First, a few questions:

1) Am I the only one who had to look up what an Oxford Comma was?

2) Who are you people? I have a few repeat customers, as it were, of whom I have little knowledge. For instance, person from Louth, who are you? Person from Tempe, AZ, who are you? The people streaming in from various Middle Eastern places to look at (presumably) soft-core boy-kissing because their web-nannies ward them off from real porn -- this I understand. People looking for Furri porn -- this I *don't*understand, but I'm too lazy to track down one errant image that summons ye as hogs to slaughter-blood. Regular hits from other places (including Ile-de-France) confuse me. Identify yourself. Cookies may ensue. Actually, I fear that you are someone I know and haven't recognized moves me, so sing out... Feel free to use the nifty Guest Map.

Next, an observation:

I saw a coyote the other day. At least, I'm reasonably certain it was. My first though was that it was a wolf -- having spent more than my fair share driving through the swampy woods of NE North Carolina, I have seen Red Wolves -- typically dead on the side of the road, to be fair -- and I have seen Gray Wolves, and this was not a wolf. Nor was it a dog.*

Next, an exultation:

I got a random check from my (ex-) health insurance company. I used it to get a DVD set and book I've wanted for months. The local Barnes and Noble (and before you give me crap, it's the only bookstore with 30 miles. Yes, the only one. ) has a copy of Stephen Frye's The Liar. Judging from its shelfware, it's roughly contemporary from its 1992 publishing date, and certainly no-one else in these parts would read it. And it is lovely. It's literally hard to put down: erudite, cheeky and quite queer. The first part is -- deliberately, I'm sure -- like a cock-eyes Another Country, so clearly I'm enamored of it. I burn night-light praising it now rather than reading it.
The DVD set was It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia -- a returned-to-the-store copy and consequently cheap, but I've yet to find any problems with it.

Progress of the Rake?

You're the Tortured Intellectual!
Take What sort of Hipster are you? today!
Created with Rum and Monkey's Personality Test Generator.

You're sensitive, you're emotional, and you wonder why everyone else in the world exists on a different plane. You cannot eat, breathe, or sleep without analyzing each action to death. You're usually sombre, depressed, lethargic, but you can be nearly glad from time to time. You wear whatever you can find on your cluttered bedroom floor. You carry books, notepads, reading glasses with you wherever you go. You have friends, but only a few who truly get where you're coming from. You frequent coffee shops, libraries, and the less crowded bars. You're obsessed with past people, past ideas, past lives. You wish you could die and be reborn as Jack Kerouac.

A) I'm not a hipster, but I'd sure write over-wrought prose to get between that model's pages.

B) Except for the Kerouac thing, it's pretty right-on. Compare this to a few years ago.

I haven't got a clever name for this one

I'm not sure exactly what's up with the spate of youtube videos lately, other than it's nice to have some video content to back up whatever I'm on about. This'll be the last for a while, hopefully.

You may notice I hardly ever talk about my personal life right now. Quite frankly, it's not entertaining in the deeply venial, mostly-comic style I usually evoke. And one of the... well, not benefits, really but... results... of thinking about and writing about tragedy as a genre is the sure knowledge that however pathetic your personal life is, the cards are stacked against you that it will ever rise to the level of tragedy. And if perchance does, the US will never appreciate it.

Which is just as well -- it' a bit harsh, but it keeps you wallowing too deeply in self-fear and self-pity. (Heh heh. *That* is a little criticism joke for you!)

But in contradiction to what I just said -- and without going into particular detail -- the past few weeks have been the worst of a bad time. Insomnia doesn't help. I've never really suffered from it before, but over the past months, I've developed a healthy respect for it. I'm sure it's stress-related, but I haven't gotten more than 3 or 4 hours a night for ages. Generally, after a week or two of listening all night to trains whistles from miles away*, I get desperate enough to swallow a few sleeping pills, and that's where I am right now. It this post disappears tomorrow, you'll know that it didn't pass the right-mind test. Heh.

Anyway, the point of the post is this: music helps the soul. There's nothing better than hearing a song someone else sings that describes the way you feel. The above song is mine right now. And yes, purists, I know it's his uncle who wrote the song, but I like Rufus' version better. I like that extra little bit of frisson his sexuality gives it, and I just think he's lived it better. It's one of the few songs he sings that I can forget how... slimy he is personally (yes, I have met him so I can say that with some level of authority) and just for once go with the song. Since I always like something to look at while I watch videos -- closed captions and subtitles, how I love thee -- below are the lyrics.

One Man Guy
Rufus Wainwright
from his album Poses (Dreamworks, 2001)

People will know when they see this show
The kind of a guy I am
They'll recognize just what I stand for and what I just can't stand
They'll perceive what I believe in
And what I know is true
And they'll recognize I'm a one man guy
Always was through and through

People meditate
Hey that's just great
Trying to find the inner you
People depend on family and friends
And other folks to pull them through

I don't know why I'm a one man guy
Or why I'm a one man show
But these three cubic feet of bone and blood and meat are all I love and know

'Cause I'm a one man guy in the morning
Same in the afternoon
One man guy when the sun goes down
I whistle me a one man tune

One man guy a one man guy
Only kind of guy to be
I'm a one man guy
I'm a one man guy
I'm a one man guy is me

I'm gonna bathe and shave
And dress myself and eat solo every night
Unplug the phone, sleep alone
Stay way out of sight
Sure it's kind of lonely
Yeah it's sort of sick
Being your own one and only
Is a dirty selfish trick

'Cause I'm a one man guy in the morning
Same in the afternoon
One man guy when the sun goes down
I whistle me a one man tune
One man guy a one man guy
Only kind of guy to be
I'm a one man guy
I'm a one man guy
I'm a one man guy is me

*Yes, it is very "Blues in the Night". The nearest trains tacks are 4 or 5 miles away, but the whistles come in clear and low. Oddly, it's much more depressing a sound that the ships' horns from Upper New York Harbour I could hear in Brooklyn.

Survey Confirms...

...What we all knew anyway. Go get a haircut, Justin Long. Or a blowjob. One or the other.