the minutes 62611

.39 inches of rain fell like God in Lucky Town last week.  I walked out of the Horseshoe and into it on Tuesday night, getting drenched and feeling mighty fine.  We were back up to the hundreds by the weekend but it didn’t stop me from having a good time. 

I was dragged onto the dancefloor by no less than 3 fine young ladies at the Dale Watson show at the Continental on Saturday night and I was treated to a special encore performance featuring blues songstress Skye Downing.  Not a bad way to spend a Saturday night after work in Lucky Town USA no matter how you slice it, sure to beat any action anywhere except maybe Damascus or New York City.

The Gay Pride Parade in the Big Apple on Sunday probably felt like the 21st Century had finally arrived.  New York’s a big state with 29 representatives in the House and a big slice of the electoral pie.  It’ll be interesting to see how many politicians will join the New Century, suddenly having firm support for same-sex marriage next November.   The people have spoken. 

And the people have been shut DOWN.  It turns out that 1.5 million people can be wrong, at least, they won’t be able to file a class suit against a corporation like Walmart even if they are right.  Another ruling for big business in the land of the free by a conservative Supreme Court.
In the Other Hemisphere, Friday nights in Syria continue to be some real heavy shit.  Some 20 protestors were gunned down in the city of Homs, 4 more than last Friday.   Heavier still was the headline that half of the world’s refugees are running from U.S. Wars.  They’d do well to keep running. 

Even though Congress voted nay on authorizing operations in Libya last week, they did not vote to cut the funding for War efforts.  Good luck brother and who knows?  Maybe this diaspora can land in a cool country like the Netherlands with socialized healthcare, beautiful women and net neutrality. 

Can you imagine if we were involved in three Wars, all at once?  The first person to use the words “freedom” or “democracy” gets a Noam Chomsky book upside their head. 

It’s the minutes, Brother, there you go.  I can handle MY trouble, can you?

It didn’t take long for Metallica sell out of its pressing of And Justice For All on green vinyl last week but those who missed out on one of the thousand copies can perhaps curl up in a snake layer onesie while playing the Metallica monopoly game.  It’s the same old story, rock n roll is dead. 

I finished reading “Enter Night”, the latest  biography on the band, and I have to give it to writer  Mick Wall.  He actually gives some credibility to the bands early days as pioneering “long-haired punks” before concluding what we already know about rock n roll.  Metallica might not have been singing about the usual get-girl or wizard fare on their thrash-swan song but it comes as no surprise that one of the working titles for Justice was “Wild Chicks, Fast Cars And Lots of Drugs”.

“it’s every Bastard for himself
the last Century hasn’t ended yet.
Bring us the head of the King
the last Century hasn’t ended yet.”  Off This Century, Unwound

Momento mori.
jimtrainer.net

the Minutes 61911

“I’m gonna lose these
blues I’ve found
down in lucky town.”-the Boss

Summer’s here and I don’t care.  Things are expected to cool down to 101 on Monday in Texas.  I hope you didn’t let the heat keep you from getting out to cast your vote for City Council on Saturday.  School’s out and the town is ours but we’re not out of the woods yet.  The Open-Air Frat Market of 6^th street was in full swing as observed among the balloons and cigarette butts out front Barbs&Babes celebrating its 6th birthday Friday night.   “Another smashed weekend”  and the Sunday minutes coming down/the/wire…

Two news items outside of Austin interest me very little so we’ll just get them out of the way.  The mind-numbing doublespeak about the economy and the faux moral posturing over Anthony Weiner’s resignation coming through the news media can be summed up in one sentence:  He ain’t getting fucked any time soon but our generation will be and every day for the rest of our lives.

“Where have all the good times gone?”-Van Halen
some real fun was had in the beautiful city of Vancouver on Wednesday.  What else could it be but fun?  Those people damn sure didn’t look anything like Abdou Abdel-Monaam Hamadah.  It was all looking more like the streets of Philadelphia back in 2000 when the GOP came to town than anything revolutionary.   not that Philadelphians need something to rebel against.  hell didn’t they do some cars Vancouver style after the Phils won the World Series?   In any event some 1000 citizens of Vancouver  probably weren’t celebrating the failure of their Canucks to win the Stanley Cup Wednesday night.

Perhaps we should celebrate the Supreme Court’s decision Thursday to  limit Police authority.  This could be good news, at least  if you’re a  13 year old special education student cornered in a small room with a cop and the school principal.

Absent from Secretary of State Clinton’s concerns about the sexual violence used on protestors in Libya this week was any mention of Bahrain.  My heart goes out to these victims and especially those in places where fighting a revolution doesn’t even have the benefit of some well polished “buzz” in the American news media.

To sum up:  it’s hot, school’s out, hope you’re voting(locally at least), cops and high school principals are liars who would probably piss their pants in the Other Hemisphere and you can rely on American news media to bring you good and bad news but it all sounds phony and condescending.  Anybody with a critical mind can smell something much worse coming down the wire than burning car fumes or a foul wind blowing down Tripoli Street.

I bought a copy of “Lucky Town” on Thursday and its title track is taking me back to a July night in Historical downtown Smyrna, smoking cigars and drinking large mugs of Sam Adams talking one of my only friends in Delaware out of joining the Army.  We all gotta die but perhaps I’ll save all that for another time.

Death is not the end.-Nick Cave

Clarence Clemons
January 11, 1942 – June 18, 2011
RIP

#12

The Offices of Jim Trainer
Avenue of the Dead
Land of the Free

David Hagysback
Lap of Luxury
Hippie Town, USA

6/10/11

Hallo-

Trouble comes in a myriad of merciless and twisted forms.  We’ve taken on the Blues, it came with the Night.  We bought it part&parcel at the onset of this twisted dark journey.  We’re pioneers and we’re Kings.  The Big Boss Man will find you, however, so sip your iced drink with the dumb&the Blonde, we’re all gonna be judged and we’re all gonna pay.

The good news about Democracy and Revolt in the Middle East and parts of Africa is nothing good for the workingman lest he’s a company man but even he ain’t smilin like they do in the boardroom when they hear about some immoral pirates taking to the streets in the third world.  Military time has always worked for me-at least it did until I discovered that there is no War, just this paltry day to day dumbing down of our minds as we try to make a living with our heads in and hands caught in an American dream.

You can never believe anything and if what I learned from psylocibin is correct then everything is suspect.  Nothing can be trusted.  The truth is some slippery shit but the Grand Imperialist Strategy will be realized.  Just like you’ll be there on Monday morning, life goes on and etc.

“What is this paranoid garbage?”, you may be thinking.  Just a reminder to you mon ami that we are stronger than this Life.  Even if our generation yields no more Wisdom than that sung by Van Halen:

“Where have all the good times gone?”

Maybe the real Drama and the only good money to be made is not here in the USA but in the OTHER hemisphere, fighting for democracy and whatever, and using the barrel of a gun.  Maybe we could take a ride to Oma, I know a guy there, he could get us a job on a boat with our own Berettas in Sierra Leone or Bahrain.  Last I heard they had ships in the Gulf of Mexico but my guess is, by now, they’re probably looking into other, less “contaminated” markets.  Fuck him and pardon my bitching.  We could be knee-deep in the dumb in some sleepy town on the gulf, waiting for orders-out with all the other roughnecks at the Red Carpet Inn bar.  Instead, we are in Paradise.  Don’t forget this, David.

We are Kings.

Jim Trainer
jimtrainer.wordpress.com
jimtrainer.net

#11

The Offices of Jim Trainer
3923 Run of the Oaks Drive#G
Austin, TX 78704

G. Razas
Lap of the Empire
Hippie Town, USA
 
6/11/11
Hola hermano-
 
When I was 25 I was the foreman of a demolition crew.  There were about 25 of us:  black and Puerto Rican men working for a day wage.  We had to demolish, disassemble, shovel, haul and clear out the remnants of an old candy factory in North Philly.  They don’t call it “North Philly” anymore.  10th&Hamilton is “Northern Liberties” now and the old candy factory rents “loft-living” to people who make more money than you and me.   
 
Now I work as a caretaker for a quadriplegic named Robin.  It takes me about an hour and a half to get him settled in bed.  Some people have more courage than we ever will.  Saturday night after putting Robin to bed I went to the CC Club.  It was indie night and there was nothing rock n roll about it.  Frumpy girls with stupid haircuts and awkward dudes wearing boboes milled around to the milktoast music.  I recognize this type of crowd.  They heard an ad for the show on KUT(like I did) and came out because they thought it’d be “cool”.  When I think about radio ads and see bands perpetrating fraud in the name of rock n roll I feel the same way towards the music industry that I do towards most other institutions-like an outsider.  These people are innocent.   I glowered and drank my beer.  There are far more deadly frauds being perpetrated over in the Other Hemisphere and with far more serious ramifications than any Saturday-night-in the big City malaise I might feel.
 
Over there they’re fighting to live, or to die, and over here the man on the radio talks about democracy.  Beware the flag-wavers, the slogan bearers, the parrots.  Beware the Club Members.  As usual, I’m just looking for something to rail against, some way to brain the dumb American night we all got our hands caught in.  No trouble for me is the worst kind. 
 
Peace has found me at last.
 
 
Namaste.
jimtrainer.net