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| September 2004 »
While eating dinner last night I noticed a hugely fat person eating by a motorized wheelchair and wondered if maybe this is a self-inflicted handicap. Granted, a person confined to a motorized wheelchair doesn't get much exercise, and the diner I went to for breakfast this morning features a 6-egg omelet. Its motto is, "you won’t leave hungry," and they're right.
Tracy and I biked upriver. There's a lovely paved path, Centennial Trail, that goes all the way to Idaho. The city was really smart to get it built. There are lots of people out during the weekend heat enjoying it. We go out past the town along the riverside, through pine forest and scrub, and get as far as a beach, where a large man with a Mohawk is standing waist-deep in the water smoking a cigarette.
The show is in a large club. Deanne is back mixing, over her bout with chicken pox. We begin rehearsing the Hendrix tune, but it's got a ways to go. Lisa Germano opens, and her quiet material is difficult to hear over the chatter of the crowd ordering beers and whatever else. She's pretty unfazed but I feel bad for her. I wonder if we're going to have a tough time, too — if this is maybe a middle-aged (like me) crowd that just wants to hear the hits.
But they prove me wrong. They're up and dancing and yelling and, by the looks of things, they're not all middle-aged, either (though some of the middle-aged folks are jumping around more than anyone else).
Some of us hit the Baby Bar for some $1 Blue Ribbons afterwards. I'm exhausted; the sun I got during the bike ride has done me in.
Tracy's bike got stolen in Vancouver, so I say that if I see a place with cheap ones I'll pick one up. This afternoon I see one at a pawnshop for $50. It’s not in perfect shape, but it works.
Paul knows the bass player in Rod Stewart's band so a few of the band are off tonight to see his show of standards at the local arena (though I'm sure "Hot Legs" and "Do You Think I'm Sexy?" will still be part of the set). The latter I hope generates some royalties for Jorge Ben, as the chorus is lifted from his song "Taj Majal."
(Tracy and Leigh had eggs thrown at them out of a truck as they walked home through an underpass. Tracy got a welt as a result.)
Spokane has a lovely waterfront park overlooking waterfalls; it is partly populated by homeless people. Well, maybe they're not homeless, maybe they're winos, junkies, crack addicts, and lunatics and this is their preferred hangout.
Spokane seems to have these social outcasts all over. Later I pass a bunch of kids diving off a bridge in full Goth gear and makeup. A shirtless man sits on the sidewalk with pendulous breasts. One scenario has it that these people are victims that a capitalist, dog-eat-dog society doesn't care to support. They've fallen through the safety net, whatever there is of one...and they have been left behind, if they were ever even on the train to begin with.
Another scenario has it that they are here by somewhat unconscious choice. That these are the brave outlaws who have, whether they know if or not, chosen not to live by society's rules. Some of them, by genetic fluke or bad luck, are not here even by choice, unconscious or no. But some, one might argue, are the noble rebels that live outside the law, hand to mouth, not punching a time clock or paying off a mortgage, not mouthing the usual platitudes and go-for-it sentiments. These are the weird, sad freaks who couldn't blend in even if they wanted to.
Of course, there's also the Neocon scenario, which probably runs along the lines of: “these people are society's leeches and sponges and, if they won't pull their own weight, this is what they deserve...but for God's sake get them out of my sight!”
I pass a storefront mission called "Beans, Rice and Jesus Christ."
Words and language evolved as a means to gain dominance over others, to deceive them, mislead them, and to excuse and justify our behavior — not just bad behavior, good behavior too. So much for literature, epic poetry, and sparkling conversation!
Our true feelings and intentions are more transparently visible in our looks, stance, and gesture, but words evolved as a means of convincing others that what they see in front of their eyes is not what is true — that there are extenuating circumstances, moral laws and scruples that must be adhered to. That war is peace and hate is love.
 Yesterday was a day off in Calgary. Some went to Jamie’s parents' house, southeast of town, for a barbeque. I had committed to do an interview regarding the Talking Heads Best of and live CDs that are due out, so I joined some of the crew, as it was Todd's birthday, and we went to a restaurant in the park. Todd, a bit of a wine expert, ordered a bottle of Caymus Cabernet Sauvignon 1994 that all agreed was incredible. I have no idea what it cost, and Todd said he couldn't afford to drink it very often.
The bookstore here has lots of hiking books, guides to wilderness areas, and books about how to survive in the wilderness. (Banff is 1 1/2 hours away.) There is also a whole section of books related to oil refining, drilling, and pipelines. Alberta recently wiped out their deficit, which they credit to the oil fields up north. Immigration is welcome; they need skilled folks up here. And if those folks need to bone up on their pipeline knowledge, here's the place to do it.
The Times reports that there are more, not less, Al Qaeda operatives than there were before the "War on Terrorism" began. Duh. It was obvious by the way Afghanistan and Iraq were handled that they would be virtual recruiting programs for Bin Laden and other anti-western groups out there. I am not as cynical as some who propose that the Neocons advocate a policy of endless war in order to keep the population fearful, on edge and pliant, submissive. They point out that it's also good for their friends' businesses. It's hard for me to believe they could be that cynical, though I’d grant that the human capacity for denial — and for convincing oneself that a heinous course of action is morally justified — is pretty self-evident.
The cold war was an example of endless war, but this one is more perfect, as it has no clear goals and no solution. There is no "end," just vague generalities like "wipe out terrorism," which, if interpreted literally, could include a lot of U.S., Russian and Israeli military and paramilitary operations.
 It's early morning and we're driving back through the Canadian Rockies. We wake up to one of the most spectacular drives on earth. We stop for supplies at a gift shop in Field, a town (pop. 100) that seems to take its name from the fact that there is that rare thing here, a patch of flat land. We’re in the Yoho National Park/Forest, which inspired a few jokes. They sell turkey jerky, bits of woolly mammoth tusk, shot glasses, and salty snacks.
We pass the Continental Divide. The water in the river, like green dishwater, is flowing in our direction now. The snow-covered mountains loom up. This two-lane road is the main east-west artery across Canada. Banff, Lake Louise, and we're an hour and 1/2 from Calgary.
I realize that the tour experiences discussed above have little overlap with that of the band portrayed in Almost Famous, not to say that didn't seem partly true. (I thought Philip Seymour Hoffman did a pretty good Lester Bangs.)
 Last night, Jaymie Matthews, an astrophysicist that some of the band met in Porto (Portugal), invited us for dinner and to have a look at the University of British Columbia's observatory. He organized dinner at a seafood restaurant overlooking the inlet and we were joined by a couple of his male assistants and about 6 young women, who didn't seem to have anything to do with astronomy or astrophysics. There must have been about 20 of us.
Jaymie and the department of physics and astronomy launched a satellite about a year ago called MOST. It was launched from a former Russian intercontinental ballistic missile based at a northern Russian launch site that they denied existed until fairly recently.  Maybe it's a coincidence that MOST is the name of one of the big Russian banks, but I dunno. Note that the launch tower is bannered with ads and logos. NASA has yet to capitalize on the commercial potential of space vehicles as advertising platforms. In this respect, the Russians are way in the forefront.
The satellite observed a specific star for about a month to see if it was really oscillating, after scattered observers had reported that it was. But from space, and viewed consistently, the star appeared to flatline, a fact that didn't please some astronomers. The satellite looks like a large silver briefcase — no big solar panels like the Hubble. It doesn’t need them because it runs on low power.
Later, at the observatory on the UBC campus, Jaymie opened some bottles of wine while assistants aimed the lens at a ring nebula, the Hercules star cluster, and a set of twin stars (one red, one blue) that revolve around one another. These objects were completely invisible to the naked eye. The guys would point up at a blank space between some stars and say, "that's where it is." More young ladies show up and some of us wonder if maybe we got into the wrong business.
It’s show day and Tracy, Leigh, Ames, Mauro, and I bike around Stanley Park. Mostly it's spectacular. Paul announced that if Bush wins, he's ready to move here. This is all right in Vancouver.
 This (right) is the Siwash rock where in 1966 a young man of 17 failed to notice it was low tide as he dove off the rock to his death. Odd how this could have happened, as it's low tide now and the water is only a few feet deep around the rock and any idiot could tell that.
We see seals frolicking in the waves. A man advocating the benefits of meditation is having a nap with his head inside a milk crate. Maybe there is a link between meditation and percussion?
At night, we've driven by bus over the Rockies and through the Cascades to Vancouver. At one point in the early morning I get up to pee and I can see huge peaks looming through the foggy dawn on our left and right. I watch them pass for a bit and then return to my bunk knowing we've got many hours to go.
Around 9:30, I feel the bus stop. We're at a town called Salmon Arm, where we have stopped for coffee and donuts. A man tells Lance (our driver this week) that, in this town, if you're not employed by the lumber company, chances are you're not employed.
We watch Almost Famous — we are on a tour bus watching people on a tour bus.
Since we've still got an hour and a half to go, Tracy puts on Doug's yoga DVD and a bunch of us get into positions all over the front lounge. Legs are every which way and butts are in the air. It was one of the most ridiculous scenes I've ever witnessed on a tour bus. Lance couldn’t believe it was a happening. But it actually felt pretty good and now we have arrived in the Vancouver suburbs.
More West Edmonton Mall facts:
There are more than 800 (!) stores.
There are 2 hotels in the mall.
You can download a map and guide to the mall onto your PDA.
Mauro was visiting Deanne in San Francisco and was exposed to chicken pox, so I call my parents to see if I had it when I was young. My dad says, "oh yes," until I say that there is a small chance Mauro might be carrying it along without coming down with it himself. Then my dad says "oh, in that case, you didn’t have it."
I saw Earl Scruggs eating breakfast this morning in the hotel: eggs, sausage, the works.
The buttons on the hotel phone — for front desk, rooms service, etc. — include one simply labeled "pizza."
Tracy, Paul, and I decide to bike to the famous West Edmonton Mall, claimed to be the largest in the world, or the largest with some qualifications, such as "largest mall and indoor amusement center." We ride along a busy road that reminds me of the one Mauro and I rode along from Buffalo to Niagara; it seems to feature almost every chain store based in North America: Toys ‘R’ Us, McDonald's (more than one), etc. It gets pretty repetitious and monotonous, and I wonder how Canada let this happen. I would like to think that Canadians know better, ha ha.
 This scenery gives way to industrial buildings and giant grain elevators. Beyond them, the great flat plains of Alberta stretch out in the distance.
Eventually, we reach the mall, which, from our vantage point, is too spread out to reveal its true size. We enter and it looks like a regular mall. The scale of the shopping areas is not unusual, and one can't see the true vast size from in here. The commercial clutter, fountains, and kiosks prevent one from seeing the entire length and scope of the place. Maybe that's intentional – they don't want the shoppers to be overwhelmed with too much shock and awe. Shopping is a narrow focus experience; it may be better to limit the shopper's view than allow them to see the whole cornucopia that lies before them.
 We come upon the indoor amusement park area, which is pretty damn impressive. It's dominated by a giant roller coaster, which they claim reaches almost as high as the Statue of Liberty.
Tracy and Paul, a roller coaster aficionado, convince me to ride with them. I hesitate but agree. After we're locked in the car, I raise my hand to get out and pee, but it must look like I am trying to wriggle out of this ride.
I am not a big rider of roller coasters, and I scream the whole way and appear to brace myself in crash position during the loop-de-loops and sudden drops. Or maybe I'm praying.
 We get off, wobbly-legged, and wander further down to the famous submarine fleet. Surely this is the only mall with a submarine fleet!
This area not only has submarines (and shops around the periphery) but a pirate ship and an area where guys in Speedos are giving a diving exhibition.
On the way back, we check out another large attraction — the beach. Locals are spending a sunny Sunday afternoon swimming and lounging about.
There are waves, not big enough for surfing but waves nonetheless, and a couple of water rides and slides that deposit one into the surf.
Tracy says she heard that the roof of the skating rink apparently caved in during a recent storm. There are big storms up here, and the drains and gutters overflowed and flooded the mall. I image a scene out of some disaster movie.
We bike back by a different route, along a path through the woods that borders the river. It's absolutely beautiful, paved with mulch. The path has little swoops up and down along the riverbank. There are no buildings on either side of the river. It's pretty idyllic, until we decide to ride up McKenzie Gorge, which is a slow uphill climb out of the valley. We make it back to the hotel with sore butts and take hot baths.
The folk festival features Lhasa and Ani DiFranco in the late afternoon, before we go on. I pick up Lhasa's new CD at the record shop tent on site. Ani DiF does a passionate set and, at one point, breaks into a long, rapid-fire poem that is just amazing.
By the time we perform, it's dark and the audience members are holding candles (electric candles?) that illuminate the hillside where they sit. I can't really tell how we're doing; it's see-your-breath cold here. But I can sort of gauge our success when I see the little lights begin to move back and forth to the beat.
Re: Malu's comment on Russian fashion a few weeks back. For the record, I don't endorse her perception that the people there look bad, but it does seem typical of a North American teen's sense of fashion different from her own. It's not a question of perceiving people who can't afford Urban Outfitters (for example) as hopelessly bad-looking and out of touch; ordinary people, rich and poor, are usually not seen unless they are trying to be stylish, so they are unnoticed or beneath the teen fashion radar. That's my relativistic assessment of the situation.
The book I've been reading for ages, The Moral Animal by Robert Wright, suggests that deception and self-deception might be survival strategies evolved in the human (and probably animal) organism. In order to convince ourselves of a course of action, we support it with feelings, faith, and a perception that suits our purposes. An accurate assessment of reality, or of the truth, may not be a genetic and biological priority. Sure, if the truth happens to align with our needs, our actions and beliefs are based on the real world. But there is absolutely nothing within us that guides in that direction. In fact, as he states, honesty can be a major blunder.
This sort of implies that philosophy might be considered a branch of psychology. Philosophers are engaged in self-serving deception, even elaborate self-deception, and not in a search for the true and good as we might have hoped.
I realize this book may be of particular fascination to me – Mr. So-Called Anthropologist from Mars — and it might be a primarily male zone of ignorance we're dealing with here. The whys and wherefores of the moral and social behaviors make this subject fascinating to me. Maybe women, traditionally lovers and appreciators of the intricacies of relationships in literature and in life, find this stuff glaringly obvious and therefore dull, but guys may find the somewhat scientific principals behind what strikes them as crazy behavior riveting.
Schopenhauer anticipated Freud in proposing that we have conscious minds and also what is often translated as "will," though a word such as “energy” seems more appropriate. This energy lies behind the screen of represented acts and thought.
Schopenhauer believed that this unconscious will influences conscious decision-making. Therefore, our decision-making is essentially non-rational and distorted, though we would like to believe otherwise (see above). He distrusted mechanical models of the mind, because they didn't take all these subversive plots and influences into account.
This all seems very modern and Freudian. Things as they truly are — the noumena, they called it — may coincide with our perceptions from time to time, but there are no guarantees.
For Schopenhauer, the means of escape from this false word of rational appearances was aesthetic contemplation – an appreciation of the forms and patterns of the phenomenal world without giving them rational attribution. Very Buddhist, it seems, a detached appreciation of the play of shapes.
That may bode well for music and art, conversation, and good food. Props from the philosopher Kings, though it might be tricky to apply to everyday life.
A raggedy sputtering reconstitution of the touring party. We were scattered all over. Todd was in Carolina and his flight had to be re-routed. Jennifer arrived at LaGuardia moments too late and they wouldn't let her through security. She'll be on a later flight. Mauro is in San Francisco, as is Deanne, who came down with chicken pox (!), and she will be confined to home for a week. Graham was performing in LA.
We begin again in Edmonton.
At LaGuardia, I made what I suspect was a racist comment to Paul. A little black girl was walking towards us with her mom; she got distracted by the airport sights and almost walked right into me. She was about waist high to me so I swerved suddenly and wasn't sure if she had bumped into me or not, so I turned and asked, "Are you OK?" She was, I guess. She just stared up wide-eyed at the man she'd almost collided with. At the same time I looked at her mom, who smiled.
We walked on and Paul said, "She was trying to take you out." I chuckled and said, "or trying to steal Todd's laptop," which I was carrying. It was this object that had almost slammed into the little girl's oblivious face.
Moments later, I thought to myself, "What did I say that for?" "Would I have said that if it was a little white or Asian girl?" Maybe, maybe not. "Did I really say that? Did I imply that a cute little kid might be, even in a joking way, a thief because she’s black? Do I have evil lurking in my soul?"
I felt a wave of remorse. I didn't say anything. I would like to think it was an innocent, though lame, joke, but I suspect otherwise. I think it might have been some dark subconscious prejudice that asserted itself, something I would never believe, but that some evil part of me blurted out. I hoped the comment would soon be forgotten. But I began to mull it over. Am I that evil person deep inside? I think of myself as a good, compassionate person, but maybe we are the worst kind. We are the ones that hide our prejudices even from ourselves.
I instantly remembered the statement I'd made years ago on MTV about racism being something I was trying to overcome and that doing so is an uphill battle. The statement on MTV began with me admitting that I harbor some racist attitudes — like it or not, and I definitely hope not. I said that submerged prejudices are part and parcel of growing up in a country with hidden but omnipresent racist attitudes, which means that these bigoted attitudes cannot simply be overcome by mouthing liberal platitudes and ideals.
These hidden, semi-conscious prejudices surface in lame jokes like mine. As much as I would like to be rid of such attitudes I can see them raise their ugly heads occasionally. Maybe, eventually, I will wipe them out, but I realize, living in the world we live in, it is not simply a matter of wishing them gone. They are reinforced subtly, almost daily, in a million different ways, so one has to work at it constantly and maybe, bit by bit, he (I) can eliminate them.
I finished recording a vocal for a Thievery Corporation track that is vaguely Fela-ish (the track, that is). It's too soon for me to know if it’s good or not. I hope it is, and I hope they like it. I mailed it off later in the afternoon.
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