental account, and we were on our way to get some beer.  Well, that store that was recommended to us wouldn’t give us beer.  So we went to a different one.   As we drove there, I told Leah my ridiculous idea that’ll let me buy the beer without an ID and without stealing the beer.  She told me not to do it because it was ridiculous and didn’t make any sense.  We arrived at the second liquor store and the dude wouldn’t sell us any beer, either.  We drive to a third liquor store.  She had been going in first with our last 2 attempts, so I told her I was going in first this time.  And I was going to do the scam I invented in the car that she wouldn’t let me do.  Well I do it and it works!  That night we got drunk and watched This Is England.

If you want to know my beer scam, you’ll have to buy issue #2 of Lone Star State of Depression that comes out later this month!

This Is England was such an amazing movie!  Leah and I both loved it.

We headed back to Houston the next morning.  On the way there, we saw thousands of birds migrating south.  It was one of the most beautiful and amazing things I’d ever seen.

forgetters at Nowe Miasto in New Orleans, LA. (12/09/2009)

Darcy, one of my friends who traveled to New Orleans with me to go see forgetters, took video of their set. It’s in 5 parts. She was very drunk when she took it. I wish the audio could be better but what could ya do.

forgetters at Nowe Miasto in New Orleans, LA

It’s a 6 hour drive between Houston and New Orleans, but Casey, Aaron, Darcy, and I thought it was well worth it to go see forgetters play again. I’d already seen them twice (a house show in Austin and at the Red 7 the next day) and Aaron had seen them once but Casey and Darcy didn’t have the opportunity. In another car was Bucky, Anna Garza, Ceej, Paolo, and Talia. We left a few hours before they did because we were afraid of being late.

Nowe Miasto is a live-in warehouse where they book shows, silkscreen, have meetings, and other neat things. It reminded me of the good ol’ Bill Hicks Resurrection Laboratory we used to have back home. The people who lived there were awfully nice. Us roadtrippers ate clementines with the nice dude touring and selling merch with forgetters.

This was the best show I saw them play.

Stuff’s weird

It’s been a strange season.  It seems like everything’s happening all at once and I can’t take it all in.  Marci’s getting married, Lee died, Casey and I started a Jawbreaker cover band with Lance, Josh is moving back to Houston, Leah is moving to Syria, Airon and Steven are moving to Seattle, Andrew moved out of his house, I’m moving back into my old house, Pam moved in down the street from me, I went to Austin a bunch, I went to Gainesville once, I wrote a zine that sold out, I got a credit on the Teenage Kicks LP, and so much more to say about everyone. Damn, it’s like condensing a lifetime into a box that only holds 5 months.  Things like this make me wish I never had to sleep.

I’ve been writing letters.  Well, some were handwritten and some were typewritten.  It depends on where they’re going.  All of them went to girls that don’t live in town any more.    I think my favorite letter was the one I wrote to Francisca.  She moved to New York and lives in Brooklyn, going to school in Manhattan…living the crazy life, I guess.  I typewrote her letter on some Xeroxed skinhead photos I took a few months ago.  Actually, I met her sister the same night I took those photos.  Her name was Magdalena and she told me to give Franny a call because she misses Houston.  I did her one better and wrote a letter.  It reminded me of a time about 2 years ago when Franny and I were still working at Amy’s together.  We were both seniors in high school and our high school careers were coming to a close.  She told me she was excited to go to New York and I told her I was excited to stay in town (I have an unhealthy love for what Houston has to offer).  Before she left, I made her a mixtape (because a Jewel CD was permanently stuck in her sister’s stereo), a lyric sheet, a map of Houston, and I think I wrote her a letter, too.  All this for a girl I barely knew.  I didn’t even hang out with her often.  She didn’t know much about me and I didn’t know much about her, despite knowing each other for years, and I doubt we had much in common. I don’t really know why I did it, it was just fun for us, I guess.  I don’t know why I miss her, either, because I never make plans with her when she’s in town.  I guess it’s an acquired taste, like developing the taste for beer.  An acquired feeling, I guess.  Don’t care for it at first, can’t wait for it now.  Or maybe it’s the association in our brains.  Y’know, like how some people drink beer but hate the taste but love to get drunk so their brain associates the good drunk times with beer so they don’t mind drinking it.  It’s the same thing with girls, the way you can feel kinda drunk just by hanging out with the right kind of girl.  But you drink a bad liquor and you have the reds and the blues for what feels like forever.  Ever meet a bad girl?  Same thing.

forgetters, Wild America, and Come and Take It at the House of Commons

Pam Cantu and I drove to Austin on Friday.  Well, she did the driving and I paid for gas (I don’t know how to drive).  We made it in 2 and a half hours, a personal record.  She somehow got her Honda Fit up to 100 mph, I saw the speedometer with my own eyes.  We almost crashed into a median and died.

On Saturday I was waiting for the Jesus Lizard to begin their set.  The band started and my phone started to ring.  I decided to wait until the Jesus Lizard were done and then call whoever it was back.  During “Mouth Breather,” I get a text from the same number. It was Aaron.  I was about to text him back but at that moment a stagediver kicked my hat, gun range earmuffs, and glasses off.  I picked up my hat and ear protection but I couldn’t find my glasses.  I pulled out a little flashlight on my keychain and got down on one knee and looked for it.  The second I did that, the whole crowd of people made space for me, 2 guys pulled out flashlights, 3 guys pulled out cellphones and started using them as flashlights, and everyone was looking for my glasses.  And one of those guys found them. Awesome.

After the Jesus Lizard set, I called Aaron back and he informed me that forgetters from Brooklyn, New York were playing a house show that night.  I couldn’t get the show confirmed as real and not a hoax, but I couldn’t risk it.  I thanked him and started walking to the address he sent me; it was 2 or 3 miles away and took about an hour to walk.

For those of you who don’t know, forgetters (all lower-case with no article) is a band from Brooklyn, New York with Blake Schwarzenbach (Jawbreaker, Jets to Brazil, Thorns of Life) on guitar and vocals, Caroline Paquita (Bitchin’) on bass, and Kevin Mahon (Against Me!) on drums.  This would be my only chance to ever see Blake play a house show.

When I finally made it to the house, I saw a bunch of people sitting on the front porch and a kid pumping what looked like a potato cannon with a bicycle pump.  That kid was Kyle, I hadn’t seen him since I was about 15 or 16.  I yell from the sidewalk, “Kyle, is that you?”

“Yeah!” he replied.

I walk up the steps and ask him in almost a whisper, “Hey, uh…is forgetters really playing here tonight?”  He said yes.  I walked inside and sat down in the room with the PA.

A guy with a beard was sitting next to me.  “Are you excited, man?” I asked him.  “Yeah, how ’bout you?”  “Totally. I never thought I’d ever see him in the flesh, y’know?”  (Aaron had been using the phrase “in the flesh” for the past week so I made it a mission to use it at least once)  I told him about how Jets to Brazil didn’t come to Houston on their last tour and I told him about all the other legendary shows I had to miss because I was so young.  He was quite a bit older than me so he told me all the bands he had to miss.  I think one of the bands he missed was Jawbreaker because his dad said no and it was a school night and it was snowing.  Blake then walked into the room and put down his guitar.  Then he started talking to some guy.  Me and the bearded guys sat there in silence and watched.  The 2nd bearded guy pulled out a Polaroid camera and, without looking in the viewfinder, pointed the camera from his lap at Blake and pressed the button.  A big bright flash momentarily blinded everyone in the room and the loud mechanics of the photo being exposed made a shrill noise.  “Uhh…hi there…” said Blake.  The 2nd bearded guy waved his hand. “Hi,” he said.

Their set was great.  I recognized one of the songs was a Thorns of Life song, I think it’s called “Oh Deathly Death.”  My friend Leah was at the show with one of her friends.  I told them how legendary this forgetters show was going to be, but they didn’t get it.  They actually left before the forgetters set.  If I believed in god, this moment would have thrown my theism down the drain.