LP art was part of the whole listening process. Have a few special brownies, sit in the sweet spot on the floor between the speakers big enough to park a VW in and scrutinize the jacket. I don't care how flashy CD covers are, they'll never compare to the detail of the great pieces of art that the LP sleeves of the sixties and seventies are. Conspiracy buffs couldn't find a Paul is Dead clue on a CD, even if they stood on a chair and used a shoehorn. You can't use a jewel case to clean your stash on, either, and just try hash under glass with a CD.

My labor of love for the last year has been embroidering quilt squares based on LP covers. To honor my Rock Gods and Goddess. My take on Morrison Hotel is worth framing as a single piece.

The process is fairly simple. All you need is:
• tracing paper
• mechanical pencil
• hot transfer pencil
• 2000 albums

Lightly tape the tracing paper to the cover. Double-faced sticky tape works the best.

For Jimi Hendrix I opted for the simple cover of the soundrack album of the eponymous film. Jimi sitting on a tall school, curled around 12-string acoustic (strung left-handed), face almost totally concealed by a floppy brown hat decorated with conchos and a large, colorful feather, against a white background. I had 86'd Axis: Bold as Love because I wanted to be able to finish it before I was eligible for Medicare. The making of the transfer was easily finished. I was ready to hot-stamp it to the 14X14 inch square of unbleached muslin. I set the iron to stun. Carefully keeping the iron moving over the paper so as not to scorch the fabric. 20 seconds is usually optimum. I gently lifted the lower left corner of the paper to check for color intensity.

Nothing.

I repeated the ironing. Still no Jimi. That's when I realised I had forgotten to place the transfer side down.

I had a perfect print of Jimi Hendrix on the bottom of my iron.

It will be forever known as "The Jimi Hendrix Experience."

Remember the McDonald's coffee burns? I thought that was pretty dumb too. Until today.

On the way to work, we stopped for petrochemicals and coffee, as usual. They like to give yo those tall styrofoam cups with a lid, and they aren't too stout. I must have squeezed mine a bit too hard or in the wrong way, because the lid popped off like a Jack-in-the-box and rained coffee all over my lap.

It hurt. Really hurt. My coins were superheated, my stomach red, and I even took some hurt in a strategic location. I had to jump out of the car to recover myself. But like the manly man who just starting a new job that I am, I soldiered on and headed to work.

Tonight I have second degree burns. No kidding. I always expected that the McDonald's case came about because the lady was rather elderly, with the rice paper thin skin that makes many elderly people particularly prone to cuts and bruises. My skin's still pink and hearty. Okay, it's red and blistered, but it wasn't always like that.

Still, I'm not going to sue. The story is worth a couple weeks discomfort. And I won't stop drinking their coffee. At least I know it's hot. I have the blisters to prove it.

Lesson! The cup failed becaue I was holding it too high. Without the base to stiffen it, the cup deformed at the top, shooting off the lid and dousing me with blistering hot coffee. Hold your cups down low.

Update it is now December 2003 and the burns have not completely healed. in fact, they probably never will, leaving me with permanent scars on my abdomen and right inner thigh. Fortunately the strategic parts healed nicely

there was another bicycle-car accident at the bus stop today. second time in like a week, i think. a hubcap was hurt. cellphones were invoked.
this girl asked me questions in not-so-good english.
"What happened?!"
"i think that girl crashed into that car.. yeah"
"Was anyone hurt?!"
"no, no i don't think so.. except for that hubcap, *hehe*"
"What?"
"um, that.. uh, nothing"
"Someone was hurt?"
"no.. no, i don't think so."
and then her bus arrived and she smiled and waved good bye.

an accident can really liven up a place, i realized today. it fills the moment with some kind of suspense, and i think alot of people like that..


hmph..

I recieved a call from the British high commision today. Happily, they have approved my visa application (no - not the credit card). I say happily because I have already paid for a one way ticket to sunny London. It's in the UK (for the geographically challenged). The plane ticket will come in handy as I'd rather not have to walk there from Australia, especially in the summer heat. Oh yeah, it's going to be winter over there in December isn't it? Eep. I can only hope that my body doesn't go into some sort of temperature-difference-induced shock upon reaching my destination.

That should probably read "our destination" as I am not alone in my sojourn across the globe. No, I am planning on taking my SO with me! Someone's gotta earn the money while I sit in pubs drinking warm beer eh? That is what you do in England right? We prefer wrestling crocs and throwing boomerangs down here but I'm sure I can adjust.

Sorry where was I? Ahh yes, visa application - it's an ancestry visa which allows me to stay for up to four years if I so desire (can you hear the Crocodiles sigh in relief?) With any luck I'll be able to attend some kind of UK noders' gathering whilst touring the mother country. My only concern now is what football jersey to buy (I think I'll just go by the majority at whatever pub I grow to call 'local', I don't want to start an international incident after all.

hopping mad

Have any of you heard the word "hop" used in everyday activities? Hop into bed. Hop out of bed. Hop on over. I am sure that you have heard these phrases used at least once in your lives. I never really understood why anyone would want to hop anywhere, but hey, to each his own. Anyway, my point...

I thought about this whole hop phenomenon. Is it something I want to do? It is me? Does it sound like I would benefit from this hopping? So I decided to do it. I was going to hop. Why not? I like to try new things.

This morning I really really really didn't want to go to class. At all. I would have rather stayed in bed of course, slept an hour more and gone to work on time. But I had to go. I had to get my lazy ass up and go to class. So as I laid (I have no idea if I used the correct form of that word, I always fuck up on that sort of stuff) in bed, in my warm bed, in my warm, wonderful, comfy bed. I had to force myself up. I so threw the covers off with my legs and readied myself for the hop. I spun around so my legs were level to the floor and I thrust (that is such a dirty sounding word) my body upwards into the hop. The hop that was going to start my day off right. The hop that was going to energize me for the entire day. Oh, I wish that were true...

I didn't so much hop as slide. My left foot landed on a back issue of Rolling Stone and I slid across the floor. I guess the force of the fucking hop propelled me across the room with my foot on Ruben Studdard's face. The high impact slipping caused the fall. I fell right on my ass, and it wasn't a nice fall. Since none of you know me, I'm a slob. I never put anything up after I take it off and it's all on the floor. I fell on a heel. A spiky heel. Right in my ass. My shoe was upside down and I feel on the fucking heel. It wasn't nice. I didn't like it. I was in large amounts of pain. And because of the fall, I almost cut my tongue in two with my teeth. So I was sitting on the floor, holding my ass and doing my best to hold back screaming, "FUCKING SHIT ASS CUNT!" I was not a happy camper. Needless to say, my bruised and beaten ass got back into bed, set the alarm for an hour later and went back to bed. When I got up again, there was no hopping.

So now, I have a bitten tongue, a bruise on my ass the size of a nickel and rug burn on my right ankle and shin (don't ask me how that happened).

The Moral of this story: Never try new things the first thing in the morning.

Sometimes I just want to throw myself into wall to get myself motivated.

I'm not saying this would work, but it sure would hurt. I hate the fact that I have the motivation to write about bloody nothing in my daylog, but I can't get my brain into gear and write about something in a node.

It's so much easier though to write about my own life. I don't have to research it. I don't have to edit it and I'm less likely to get a copyright infringement suit slapped on me.

---

I started putting my knowledge of the guitar to good use and I have began to hit the big time. I am now leading a band at my church for kids and I play electric guitar for a budding youth group's worship band. I love it. I get to work with little kids who don't care if I miss a chord or mess up. They just want to hear my sing Jesus' name and get them hyped up so I can hand them over to the teacher who has to calm them down. I LOVE IT! With the youth group, I just started, but I'm working with a band that needs work. The bassist has a hard time with beats, the drummer doesn't know when to stop and the guitarist knows three chords. I'm in my element though because I love to teach.

---

Next subject: My long time friend and probably the only girl I have ever let touch me, Kori, is depressed and feeling lonely. I met with her at a Taco Bell and just listened, something I need to learn how to do more often. To back it up a little, I have a girlfriend named Kari. Kari is awesome in every way. She's beautiful, charming, smart, and I really, really, really like her. BUT I still feel distant from her. We are getting closer though after going out for 5 months, but it's hard for me since I shunned girls from my personal life for 17 years. Rounding it back to the subject, I have always been close to Kori, but like a brother-sister type close. I want to help her, but I know I can't get to involved because I need to think of Kari's feelings.

In light of all this, I realized how much I hate confrontation and I've never been the kind of person who could handle someone's emotional baggage. But I am also beginning to realize that being an adult means doing things sometimes that we dont wanna do. Which means, I will listen to Kori and Kari's problems because I am a good friend and a good boyfriend.

I know that most of you who actually read these things probably skipped past my whining and teen angst, so I will try and make things as colorful as possible now.

What I've been listening to:

• John Mayer - Room for Squares
• Story of the Year - Various Songs from the album Page Avenue
• PFR - The Late Great PFR
• Dean Martin - Greatest Hits
• Watashi Wa - Anything of theirs
• Taking Back Sunday - Who cares? It's all good

I know, I know. You want that minute and a half I stole from you. Well, YOUR NOT GETTING IT BACK! MWUHAHAHAHAHAHA!

JIMI HENDRIX

1942 - 1970