Got to sleep in Wednesday, and then spend all afternoon reading & talking to May online—so it was a nice relaxing day. Sean had already left for Ohio on his Thanksgiving break. He has nominated Jeremiah to replace him, which makes a lot of sense the more I think about it. We talkt the night before and he told me it’s not just Ceejay being a bum, Sean’s overwhelmed with the classical guitar program & college life in general. He’s been thinking about switching majors to something else… he’s not sure what. Jeremiah is itchin to get back to playing shows again, but only if I am 100% on board with it. It wouldn’t be the Neo-Fugitives or August Fools but something new altogether. I guess he & Sean have been discussing? Maybe this is good.
When it got dark I left for Echo Hollow. Ceejay was at work, and Jerry & I were going to try & wait for him so we 3 could jam. Ended up just the two of us awkwardly sitting & learning each other’s songs till 9:30. Olive was with mom Daina; Jerry pays her $94 a week in child support. He got wasted off a few bottles of Amber Bock as we sat in the kitchen, trading tidbits of our musical selves. I recommended Minutemen & the Flaming Lips (early albums), likewise he told me to check out Sunny Day Real Estate & Cursive. Then I went Home, visited with the Parents, and once they went to bed I cald Jordan and he came over to hang out. We drove around the neighborhood a bit, then parkt by the baseball fields & spent about an hour shooting the shit.
He told me how he’s set up the perfect MySpace for himself, by embracing the fakeness. “Something I can give to people when they ask for it; and then they either think I’m the coolest scene kid ever, or they’ll think it’s a joke.” Profile pic is arms-length selfie taken from above, flash on (digital camera, no cellphone quality here) of Jord with swoopy emo hair & faux snake-bite lip piercings—expertly curated Top Eight—clever & cryptic About Me section—and all of it titled “Two-Headed Boy” at the top of the page. “I’m already talking to, like, a couple of different girls; one’s from Michigan; I found her via Jeremiah, actually…”
Thanksgiving Day was pleasant; good food & an easy time with the family. I played my classical for them (Will said “Why’s he makin’ a face?”) and then left to go hang with Jordan again. We were meeting up at Best Buy with the Hazelwood High bunch (Jessica, Paxton, etc.) to take part in the overnight line-up for the Black Friday super sale. It was going to get down to 20 degrees. We were the first ones there, at around 8:45. Next, Ian Wahl showed up, then Seth, then all the rest of the people I hadn’t seen since graduation slowly filterd in. Apparently this was a big organized event, because we weren’t allowd to set up tents on the side of the doors that “folks normally don’t line up on,” even tho some of us had no intentions of staying until the store opend or actually buying anything. People had generators. All night you’d hear like “Hey! Where did those guys come from? Out of that tent there, or what?” Crazy how far these rabid consumers will fight for their chance at a holiday discount.
Jordan & I were finally able to get ahold of Tige so we zoomed up the interstate to the Muse. He cut us a good deal, 4 hits for $25. We thankt him and headed outta there, dropping our 2 each as we sped off. This night seemed to be turning out very nicely.
We returned to the parking lot beneath the giant blue & yellow luminescence. Pax had brung scooters, and we entertaind ourselves by scooting around the lot. It also kept our hearts pumping & body heat up. Partook in some Jackass-style hijinks, like getting pushed in a shopping cart over a curb and then on two scooters at once over the same; Seth/Ian were pushing & went tumblin down with us. The scooters were pretty fun! The thing has a lot more mobility & agility than I expected. I could glide around at fairly high speeds, cold air biting my face, and watch as blotches of color appeard on the pavement and concrete and brick walls.
Suddenly I saw Jordan & Pax getting in Paxton’s car. I ran over & hopt in the back seat and he took us on a speedy loop thru the system of shops surrounding Best Buy. That song “Mondo ’77” from Vanilla Sky was playing, and it was the funnest joyride I ever had. Logos passed by, bearing names with extra meaning: GameStop, Party City, Sleep Inn. After that, we watched trippy music videos by this French guy Michel Gondry on Pax’s laptop in his tent. The one for Björk’s “Jóga” was amazing. Before long tho we started feeling kinda claustrophobic so we went outside away from the crowded line of tents, over to some bushes. A playfulness showed itself. We could see them move, one branch at a time, very slightly. Bounced off the stiffer ones like bumpers in a pinball machine. Then we scooted across the lot to the shrubbery on the far side, by the freeway.
This is where the real fun started. We were wandering thru the brush when Jordan’s foot blindly kickt over an ammo box, hidden next to a huge exit sign. It was labeld “Official Geo Cache” with a key attached. We opend it and inside was a Ziplockt note: “Congratulations! You’ve FOUND IT!!!” and for a split second we thought we’d uncoverd some sort of Gnostic treasure chest that held the secrets of the Universe. Evidently it’s just this worldwide GPS scavenger hunt cald Geocaching, where finders can take/leave trinkets of whatever. There were necklaces, bracelets, pens & pencils, marbles, old coupons, button badges, and a mini rubber alien & kitty-kat in there too. We managed to write our names in the ledger, which was a rold-up receipt paper in a pill bottle, put everything back & return the box to its original spot under the sign.
Almost everything. I pocketed one of the buttons.
It’s so grossly racist—I had to. (We found it hysterical, of course.)
It looks like this:
No idea where it comes from.