i had a clever title, honestly...
so what's to say, really? the move is coming down the pike like crazy (about three weeks) and we've been busy this entire week with people who want to occupy a chunk of the remaining time before we go.
new year's eve was incredibly fun. no, i'm not going to bother to fill in any details or clarify anything i said in my post, cause it just cracks me up to toss out teasers or random things that make you stop and say, "wait, what?!?" and then not even bother to clarify.
new year's day we went and got the kids from my mom, and had pho and hung out and relaxed (and no, despite the apparent lushness of my nye post, i was not hungover whatsoever) and had a nice day.
my wife still had wednesday off, but other than that it was your average day. i had to take the youngest to therapy, get the oldest to school, and later in the evening, friends came over.
thursday, my buddy a drove up from portland with his new girlfriend, and she is really cool. they work night shift, so they didn't leave until 1:30 am. and frankly, it's been so long since we have seen him and gotten to really hang out, that i really wished i could've stayed up longer to hang out with him more.
yesterday, lunch with m at some new indian place, and then out with my high-school buddy s for drinks and the strip club. i am not going to regale you, o beloved non-existants, with tales of debauchery and shenanigans, mainly because there aren't any. i will say this: alcohol certainly makes for a much more fun strip joint experience. (washington state has a law that alcohol cannot be served at any place where people are getting naked. i am sure my strip club experience would've been better if i could've at least had a drink or two. the two drinks i had at the bar before we went to the club were damn near wore off by the time i got in there, and then i just felt like an uptight loser the rest of the time. i also didn't have the kind of money that would've helped make me feel more relaxed, alcohol or no alcohol. in short, i was a miserly teetoler, which seems counterproductive to the whole strip club atmosphere in general.)
today, in a few hours, our friend m (different m) comes up from portland to hang with us for the weekend.
so that is why i haven't been posting.
and now, a short rant: if you have to announce to the world (i am thinking of a t-shirt, but i am sure there are other ways) that you are a part of the "counterculture" you are, in fact, more mainstream than the bubble-gummers.
mtv, and other mainstream "anti-mainstream" establishments will lead you to believe that uniting yourself with them makes you "subversive" and "left-of-center."
i mean, look at you, you aren't settling down for what the media machine is feeding you! you are finding the things that are the cool and acceptable "alternative" to the mainstream. (we could call it simply another mainstream, there are several: don't like the pop mainstream? buy into the country mainstream. you get to drive a truck and wear boots and a hat. don't like that? try the hip-hop mainstream. fubu shirts and cars with rims, gold jewelry if ya got it. not your cup of tea? go with the alternative mainstream. you get to do crazy things with your hair and wear clothes no one else wants.) regardless of which "counterculture" you choose, you get to run around being pretentious and thinking how cool you are cause you were there "first." that you knew about it before anyone else, and you can actually name all the members in some band, and even play this other band's song on the guitar. you feel superior cause you've been to every vans warped tour since they started.
and you know what? your heart is in the right place. maybe one day you will branch out, and start leaving the accepted "counterculture" uniform behind, and finally making decisions on your own. you will get turned onto things that really are counterculture, and slightly subversive, and your mind will expand.
the actual leaders of counterculture "movements" don't see themselves as such. (i keep using punk and alternative examples mainly cause that is what i am familiar with.) and self-proclaimed leaders of counterculture "movements" are often found to be posers.
for example, the ramones simply didn't like the music they were hearing on the radio, and wanted to make music they would like to listen to. the sex pistols were changing the world. it is widely agreed that the sex pistols were a bit of a big publicity stunt.
if i were more computer savvy, i would make a "punk as fuck" blogger award, and what is funny is that the blogs i would award it to would probably not be considered punk at all. moreso even by the bloggers themselves. but what is punk? it is not accepting the status quo, the bottom line, the by-line we are being fed. it is, simply put, living our own lives, and doing the things that make us happy, making our own path, following the beat of our own drum. is this something new? fuck no, teenagers have been doing it for time immemorial. some along the lines of "i belong to the counterculture" but even more along the lines of "i just can't accept that this is all there is, that this is the only way."
wow, ok, so much for "short." hahaha.
but thanks for playing along.
darth sardonic
new year's eve was incredibly fun. no, i'm not going to bother to fill in any details or clarify anything i said in my post, cause it just cracks me up to toss out teasers or random things that make you stop and say, "wait, what?!?" and then not even bother to clarify.
new year's day we went and got the kids from my mom, and had pho and hung out and relaxed (and no, despite the apparent lushness of my nye post, i was not hungover whatsoever) and had a nice day.
my wife still had wednesday off, but other than that it was your average day. i had to take the youngest to therapy, get the oldest to school, and later in the evening, friends came over.
thursday, my buddy a drove up from portland with his new girlfriend, and she is really cool. they work night shift, so they didn't leave until 1:30 am. and frankly, it's been so long since we have seen him and gotten to really hang out, that i really wished i could've stayed up longer to hang out with him more.
yesterday, lunch with m at some new indian place, and then out with my high-school buddy s for drinks and the strip club. i am not going to regale you, o beloved non-existants, with tales of debauchery and shenanigans, mainly because there aren't any. i will say this: alcohol certainly makes for a much more fun strip joint experience. (washington state has a law that alcohol cannot be served at any place where people are getting naked. i am sure my strip club experience would've been better if i could've at least had a drink or two. the two drinks i had at the bar before we went to the club were damn near wore off by the time i got in there, and then i just felt like an uptight loser the rest of the time. i also didn't have the kind of money that would've helped make me feel more relaxed, alcohol or no alcohol. in short, i was a miserly teetoler, which seems counterproductive to the whole strip club atmosphere in general.)
today, in a few hours, our friend m (different m) comes up from portland to hang with us for the weekend.
so that is why i haven't been posting.
and now, a short rant: if you have to announce to the world (i am thinking of a t-shirt, but i am sure there are other ways) that you are a part of the "counterculture" you are, in fact, more mainstream than the bubble-gummers.
mtv, and other mainstream "anti-mainstream" establishments will lead you to believe that uniting yourself with them makes you "subversive" and "left-of-center."
i mean, look at you, you aren't settling down for what the media machine is feeding you! you are finding the things that are the cool and acceptable "alternative" to the mainstream. (we could call it simply another mainstream, there are several: don't like the pop mainstream? buy into the country mainstream. you get to drive a truck and wear boots and a hat. don't like that? try the hip-hop mainstream. fubu shirts and cars with rims, gold jewelry if ya got it. not your cup of tea? go with the alternative mainstream. you get to do crazy things with your hair and wear clothes no one else wants.) regardless of which "counterculture" you choose, you get to run around being pretentious and thinking how cool you are cause you were there "first." that you knew about it before anyone else, and you can actually name all the members in some band, and even play this other band's song on the guitar. you feel superior cause you've been to every vans warped tour since they started.
and you know what? your heart is in the right place. maybe one day you will branch out, and start leaving the accepted "counterculture" uniform behind, and finally making decisions on your own. you will get turned onto things that really are counterculture, and slightly subversive, and your mind will expand.
the actual leaders of counterculture "movements" don't see themselves as such. (i keep using punk and alternative examples mainly cause that is what i am familiar with.) and self-proclaimed leaders of counterculture "movements" are often found to be posers.
for example, the ramones simply didn't like the music they were hearing on the radio, and wanted to make music they would like to listen to. the sex pistols were changing the world. it is widely agreed that the sex pistols were a bit of a big publicity stunt.
if i were more computer savvy, i would make a "punk as fuck" blogger award, and what is funny is that the blogs i would award it to would probably not be considered punk at all. moreso even by the bloggers themselves. but what is punk? it is not accepting the status quo, the bottom line, the by-line we are being fed. it is, simply put, living our own lives, and doing the things that make us happy, making our own path, following the beat of our own drum. is this something new? fuck no, teenagers have been doing it for time immemorial. some along the lines of "i belong to the counterculture" but even more along the lines of "i just can't accept that this is all there is, that this is the only way."
wow, ok, so much for "short." hahaha.
but thanks for playing along.
darth sardonic
Labels: ranting is good for the heart
posted by darth sardonic at 9:02 AM
10 Comments:
Mainstream, just not your kind would be my T-shirt sign. If I wore those t-shirts. And I don't.
And what was the title supposed to be?
that would be a cool t-shirt, krissie. i didn't have one, and i guess that is the joke. lol. i'm a dork.
Can I hire you to come tell that to the kids at my school?
unfortunately, belle, it is the kinda thing one must find out for themselves. i know i did. good luck, lol.
been there, given up the t shirt, wear cashmere and levis.
Oh I'm so radical!
love the 'punk as fuck' idea.
pxx
ty pixie, if i had the time and energy i might look into making one. but alas...
Actually, in my experience, teen-agers are the most conservative of all age groups. No other age group finds it so important to be part of a group, to look a certain way, and act a certain way. It's hell being a teen-ager who's "different" from the rest of the crowd.
true, but at the same time they want to rebel. hence the plethera of choices. don't want to belong to the mainstream, you can join one of the other cliques.
i liked the punks (back in the day) because it didn't matter how i looked or dressed.
but good point, wuastc
Nice rant Darth and what I've been telling my daughter.
Just be yourself and forget about those girls. Not that it's that easy when they point out everything that's different about you twenty times a day or more. But hey, how many of them have any desire to not blend?
yeah, i know, z. we want so horribly bad to fit in, but most of my friends didn't want to fit in the mainstream. so we had our "other choice" mainstream lol.
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