Dear Diary,

I bought tickets to see SPIDERMAN on opening night, May 3, 8:00pm, at Kips Bay on 2nd Avenue between 31st and 32nd Streets. If you'd like to join me/us, click on the link above and you can get tix through FANDANGO. If you'd like to avoid me, well now you know where not to be next Friday night...

I kind of feel it's inevitable that a lot of people are gonna be disappointed, and I'm not a big fan of Tobey Maguire. (I think James Franco, the James Dean look-alike who's also in the movie, would have made a much cooler Spiderman, but nobody ever listens to me... because the world is racist...)

Allergies are kicking my tired ass. If anyone has access to drugs (allergy-related or otherwise), send them my way.

I've got to help this guy move today, in the pouring rain. Then I've got to attend this girl's senior thesis reading at NYU. A Sunday full of good deeds... *sigh*...

To the Insincere:

Guess what? It's Luke Dimick's birthday today!

What? You don't know who Luke Dimick is? Well, join the frickin' club!

The WHO IS DIMICK? FAN CLUB is accepting applications for membership RIGHT THIS MINUTE!

Oh, yeah, back on planet earth, I failed to get the NYFA Fellowship I applied for. Why? Because I'm a no-talent loser! STUPID STUPID STUPID!!!!

Dear Sinners,

C. and I staid home from work 2day, to recuperate from the dire state of hayfever/cold we are both in. Feeling better incrementally, though getting back to work tomorrow should still be a long drag.

Through the peephole, I watched some guy take most of our squatter's shit out to the trash today. Eviction papers?

Now that Friday's performance is done, I've got more space to focus on my real work again. There are also the slew of weddings I need to attend over the next two months. So much work to do...

I cannot forget to start looking for jobs. I've been contemplating quitting my current job for a while now -- I must be careful not to get lulled into staying long enough for me to get sucked down into the briny depths along with the rest of the passengers...

Dear Fellow Americans,

So, we officially have a crack-smoking squatter in our apartment building. He's set himself up on the landing between the 4th floor (where we live) and the rooftop. I guess he's been here a while -- one of our roommates actually went up there a few weeks ago, had a talk with him about how he can't stay there, even fixed him some coffee and an egg sandwich...

Well, i guess it's the same reason you're not supposed to feed alligators in the wild: they come to associate PEOPLE with FOOD...

I walked up there today and saw that the guy had apparently gotten himself more comfortable. I found a big pillow cushion, a bunch of newspapers, cigarette butts, backpack, a folded-up sidewalk scooter and literally about a dozen soda and liquor bottles filled with urine (or what I am going to assume is urine...). I did NOT see any crack pipes, though someone else has seen one up there before.

Our super apparently KNOWS this guy from way back, and is sympathetic. Supposedly, the guy actually has an apartment around the corner from here, even has a daughter -- he may have been kicked out. Anyway, the story's complicated and stupid and we're just trying to figure out how to get this resolved because our landlord's being as unhelpful as possible. (This squatter guy may or may not be the fucker responsible for stealing everyone's mail in the building, but that is another story.)

In any case, I e-mailed FOX NEWS Problem Solvers, about our mail theft issue. Though, from the looks of it, there may actually be material for at least 3 different news segments for the problems in this building.

And I'm still recovering from my cold...

OK, I take Chris Wang off my shit list.

Last night's show went off really well, despite the hazardous weather and despite the fact that I've been nursing a really rough cold. Nick came out to support (our one friend that did), even though we missed his show the previous night and even though he'd just suffered his first painful day substitute teaching.

Oh, well, whatever, nevermind...

To The End of Time,

So, I'm singing with my band, Urban Dust, tonight at NYU. It's our first gig and I've come down with a huge cold -- just like last year, the allergy-season has come and kicked my ass. I'll have to load up on drugs right before we go up.

This weather has been a fucking nightmare. I'm stuck in a jacket and tie at work all week. The pollen count explodes. I mean, I like warm weather, but give me some time to ease into it...

I missed Nick's show last night, because I'm a dickweed. I was so sick at work yesterday, I came right home and passed out. I woke up and it was like 10 minutes to his show.

Maybe it's karma that Chris Wang is skipping out on our show tonight.

No.

Chris Wang is just a bitch bag!

To All My Heroes in the Methadone Clinics,

The televisions hitched up to the ceilings at Bally's are usually set at specific channels at specific times. I do not know who decides what channels are chosen, but they are pretty consistent. Different televisions are set to different channels, so the programs you're forced to watch differ depending on what machines you're using.

It so happens, because of when I'm able to get to the gym, the two programs I'm forced to watch every day are Oprah and back-to-back episodes of Mama's Family. Of course, you might offer, I have the freedom to NOT watch either of these programs... but it is like going to the circus and trying not to look at the elephants.

I find Mama's Family nearly unbearable to watch, and yet I cannot help myself!!! I don't even read the poorly transcribed subtitles (since it's so noisy in the gym, the volume on all the TVs is turned down and the captions for the hearing impaired is activated), but the episodes read like picture-books. Among the storylines of recent episodes:

Mama and friends picket a supermarket for selling smutty magazines; Mama joins a grandmother beauty pageant; Mama becomes a professional wrestler; Mama is a contestant on Jeopardy. Today, there was the obligatory, two-part Hawaiian episode, where everybody goes on vacation in Hawaii and exotic hilarity ensues. [Hawaii must have some production deal with all sit-coms that last longer than 2 seasons...]

It is also slightly depressing to see all these actors who were on this show FOR SIX YEARS and were never heard from again... Ken Berry...? Allan Kayser...? We hardly knew ye...

Dear You,

Rolling Stone Online has a poll on their site today (i don't know how long it'll be there) asking who's the best actor among these performers:

Ice Cube
Ja Rule
Mos Def
Sean Combs

Right now, Ice Cube is leading with 69% of the votes!
Followed by Ja Rule and Mos Def with 12% (with Ja Rule edging out Mos by a scattering of votes)!
Followed by P-Diddy last... which is obvious.

Obviously, these people haven't seen Mos Def in TOP DOG/UNDERDOG...

Hey Pigs,

(yeah, you)

I know what most of you have been thinking...

He hasn't posted anything in a few days... has he finally found a sense of purpose in life...?

No.

I have been worn out and drugged up by the marathon of the 9-5 clockwork.

And BLOGGER's been blogging up lately...

Need to get more writing done.

It also occurs to me that I'm performing at NYU in 9 days, and I should probably think about practicing something... *anything*...

I have this creeping suspicion my readership's suffered a nosedive since April Fool's Day. O!, to have felt love once, only to lose it to the world...

Hello? Is anybody in there? Just nod if you can hear me... is there anybody home...?

So, I've been listening to 92.3 K-Rock at work lately, catching up on the current state of Rock N' Roll. I hate to say it, but there's this one CREED song I actually like. (Though I won't reveal which one it is... but you know the one...) ..

Also, there is this advert they keep playing over and over -- I mean, they play A LOT of adverts over and over, but this one features this truly, teeth-grindingly annoying DJ personality by the name of "Cabbie", and the ad is basically him shilling for this diet pill scam called "TRIM SPA". (You can hear the actual ad on their site.) Anyway, he goes ON AND ON about how he's lost a ton of weight through the program, and how you can check the website to see before/after pictures of him if you don't believe it... so I finally remember to check out this bleeding site and the before+after pictures of him are lamest before+after pictures you could ever imagine for a weight-loss program. The before pics show him as a big, blubbery fart with his guts hanging out everywhere you look, and the sole after pic shows him with a frickin' LEATHER JACKET obscuring his whole body!

If you're out to screw the public, at least make a decent effort by putting forth a persuasive argument!

Fad diets are rubbish.

Fight the REAL enemy.

End soap box.

Dear Unenlightened,

Why are all of you using your legs to walk around like a bunch of suckers?!

Get yourself a SEGWAY -- because there's no such thing as too little exercise!(TM)

Dear Emotionally Disturbed,

Since Dr. Craig has chosen to discontinue his reading of this virtual pub (comments, "CMH", 4/2/02), we can use this space to discuss his work...

I just read this brillo article he wrote called Superheroes, monsters, and babies: roles of strength, destruction and vulnerability for emotionally disturbed boys. It was published in a recent issue of The Arts in Psychotherapy, and concerns the use of role-playing in a therapy group for emotionally disturbed boys -- more specifically, the recurrence of the these archetypes (superhero, monster, baby) in the drama-therapy and their significance.

I won't go into it because I don't think I'm equipped to do it justice here, but here's one of many passages I really like:

Most people are able to take on a variety of roles in their daily lives, choosing aspects of the self to meet the given circumstances of each new situation. Severe emotional disturbance, however, is marked by inflexibility, a "diminished capacity to take on and play out roles" (Landy, R.J., 1995, The dramatic world view: reflections on the roles taken and played by young children).

It's encouraging to find that I'm not "severely emotionally disturbed", since I take on and play out roles like they're going out of style...!

The article is fascinating material that I plan to mooch from copiously in my own creative work. If you've let your subscription to The Arts in Psychotherapy lapse, now's the time to renew!

Dear User,

To set the record straight, yesterday's post was an APRIL FOOL'S post.

I haven't quit my job.

I still work for Big Brother (as long as I can elude the Thought Police).

Though I have entertained the idea of using my new camera and editing gear to make some bar mitzvah casholah, I have not taken those steps... yet.

Speaking of The Job, I took the postponed "skills assessment" exam today. Five hours, no macros -- just WORD, EXCEL and POWERPOINT, stripped and manual. I've been creating pitchbooks for the better of two years now, but when you've got a host of macros at your disposal -- designed to make life easier -- it encourages an atrophy of knowledge. I got hung up on this one complicated formula in EXCEL that everyone else knew to memorize beforehand, while I tried in vain to figure it out on my own. During the break, though, one of my crafty coworkers slipped me the answer:

[=800]"2,000"; [>=1000]"3,000"; _##0

(Note: If you know EXCEL, this is actually really funny.)

Anyway, I really didn't think I'd fool anybody with yesterday's posting. In fact, it slipped my mind that it was April 1st, and I originally wrote a different post (which was decidedly less interesting, as reality usually proves itself to be) before scrapping it and fabricating the bar mitzvah hoo-hah. But it sort of took me by surprise that some people did buy it -- the sincerity of the two well-wishing comments that were left caught me off guard, as if their encouragement were saying, "You know, maybe it ISN'T such a crazy idea, after all..."

The wheels are turning.

Hello, World,

Quit my job. It is liberating. I'm going to be shooting bar mitzvah's and small weddings from now on. I've already got a few gigs lined up, and the economics work out to keep me going. I know it sounds nuts, but I have to try it out. And I won't be able to afford to do crazy things like this when I'm married with children.

So, wish me luck.