Ellen... R.I.P.

I'm sad to say that my insurance company called me yesterday afternoon to tell me that Ellen has passed away.

This pretty much ushers in a new phase of suckage into my life. For those of you keeping track, my Treo is dead and the charger is still missing so I'm using a barely useful backup cell, I'm going to have no place to live shortly as there's been an offer on the home I'm living in currently, my car's been totaled and after paying off what I still owe on Ellen I'm left with not enough to buy anything decent, and I'm still making no money for stapling boxes.

Sucks too that she had a nearly new engine, so many parts in that engine bay still had that new-part shine. She was guaranteed not to rust for as long as I owned her, had a new clutch, drivetrain warranty... The stereo sounded so nice, and left several people commenting: "Hey, I never even knew that sound was in the song on the radio..." There was no reason why she shouldn't have stayed on the road for many more years.

Heh, I *so* would never have guessed that this would be what my life'd be like five years ago.

Ellen, it's been a great seven-and-a-half years together, we sure saw a lot and been through so much... you were a wonderful car and that body'll forever leave me with nice soft mushy feelings whenever I see one of your siblings driving down the road. I'll miss the warm embrace of your heated leather seats after a day of snowboarding, the smooth feel of your clutch and shifter, the soothing comfort of your flawlessly functional air conditioning. If you get scrapped, may your parts bring long trouble-free service to some other Honda or Acura owner. If you get bought at auction, I hope that the chop-shop that repairs you does a nice job of it so the next person who gets you has a nice car... I hope they enjoy the new engine and clutch.

Rest in peace, sweetheart.

...Art

Let it go, it's over.

Okay, so I'm watching Power Shift on Much Music. Not really something I tuned into, it was just on TV. The Backstreet Boys were on in 9th place.hy
...Wait a fucking second, THE BACKSTREET BOYS ARE CHARTING?!? They have a new album? Iza informs me that yes indeed, they've got a new album. And it gets worse, she says. Apparently the Spice Girls are getting together too.

Why? Jesus, have we as a society not learned anything from the first time around?

Following that, in 8th place, was System of a Down. I'm not sure how this happens in a civilized society. Backstreet Boys followed by System of a Down. ...I'm having trouble with this, and am feeling very much like Lewis Black appears to be feeling when something's gone and broken him.

...God dammit. Let the shitty groups die.

Art

Ellen...

By now you've all pretty much heard that Ellen was crashed into some Accord last weekend. The resulting week has been pretty much ass, and can I just say I'm not especially fond of the rental I got? Nissan Sentra's one boring car with a stereo that sounds much like I'm listening to a CD on the other end of a telephone.

I dunno if Ellen'll be written off or if the insurance company will fix it, either option scares me. Most of you know how perceptive I am to the slightest faults in things, so if they fix it I know I'll be unhappy with the repairs. On the other hand, if they just write it off, where am I going to find a car like Ellen? She's got a fresh engine, the interior's in really good shape... Whatever they give me for the car could go towards a new vehicle, but what the hell would I pick? Besides, that would also mean financing, and we all know I play with boxes in fucking Milton in a futile attempt to make ends meet.

Oh, Bell Mobility called today. A courtesy call. Poor girl picked the wrong time to ask the wrong guy if everything was fine with his service... after a half hour of me listing problems I've had over the last little while you could tell she really really wanted to get off the phone.

Buh. Life blows. Also, an NYC post is looking exceedingly unlikely now. It's a long weekend, a Friday night of a long weekend, little bit after 9pm.. and I'm sleepy and in bed with no energy, plans, or enthusiasm for the long weekend.

What the fuck's that smell? Oh. Depression. Man, that's a strong stench.

...Art

Thoroughly rocked and rolled.

Yeah, so Iza and I got to the Nine Inch Nails show, scanned our Ebay-bought tickets... and they worked! A sigh of relief... see, I was thinking, really, what's to stop someone from getting these Print Your Tickets Yourself deals off the internet and selling copies of those tickets on Ebay? Anyway, ours were legit, or we were at least the first ones to try those barcodes. Whatever, we were in, and I was about to enjoy the last of my lingering birthday gifts.

My god, those NIN fans hot-boxed The Koolhaus. Just as soon as we got past security and entered the main room it stank to all holy hell like The Cave did when Joe and I smoked up in the basement. Good times.

Anyway, the opening act was a band called The Dresden Dolls. As far as I can figure, the band consists of one drunken Irish guy wrapped in a fairly attractive female body, and one deaf-mute mime. The chick sang really well, with a powerful rich voice that sounded really good especially considering the fact that she's performing live in the middle of a warehouse. The deaf-mute mime was playing drums when we walked in and had this open-mouthed shocked-happy mime expression on his face the entire time he played. He looked a little creepy in a harmless sort of way. I really don't know how to describe it; he just looked really really simple. Like he rode the short bus to school. Pretty good drummer though. Then they welcomed some guest drummer and the mime picked up a guitar and the three of them proceeded to cover Radiohead's "Karma Police". A damned good cover too. Anyway, they did a few cover songs and a few of their original pieces, and I must say it was really quite good... but absolutely nothing like what NIN fans would expect an opening act to sound like at a NIN concert. Had Trent grown up? Matured to the point where he'll be playing acoustic versions of all the pretty Nine Inch Nails songs?

I came to rock.

...I was not disappointed.

The show was great, the stage was pretty basic with what appeared to be banks of those one line colour pixel boards bundled in groups of five strips with fluorescent bulbs between each vertically-oriented pixel board, with a bank of incandescent floodlights between each bundle of these fluorescent bulb and pixel board banks. I think there were five banks in total. I'm sure you're all confused with what I've just described, and I don't care. It was a nice enough effect, but a far cry from those bitching tilting video panels from the last tour. Those of you who were there or saw the concert DVD know what I'm talking about. But that stage setup would never have fit inside a venue like The Koolhaus.

One puzzling thing though, the NIN show ended abruptly. A quick thank-you, and they hit the house lights. What? No encore? I wasn't ready to let this one go yet! I looked at my watch and they'd been on stage for about an hour and forty minutes, which is something like a show with an encore... so it's kind of like it was all played together with no break. I guess they played pretty much all I really wanted to hear anyway, but it would have been nice to have been given a bit of a heads-up that the end of the show was near.

We were at the right edge of the stage, just to the left of the right speaker banks, and right up on the fence, so we go a great view of the show. Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and it looked like Iza did too as she was usually boppin' around up against the fence. Although, she DID look a bit annoyed when some crowdsurfer pawed at her face a couple of times while surfing over her and the security people pulled him out of the crowd. She smiled broadly enough when she recognized that face-pawing guy as some handsome stud she's dating. I moshed a bit and surfed a couple of times during Star Fuckers 'cuz well... the beat took hold of my soul.

Anyway, thanks Iza. The show kicked ass and I had a great time.

Now that I've got no more birthday gifts to look forward to, I'm a bit bummed!

Maybe if/when I turn 40 I'll get some more cool shit.

And maybe before I turn 40 I'll post my god damned NYC blog.

Lay-tah...

...Art

NYC's on hold... NIN's more pressing!

So yeah. Things have been stupid in my life lately. I've started the NYC blog, though at this point I doubt anyone even cares anymore if I finish it or not. Just wanted to say that right now... in Toronto... people are getting ready to watch Nine Inch Nails on stage. They're due to hit the stage in a half hour or so.

A show that I wanted to go see, but not so much... Both tonight's and tomorrow night's show sold out in some five minutes.

...But then there was Ebay. And Iza hooked me the fuck up!

By this time tomorrow I'll be giddy and waiting rock out to NIN.

I'm sure it'll be great.

I hope Iza enjoys it too; it would suck to pay ebay cut-throat prices for tickets and not like the show.

Anyway, I'll probably post a blog entry for NYC eventually. I figure I would have wasted the time I already spent typing that entry if I don't bother posting it, so what the hell.

Talk to y'all later.

...Art