July 29th, 2002. Monday
 

    Le weekend:

    Perhaps the most boring weekend in recent memory.  I rarely left the house all weekend.  But it was also one of the more productive weekends I've ever had.  I didn't get a lot done, but I got a lot started.  So I was a little less frustrated on Sunday night than I have been in recent weeks.

    Friday night after work, I met my parents around Lincoln Center. They were waiting for my littlest brother Galvin to finish a reception with the Japanese ambassador.  Galvin is doing the JET program and teaching English in Japan for a year. What a weirdo.  So we had coffee in the Starbucks on Columbus, and waited for Geoff to show.  These days my mother is fond off telling me "I don't know you anymore."  Well, I wouldn't say she's fond of it, since it clearly disturbs her. But she says it a lot.  I'm always like "What do you mean?" and she says "You never tell me anything."  I'm like "What do you want to know."  This is all very weird, because I used to be the mama's boy.  I don't know when I became so closed off.  Anyway, Geoff showed up and we met Galvin back at Geoff's apartment down the street.
    For dinner we went to Isabella's, a fairly nice place on Columbus and 75th or so.  Nice time having 5/6 of the family out for a nice meal.  Banker Geoff paid for the meal.  He's loaded.  After dinner, Geoff, Galvin and I went back to Geoff's apartment and played video games for a few hours.  This is a very popular pastime for the brothers, and it was our last real chance to do that together for at least a year.  So it was more a sentimental ceremony as anything else.  Male bonding in a way.
    It's been occurring to me lately how much I appreciate my family.  We can be very self-sufficient.  As far as entertainment goes, if it were just the six of us, I think we would be just fine.  I know I would.  There's almost nothing that I like to do that at least one of my brothers doesn't like to do.  We all have a fondness for video games, we all like pretty much the same movies, have the same peculiar sense of humor to varying degrees, we all play instruments (again to varying degrees), and we have similar musical tastes.  So I've felt pretty fortunate.  Also, we all really like to eat. A lot.  Especially things like good cheese and fresh donuts.  Of course, we also really like to eat cheap cheese and stale donuts.  I also appreciate this.  Man, donuts are great.
    I felt guilty spending the money on a cab home, but once again, it was worth it. It was late, and I didn't want to deal with the subway carrying a bunch of stuff my mom had brought for me. I can't think of every getting in a cab and regretting it. Except maybe the few times with Rodzilla, who often demanded we take a cab for distances as short as three blocks.  Anyway, it was about 1 by the time I got home, so I decided to call it a night.

    On saturday, besides a bike ride around Prospect Park, I didn't do a damn thing all day except get a bagel with lox and cream cheese.  In the evening I stayed in and watched most of Driven, the terrible Sylvester Stallone racecar movie.  During most of the day I sat in my room and played guitar in spurts.  I hadn't been that bored in ages.  I thought about calling my neighbor Rachel to see if she wanted to play guitars.  She lives in the room directly above me, and I can always hear her rocking out. Plus, she was particularly out of tune on Saturday, and it was really getting on my nerves. So i figured I'd at least call her and tell her that much.  In the end I decided against it.  I don't really like playing with other people that much. I get all nervous. But we have very similar musical tastes and guitar playing sensibilities.  We've been talking about playing together for a while, but we just never get it together. We actually set a date a few weeks back, but she was all drunk and I don't think she even remembered.
    So I just sat in my room with my new digital four-track, and alternated between guitar playing and trying to edit a little story I wrote that I'm trying to get published. The editing didn't go so hot. I've read this thing a thousand times now, and it's lost all the cleverness and originality that it had when I first wrote it.  To me, anyway.  Part of me just wants to send it out now, but I really like this idea and I really want to do it right. I just can't get anything done with it. Very frustrating.  The guitar playing went much better though.  Recorded the beginnings of two songs, and i was pretty happy with them until the next morning when I realized the vocal melodies for the second song were exactly the same as a song I recorded last week.  The late-night recording is very comparable to late-night bar conversations with seemingly interesting girls.  At the time, you think you're being clever and witty and maybe a bit profound, but the next morning you wake up and realize you were just being an idiot. I long to come up with an idea or sentiment that stands up under the harsh test of daylight.

    Sunday my inactivity continued.  The fetching of a carton of milk was my lone foray out of the house. I watched the Fast and the Furious on cable, which was also particularly bad.  But it kept my interest.  If only because I'd always read how the actor Paul Walker was a major non-entity in everything he did. And it's true. I couldn't believe how someone could be that neutrally ineffectual in a movie. But there he was, barely even there, and in the starring role no less.  It also occurred to me how recycled the plot was.  Substituting driving for surfing, it was almost an exact copy of Point Break, a superior movie in every way, not the least of which was the inclusion of Gary Busey in the cast. My brother Geoff and I used to joke about putting on a Gary Busey film festival. We've always had this weird fascination with him. It started as a joke but became something more.  Anyway, if you ever thought no one was a worse actor than Keanu Reeves, check out Paul Walker in this movie.  It's also worth mentioning that Vin Diesel is surely no Patrick Swayze.  Jordana Brewster's not even Lori Petty.  Here's the analogy:
Fast and the Furious : Point Break :: Days of Thunder : Top Gun.

    After a day of inactivity, I went into the city around 8:30.  The only planned event of the weekend came at the very end of the weekend, which was to see "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart," the movie about Wilco.  I met my upstairs neighbor Miss Charming Melodee at the theatre on 12th street.  We had a quick bite at the Big Enchilada. I recommended the place, as it was right next to the theatre and used to eat there all the time, but I think we were both unsatisfied. I had the flan, and it was a little too grainy for my taste.
    Anyway, I'd been looking forward to seeing this movie since I heard about it many months ago.  It was wonderfully shot, and looked and sounded great. But ultimately, I came away feeling disappointed.   Miss Charming Melodee was of the opinion that if you like Wilco, you'd really like this movie. It was quite obvious that the director really like Wilco, and Jeff Tweedy in particular. One review I read of the movie went so far as to call it synchophantic.  I could see the validity in that.  It spent most of the time dealing with the well-documented label troubles Wilco had, and not enough time dealing with the internal band problems that arose during the recording of their best album to date.  I didn't really like the way they made Jay Bennett, the dreadlocked multi-instrumentalist, look like a big dumb-ass, and I didn't like the way the whole band just turned on him.  He kind of dug his own hole though.  Maybe I just sympathize with him because I feel like if I were in a band, I'd be the Jay Bennett character.  He didn't write any of the songs, but he really suped them up and wanted to do everything his way.  It's funny though, because it was clear that Jeff Tweedy kicked Jay out to reassert his leadership role in the band.  This seemed kind of a full-circle effect, since it was Jeff Tweedy's own musical ascension that lead to the demise of his previous band Uncle Tupelo by Jay Farrar, who was the primary song writer.
    Anyway, I couldn't really recommend the movie to someone unless s/he was a Wilco fan.  There are a lot of live performances, which were good, but personally I could have seen less live shows for more dialogue. I came away liking the members of the band less, particularly after the Jay Bennett expulsion. The rest of them just seemed like Jeff Tweedy's toties who just fell into line.
    It's hot as Hades again today, and hazy as well.  Weather-wise it's been a really shitty few days.  I'm finding myself particularly susceptible to changes in the weather lately.

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