If it's not sports, it's sometimes this

I did vow to see more movies in 2012 than in 2011. I did accomplish that, for what it's worth. Out of this list, maybe a dozen were seen in a theater. The rest were DVD, a couple on TCM, some at a friend's house and more recently, home on Netflix.

This number may be even higher next year.

1) Louder than a Bomb
2) Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (2011)
3) True Grit (2010)
4) The Artist
5) Ghost World
6) Haywire
7) One Day
8) Crazy, Stupid, Love
9) In the Realms of the Unreal: The Mystery of Henry Darger
10) Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
11) A Great Day in Harlem
12) Moneyball
13) A Separation
14) Tokyo Drifter
15) Casa de Mi Padre
16) Senna
17) I Like Killing Flies
18) Branded to Kill
19) Gate of Flesh
20) Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life
21) Scott Walker: 30th Century Man
22) The Thing (1982)
23) The Runaways
24) The Last Waltz
25) Cabin in the Woods
26) Drive
27) I Was a Maie War Bride
28) The Avengers
29) Captain America: The First Avenger
30) The Woodmans
31) Fighting Words/Street Poet
32) Cafe Lumiere
33) Perfect Sense
34) Moonrise Kingdom
35) The Grey
36) Resurrect the Dead: the Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles
37) Gran Torino
38) The Amazing Spider-Man
39) The Muppets
40) The People Vs. George Lucas
41) Quai des Orfèvres
42) Super 8
43) The Dark Knight Rises
44) The Power of Kangwon Province
45) The Adventures of Tin Tin
46) Expendables 2
47) Certified Copy
48) On the Town
49) Gun Crazy
50) The Descendants
51) Mickey
52) Murder, My Sweet
53) Kiss Me Deadly
54) Into the Abyss
55) Gremlins
56) Wreck it Ralph
57) Tommy
58) Casino Royale
59) Skyfall
60) El Bulli: Cooking in Progress
61) Hello Down There
62) Where are my Children?
63) The Card
64) Your Sister's Sister
65) Like Crazy
66) That Sinking Feeling
67) Django Unchained

So ends another year of blogging. Fewer posts. Fewer comments. Thank you all for reading, even you, especially you.

Coffee and Pictures

Last year My Scottish Wife got me a French Press for Christmas. I took to it well and use it mostly on the weekend. Found out which type of coffee I like and try new types frequently. I try to have a couple of different ones around and buy it already ground in small amounts, about a quarter of a pound at a time, to keep it relatively fresh.

For Christmas this year she got me a Burr Grinder. Used it over the weekend. It's quite loud but works very well. Now I can buy beans, keep them a little longer and have supposedly fresher and better tasting coffee when I want it. Maybe I'll increase the varieties in the house to three.

Took a bunch of pictures last year. Inspired by another blogger, who did something similar last year, I decided to keep a file of 'best of' pictures as I downloaded them. By the end of the year I had enough to put together a slideshow in near chronological order, added a song from my favorite album of the year and voila, instant youtube sensation. Or not. Did not really go anywhere exciting, but there are some amusing pictures in there - and not just of me and my kid!

Enjoy.

No resolutions, but must improve

Probably the worst year of reading than I can remember. The quality is there, but the quantity is missing. Could not even read a book a week in 2012. For me, that is ridiculously low. Plus, I included a number of shorter poetry books. They seem to merely pad my count, but you should all check out Jack Gilbert's work. Yes, I can do better.

There were a few books I started, then got about 25-50 pages in and gave up. Those do not get listed here. If I finished it, the book is here. Three stars is a cut above average, four stars is a very good book.

1) Haruki Murakami - 1Q84. 925 p. ***
2) John Doyle - The World is a Ball. 330 p.
3) Frederica Sager Maas - The Shocking Miss Pilgrim. 264 p.
4) Gil Scott-Heron - The Last Holiday: A Memoir. 321 p.
5) Jim Walsh - The Replacements: All Over but the Shouting. 304 p.
6) Annie Liebovitz - Pilgrimage. 246 p.
7) Stephen Fry - The Fry Chronicles. 438 p. ***
8) Kent Hartman - The Wrecking Crew. 292 p.
9) Susan Senator - Dirt: a story about gardening, mothering, and other messy business. 270 p.
10) David M. Wilson - The Lost Photographs of Captain Scott. 191 p. ***
11) Kate Winslet - The Golden Hat: Talking Back to Autism. 284 p. (mostly pictures)
12) Jack Gilbert - The Dance Most of All. 60 p. ***
13) Guy Delisle - Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea. 176 p.
14) Johnny Ramone - Commando. 174 p.
15) Francesca Woodman. 224 p. (mostly pictures)
16) Carole King. A Natural Woman. 489 p.
17) Mike Doughty. The Book of Drugs. 252 p. ***
18) Will Hermes. Love Goes to Buildings on Fire. 368 p. ***
19) Jack Gilbert. Refusing Heaven. 92 p. ****
20) John Irving. In One Person. 425 p. ***
21) Buzz Bissinger. Father's Day. 242 p. ****
22) Jack Gilbert. The Great Fires. 90 p. ***
23) Ken Calliat & Steven Stiefel. Making Rumours. 362 p. ***
24) Frank Langella. Dropped Names. 356 p.
25) Mark Haddon. The Red House. 264 p.
26) Gillian Flynn. Gone Girl. 419 p. **** (best fiction)
27) Christopher Coake - You Came Back. 416 p. ***
28) Ian Rankin - Black and Blue 397 p. ****
29) Dori Hadar - Mingering Mike. 192 p.
30 Joe Oestreich - Hitless Wonder. 293 p. **** (best non-fiction)
31) Natasha Trethewey - Native Guard. 64 p.
32) R.A. Dickey with Wayne Coffey - Wherever I Wind Up. 340 p. ***
33) Jay Stringer - Old Gold. 236 p. ***
34) David Davis - Showdown at Shepherd's Bush. 308 p.
35) Alexandra Scott - If I Could Be Louder. 20 p.
36) Jamaal May - God Engine 2.0. 30 p.
37) Paula J. Lambert - The Sudden Seduction of Gravity. 57 p. ***
38) Pete Townshend - Who I Am . 538 p.
39) Tadashi Ago, Shu Okimoto. The Drops of God. 423 p.
40) Christopher Hitchens. Morality. 104 p. ***
41) Susan McAllister (et al). A Bigger Boat: the Unlikely Success of the Albuquerque Poetry Slam. 327 p.
42) Jack Gilbert. Tougher than Heaven. 24 p.
43) Richard Russo. Elsewhere. 243 p. ***
44) Michael G. Ankerich. The Sound of Silence. 260 p. ***
45) Kurt Vonnegut Jr. We are what we Pretend to be. 161 p. ***
46) Soccer and Disaster: International Perspectives. 193 p.

Kick that can down the road

Poetry 2012, what I remembered

I doubt that I'm going to write anything close to Howl in the next week so here's a recap of 2012, from the poetic view.

Not sure how much original work of any quality I wrote. Work was done, most of it average at best. I did finish my first sestina, not saying it's decent but I completed one.

I was published a couple of times. Once online by New Verse News about the wedding of Kim Jong Un and in Night Ballet Press' - Buzzkill: Apocalypse - An End of the World Anthology. This was good news and showed some growth. More hard work is needed though.

The film Street Poet was so horrible we gathered and took the piss out of it one afternoon at the library. It inspired my poem, Kabuki Condom, that helped me win only my second poetry slam.

A more memorable gathering of poets occurred in March on the steps of the Main Library as we celebrated a Great Day in Columbus as the snow smacked us all in the face.

I made three appearances on the show Speaking of Poetry this year talking about autism, IWPS and phoning in to give Izetta a goodbye Haiku.

Writers' Block brought on the usual shenanigans and coy racism along with new regular Erik the Viking, his height, his Mormonism and wind sex. It was also awesome to see Aaron appear in his first Grand Slam.

One of the big surprises for me was winning my second IWPS title and representing Writers Block in Fayetteville. I was a bit nervous and not as pumped as I could have been but being in the coolness of Fayetteville rejuvenated my enthusiasm. That and I was 28th after the first night! Ended up falling into 45th out of 67 but I had an absolute blast. So happy to have this experience under my belt.

The other big surprise was getting involved with the Columbus Arts Festival as a volunteer. Working with such a great group of people was inspiring. Then I was asked to be the Chair of the Poetry Committee for 2013. I'm humbled Scott Huntley and Shana Scott have so much trust in me. A good group of people are on the committee and I'm excited to be working with them. And hey poets you can apply to appear on stage right here!

Been a heck of a year, looking forward to Arts Fest and what the rest will bring.

In closing I urge you to give a listen to this. Jack McCarthy on IndieFeed.

Never beleive it's not so

You never know when a night will totally enthrall you then bring you back to reality. We went to a Christmas party last night. Our host is friends with a local magician and I knew that, at some point, he'd be doing some tricks for us.

Magic has never really interested me. I mean, it's cool when it's done right, but I'm generally neutral about it.

Last night it was intimate, spellbinding, and done right. Carroll had perfect banter and his skill of card manipulation or whatever the Hell he was doing blew me away.



Later in the evening the host's son, who has been learning magic from Carroll, came out and did a magic act of his own. Very engaging and eager student. He is ten, the same age as my son, and the differences hit me over the head. I cannot be comparing all the time. Kids are different. Yet when the social skills display themselves, it hurts a little bit. Some nights more so.

Live Journal, from ten years ago.

He was no hero. (12/22/02)

Yet there was such a passion to his music and that of the Clash that you could not ignore.

They were loud, political, with a sense of intelligence that wasn't in many of the other 'punk' groups of the time.

I really hadn't heard of them until London Calling. The explosion of the opening cut, the cynicism of Lost In The Supermarket, and what were they saying about Montgomery Clift?

The bloated Sandinista came out after that. For a friend's radio poetry project I read the lyrics of Somebody Got Murdered.

Goodbye, for keeps, forever.

Then, at the station, we got a 45 from Epic Records. No group was listed on the label. It was a promo of Should I Stay or Should I Go. Things had changed for the group, or had they? Were The Clash becoming hit makers on their own terms?

I saw them live, at Rich Stadium, opening for The Who. they did their 45 minutes, closed with I Fought The Law. They weren't a stadium band. They needed the intimate raw energy of a small club to get their message across.

At the bar I worked as DJ, at the end of one evening I heard a voice call out, 'Ed, play The Clash. they have something to say.' A couple of years later I found out that voice belonged to someone who became a good friend.

They had the torch, but as Strummer later said, they dropped it.



The band split, a very ugly split between Strummer and Jones.

There was a strange Clash record done in the mid 80's. Jones did Big Audio Dynamite. Strummer had a few decent solo records, recorded with The Pogues, did some acting.

The Clash are being inducted into he Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in March.

Joe Strummer will be missing.

It will not be the same.