When you have gone to the movie almost every day for a year, and the concessions girl
knows your first name, that’s when it’s time to consider your career. Ask her on a date,
sure, but don’t forget to make up an impressive title for yourself.  Art director, creative
consultant, system administrator.  Be prepared to speak about it for five minutes and then
change the subject.  If she insists on talking shop, get real quiet.  Make sure to suggest the
outdoors.  Have some cigarettes handy and offer her one.  When she takes it, light it up.
Sit facing away from her as she talks about her job.  Interject meaningful comments and
remember to look for a way to segue.  If the opportunity never presents itself, use some
finesse.

Everyone was shouting for me to ride the pony, but I was too
busy with my new found elixir. I had handed all of my money
to this small Asian princess and had been handed a crystal cup
of slinky a-dult-juice. The sound coming from the speakers was
rapid fire talk. The subject discussed at high volume was quite
ominous, indeed. Issuing orders about what we can do with
certain body parts before the night is over, and talk about the
party never coming to a close. The thought worried me. Often,
I’m confronted with issues concerning infinity. Sometimes,
boundlessness brightens my day and is even inspiring to a degree.
Tonight, however, is different. My drink, on its doily, my head
on a shoulder, my eyes, blinking in the laser light, the crowd,
thinking about the never-ending party- it was all too much.
Slightly upset, I used someone’s telephone to call a former
co-worker. Hello? Who? Do you know what time it is? Now
is not a good time. Now is not a good time. Good-bye.

The vest felt tight on my back.  I wanted to take it off, but for some reason, I knew
that my guts would fall out if I took it off at this moment.  When I thought about my
guts, a bunch of shivering warm flecks of feeling went flying around the places the
vest touched my skin. I turned on the vest instinctively and felt it’s strange power.
I had found a piece of paper inside the left breast pocket.  On it was listed the
places the vest had been:  church, the supermarket, the post office, the pharmacy,
the rodeo, and the museum.  I had to show it to somebody, but who would
understand? I wracked my brain trying to think of who I could share this strange
vest with.  I thought of my brother, but he would want to take it to the authorities.
My father would want to sell it.  My friends would make fun of it and ruin it.
My mother would never talk to me again if I showed her this vest.  I had to find
someone new. There had to be a person who would understand.  Certain measures
would have to be taken to find this person, and it would start with the list of
destinations.  Church was too creepy of a place to start.  The supermarket was a
brightly lit place that was sure to draw unwanted attention.  The post office would
take two or three buses to get to.  The pharmacy required a perscription.  The rodeo
was not happening today.  And the museum, where was that?  I didn’t even know
where the museum was.  I had been there before, but I had not paid attention to how
to get there.  Then I thought of where I had found the vest in the first place-
of course!  It was near some unfamiliar buildings, one of them had to be a museum.
And the museum was the  last place on the list.  Therefore, I started back the way
I had walked.  I didn’t get very far because I was invisible.  I ran into a crowd of
people who were in a rush and caused an accidental dogpile.  With the wind knocked
out of me and someone’s foot on my face, I pushed my way out of the pile of people
and ran into the road.  I got run over by a Volkswagon bug, but I didn’t die.  I was
flat and narrow like a pancake.  The vest was barely keeping my guts from spraying
all over the concrete.  My flattened finger switched off the vest, and I stood up.
The wind blew me up against a fence that I couldn’t get off of.  I would have to
wait until the wind died down, but there was no telling how long the wind would
keep blowing.  But once the weather permitted, I was going to meet someone at the
museum, no matter what.

Thrust pack bent up stair castle without limitation for pond scum
you are adding up your tolls in a vat of preserved air particles.
Labels are peeling off by themselves in your underwear band.
And touches of larceny highlight your study with manners on hold.
Gifted little decoys appoint themselves in the pond for you.
Anyone know if it is duck season, deer season, polecat season?
If it is polecat season, I need to get the fuck out of dodge, man.
Use my batteries up for projects that benefit philanthropic sullies.
Barf muppet hanging on the hat rack scared the silhouette out of me.
Again, it’s my over active mind, trying to sting my hidey-hole impasse.
Stinging, hurting, ouch, boink, and my hands pop bubbles in mid-air
jumping over candles to reach the doorjamb sticking inside the laundry.
Tickle spots emerging, sticking to my belly button inconveniently, ugh!
The visitor is singing about thirty-six babies dead in the four car garage
and the record is playing backward about marigold pinata touch
inside AREA 51- no pinatas with human forms were collected there.
Children ate my chalk, swords fell in the history museum, and tin bowls
clatter in the pale, speckled bodegas on the afternoon stroll. Love me.
Of course, in time you will see it’s the only way to be as happy as I.
Love me. The paper is stacked high, the hands change the paper, uh huh.
The paper means something that it is not. Summary papers are present.
And the symbolism is dancing with the expert’s little princess baby.
Her name is not slumbering, it’s on their tongues, ringing into microphones.
On billboard sky crime kingdom porch torture weight bait so long, long.
The tonal party bulletin straightens the chief’s angry wrinkle out nice.
Let’s purchase the things with expiration dates, let’s purchase, buy, sell,
limit me, limit me, take my line and draw me with your pencil. Draw me
right up to the trap door. And I’m falling. I’m dying. Commitment.

Bright felt was spread along the dashboard.  It was there so that it would not get so hot
that Bunny couldn’t steer her car.  There were mascara prints on the felt dashboard
mat from when she had to make some corrections during her beautification process.
This was part of what framed downtown.  There were other things, like the rear view
mirror and the fuzzy dice.  The fuzzy dice floated from building to building, doing a
disconnected waltz.  They danced in her peripheral vision as she navigated her way to
the pharmacy.  Swelling masses of electricity formed into honking horns of
protestation, and she ran a red light. “Afternoon, m’lady,” chimed the pharmacist
as she fumbled around in her purse.  Her contact case fell to the floor, and she bent
to get it.  She did not get far.  “Here you are, Bunny.” It was a pile of romance
standing there, handing her the case.  She couldn’t see him through her naked eyes
for they were swivelling endlessly in her paunched eyesockets.  “Oh, hi Ned,” she
chirped with a careful smile that turned to the pharmacist, who took her money away.
She waved bye-bye to the money in a strange little wave that lasted long enough for
Ned to ask what was wrong.  “I don’t know.  Everyday, it’s like I’m just trying to
make it through the night.”  She waved her hands in front of her face and sighed.
“I want to show you  something.”  And the couple sat at the blood pressure machine.
Ned was at 101/68 mmHg and Bunny was 118/73 mmHg.  Bunny was in hysterics as
the plastic lifted from her arm, and she couldn’t help feeling a thrill as Ned read
her the numbers.  His voice reminded her how crazy he really was.  They were going
to date, and then break up in front of Bunny’s dash board.  Her mat was going to
have many more stains on it, a sandwich, and also a melted cassette.

Come melt with me in the knife rays of the mid-afternoon scream
because you are all frozen, muted into a sheet of language when
you should be sheets of music on fire in the exploding silo of
the world. Nosh on the soulful mellon dollop of your yelp with
careless abandon. The fruit is sweeter than your cardboard hum.
There is an expiration date stamped on your wrinkling forehead.
Fetch a wet snow vest for me and wipe it off. No more figs or
dates of any kind.   Everyone should be grabbed at random out of the
hatchery and dropped in the water to splash and shriek- Aaaaagh!
Please, let us pierce this protective seal at once with a spear.
The packaging is a stubborn mule obfuscating the rock and roll.
Drink in the maced banshee spine in order to get rid of christmas
carols, syndicated hymns, religious commercials, and mint paste.
Landscape a radical buzz saw through your mystified indian self
and murder the cowboy with electricity. It’s fun to be tried on
in the jigsaw dressing room. The ringing vocal chord is sliced
to pieces by unrestrained shouts into the cool, white void files.
Refrain from getting into the car. Stay with me in the negative
planetarium of howling black stars, spiking whitewater rapids in
endless fluxing spasms through stabbing, unhindered teeth-songs.

You were laughing with your hair in your face, and I felt quite handsome
in my pressed suit. Walking aimlessly in our party clothes, we danced
for an interval. The littlest part of an evening was our detour through
a park of spongy grass. It was Tennessee moisture, that had to be the
title of the painting, if one were painted. We never bought drinks, people
had always brought around a tray and offered them with no check. Even
in the parking lot, we were drinking champagne and lighting sparklers.
I used a few of your cigarettes as insurance for my state of mind. You
didn’t get angry when I stepped on your toes. What made you angry was
far from your mind. The cars were driving in swerving formations in the
street. We cheered them on with our fists clenched and our drinks spilling.
You looked as happy as anyone could be, but your mind was made up
to go to sleep. And I had to leave because nobody could give me a ride
except for my family. You touched my shoulder and took me to a bench.
We looked at the ground for some moments, and then you told me that
you loved to watch sports on television.

Drowsy thoughts of wind socks whipping.
Aerial photos from magazine clipping…
Driving the plane with only one knee
on a trip to merry mountain-scape
crinkled into distant shadow dappled cirrus
clouds fallen like your stomach feels.
When the time comes, you nosedive
to stay awake, you barrell roll to confirm
the sky from the water, you quiz
the autopilot about current events, you
turn off the radar and turn on the
radio. On the radio, there’s a song
you recognize. Landing won’t take place
inside the rectangular district that
was intended. It’s up to the plane to find
a new space.

I saw this movie at Cinematexas while I was a sophmore at UT in 1999. I was turned on to the program that included the movie from an interview I did with the girl who put it together, Astria Superak. She called the program “Broken Music.” The common theme was making music from broken instruments. “Kick That Habit” was the last film in the series. I was kind of in a daze from the preceding films which featured a lot of harsh noise, breaking of records, and hammering nails into a piano.

It opens with three guys playing miniature golf very badly. Slowly, there is a noise that begins to sound during the game. It fades into their rehearsal studio which is full of junk that is turning around on several record players. The noise may not appeal to many people, but I really enjoy the cut-away flashes of Swiss and Russian landscape interspersed throughout the movie.

It is not all noise. The experimental music of Voice Crack (the band featured in the film) does employ acoustics and some creative use of contact microphones. At one point, the group stretches a very thick piece of cable wire across their practice space and make incredible soundtracks on it. It is suggested that the wire is taken from excess cable for the gondolas that run across the Alps.

It is entirely shot on Super 8 and looks very pretty. It is inspiring and will make you want to run out and buy a Super 8 camera. The experimental music is well done. There is also a big pay off at the end of the 40 minute film where “the movie writes its own soundtrack.”

I watched it last night.  It had been ten years.  Drag City just released it on DVD for its twentieth aniversary.  I was reminded of the movie during a Thanksgiving a couple of years ago when my friends Erich Ragsdale and Erik Archer put contact microphones on the wall and started playing 16mm films.  They might have seen this film, but I’m not sure.

There’s nothing worn out about these shoes except that they break
with the bending and stooping of my endless hours in the hot tent
and the granules of sand lodged through out their blue bodies.

There’s nothing wrong about what I’ve been doing because I just
fed many people what they wanted to believe in the bleak planes
of inherent truthfulness that threatens to drown them each day.

There’s not much unholy about bearing your ass in the car window
while driving by someone who cut you off while ignoring the sign
that said in bright yellow and contrasting black “DO NOT PASS.”

There isn’t anyone else like Jesus in this swarm blast of mutation
that deposits plasma in blood banks designed to turn wine back
to water for charity because they let all the blood go bad, I know.

There’s nothing unhealthy in our resignation of the flag. Put away
thoughts of nationalism and welcome the hand that is offered to you
because it’s going to be a long, long ride up the hill to the mausoleum.