tourist-free traffic

i dozed fitfully on the six-and-a-half hour flight. there was no one of any interest near me, and i didn't want to finish my book too early.

i guess florida is the place other than the pacific northwest that i have been the happiest, because i didn't notice the wet pine/mountain air smell right off. of course, it is raining, and mt rainier is shrouded in cloud cover (as she somehow manages to do even when there is no other cloud cover in the sky).

the rental car place gives me a pt cruiser, about which i grumble to myself, and as i drive i find numerous reasons to hate them even more (...the space inside is allocated poorly, my cupholder is situated that i have to lean down almost to reach it, it's ugly...), but it is a car, and cheap, so off i go.

my appointment for my back was yesterday, and there was a general air of levity and humor in the shop. despite this, i am not really looking forward to six hours of aggravating pain.

"darth, have i used a rotary motor on you before?" scott asks.

"no, how are they different?"

"well, alot of the customers say they don't hurt as much."

and he is right. the more he does, the less i feel i need to tense up. the less my skin feels like hamburger. the less my jaw aches from jamming my chin into my cupped hands.

we talk about the rotary motor, how it does about the same job as the electromagnetic motor, but he did have to change his technique. the rotary motors always got written off as shit because they made them in prison out of cassette player motors. how one of his friends that he respects turned him onto them. i agree with him that it hurts considerably less, that it was "almost like a massage compared to the other motors."

we talk about skinny puppy and old ministry. how the only reason anyone knew lane staley was dead for two weeks is because his accountant noticed that his 9,000 dollars a day for heroine was no longer being taken out of his account. how 27 seems to be the magic number for these artist type's burnout.

"do you think it is just that that certain genius hits some point where it has to self-destruct. better to burn out than fade away?" i ask.

"i think it is a helluva lot simpler than that. i think when you are that popular, everyone wants to be your friend. and they will bring to you the things you like. 'you like alcohol jim? here ya go.' 'have some more heroine, kurt.' they don't even have to leave to get it anymore."

this seems like a brilliant, albeit less romantic, reason why we lose some of our possibly greatest minds before their time.

time rolls on.

"i'm definitely going to finish the angel's body today. then we could do the wings in dallas, and another to do the background, cause i can probably just get a mag and wash it in, and then one more, if you wouldn't mind, to just kinda put my blessing on it."

"yeah!" i am just thrilled that there is finally a light at the end of the tunnel.

i know i have really impressed scott with my diligence in coming back to finish my tattoo up. i somehow see, in his 20 or so years of tattooing, a long list of unfinished projects.

i hang out with s, my old friend from the inner circle of pizza hell, and we have a couple drinks and ride around lakewood looking for something to occupy our otherwise tired minds.

i know, i failed to post pics last time. but i promise (especially to you, byrd) that i will get them up as soon as my back is healed.

more to come, i've no doubt.

darth sardonic