EVERYTHING IDOL UPDATE

I know you're all salivating in anticipation, but you'll have to wait one more week for Round 3 to begin. I'm going to enjoy my last week of vacation and work out how I want Round 3 to proceed. But it will be worth the wait.

EVERYTHING IDOL | Round 2, Heat 21

Music beats out TV, NMH and Batman to move on to Round 3. The Round 3 contenders so far:

Art
His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
Water
Johnny Cash, 1994-2003
The Big Lebowski
Books
Air conditioning
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Sex
Kitties
Automobiles
Coca-Cola
Swearing
Home cooking
Science
Email
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Friends
Rushmore
Music

This is it, folks--the last heat of Round 2. Next week we begin Round 3. The final four contestants, please:



1. The Sopranos | Pros: Frequently considered the best TV show ever (by those who haven't seen The Simpsons or Deadwood). Made Deadwood and The Wire possible. Made household names of James Gandolfini and Edie Falco. Cons: Probably should have ended after four seasons.



2. Love | Pros: Gives life meaning for many people. Better than the alternative. Cons: So very hard to find.



3. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain | Pros: Arguably the best American novel ever written. Captures a time and a place like few other works of art. Contains at least three of the most indelible fictional characters ever created. Cons: That last chapter.



4. Film | Pros: The art form of the 20th century (and the 21st, so far). Provides employment for most of the people I know. If you're unemployed, it gives you something to do on a weekday afternoon. Cons: Two words: Brett Ratner.

Polls close Monday, May 30 at midnight.

COUNTDOWN TO INFINITE MELVIN

10 Things about Revenge of the Sith That Make It a Great Movie (Probable spoilers, if you care)

1. This time out, the wacky new CGI character isn't a gibberish-spouting racist stereotype, but a murderous lightsabre-wielding cyborg with a bronchial infection.

2. The insane opening tracking shot. Suck on it, Orson Welles and Robert Altman.

3. Ian McDiarmid, particularly in the opera scene and the scene where he reveals to Anakin that he's the Sith lord.

4. The "Somewhere Out There" scene where Anakin and Padme, on opposite sides of the capital, wonder about the future while Mace Windu goes to arrest Palpatine. When they're not talking, they can really act up a storm.

5. "Execute Order 66."

6. The fact that the movie is probably 80% digitally animated--in essence, it's a cartoon with a few flesh-and-blood actors to keep things interesting. Proof that with enough money, it's possible to do absolutely anything in a movie, which is very exciting.

7. Everybody, with a few exceptions, just stepping up their game on this one, from Lucas himself to the actors (especially Hayden Christensen and Ewan McGregor) to the guys animating Yoda.

8. The increased speed and urgency of the proceedings--everything matters this time.

9. The final duel between Anakin and Obi-Wan. It might not be exactly what you pictured, but it's more brutal and heart-wrenching than I could have imagined.

10. The look on Christensen's face as the Vader mask is lowered onto Anakin's face for the first time. It's the space-opera equivalent of GOB's "I've made a huge mistake." That one look nearly justifies the entire prequel trilogy.

9 People I Don't Like

1. People who make a dismissive exhalation after every trailer at the movie theater. Yeah, dude, we get it, anything with special effects and a plot is beneath you.

2. People who ask dumb questions during the movie, i.e. "Is the Duke in the freezer?" after the guy on screen says "Where's the Duke?" and the other guys says "Follow me" and then opens the freezer.

3. People who humor the people who ask dumb questions by answering "Yes, the Duke's in the freezer," etc. Don't answer their questions, just tell them to shut up! (People 1-3 were sitting behind me at Layer Cake this afternoon, and I really wanted to turn around and say something devastatingly witty like "Are you the director? Because if not, I don't really want to hear your commentary," but I didn't, and as I was leaving I was glad because they turned out to be an elderly couple, and I think the guy was just explaining the action to his vision-impaired wife.)

4. People who feel the need to explain in exhaustive, condescending detail exactly why they don't care about Star Wars and won't be seeing Revenge of the Sith (usually involving some variation on "I wouldn't see Rocky 6 either" and "the original trilogy is fun escapist fare, nothing more").

5. The DJ on Indie 103.1 last week who kept harping on the "insane train wreck of a segue" he just perpetrated by playing U2 after M.I.A., and how only Indie 103.1 could do something that kuh-razy. Yo, dude, you just did something anybody with an iPod Shufle could do. You're not special. Indie 103.1 is the best radio station in LA, pretty much by default, but they're so goddamn smug about it.

6. Nicole Richie. She knows why.

7. The programming geniuses who decided to schedule Veronica Mars and Lost at the same time next season. WHAT THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO DO NOW, JERKS? Also, but to a lesser extent, whoever programmed Alias and The O.C. opposite one another. That one's easier--I'll just watch Alias and catch The O.C. on DVD--but still. The schedule was perfect this season. Why ruin it? (If anybody is in the same dilemma and wants to set up a TiVo/videotape swap arrangement, let me know. TiVo needs to get on that double-tuner box ASAP.)

8. My building's replacement mailcarrier. The regular mailperson's on vacation, and he/she apparently didn't give the building's front door key to the replacement, so I didn't get any mail from Friday to Thursday, and my Netflix discs are probably on the floor of the post office somewhere.

9. The gnomes who live in my TiVo and think that I want it to record old Drew Carey Show episodes and Disney Channel cartoons. I do not.

8 Very Attractive Women



1. Yunjin Kim
Aka Sun on Lost. She and Jin are officially the prettiest couple on TV.



2. Judy Greer
I TiVoed an episode of CSI: Miami just because she was a guest star. Dude, is David Caruso doing an Agent Smith impression or what?



3. Mia Kirshner
See lessons learned from 24 below.



4. M.I.A.
Why does the American takeover seem to have stalled? She's Gwen Stefani if her dad was a terrorist, people! Go buy her record!



5. The girl in front of me in line at Ralphs the other day
In the pink sweater and black pants. Wow. I'm going to assume she's a student at UCLA and not some local high school.



6. Brittany
She's still America's Next Top Model in our hearts, at least.



7. Kelly Rowan
We know you like the Chardonnay, Kiki. Just get some help, for all of our sakes.



8. Natalie Zea
Guest-starred on season 3 of The Shield and starred in the unfortunately short-lived Eyes. In both, her characters liked to cheat on their husbands with coworkers in dark alleys.

7 Things about Revenge of the Sith That Make It a Typical Star Wars Movie (i.e. Frustrating and Almost Irredeemably Flawed)

1. Natalie Portman. I don't know what the problem is here. Maybe her dialogue is that much worse than everybody else's, or maybe she's just embarrassed to be in the movie because she's an Oscar-nominated actress, but you'd think an Oscar-nominated actress could learn to actually act. Everybody else is doing it--even the damn CGI robots--so why can't she?

2. The explanation given for Padme's death. The explanation itself might not have been so bad, were it not delivered by a Microsoft Office Assistant Medical Droid.

3. "Nooooooooooo!" If you've seen it, you know what I'm talking about.

4. The fact that the movie is probably 80% digitally animated--in essence, it's a cartoon with a few flesh-and-blood actors to keep things interesting. None of it feels like it's taking place in a real physical space. Ironically, the only set that looks tangible is the Tantive IV blockade-runner interior, which of course is the set for the first scene of the original trilogy.

5. The dialogue is noticeably improved this time around, but there are still a few lines that just make you cringe. In particular, this clunker that lands smack-dab in the middle of the otherwise incredible final duel: "From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!"

6. The Jedi action is incredible--but if you've seen the Clone Wars cartoon, it's inevitably a little disappointing to watch them just slice up a bunch of battle droids and occasionally use the Force to push something into a wall.

7. The overall arc of the prequels' plot is actually a lot better than you'd think from just watching the first two, but if you think about it too hard, it starts to fall apart. The story's there, but there are so many missed opportunities in all three films--the rungs on the ladder of Anakin's descent to the Dark Side don't quite fit together like they should. In a way, I'm kind of looking forward to the inevitable Special Edition-izing twenty years hence.

6 Songs to Fit a Mood

1. "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" by Bob Dylan
2. "Selfless, Cold and Composed" by Ben Folds Five
3. "Lipstick Vogue" by Elvis Costello
4. "Why Bother" by Weezer
5. "Freak Scene" by Dinosaur Jr.
6. "Ruin My Day" by Jon Brion

5 Lessons Learned from This Season of 24

1. Gay pot-smoking hippies=bad.

2. Torture=good, most of the time.

3. Surly Drunk Tony=much more fun than Uptight Bossman Tony.

4. Previously boring main-cast members (Tony, Michelle, David Palmer)=surprisingly interesting as special guest stars.

5. Hot bisexual terrorists=best ever. (See Mia Kirshner above.)

4 Excuses to Leave the House

1. LCD Soundsystem/M.I.A., El Rey Theatre, 5/15/05
2. Dodgers vs. Marlins, Dodger Stadium, 5/16/05
3. Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Arclight, 5/19/05
4. Layer Cake, AMC Century 14, 5/20/05

3 Shows on My TiVo That Have Been There Far Too Long and Which I Will Likely Never Watch

1. Alien Planet (Discovery Channel doc about a theoretical voyage to another inhabitated planet. Looks interesting and even useful to someone who wants to make a living writing movies and comic books, but it's two hours long--I increasingly prefer my entertainment in 22- or 45-minute chunks.)

2. Dragons: A Fantasy Made Real (CGI-heavy faux Animal Planet doc about the history and biology of dragons. Looks fun and clever, but again with the two hours.)

3. Five Deadly Venoms (1978 Shaw Brothers kung fu flick; undoubtedly one of the things referenced by Tarantino in Kill Bill. I really have to be in the right mood to read a movie, even if it involves people kicking each other.)

2 Best Movies I've Seen This Year

1. Kung Fu Hustle
2. Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

1 Oddly Comforting Calamity Jane Line from Deadwood

1. "Join the fuckin' club of most of us!"

EVERYTHING IDOL| Round 2, Heat 20

In a contentious battle, Rushmore wins out over poetry and Watchmen to progress to Round 3. The Round 3 contenders so far:

Art
His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
Water
Johnny Cash, 1994-2003
The Big Lebowski
Books
Air conditioning
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Sex
Kitties
Automobiles
Coca-Cola
Swearing
Home cooking
Science
Email
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Friends
Rushmore

This week and next week are the last two weeks of Round 2. There are still eight contestants left, so there'll be four choices in each of these last two polls. But I will also be adding the top three non-winning vote-getters to the Round 3 pool, for a total of 24 nominees. At the moment, The Office, The Far Side, poetry and the wheel have the most votes of the non-winners, with 8, 7, 7 and 7 respectively. Keep that in mind as you vote in these last two polls.

The next four contestants, please:



1. Television | Pros: The opiate of the masses! Delicious, delicious opiate! Currently provides higher-quality entertainment than the cinema in almost every respect. Makes the world smaller and more immediate. Cons: Destroying our children's brains, making them fat, blah blah blah.



2. In the Aeroplane over the Sea by Neutral Milk Hotel | Pros: Has the reclusive-genius thing going for it. Really, really good... Cons: But one of the best albums of all time?



3. Batman | Pros: One of the most recognizable and enduring fictional characters ever created. Represents the pinnacle of human achievement. Beat the crap out of Superman at least twice. Cons: Only in rare cases has the execution equaled the concept.



4. Music | Pros: Has the power to soothe the savage breast (and, occasionally, the savage beast). Makes nearly any activity more enjoyable and/or tolerable. A powerful vehicle for memory, emotion and nostalgia. Has a beat. You can dance to it. Cons: Some of it sucks.

Polls close Monday, May 23 at midnight.

IF YOU CAN'T THINK OF ANYTHING TO SAY, JUST STEAL ONE OF THESE BIG SURVEY THINGS

As I just did, from Hillary. Not in any particular order.

A. Top Five Lyrics that Move Your Heart:

1. "Into My Arms" by Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds
I don't believe in an interventionist God
But I know, darling, that you do
But if I did I would kneel down and ask Him
Not to intervene when it came to you
Not to touch a hair on your head
To leave you as you are
And if He felt He had to direct you
Then direct you into my arms

2. "The Rotting Strip" by Crooked Fingers
And we take what we want when we knew what we wanted
When we wished we had something to lose
You were a fine young thing
Crammed in your tight red vinyl jeans
I was a third-rate going-nowhere
Burning for nothing to do
So we branded our hearts and we tasted the stars
Getting wasted by the light of the moon
You were a two-bit tramp
I was a low-life lying scab
We were a bad lay coming undone
Burning for someone to use

3. "William Faulkner in Hollywood" by Tom Russell
So if you're out tonight 'neath your movie lights
Of a California sky
Remember William Faulkner and his pain
He served it up to pay the rent,
But could not deny the price
Now he stumbles drunk through the Mississippi rain

Yeah he longed for Mississippi and the back porch in the rain
Sipping bourbon and staring through the trees
But the silver screen and the money dream
Has taken old Bill away
And California brought him to his knees

4. "New Partner" by Will Oldham's various incarnations (particularly the Bonnie 'Prince' Billy re-recording)
Now the sun's fading faster, we're ready to go
There's a skirt in the bedroom that's pleasantly low
And the loons on the moor, the fish in the flow
And my friends, my friends still will whisper hello
We all know what we know, it's a hard swath to mow
When you think like a hermit you forget what you know

5. "Whistle down the Wind" by Tom Waits
I'm not all I thought I'd be
I always stayed around
I've been as far as Mercy and Grand
Frozen to the ground
I can't stay here and I'm scared to leave
(Just kiss me once and then)
I'll go to hell
I might as well
Be whistlin' down the wind

The bus at the corner
The clock's on the wall
Broken windmill
There's no wind at all
I've yelled and I've cursed
If I stay here I'll rust
I'm stuck like a shipwreck
Out here in the dust

B. Top 5 Instrumentals:

1. "Svefn-g-englar" by Sigur Ros (okay, there's some singing, but it's in a made-up language called "Hopelandish," and it's the same thing repeated over and over again, so I don't think it really counts)
2. "The Big Top" by Michael Penn (theme from Boogie Nights)
3. "New Orleans Instrumental No. 1" by R.E.M.
4. "Cecilia Ann" by Pixies
5. "Hall of the Mountain King" by The Who

C. Top 5 Live Musical Experiences:

1. Jas. Mathus and His Knock-Down Society, 40 Watt, Athens, GA, February (I think) 1998
I saw a lot of shows in Athens, and this isn't even the best of them, but it sticks out in my mind as being representative of everything good and bad about my freshman year of college. Plus it made me late for my RA interviews the next morning.

2. Frank Black and the Catholics, 40 Watt, Athens, GA, January 1999
The first time I saw my musical idol (see below) live and in person. I was right up against the stage; the guitar tech even put me "in charge" of protecting the guitarist's pedals. It seems like they played all damn night. My most distinct memories are the guitarist playing "Los Angeles" by hammering the strings with a beer bottle, and Frank Black's array of five guitars lined up behind him--whenever he broke a string, he just picked up the next one in line and kept playing.

3. The White Stripes, Greek Theatre, Los Angeles, CA, September 22, 2003
So it would have been nice to see them pre-fame at the 40 Watt, like Hillary did, but it's a testament to how ferocious they are that they made the big open-air Greek feel like a sweaty club. I was a fan before this show; after it, I was a believer.

4. Pixies, Coachella, May 1, 2004
A big field with a couple dozen thousand sweaty people is not where I would have liked to have seen the Pixies, but I really can't complain. Beyond reproach.

5. The Arcade Fire, Troubadour, Los Angeles, CA, January 15, 2005
The Arcade Fire's big blog-fueled moment seems to have passed--even the backlash doesn't give a shit anymore--but this show really was amazing, only marred by their #1 Superfan and Regine's ultra-dramatic turns at the mic, but even those elements feel, in retrospect, like integral parts of the show. When all eight members of the band started shouting in unison during "Wake Up," it felt like a huge conquering army trampling everything in its path. But in a very polite Canadian way.

D. Top Five Artists You Think More People Should Listen To:

1. The Cars (Right now, they're playing the prom in Heaven.)
2. Ass Ponys (Are they still together?)
3. The Pernice Brothers (Ditto.)
4. Charlie Robison (I've only heard like three of his songs, but they were all good. My dad's a big fan. Check him out.)
5. Living Colour (You know you want to hear "Cult of Personality" right now.)

E. Top Five Albums You Must Hear From Start to Finish:

1. Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen
2. Rain Dogs by Tom Waits
3. White Light/White Heat by The Velvet Underground
4. Different Class by Pulp
5. Time's Up by Living Colour (speaking of)

F. Top Five Musical Heroes:

1. Charles Michael Kitteridge Thompson IV
2. Jon Brion
3. Jack White
4. Michael Stipe
5. Johnny Cash

EVERYTHING IDOL | Round 2, Heat 19

Friends gang up and beat down couches and the USPS to move on to Round 3. The Round 3 contenders so far:

Art
His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
Water
Johnny Cash, 1994-2003
The Big Lebowski
Books
Air conditioning
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Sex
Kitties
Automobiles
Coca-Cola
Swearing
Home cooking
Science
Email
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Friends

Only two more weeks to go until Round 3 after this! The next three contestants, please:



1. Watchmen by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons | Pros: Definitely the best superhero comic book ever, possibly the best comic book ever period. Defines a genre by tearing it apart; defines a medium by pushing the boundaries of what it can achieve. Cons: The coloring--oh! My eyes!



2. Poetry | Pros: The best medium for pitching woo. Cons: Poetry's for girls.



3. Rushmore, directed by Wes Anderson | Pros: Just a little something called THE BEST MOVIE EVER. Five reasons why: 1) "Yeah, I was in the shit." 2) "These are O.R. scrubs." 3) "You want me to grab a dictionary?" 4) "A hundred and twelve pounds. Black hair. Glasses....Oval face." 5) "We both have dead people in our families." Cons: You don't like this? You think the humor's all arch and weird? You think Max is an unlikeable little snot? You wanna fight?

Polls close Monday, May 16 at midnight.

STORY TIME! | The Case of the Lumpy-Dumpy

“They’re trying to buy us out.” Henry spits into the spittoon next to his desk. He looks at me and Trent, and I can tell he’s close to giving in. He doesn’t chew with the same force he once had. “They’ll move us to Oakland, probably. Been a while since they had a team. Already started building the course. That’s where their headquarters are, anyway.” Why would any company have their headquarters in Oakland, is what I’d like to know. Trent and I spent five years there I know I’d rather forget. Much less Big Bobby’s Baby Boutique. You’d think any kid who got a rattle or whatever from Big Bobby’s would be doomed from the start, with all the bad vibes from that place...

CONTINUE READING HERE.

Monday's story here.
Tuesday's story here.
Wednesday's story here.
Thursday's story here.

STORY TIME! | Red Skies

Martina had a clear view of Jeffery’s bedroom window. Had Jeffery known this, he might have been more mindful of the activities he engaged in with curtains open. For one thing, he probably would have masturbated less (never mind the fact that the idea of Martina watching him would likely have precipitated a rise in Jeffery’s onanistic exercises, albeit with the curtains closed). For another, he would have spent less time sitting alone in his room on weekend nights reading comic books, flipping though “Crisis Crossover!” issues of Infinity, Inc. and Blue Devil, charting their place in the Crisis chronology by the appearance of red skies...

CONTINUE READING HERE.

Monday's story here.
Tuesday's story here.
Wednesday's story here.

IS YOUR DAD A DEALER, 'CAUSE YOU'RE DOPE TO ME

Chris alerted me to the Online Piracy Funds Terrorism Mixtape, where you can listen to remixes of M.I.A.'s songs and even download a few vocal tracks to make your own remixes. So, of course, I spent the bulk of last evening and this morning making my own remix instead of working on tomorrow's STORY TIME! Which is a bigger waste of time? U-decide!

MP3: "URADBASR" by Gardner

M.I.A. vs. a string quartet tribute to the Pixies vs. the Pixies themselves. I don't hate it.

STORY TIME! | Black Thor Rides Again

"I’ll never forget the day my sister ran away from home. It was the kind of day that made you think nothing bad could ever happen. Flowers opening to the sun, not a cloud in the sky--the kind of day that makes you want to believe in God. And then--" a pause to choke back a sob-- "and then something happens to take that all away from you. Something that could have been avoided had you just seen the signs. Had you just listened, just once--" I try for the tears. I think of Scooter getting hit by the car. I think of Diane saying goodbye. Nothing. Out of the corner of my eye I can see Ken getting fidgety. Nicole’s finger taps impatiently on my hand. Everybody’s already thinking about the next take, about how they’ll be going home late again tonight. This is TV. There’s no time to screw around...

CONTINUE READING HERE.

Monday's story here.

Tuesday's story here.

STORY TIME! | The First Dance

A young girl with a crown of daisies and a slight limp walked along the pier alone. Unnoticed by all on the pier except the ring-toss barker, who noted her daisies and limp and fled his booth for the bathroom to cry for the first time in seventeen years, the girl hobbled the length of the pier, the orthopedic shoe on her right foot clumping on the boards. Thirty minutes after her walk began, the girl reached the far rail and its view of the horizon. In that time, the ring-toss barker attempted suicide three times, but succeeded only once....

CONTINUE READING HERE.

Read the previous story here, along with an explanation of what exactly is going on.

EVERYTHING IDOL | Round 2, Heat 18

Thanks largely to a motivated get-out-the-vote campaign, Infinite Jest moves on to Round 3. The Round 3 contenders so far:

Art
His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
Water
Johnny Cash, 1994-2003
The Big Lebowski
Books
Air conditioning
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Sex
Kitties
Automobiles
Coca-Cola
Swearing
Home cooking
Science
Email
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace

The next three contestants, please:



1. Couches | Pros: Comfy. Enhance the already considerable pleasures of TV watching, eating, conversing, etc. Cons: A symbol of all that is lazy and slothful.



2. Friends | Pros: Their presence enhances almost any activity. Know you and yet still put up with you. Cons: Sometimes force you to write a week's worth of short stories for your website.



3. US Postal Service | Pros: Delivers missives and parcels quickly and cheaply. Will leave packages at your door, unlike UPS. Cons: Sometimes neither quick nor cheap. Employs the slowest workers at post offices, and rarely lets more than two of them work at the same time.

Polls close Monday, May 9 at midnight.

STORY TIME! | Bonjour Des Moines!

Greetings, Gardner Linn Fans, and welcome to the first installment of STORY TIME! A week or so ago I was positively browbeaten by a friend for the lack of content on the GLFC of late, the gist of this tongue-lashing being that, as I am on vacation, I should be doing more to entertain those of you still grinding away at your day jobs. Yes, I replied, but what if my TiVo gets lonely? Well, long story short, I was tricked into agreeing to write five short stories of increasing length over the course of the first work week of May. What follows is the first, and shortest. Titles and first lines provided by Meeta, with assistance from Chris. Stories were written in haste, with no pauses to edit, censor or worry about whether they make any sense, and possibly under the influence of over-the-counter medication and/or distilled spirits. I make no guarantee as to their quality. Enjoy!

"Jesus wasn't nothing but a motherfucker," says Cesar. Yeah, I guess, I say, because if you accept that the Father and the Son are really two sides of the same three-sided coin, then Jesus really did kinda sorta have semi-sexual congress with his own mother. "No, dipshit," says Cesar, "I mean Jesus. Hay-Zoos, man. The dishwasher." Oh right, I say, and I have to remind Cesar that Jesus and Jesus look exactly the same, the names I mean, and I've had a hard time distinguishing between the two ever since I got hit on the head and started seeing speech instead of hearing it. "Yeah, whatever," says Cesar, dropping a cheeseburger plate on the bar. "That goes to table 2." I note how it's interesting that Cesar says "2" instead of "two," like the lady at table three does. "And if you see Jesus, tell him he still owes me 27 $s."

I see Jesus that night, but I don't tell him about the twenty-seven dollars, because fuck Cesar. That's our twenty-seven dollars now, mine and Jesus's, and we're gonna need it where we're going. Jesus was in the accident with me, and now he hears colors. I'm learning to read Spanish; he's learning the sound of my green eyes (lluvia, he says) and red hair (I still can't read it, but I think I catch hoja in there somewhere). Jesus can't drive, but his car's totalled anyway, and we can hitch across the state line easy enough. We spend our last night in this shithole wrapped in a blanket out behind his mom's trailer, watching the clouds drift west. He talks, but I can't understand what he says. I watch the words float up from his lips into the air, a thicket of accents and tildes. The words break into letters and dissipate into wisps. I figure I'll learn Spanish soon enough; I took a couple semesters of French before dropping out of Northwestern, so it can't be that hard. I ask Jesus to tell me what the stars sound like, and as he tells me I watch the nonsense drift west with the clouds.

I've got a cousin in Iowa, so that's where we'll go first. She's nonjudgmental, most important, and can maybe hook us up with some jobs at the University, custodial or food-service or something. Maybe I'll start taking classes, pick up French again. I always wanted to translate Baudelaire. I can see a title for this, for the start of the rest of our lives together. I see it hanging over the world as it slowly turns from colors and shapes into perfect, precise text. We're leaving behind the Cesars of the world, heading into a future where everything is already written. Jesus! It is time to go! Let me kiss your lips once last time, before they become "lips!" Do you see it, there, Jesus, suspended above the "road," above the "trees," above the "sky?" Do you see our future? Au revoir, Rockford!