February 16th, 2011

Happy birthday to me.

Another year down. How far have I come?

Well, let me sit back and count my blessings.

2010 brought me:

Bevies of runway models

A new BMW 745, with Blizzack all season radials

A surprisingly positive return on my stock portfolio (thanks to my cousin, Jorge, and his shrewd investment strategies)

Many lost nights, and a few lost weekends with Pedro

A new job opportunity for a former employer, with none of the bullshit and all the financial gains

Leads are coming back for three of my screenplays

I have more, but suffice to say, 2010 treated me well. I was able to get in a trip to New Orleans with My Master, on our way to our new home, Chicago. This worked out very well, I have been wanting to live closer to my cousin Pedro for some time. His operation up there has been poised to grow for some time, and now that I'm here I can take a more active role in soliciting new business capital and creating subsequent revenue streams. It's worked out quite well thus far, and shows vast promise for the future.

I might get to buy that island and fill it with peanut butter chewies and topless Brazilian women before it's all over, after all.

The only real negative to this past 12 human months has been the introduction of My Nemesis. He is truly a disgusting human being. Bereft of any sense of fashion or style, he is always wearing the same ugly green pants, insists on riding his bike everywhere (I've yet to let him ride in my 745 out of general principle), and usually smells like he hasn't showered for days. I continue to implore My Master that she can do better, but for some reason she is very taken by him. This is something I'll never understand, but then again, humans will never understand the majesty and glory of the peanut butter chewy, or how satisfying it is to lick feet. I guess no species is perfect, but I'm close.

In a rare moment of humanity, My Nemesis made me an "Alpo cake" for my birthday the other night. He was very excited about my birthday, saying the number 42 had some magical significance or something. It probably relates to some pagan god or something, who knows what this troglodyte thinks. While I wanted to lecture him about my affinity for mignon and vintage Dom, I held my tongue and enjoyed the cake he made. People from Minnesota do leave something to be desired, but they do try when they need to, so I allow them to cling to life, I guess.

I also allowed myself to be photographed, and am even going to post said photo here. I look happy, right?

I have also been really digging on a 3 hour techno set from a favorite performer of mine, Tony Child. It was recorded just this past October in Australia. It really covers the gamut of the older sound, and per my entry regarding the Mills track below, so much of this takes me back to my NYC days. Pedro was there, he can tell you. How we both made it out of that time period alive and with all our toes I cannot know. If any of you would like to hear electronic music as it was meant to be, have a listen to this:

Surgeon live at The Forum, Sydney, October 2010

A little for the masses

This is a def. top ten for me. It calls back to my time in NYC as a currency trader, and nights at Tunnel or Limelight, when Mills was a resident. It's not 1993 anymore, but still to this day, it's hard to top the master himself. It's so simple, gets right to the point, and the low end gets my furry ass moving, time in and time out. It was a simpler time.

My cousin Pedro has no taste for this sort of thing. He prefers Dave Guetta or Bob Sinclar. I just don't get it. I just don't.

The real way to a good nights' rest

I have found it. Finally. After looking long and hard, I have found the perfect sleeping scenario. It has taken me many a moon, but at long last I’ve found it.

Tempurpedic, you say? Yes, the Swedes can make a nice mattress, but after owning their flagship mattress in a California King size (I always have room for a few friends) in the early part of the last decade, it’s just not for me. A Sleep Number bed? I don’t think so. I do find myself, on long roadtrips through My Master’s home state, listening to AM radio, and yes I hear many commercials during breaks in the rancorous hate-mongering of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. But, my cousin Pedro had one of those, and we actually popped one of the air chambers after a rawkus night of super modeling and tamales, so I can’t fully endorse that brand, either.

But, my friends (mostly the ladies), therein lies the secret. A perfect night’s sleep doesn’t require a special Swedish air-filled radio mattress. Don’t be fooled by advertisements! The perfect nights’ sleep can be had anywhere! You might be surprised to hear me say this, but don’t be. After all, I’m a baby puppy, and if there’s anything I know about, beyond international political economy, currency trading, and young adult screenplays, it’s how to ensure I get good sleep. How else can I maintain this glossy coat, or keep the wrinkles under my darling brown eyes to a minimum?

So, now you’re all asking, “My dear Smokenstein, what is your secret?”

I thought long and hard about publishing this. I have come to the conclusion, which I’m comfortable with, that I should ideally include this as an aside in my upcoming screenplay. It’s one of those secrets that merits disclosure, but I’d like it to be only known to those who are, as My Nemesis (the ass) says from time to time “down with it.” As My Master and Nemesis have spies everywhere, who no doubt read this blog, and report back my thoughts, plans, and desires, to be used against me. But it doesn’t matter, here’s why.

The perfect sleeping position is a complicated thing. There are many factors to consider: the number of layers of blankets and each blankets’ thickness; the temperature of the ambient air in the room; is my little head covered or not; whether or not to leave feet out; to name a few. THAT is the conventional wisdom, and it’s all wrong!

It always starts the same. My Master and Nemesis go to bed, and I dutifully climb down to the bottom of the bed, under the sheets, and lick feet. It’s a guilty pleasure, I don’t expect you to understand it. I am who I am. As soon as they are asleep, and it doesn’t take long, especially for My Nemesis, the buffoon, I climb back out. This is the true secret. I climb back out, and I proceed to lay between them. Now, you’re asking yourself, “between them? This doesn’t make any sense at all.”

Oh but my friends, it does, and therein lies the secret. The fact that nobody believes me is the best part. As described above, the blanketing is very important. I cannot stress this enough. Although I am small, I have a surprisingly complex internal temperature regulating system, it makes for problems unless everything is just so. I have tried 800+ goose down comforters, I have tried sleeping bags. I have used 5 layers of 600 thread count Egyptian cotton sheets. I have even tried electric blankets. Although each has its place the game of life, none are perfect. This is when I realized that if I correctly position myself, I don’t need any of it! The heat given off by My Master and Nemesis is in itself the perfect solution. Their combined bodyheat (mostly My Nemesis, jagoff) is stifling, but this is why laying between them is so important. By laying between them I am able to get the best of both worlds; their blazing combined heat warms me to my little puppy core, and it is immediately dissipated because I have nothing covering me. I am truly in the valley of the sleep gods. Although it worries me sometimes, being so close to the ass of My Nemesis, who is known to drop what he affectionately (jagoff) refers to as ‘bombs’ during the night, I have thus far remained unscathed, and I grow more and more confident each night. Now, this no doubt infuriates My Master and Nemesis, as I am basically stealing their covers, which their cold hairless bodies depend upon for warmth, but seeing as I’m the baby puppy in the room, I think I deserve a little more.

And, I am clearly getting it. Night in and night out.

So, there. I, Smokenstein X. H. McGothlin have shared one of my most closely guarded secrets. All you non baby puppies need to do now is find two creatures approximately 10x your size, and the bed they sleep in, and you too can have the best nights’ sleep of your life, each and every night.

#483

Why I quit Facebook, I do not want my firstborn to be a PC/Chihuahua mix.

To all you non-disguised humans, I did it. The cajones in me, the fear deleting my account would somehow compromise my identity was the final straw. I do not want to be on my death bed compulsively checking my friend's relationship status when I come to out of a morphine cloud.

It scares me to the point of pissing my fur pants.

Many of you were not my friends on facebook, many were. Like any other dipshit excited to meet up with my relatives back home in Chihuahua, or mi amigas all over the world, with an annoying amount of enthusiasm, leaped onto the bandwagon, bounded, all four paws.

Thinking, This is better than MYZpace. More "cool." At least more entertaining than that joke of a website the cat's made with their misspellings and what no

The diluted communication with others that are far away drew me in. I could go visit my friends in Japan on a whim. But wait, I only sang karaoke with once. Wouldn't it be awkward if I just randomly FB'd them up to come visit? We haven't spoke one word since my visit, but from facebook I hear that they currently are loathing their new emo haircut and they never got over Sheri leaving the Runaways. I am not a big fan of Joan Jett, and I make fun of emo haircuts, it would be difficult to hold composure with these people, even with mass amounts of Sake.

Short seconds turned into excruciating hours, I started to use FB less. I got violently ill upon hearing of people having a bad day, projectile vomit covering walls in reaction to truth I did not want to know, my brain started to bleed at there mere sight of a status update.

I do not care whether or not you drank so much that you slept with a vagrant of the same breed, or are bawling because you realized that Dave Matthews Band really does suck. Especially if our interactions have consisted of a small conversation in a pub one night after 46 shots of Tequilla.

Facebook makes a mockery out of true friendships, and realistic relationships. To think that you can be friends with over 1,000 people is ridiculous. Real relationships take work that most of us don't want to make, and effort that most of us loathe others for.

Many of us know people, but to say every one we know is a friend is a lie. We do not care about the people we know like we care about the people we love. Facebook proves how lazy we are, we don't want the real work of a relationship when we can just click and get the instant gratification.

I understand that I don't have facebook anymore and I will still use electronic devices to communicate, but I don't have to hear about someone's bad haircut every time I pick up the phone. I do not have to feel guilty that although FB proclaims that I have over 3,000 friends, I only talk to three of them, or actually care to hear what two of them have to say.

My search for meaning comes from a different place. I want to talk, I want to write, and I want to listen. In the time before facebook, I remember a weird thing I used to do which was think, it REALLY was weird, I would think, then if a thought was relevant, or consumed me for a long period of time, I would share that thought with another human being. But if it wasn't, I would forget about it, and nobody would ever know...

I wouldn't call someone to tell them I just clipped my toenails and I accidentally snipped the quick. Get a grip folks, start to smile at people if you believe it is possible to have 3,000 friends. I mean I guess, the internet can be your best friend, but how will you procreate with it? No seriously, if you can explain this to me, I will join facebook again, and OK CUPID, and I will marry my PC. You non disguised humans really do annoy me sometimes.