Notepad Hypotheses.

To the Whims of the Great Magnet

Some days are not for the road.

When your morning is staring at the terrified eyes of the eight-year old passenger in the car that you narrowly missed crashing into, the world is trying to tell you something. The drivers in gargantuan SUV’s and hulking Ford Escorts around you look into your nervous rabbit eyes with a mixture of disappointment and understanding. They’ve been there. You’ve stalled, almost been hit by a taxi, and now, you’ve almost hit a car holding a child. You want to get the fuck out of there, but you can’t even bring yourself to pull out when there’s a space. Deep breaths and the gentle clutch control drilled into your by months of instruction eventually serve.

So here you are, rolling again. Glance at the clouds, those blackening bastards are conspiring against you. Head home son, your teenage blood isn’t going to get you out of trouble today, because today is one of those days. One of those days, when you don’t just have to keep an eye on these fucking terrible drivers everywhere, but you have to keep an eye on yourself, double check everything, because otherwise you’re going to kill.

Just head home, no funny business, no stops, no detours. Just get home and sit in silence. The Great Magnet is not pleased today, and as Thompson said, you’d be a fool to defy Him. Just follow the signs, stay below the speed limit for once, just like when you were a learner, because that’s what you are. A mere pupil of the God of the Motorway, Titan of Octane and Commander of the Ominous Sky. No resistance against such merciless deities, just follow their signs and pray for a quiet day.

Pull into the driveway,and kill the ignition. Deep breath. The sun comes out.

one hundred.

I’ve been having an awful night, I’m not entirely sure why tonight of all nights, but a feeling of dread overcame me at about half 11. Around midnight I turned on my computer, slammed something down and clicked “Publish”. I felt like I had been punched in the stomach.

And then someone responded.

The person who responded is not really any great friend of mine, honestly I barely know her, but someone acknowledging my feelings of desperation, weakness and stagnation lifted me instantly.

I want to thank everyone who follows my little rants on this blog, I started this thing to keep myself writing, but in the last one hundred posts I’ve found so much release from my anguish, and knowing that someone is listening makes it worth it.

I haven’t dreamed in colour in so long.

I found a note in my little brown paper notepad, it read:

“I’m becoming convinced that some sort of insanity is essential to understanding Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas…get terrified out of my mind, secreting adrenaline and check it out.”

My day to day life is becoming just that: I live each day not caring whether I see the next one. I have my school work to barely pass; some terrifying goals to meet to go to university which I am in no way close to achieving; and if I’m lucky a fuck on a Friday.

Where has my life gone? There’s no romance but what is arranged; no fun but procrastination; no insanity but depression.

I want to load up on heinous chemicals and drive through the desert, I want to be fucking terrified to my very bones and laughing while I do what others don’t dare, just to say that I did it, fuck you all you gutless bastard robots. I want to lie on my death-bed and say that I did something more than breathe.

Murder most meh.

I love Joni Mitchell. I love Norah Jones. Whatever your view of jazz is, Herbie Hancock is one of the greatest musical minds that has the earth has been blessed with. Seriously, watch the man in full swing, his fingers are a sight to see.

I had my first listen of Norah Jones’ “…Featuring” album today, which chronicles her various collaborations over the years. Oh dear.

Okay, okay, it’s not all “oh dear”. In fact, very little is. Songs like the beautiful “Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John” (with Belle and Sebastian) and “Creepin’ In” (with Dolly Parton, no less) show her incredible trademark smoky tone of voice and subtle ornamentation, not to mention her remarkable ability to fit any session, be it folk, jazz or country.

However, the shit hits the fan as soon as Jones teams up with legendary pianist Herbie Handcock for what can only reasonably be described as an ‘interpretation’ of Joni Mitchell’s “Court and Spark”. A jazz pianist and jazz singer coming together for a cover of what is essentially a jazz song; what could go wrong?

Well.

Despite being written by a songwriter with a penchant for jazzy improvisation and diverse harmony and structure, (check out the use of dreamy whole-tone scale in the opening sequence) Mitchell retains the accessibility and pop sensibilities that make her so well loved. While Hancock’s version opens with dreamy, meandering piano, it seems to build to very little. Mitchell fans will sit and wait for the intro melody to kick in, and sigh when Jones begins the vocals with no hint of any real melody backing her at all, just more improvisation. The overall effect is unconvincing: Hancock is shredding away at some scale or another; Jones is singing with half of Joni’s power, instead relying on her sultry, sexuality-dripping drawl that often serves her well, but here comes off as lazy; and I can’t help but feel that Jones is struggling to keep up with Hancock, understandable in the presence of a man who was once Miles Davis’ go-to guy for keys.

I’m not saying that the whole album is a waste of money, not at all. There are many fine tracks to be found, which will sound great turned down low so that everyone can talk over their dinner. But if you want easy listening/dinner party music, buy one of Norah’s fantastic first two albums.

Flight Home

Women young and old,

Mothers and daughters,

beautiful and ugly,

some were wise in the maternal manner of the middle aged woman,

some would someday become wise after life had worked it’s impression upon them,

in the way that the wind carves the desert canyons into something deeply scarred, and yet full of beautiful years and experience. Stories to tell.

Every woman simultaneously closed her eyes, leaned back and calmly sighed around me in the cabin,

as the plane began to gently fall through the night sky.

I looked out.

Black.

Thick, and as meaningful as a bucket of tar.

I was terrified that the world had gone out without me.

Only myself, and the sleeping wise women in the sky above the dead Earth.

Belles-lettres

–plural noun1.literature regarded as a fine art, esp. as having a purely aesthetic function.2.light and elegant literature, esp. that which is excessively refined, characterized by aestheticism, and minor in subject,substance, or scope.