I am greedy

I want more people to set Twitter challenges. I want people to send them to me specifically. I have fun doing things like bedtime stories and "50 L Tweets" in less than 140 characters. Now I need to figure out how to make this happen.

Today I really mean it

I don't feel well again today, and I am interested to see how the new higher dose of seizure meds plays out. The only thing I am considering post-wise are a couple of things that have come to mind in the aftermath of writing the 7 things post yesterday.

The first is that I was not really raised atheist. Not religious, either. There is not really a word for it. We did not attend church, but moral, civic, and societal obligations were deeply stressed.

The other is that there is one more thing I am irrationally frightened of - space. There is nothing you could do to get me to go up in a spaceship. And yet I am a big fan of most space movies, even a lot of pretty bad ones.

Day 7 and all that

I am back home from Minnesota. It is cold there, and it just trips me out that so many people live in wintry places and just put up with it.

In lieu of anything really on point, it occurred to me the other day to write about two images I use in my head for my own convenience. One is the hopper. The hopper is the basket for topics I am ready to speak about. I suppose it is like the hopper on a pitching machine. The topic is in the hopper, and it will shoot out of my mouth or onto this blog. The other is the big lazy susan. Projects I want to do are on the lazy susan. There might not be one in front of me at the moment, but there are many out there, spread around the circumference, and when I think of something that goes with a given potential project I can just put it on the pile. If it comes time to do a project, just pull on the edge and pull the project to right in front of me.

On the lazy susan and hopefully soon to be in the hopper is my part as one of the opening acts for Megan Volpert's book launch this Saturday at Wordsmith's - on the square in Decatur - TIME CORRECTION - THIS EVENT BEGINS AT 5PM - And I am probably going first, because my bit is the only one with techie stuff.

It is probably the BAD angel

So, here it is Day 4 and I am posting. I am also going to pre-load posts for launch tomorrow and the next day because tomorrow and the next day I will not be posting in person.

The angel I refer to is one of the cartoon angels everybody has on each shoulder that tug in opposing directions. Usually the tug is portrayed as between good and evil, but that seems a bit two dimensional. There are probably at least 64 angels, if it is a binary thing. But, the angel in question is the one that occasionally pipes up about somehow getting a lot of public attention. Fame and fortune and everything that goes with it (hopefully, excellent health insurance and better possibilities for subverting American literary culture).

That angel says "You are photogenic, well-spoken, and you have a fascinating medical condition that will probably kill you without deteriorating your looks! Write a poignant meditation on the fragility and beauty of life and it is next stop, Good Morning America! First, we take Manhattan, baby!"

When I think about how many people I would have to talk to every day if I did that, plus all the other items on the very long list of reasons I have not done that so far, I get tired all over and just buy a lotto ticket. I had a long odds totally random bad thing happen to me, I figure I am due for a long odds totally random satisfying thing that could definitely include excellent health insurance and possibilities for subverting American literary culture.

Best regards to you all.

Yes! Third time is the charm -

I am hereby posting for a third day in a row. Haven't Twittered today at all (except just a tiny bit) because (1) I don't feel well; (2) I am preoccupied; and (3) the energy I have had has been devoted largely to Wii. Check me out! I am au courant!

With regard to the DIY book discussed in the last post- I am enjoying the section on music much more than the section on poetry, which was what set me off yesterday. There is some good information on pirate radio in the UK (more specifically, in international waters near the UK) and on the relationships between Zine culture and Riot Grrrl - showing that in many ways the public perception of Riot Grrrl everything was inaccurate. Interesting. BUT I think the author of DIY needs some brush up on American music history- there is a paragraph or so leading up to skiffle taking off in the UK that does not make sense, although the big picture is as accurate as really needs be.

Delusions of Banjer today, for the first time in a while. Thank you, Bad Livers.

The Only Thing That is Difficult

The only thing that is difficult is putting your pants on over your head. In theory, it is possible and would even be easy that I could do at least one post every day for a year (excluding Jan 1st, which I missed).

It is calculated future disappointment for me to set out projects like this. If I do this one, several days will read "'Here Is a Post for Today' - A post for today." Just so you know.

What to say. OK. I read a book yesterday and am reading another one today that have me a little riled up about online communication. The one I am still reading has an obvious connection. "DIY: The Rise of Lo-Fi Culture" by Amy Spencer. The rise and evolution of 'Zines and other DIY anti-mainstream self-produced culture. It is pretty interesting stuff - tracing threads from Dada to punk to queercore to riotgrrl to crafting. I recommend it, at about 100 pages in.

The other book, the one I read yesterday is a less obvious candidate for "get somebody riled up about actively participating in communication online." The book is "Love All the People" and is a collection of all of Bill Hick's words - sets, interviews, notes, sayings, articles. Highly recommended. He was a fire and brimstone preacher/shaman who was visible in this dimension as a stand-up comedian. He is a personal hero of mine.

Well, the obvious connections between me and him are Georgia, religious upbringing, dedicated smoking, and terminal cancer totally unrelated to smoking. He had less than a year after his diagnosis (pancreatic metastasized to liver, advanced stage IV). I was anticipating less than five years at diagnosis (right temporal mixed glioma, low stage III), but that was almost eight years ago.

His modus of righteous fury and catharsis could never be mine, but it is tremendous and wonderful. It is not a matter of "agreeing" with everything he says, and I don't laugh at everything in his set, but he was righteous and motivated and true to his self. I hope I can be as well.

He did not understand why it was so difficult for the American media to grok what he was up to - his audiences were often totally on board. He was huge in England.

It was inspiring (and a little wearying) to read his work and be reminded so forcefully of my own abortive lunges toward more public avenues for attempting reclamation of some particularly noxious cultural waste. I had a recommendation lined up from Kenneth Koch for applying to MFA programs and then realized I would never write what I need to write if I went through academic channels for poetry. I repeatedly attempted in high school, college, and out in the world to get involved with video, writing, and comedy scenes and found that attractive women who did not want to date any of the guys there (and were funnier than the guys there) rarely get an invite to the next meeting. Many women do get into the scene, and I do feel that I have a personality issue that conflicted with the folks I tried to interact with. And yet, and yet, and yet. I still believe that American culture needs the cleansing fire from somewhere, and not nearly enough people are producing it.

I am trying to find them, they must be out there. It could be prose, it could be poetry, and there is probably a great deal of it in what is called (hilariously) comedy. I follow these guys on podcasts and Twitter and they are talented and funny, but they are guys (not adults), and it seems they are in a bit of a "Warmed-over-Bill-Hicks" rut, like they heard his words but never listened to what he was saying. I am not sure whether they are listening to anyone but each other. Makes me want to throw my shoes at their heads. Oh well.

About this Person

My limited and probably naive efforts to raise public awareness of Tiny Bedtime Stories lead me now to address an issue I might otherwise avoid. If I am going to pester strangers and ask whether they would like a copy of the book, it seems appropriate to give some account of myself somewhere publicly accessible. Am I, JS van Buskirk, a real person? A weirdo? What is the big idea?

Yes. I am a real person. “JS van Buskirk” is an assumed name I use for creative work and online things, but it is my name for those purposes. I have been using it since sometime in the late 90's. It is difficult to remember exactly when I started. JS van Buskirk was the name I used for the first OPOYUL~ website (now gone) and for the first large-ish complicated art project I undertook. Perhaps that project will rise from the ashes one day. JS was also the name I used when I started a performance series here in Atlanta called INFO DEMO - a knock-off/homage to Mr. John Hodgman’s Little Gray Books Lectures. I was interviewed for Creative Loafing while that was going on - you can read the interview here.

Much of Tray’s interview is still fairly accurate, although I no longer have the fancy downtown office. I have a non-fancy downtown office and I work for the government. The brain tumor is still an issue - after surgery, chemo, radiation, chemo, and now chemo again, plus an increasing dosage of anti-seizure medicine. Keeps life interesting. I have not done much to increase the OPOYUL~ knowledge-base in recent years and I no longer produce OPOYUL~ trading cards for Art-O-Mat machines. You can print some out for yourself at the main site, if you like.

I write poetry more often these days than I did for a long while. The big project now is a collaboration with artist Julie Puttgen and composer Jim Carlson. It should be pretty fantastic. We are hoping to have the multi-media feast consumable by audience in August/September of ‘09. I need to get cracking, having written only about 1/4 of my portion. There might be a website for the project between now and then that will give tidbits.

I am a little weird, but not a weirdo.

The big idea is that I do things I enjoy doing, including giving out copies of this book I am very proud of.

pruntiform - the usual thoughts about traffic

Seems like all the people want to drive in this lane.
Like this lane has something special about it -
All the lanes are headed the same way.
The traffic is dense and darting, inefficient -
People display a monstrous lack of patience.
Want is a state, it is desperate, has private motive.
To satisfy want, people are moved individually -
Drive unpredictably and that can cause accidents.
In this town, everyone is from elsewhere, each drives differently.
This lane must have special qualities, must seem worth the trouble,
Lane changes being so dangerous.

First Post

This is the first post. Good enough for now. I am going to buy a camera.