la pomme du ciel

The day before the inauguration, I was in Baltimore after a pleasant drive, broken up only by the frigid onslaught a smoking habit causes on the winter road.

My hostess supreme, my friend E, showed me the city, sort of a brief and incomplete tour. For whatever reason, I never really thought of Baltimore as a city so much as I thought of it as that place that stole the Browns and broke my father’s heart in the mid-nineties, and more recently, as the home of the [insert expletive(s)] Ravens.

I was pretty jazzed about the drive-by experience; I love seeing a city at night. It offers a certain vitality that you can never match during the day. Baltimore is very attractive, despite the fact that many monuments and buildings were festooned with purple lights and banners for the Ravens’ doomed playoff season. Honestly, did anyone really think they were going to win? Honestly, was anyone surprised how long it took Polamalu to show us some fireworks? Because you knew it would happen. It was just a matter of when.

E showed me part of the waterfront, which I am told stinks a good bit during the summer. I abstained from a proper walk along the boards, reasoning that it was both ass-cold and we were already late for her friend’s broomball game.

Broomball, for those who don’t know, is a delightful Canadian invention, involving rubber brooms, a ball and ice, because that’s totally Canada’s largest natural resource.

The rink was in one of those plastic-bubble buildings, in the middle of Patterson Park, which I’m sure would be lovely in weather that wasn’t painful. In any case, we were late, so we caught the last few minutes of the game, and all of the post-ice sports stink. E’s friend and her team instructed us to meet them at their sponsor bar just a block away.

As we made our way there, I noticed a red neon face, winking from atop a building in the distance.

When we reached the bar and beers were distributed, I found out that this winking face belonged to the front of a bottle of National Bohemian. It’s a pretty goofy mascot.

See? That one eye? That's the one that winks.

The beer itself is fucking terrible. Baltimore has the nerve to say that Iron City (admittedly not my first choice) is made from filtered dredge from the Allegheny River. If that’s the case, then our bilgewater tastes a hell of a lot better than whatever the hell Pabst is putting into it.

That was the other funny thing I discovered. While Mr. Boh abounds in the city and surrounding area, the beer isn’t even made there anymore. After some ownership shuffling, Pabst ended up with the dubious luck of owning a terrible beer. I mean, this one can’t even lay claim to winning a Blue Ribbon, ever! 1892 and still going strong, brotha!

I had one, just to say I did it. After I finished it, I understood why the Ravens fans are always so angry- if I had to deal with the hangover I’m sure that sludge causes, I’d hate everything too. Adding insult to injury was the puzzles on the bottle caps, like the ones on bottles of Lion’s Head. Please, just try and solve those while drinking.

We left for E’s parents’ house right after that, taking a nice scenic route out through the city, playing spot the junkie as we rolled through the streets of Charm city. Despite the cold, there were a considerable amount of junkies.

While that was the end of my abridged Baltimore experience, I’m excited to see more of the city. The experience rekindled my love of travel and reminded me I dislike being in any one place for too long, hence the fact I’m going to Columbus at the end of the month, hooray!

Dear Uncommon Sense:

My boyfriend and I broke up a month ago, but he really didn’t handle it well. He was alright at first, but occasional friendly calls turned into miserable drunken voicemails pretty quick, along with daily emails. While there’s nothing I like more than a dose of abuse waiting for me in the morning, I’m sick of it and a little freaked out. What should I do to end this?

Yours,

Scared and Single

Well, SS, barring moving and completely fucking off, there’s not too much you can do re-actively for this sort of idle harassment. Proactive is another matter, and it’s the only sensible thing to be done. Letting the voicemail take care of the dirty work is top priority-an old trick used by many a harried woman is to let your voicemail box fill up, thus depriving the tormentor of a venue. As far as the email goes, unless you want to wade into a neverending tit for tat war that will only make you feel like shit, either immediately delete or ignore the emails. Block them if you feel it necessary. The catch with all things internet is to not get petty. If he decides to de-friend you on the Facespace, Livebook or Twatter, so be it. That just means he can’t spy on you through those channels. Make sure your privacy settings reflect that if the thought of him agonizing over your Relationship Status, pictures or blogs worries you.

The bottom line is to give the coldest shoulder possible. Eventually, the dude will pull his ass out of the sewers of self-loathing and might even apologize. Unfortunately, the only endgame is a waiting game. Go out, celebrate your freedom, trash the fucker with you friends and bat your eyes at the bearded kid moping at the bar. When you fill your head up with activity, you don’t leave much room for thoughts of the ex; what used to be a worry now becomes a minor annoyance and an endless supply of punchlines. Of course, the ex might be a total psycho and you’re due for the slaughterhouse. It never hurts to change the locks. Just remember, this is but one of the risks of enjoying the nightmare that is dating.

To all the dudes who were, are and will be that guy: Yes, you’ve crossed the line. Yes, it happens. Yes, you should apologize, but only when you mean it, and after you’ve filled your own head with something new. Yes, alcohol, your current state and a phone or computer do not mix. Sleep it off. In a few weeks or months when you wake up, you’ll feel right as rain, swearing never to drink react that hard again.

How about your problems? Email askuncommonsense at gmail dot com for your prescription.

I’m having a crisis of confidence in my social    stratum. There’s something wrong with the whole indie fucktard demographic. Are we really so desperate? Are we really so eager to rush headlong towards the record store for the latest CSS record, to make excuses for overblown heaps of mediocrity like Interpol’s second disc, to recognize bands more for the trademark and not talent?

Of course we are. The real joy of straddling the 90′s and the oughties is that I am fully aware that, well, we turned out to be just as susceptible in 1997 as we were in 2007, and stop playing that MIA record, it’s kinda obnoxious. Wanna borrow my old KOrN records?

So it wasn’t surprising to my meta-self that when I got wind of a new series of Decemberists’ joints, I was pretty stoked. O me. So I put it on. At first I thought I was listening to “16 Military Wives”- “Valerie Plame” is cut from the same irritating cloth, right down to the progression. I like my politically aware songs with a slice of de la Rocha or at least a bit of Manics, thanks.

Le sigh. Okay, fine. EPs are rarely heavy-hitting. I can deal. Then “Valerie” aped “Hey Jude” in its drawn-out closing. Jesus H. The next two songs didn’t grate me as much as pista uno, but they’ll never get stuck in my craw the same way “July, July” or “Shankill Butchers” do. By the end of “O New England” I was already lamenting the fact that the Decemberists, after four LPs, A smattering of EPs, including an adaptation of the Tain (of all things) was risking their long-standing indie-darling status. Then it got worse.

Can we please leave the dead horse alone? While I don’t mind the occasional cover, a Velvet Underground cover, especially of a yawn song like “I’m Sticking With You” is too much for me to take. Unimaginative, lackluster covers are for over-the-hill farts and powerpunk bands singing the Nerverending Story theme. Shut it off.

It was appropriate then that the banjo-laced “Record Year” followed; a creepy orchestral meditation on the impermanence of our culture: “In the annals of the Empire, did it ever look so gray?”

Not until this farce, Meloy.

“Raincoat Song”, the final blast of the series, relies on the Decemberists’ most consistent strength- oh I love those memorable choruses!

But they’re all an invite to sing along, and who really gives a shit anymore? I was grateful the song was a short ditty, so I could get back to the routine of irony, suspicion, and quiet optimism that marks our tribe, the halls of our idols a bit dimmer.

Until of course, the Decemberists release Hazards of Love in late March. Or maybe Björk’s new joint (remember her?)- I hear her new album will take three years to record (true) and is to be comprised entirely of her clipping her toenails and warbling like a drunken bird of paradise (Seriously, I wish that weren’t likely true. Oh Homogenic, I miss you.).

We’ll all be there on that fateful Tuesday, won’t we.

Grade: D-

Tuesday morning around 6am, I found myself in a suburb of Baltimore, grumbling at my friend E to wake up and take a shower so we could leave and get the party started.

Breakfast was had, coffee was made, the pockets of a loaned coat were loaded down with string cheese, kashi bars and my camera and onto the Beltway we soared. All that nightmare traffic they talked about, all the mythological crowds that kept my neighbors, E’s Baltimore friends and thousands of others at home and indoors did not exist.

At least not at that hour. We stowed the car away at Bethesda and got down to the Metro station. Getting on was a bit of, oh, I dunno, usual crowded mass transit BS, the same with getting off. One lady kept it real by telling all the yokels that this was nothing like NYC. Then she shoved them into the middle of the train.

We got off a couple of stops early, not minding the walk and eager to avoid those tall-tale crowds.

It felt like some sort of joyous exodus; we were all on our way to a better place.

While the crowds weren’t scary, we weren’t alone; the whole city was closed down for the benefit of pedestrians, with only an occasional siren cutting through the throng. As we got close to the National Mall, the Washington Monument loomed in the morning sun. We rolled up onto the immense, frozen-solid dust clod to find that there was no wall of people.

Okay, there was, but they were well past the Monument, and we had already decided to stay the hell away from the front. Why see a speck when you have fleets of  jumbotrons around the place? Besides, even arriving around 9 or so meant there was no way to get that close. Just as well, because a friend I was supposed to meet got within that range and couldn’t get clear of anything until 2:30, when we had already left the city and were on our way back to Bethesda.

We strolled around the perimeter to kill time. I hadn’t been to DC for six years, and I really love the place, so it was a treat to walk a bit of the Mall, go to the Jefferson Memorial, see the Roosevelt Memorial, make a wish on the icy Potomac and mill around the front of the Lincoln Memorial. I chucked a penny into the Pool for ‘Merica.

It started getting reasonably close to the Appointed Hour, so we walked across the dusty tundra to about the Washington Monument. We had no interest in standing too deep in the human ocean. We hung around, exchanged chitchat with fellow Americans, shifted weight from one leg to the other and kept checking the time.

We ran into about a dozen Steelers fans, which was cool as representatives of the Steeler Nation. I liked seeing the Eagles and Ravens fans frown even more. One dude asked me who was cooler, Obama or Coach Tomlin. I was hard pressed to answer, but it was Obama’s day.

We had trouble hearing, and rather than risk not hearing the magic words, we skeedadled back towards the Reflecting Pool in view and generous earshot of the rigs that lined the Mall.

My friend and I both cried, cheered and laughed. Then it was over, and we peaced. We hit up a bistro for some food, then took the Red Line out and back to Baltimore.

It’s sort of strange; after the shouting in the streets of Pittsburgh, of America, on November 4th, the months of are we there yet, it still feels like we haven’t arrived. The sighs of relief haven’t released the tension and pressure of the last eight years.

My favorite part of the President’s Inaugural Address was this. I guess it explains a lot:

“Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.”

Here’s to the second wind.

…and boy are my wits tired.

I didn’t stay for the whole show (as I understand, the people still there are drunk on fermented dreams), but I have my own stories to tell, and it’s very important to me that you know that I am not being neglectful.

I will say this:

Last night I had a dream involving my Inauguration-trip-buddy and the Cloverfield monster. Have no clue why.

Why, I ask you, why?

Tonight, I expect my fevered head to be visited by an Obamafield monster.

Instead of destroying a city and letting loose with creepy spider-crab things, he snuggles the country and sheds Hope like a Newfoundland will drop its winter coat, all over your dreams.

Does this analogy even work? I submit that it does not, but I have an audacious hope that it can.

Certain authors, like high-profile celebrities, can engender an avid cult following. While thousands of books are published with every passing year, only a select few authors manage to gather behind them an audience that will suck up every last literary crumb with all the devotion of a starving canine.

That being said, I’ve never been one to get hopelessly fanboyesque about much of anything, although authors like Irvine Welsh put that to the test. So it’s not without a modicum of disappointment that I now state that Crime, comparatively, is not top shelf. For Welsh anyway.

Whenever I give my family flak for Harry Potter or Twilight, they shoot back across my skyward nose that not everything has to be a headtrip. So it was with a bit of perverse glee that I popped out Crime on a holiday visit, informing my family that is my light reading. Reactions ranged from a vague curiosity to I’m-washing-my-hands disgust. But there’s something in that- while I expect gold from my unwitting literary instructors, not every lesson is going to keep you riveted.

Crime did keep me riveted, but as the plot progressed, it was increasingly because the story is somewhat contrived, as Welsh himself admitted in a postscript. It’s actually very contrived, but saved by the two main characters’ resounding believability. Welsh is a master of character, it’s just that the framework he builds around them isn’t always free of OSHA violations.

On the one hand, for a crime thriller, it’s got some quality twists with unchallenging secondary characters. Welsh keeps you in the dark about what the book is even really about until you’re pretty well into it. It was also a bit of a cheap thrill to have Welsh turn his skills with replicating dialect onto American English. On the other hand, it is Welsh, the writer who was able to give every single character in Trainspotting life, even the ones with no dialogue. Beyond the two main characters, the rest of the cast feels stale and convenient; there’s not much depth in this casual swimming pool. For the vehicle of crime novel, it works, but it will certainly ring awkwardly hollow for the discriminating Welsh reader.

For the fanboys, shit, they’ll love it. But those same people “just can’t decide” which book is their favorite and will harangue you for seeing the Danny Boyle film before reading the novel that made Welsh into a literary rockstar.

Maybe the point is I should expect Harry Potters instead of Hobbits- you can’t always expect home runs. But then again, maybe I should loosen up and enjoy a decent light read. Crime was precisely that.

Grade: B-

And just because I have the excuse, sort of, here’s Spud:

A buddy of mine laid this story out on me the other day. He even foolishly told me to blog about it. It is a cautionary tale; hopefully you, the reader will pick the moral up on your radar.

A few weeks ago, my friend had the dubious company of one of his exes. For reasons I doubt I will get my head around, he had her over at his place. Breath was held on both ends, because they hadn’t seen each other for a while, and their last encounter went down like an episode of Disasterpiece Theater, with cellphones bouncing off walls, the destruction of some flatware and finally a neighbor threatening to call in a Domestic.

Given that context, I’m still not sure why either would even bother, but my buddy is keen on good terms, to a fault. He is also keen on women, to a fault. In any case, they were both pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t nearly as hard to be civil, nice even, to each other as they were expecting. Drinks were had, tongues were loosened.

Towards the end of the night, proceeding more boldly than Star Trek, his ex announced that she would not be sleeping on the couch. My buddy resisted the urge to tell her she could have the dog bed because, as he explained to me, the dog usually just sleeps on his bed and the dog’s breath isn’t nearly as bad as her morning breath.

Instead, he sighed inwardly and followed her swaying ass into the bedroom.

At this point in my friend’s story, I stopped him with a look of horror and uttered those famous last words of Mistah Kurtz. My friend didn’t find that very funny and immediately countered that he knew exactly what I would do in the same situation.

Right he may be, he’s still a dumb motherfucker.

I’m sure what followed was a foreplay session filled in equal parts with the obvious lust, shame and the sort of slow nostalgia you feel when some good soul hits up the jukebox for your favorite Pavement song. But mostly unwashed shame. We’ve all been there. It is, after all, a little weird to turn back the old timepiece.

Our intrepid time travelers were in such a shameful rush to hit 88MPH that they neglected to weigh their decisions properly. “I prefer it without a condom. You should know that,” he said she said. I don’t buy it, but the fact remains our man braved the furies of a Fury furiously nekkid.

What followed in his story was prefaced by a gesture of contrition, a lowered voice and a scarlet flush of embarrassment. The dude blew early, which never makes anyone’s day. And here’s the part where I started laughing harder:

“What’s wrong? You what? You were supposed to pull out! Oh fuck. Fuck. I don’t care if I’m on the pill, you asshole, jesus. You are buying me a morning-after pill.”

Health class lessons aren’t just something we apparently forget, they’re also something we become. Proceed with caution, because that’s fifty bucks you don’t have to lose.

His story ended on a note of the awkward, not because of the look he said the pharmacist shot them, because she was probably just jealous anyway. No, the awkward came when they parted ways, without so much as a hug, both off to their respective places of employ.

While I’ve never fully understood my friend, I understand him with this girl even less. Once he finished telling me his tale, his eyes lit up and with all the disembodied glee of a preschooler, he said:

“Dude, she’s coming to my place this Saturday and bringing over polka-dot rubbers. I’ve never even seen those. I’ll save you one.”

It only took me about five years to put together an attack plan for total (literary) world domination, but I’ll be damned if I haven’t put together a swell one.

For those of you who stumble onto this before there’s any real content, my bad. I promise this will be a regular supply of excellent and maybe even some excellence.

So have patience, tune in in a couple of days, you’ll be pleasantly surprised.