Going Back Home (Musings)

They say you can never go back home. I think that was before cars, though.

Yeah, I'm a smartass. The point of that saying, of course, is that you'll have changed so much in the time that you were gone, that home would have transformed into "Home" through homesickness and personal growth. You change so much being away, that your home doesn't affect you the same. Being gone, you think about your home and compare your new place to it, which magnifies and intensifies your memory-experience of home into Home.

Example: nothin tastes like mama's barbecue. You grew up on it; it became your framework for all barbecue you've ever tasted. Then you move from home. You get homesick, so you start eating (it'll happen), and you eat specifically things that remind you of home: barbecue. But none are mama's recipe, so none satisfy your homesickness. Nonetheless, you keep searching for something to scratch that itch. Over time, you've tasted all your new area has to offer for barbecue. Because of this, you become a connoisseur of all things barbecue. None taste like mama's barbecue, but merely because you're searching so hard for that specific flavor, you learn all about the subtleties of each and every barbecue you sample. There are traits you find in each sauce you experience, traits which you learn to love. So you get along, day after day, loving the life you made. Until one day, you go home. And of course, your first time Home, you get mama's barbecue. You expect it to be everything you were searching for all those years. But you find that its just not the same as you remembered.

You grew:
Your search for mama's barbecue over the years has transformed it into the ideal Mama's Barbecue. It became this mysterious and perfect thing that beat all competition so long as it never entered the ring (your memory of it overwhelmed all other barbecue sauces and rubs, so to speak). So when you get home, and actually have it again, it's not the thing you built it up to be. And because of that, it fails, and you're left with a haunting memory to reconcile with reality.

Now that hasn't been my own experience so far with my return home (for the most part). I remembered it and lived where I was for the past two years without comparing too much, apparently. On returning, it was as if I had traveled back in time to where I was two years ago, with nothing different except that I lost a few years of my own life.  And that's kinda horrifying.

Kinda really horrifying.

The idea that two years can go by and nothing has to change scares me. I'm not entirely sure why, though. Perhaps it's the implication that I, therefor, have not changed much over my absence. But I have plenty of evidence to the contrary, so I don't think so. It's more that it indicates how short life is, and how you can sleep through it all, if you just have your eyes closed long enough. And my fear, I suppose, comes from who I grew into while I was away. I liked that guy, and I'm afraid that I'll lose him, being away from that place and in this old one. That act would therefor wipe out two years' time of my own life, and I will have accomplished nothing but accumulating Stuff and wasting a chunk of my own life.

Now that is something worth fearing. Every year matters when you're approaching thirty.

Don't waste your life: click the ads and know that you accomplished something!

The Best Cup of Coffee Ever (and running outta adjectives)

For this past week, I have been gradually moving to Wisconsin from Arkansas. It's a long enough move, and there's so little to draw me 851 miles to Arkansas, that I sincerely doubt I'll ever be coming back here. So, I've been preparing myself for that on a mental and emotional level by visiting all the restaurants I won't find anywhere else. Yeppers, I will be missing food more than anything else here (time will ultimately tell, but good eats is what I expect to miss).

So far, I've had Jade China (fantastic little hole-in-the-wall Chinese stir fry that may literally have a hole in its wall), McAllister's Deli (a chain, but I've not seen it anywhere else, and I am addicted to their pastrami on rye), and David's Burgers (I don't know how, but the best burger I've ever had, hands-down). All that's left is The Whole Hog, which is this fantastic small-ish chain of barbecue that makes a fantastic beef brisket. Saving the best for last, there.

But, of all these, the one place I'm going to miss the most is the one cafe that makes coffee right in all of Arkansas (to be fair, the only one I could find; I assume there are more, but they just don't have proper websites and listings for me to find). If you're ever in Little Rock area, hit up Guillermo's Gourmet Grounds.

It's the one place that knows what they're doing, and the only place I have been able to find Ethiopian Yirgacheffe beans roasted so well. So of course, I stocked up on the stuff before I jumped ship.

The scent, where the experience starts, is powerful. For several hours after brewing, it takes control of the room with its deep, nutty aroma. Then, as you near the brew, it shifts to a clear, bright, and a little tart zestiness (all of course with the deep roasted smell lingering above). The flavor follows suit, but the acidity, that sharpness in the smell, it stays quite mellow throughout the taste. It's there, but only at the very first tip of the tongue; as the sip rolls along, it increases with depth and evolves much in the inverse of the sniff-check. It gets deeper, and the darkness of this brew comes up and dominates the experience. Dark chocolate, that is the overwhelming sense-experience I found to live just at the last moment of swallowing, and on afterward for several minutes. It's curious, how I get excited about coffee that does not taste like coffee. To be fair, it doesn't taste exactly like dark chocolate (none of that stabbing in the mouth feeling I get from something so overwhelmingly bitter), but what's so fascinating is how it reminds me of something else. Like a feather dancer that doesn't look at all like a bird, but hey, feathers! On a woman! That's unexpected! And as much as I would like to claim that it's that surprise, that unexpectedness of a blended sense-experience that makes it so powerful, I doubt that. If that were the case, I wouldn't enjoy this coffee much past the second sip, by which point I'm expecting roasted chocolate. Rather, I believe it to be the blend itself, triggering more experiences in the mind, that makes it so exciting. Then, by creating a new sense-memory with such powerful links, that flavor is remembered even more zealously, over time. But then again, I liked the stuff.

I will always be a fan of drinks and foods that come to life in the last parts of the mouth, back where the tongue meets the throat at the tail end of the nose. Those flavors linger and stay with you well past the meal itself; they're the faithful flavors.

Click on the ads; if you don't I will capture the moon and hold it ransom!

Packing & The Best Wine I Ever Had

I am awesome at packing!

Like, really good.

I don't mess around with any of that "sorting by room" crap. I just throw whatever into boxes over and over again until I'm done. Boom: awesome. I felt like a genius when I discovered that I could use clothing as padding. So yeah, that's why my champagne flutes are wrapped in socks. Don't give me that look!

Seriously though, I'm terrible at packing and am not looking forward to having to unpack any of this (I'm moving a few states over, for those of you who don't know). I've had a week to pack and it in no way would take me an actual week of time to pack it all, so of course, I put it off. That and the cleaning (mold is pretty much all over the place here in Arkansas). And of course, now, I only have a few days to pack everything and clean everything too. So I got most of it done in one day, like ya do. The side-effect of this particular method, though, is that everything's a jumbled mess and I already forgot where the hell my stamps are!

not cool, Chance; not cool

The first step, of course, is donating all the stuff I don't want or use any more (done twice so far). Next, is the throwing away all the stuff that's trash, but collectible, or memorable, but essentially junk for which I have no use. Most of that process is easy, but there's the memento value in these objects. The best example I have is bottles of wine and liquor I really liked. Once drank, little remains of the liquor but the memory of it tingling our tastebuds. Nice line; quote that shit. I was carrying out those empty bottles, when I recognized the one small one remaining in my hand. It was wine from Parallel 44; their "Meditation" wine from 2007. This stuff was the best wine I've ever had, hands-down and no contest. This amazingly luxurious texture accompanied a deep, dark cherry and chocolate flavor that lingered for hours. It was good, and I will never forget the first time I had it. I won't forget any of the other times, either, but they were all a little off, and never quite matched the explosive experience of that first bottle (the cheesecake accompanying helped, too, but that's a small detail). Not only can I never find that wine any more, but even if I can, I do not expect the same overwhelming flavor of that first bottle.

Sad as that is, I will never forget it, and the fact that I cannot repeat it again makes it even more powerful a memory. It becomes all the more beautiful an experience for that one moment it existed.

So that was in my mind, as I was about to toss the bottle away. I knew I wouldn't forget that amazing flavor, that the bottle would be an idle memento. But still, it was a good moment, and it deserves its idol. So that trash, I will pack and take with me, along with its memory.

Good night, all y'all's, and click some ads (close them the moment they open a new page).

Something Feral

So I like to hike. You know, get in the woods, smell the dirt and the trees. Get far enough enough that I can't hear a car or a plane anywhere. Get deep enough that I'm not totally sure where I am anymore, and start to wonder how long I would last if I just started walking in one direction (hate that friggin band... except their one single).

I think it's important that we do that (get deep into nature) at least once in a while. We encounter something there, something feral and older than we are ourselves. I was hiking to this glacier at (near) the top of a mountain range in Glacier National Park. The whole hike was following these old CCC trails (very common), carved into the mountainside. It was a winding trail, with many switchbacks, that ended with a narrow stairwell carved into a short cliff just before the summit. And there, at the top of the range, the trail ended, but the hike continued, over unmarked rock. I found the glacier, marked with a cairn at the spot of discovery We had left early, so I had plenty of time to sit there and overlook the range of rocky peaks.

That was an experience.

What was so fascinating about it all was that I didn't make the mountains, that no human engineered them to attract me there. It wasn't a theme park, wasn't Dubai, wasn't a gigantic ball of twine in Kansas. It was just rock, and it did not care that I found it beautiful or that I saw it at all.

And that's what we need. In this age where we have personal data appliances, customized information and entertainment every minute of every day, we as people and as a society need to remember what it's like to look at something and have it not look back at us. We need to remember that if we drop the burden of human civilization, the universe will keep calm and carry on (and, with the exception of viruses and rats, will probably be the better for it).

Then, we can go back to everything we've constructed, and it will be not so important. We, by extension, will be even less important. That's not a bad thing.


Also:
-Saw a Water Moccasin (or Cottonmouth) yesterday and that was cool. Kinda wanted to see if I could take a bite from him (but not enough to actually get bitten).
-Hiking in jeans and 90 degree heat is not advisable, but it worked.
-Funnel spiders are seriously the creepiest thing ever made. Saw a nest the size of a full-sized mattress the other day. Couldn't look directly at it, though, or the Spirit of God would come out and melt my face off. Well, probably not, but there's an outside chance that could happen with anything you look at.
-Click the ads (seriously, they don't give you viruses, people, not just by clicking on them), and go watch Drive; it's fantastic!

Rules (bonus: review of Can't Hardly Wait)

Hokai, so, I need to pace myself with these things. I mean, sure, I can write nonstop, but I don't want to burn myself out. Or burn out all y'alls readers with too many words. People don't like words, not on the internet. They're heavy. And they're slow. And nobody likes a slow internets.

So this'll be quick this time, after my yesterday's essay. (scroll down for the review of Can't Hardly Wait ... you can also click on all the ads several times; it may help)

I'd like to have some ground rules for Triple-Stamped. Not written in stone or anything, but more like spiritual guidelines to direct each post. Saying it that way sounds weird, though, as if voodoo or Oprah were involved somehow. As a society, we have a vague (at best) understanding of the word "spirit" and all things spiritual in general. I'm not saying I'm going to light some candles or listen to some crystals or anything... I'm just saying: we don't get it. But that's a deeper topic for another post (a "The More You Know" post).

Tonight: the six rules of Triple Stamped!*

1: There are no rules

2: No, really, there actually are rules; I've just wanted to say that (wasn't all I hoped it was)

3: You do talk about Triple-Stamped

4: One post a day

5: Don't be afraid of the heavy stuff

6: Keep it fun

G) rules are made to be broken

* subject to change at any moment and with or without notice

And now: the review of the 1998 modern classic of our generation: Can't Hardly Wait.

Watch it (why not; it's on Netflix right now). The story's one we're all familiar with by now, since it was successful in its time, repeated, and then spoofed (repeatedly). So you won't be surprised, even if you miraculously haven't already seen it. But what very well may be surprising to you (as it was to me) is the sheer number of actors you will recognize in this movie! Jennifer Love Hewitt aside, there's Charlie Korsmo, Peter Facinelli, Seth Green, Donald Faison, Jaime Pressley, Jason Segel (seriously), Selma Blair, Steve Monroe, Chris Owens, Jenna Elfman, Breckin Meyer, and of course Jerry O'Connell. Many of these names you won't know, but IMDB them and you'll know their faces and start remembering the movies you've seen them in. Watching this movie, literally over a decade after it came out, is like visiting a highschool party after you've been to college. You recognize faces but not the names, spending the movie trying to figure out why you know them. It's a cool experience, but the best part is, that's exactly the experience of one of the characters in the movie!! But it's a messed-up feeling because that character's played by Jerry O'Connell... and nobody wants to relate to him. Dude peaked at Stand By Me. Bonus points, though: main character (if there is one) is played by a dude who looks just like a young Jay Mohr (but isn't)! Oh, and there's the wonderful 90's soundtrack with an inordinate amount of Smashmouth. Who doesn't love that?

Anyway, click the ads on your way out!

Leaving, part One (Bonus: sawn-off review of "World War Z")

You ever get the sense that a state is convincing you to leave and never return? Not in the sense of being railroaded out of town, or tarred and feathered, but little things.

[Scroll down for the spoiler-free sawn-off review of World War Z]

I was driving a route I've gone about once a week for the past two years, which half of Conway drives to work and back in Little Rock, when I almost got into an accident. Part of me isn't surprised, because when I moved here, my insurance rates jumped up a good chunk. That suggests bad drivers, sorry, and it was confirmed when I actually saw people "drive." Forget about the rushing through yellow lights, or even outright blowing through the reds, that's too expected for people here. No, I saw a guy make a U-turn in the middle of a busy road, weaving around what traffic he wasn't blocking! He was ten feet past the intersection (which allows U-turns legally, but that's another story), and just fifty from an actual parking lot in which he could safely turn about. But no, he HAD to turn RIGHT THERE. 

That's one story from this week, and one smidgen of evidence suggesting Arkansas needs to require a driver's education class.

Thankfully, I wasn't near a collision there. A few days ago, however, I was almost in a pile-up. Yep, thanks to some late braking by the pair of idiots in front of me at the time, we all had to engage in a tactical swerve to a staggered-line formation for safety. They went left and right, and I went right then left and deftly avoided the semi to my right and the ditch to my left, all while pulsing, pumping, and finally slamming my brakes to keep myself out of their cars. I thanked the god of anti-lock brakes and the god of attentive drivers for existing, that day (they happen to be the same god (God), who happens to be the God of Everything, which includes anti-lock brakes and attentive drivers). And of course, I do what everybody does when the cause becomes apparent: I looked. Did I see a grisly car wreck? How about our president, handing out money? Or perhaps Johnny Cash, not so dead? Of course not. So what caused the unnecessary and sudden slow-down? A young girl got pulled over. She was wearing jean-shorts that looked homemade. That's about it.

At least it wasn't nothing (that's happened way too often already).

Then later, THAT SAME DAY, I was turning right, onto a main road, when Bozo McOld decided to pull out in front of me from the bank opposite me. It was an aggressive maneuver, which I can respect, but it did require that I slam on my brakes (and same for Dude behind me) when he realized what he was doing and then immediately apologized by SLAMMING on his brakes in the MIDDLE of four lanes. I'm not kidding; he took up the entire street. Now, had he gunned it from the get-go, everything would've been fine. So it just goes to show you that half-measures don't cook, and that it's better to be an ass-hole than just an ass.

That's not the worst, though. Once, I saw a driver work VERY VERY hard to pull a u-turn to go the wrong way down an offramp. He worked for that shit. And there's a particular stretch of highway in Little Rock that I've witnessed, I kid you not, a delivery truck (big sized) pointed the WRONG WAY (toward me!), and suddenly fix his error and about-face. That was in my first month of living here (welcome to Arkansas; we don't require a driver's education course).

And that's just the road-safety stuff.

Today, I saw World War Z (It was okay, but not nearly dark enough to be a proper zombie horror, and not light enough to be a proper zombie comedy. Shaun of the Dead, Zombieland, 28 Days Later, The Walking Dead: those are proper zombie movies/shows and you should watch them all twice. This movie fell short of greatness, but was good for eight bucks' fun. Not worth 3D, but worth the big screen.) After the (decent) movie, there was an encounter between two women in the audience that was honestly more tense and exciting than anything that happened on screen. Many a "fatass" was slung in that discussion, and I was convinced that yes indeed, Arkansas is convincing me to never return.

The places we live, they shape us, but there isn't much of Arkansas I want to take with me wherever I go (that stuff will be covered on a later post; this one is about bad drivers). As always, I'll close with this: Click the ads! All of them! Many times!

Triple-Stamped, No Erasies

Hokai, so, I had a job, selling mattresses, but I don't any more. So I have a lot of free time to look forward to these next few months of unemployment. See, I'm terrible at personal discipline, so this is a problem. Seriously, I've watched Star Wars twice in one day, just because I started with the first one! It's not inherently evil, sure, but there's a certain point where inactivity warps you and you discover that all you've got left to prove your existence is a broken-in couch.

I don't want that for me. I want adventure , so this blog will stand as a re-branding of, well, me, as an adventurist. The idea is, have this as a public record of what I do, which will also give me reason to do adventurous things... like, I dunno, parkour or something (please no parkour, for the love of God). I'm also writing a novel, so the plan is make this blog wildly successful over the next few years (well, overnight would be great, but I am still pretty lazy).

Successful to the point at which people say "Hey, I love your words and want you to lie directly to me, but not on the computer, can you write a novel?" To which I shall respond, "Why yes, of course; here it is!"

And they'll throw money at me (and claim I can see the future, which I of course will not correct) until I can retire and do nothing whatsoever with my life. To the casual analyst, it would seem that I plan on taking a very long route to the same place (why not just skip the writing and the blog, and just do nothing but maybe working crap jobs?). However, they would be forgetting one thing: I have to feed my ego.
Yup, there it is. I like to think I'm important.

That there's my life plan. Subject to change at the drop of a hat, of course (see the rules... listed somewhere).

But, I want to write daily in this blog, because otherwise people will just forget that it exists (seriously, that's how it is with me). The catch is, I get bored, and I lose focus. My solution is to have seven subjects I can address in any given entry. Seven things I feel I can write about entertainingly (totally a word; suck it, dictionary!) enough to actually get people to read all the way through things and again, make them buy my book once it's written.

Here are the ideas I have so far:
1) Mind-jobs (at some point, I will try to convince you that circles don't exist)
2) Principles of a Dignified Life (living by a code, so to speak... seriously... like, tip even when you're poor)
3) Outright Lies (storytelling, of the freeform variety because thick fiction doesn't mix with the interwebs)
4) Cultural Analysis (how Star Wars episodes 1-3 should have been, and the implications of Twilight)
5) Adventureblogging (doing stupid shit for attention, like, unplanned bike trips)
6) People-Hacks (like life-hacks, but with people... manipulating people)
7) Beginner's Luck (I try something with little to no preparation or experience in it, like building a chair)
8) anything else

And lastly, I'll leave you, dear reader, with this thought: click on the ads!! please for the love of God, click on the ads! I don't care what they're for, just click on them; that's how I can make money out of this! Click multiple times! I don't care if you read the blog or not, just visit it ten times daily and click every ad that shows up on it! Make a game out of it somehow, like, how many different ads will Google put in there for you to click?

you'll think of something; you're creative