Big Changes in Scott World
So I haven’t been posting in a while… since August, actually. There’s been a lot of big things happening since then that have kept me pretty busy, but not too busy where I should have neglected all 50 of you who apparently may have been reading this web site.
Most of those two months were spent staring at the TV in disbelief, as a major U.S. city was destroyed and George W. Bush just didn’t know what to do about it. The whole thing continues to be a complete disaster and a hideous tragedy. I’m just not sure how I feel that something positive can actually be gleamed from all the doom and death beamed into everyone’s living rooms for weeks: the walls just keep crashing down on the Republicans, and nobody seems to like them anymore. And props to Kanye West for saying it, and to these guys for writing a song about it, cuz George Bush just don’t like black people. (That’s an MP3)
On the topic of New Orleans, I’d just like to shout out to my boy Noah who is down there right now giving some much needed medical care to some of the unfortunate souls in that neck of the woods. Congratulations, Noah, we’re all damn proud of you out here in the Bay. I’ll try to hit you up real soon. Noah’s group is actually on the Internet, and they can take donations of money and supplies, check it out.
But as far as my life goes, I was living in Montana for sixth months, a very wide-open and empty place. I think I briefly mentioned that move but never really discussed enough of my road trip to get into details. Maybe I’ll do something about that. Anyway, Montana is beautiful countryside, but the outdoors can only do so much for you, so I’ve felt pretty out of touch these last few months. It didn’t help that there was no convenient way for me to jump on the Internet with my laptop, which was constantly on the fritz anyway.
Briefly, without too many details: I was working for my now brother-in-law as a bartender in his resort restaurant. It was a fun little gig, and I met some interesting customers, but it couldn’t have been long-term since the whole state seems to close down in the winter except for skiers. Montana is a huge place, with what seems to be a higher population of grizzly bears than people. The third largest state in the country, it has a population of less than 1 million. Which is an eighth of New York, or a seventh of the San Francisco Bay Area.
A lot of Canadians come in there, too. Canadians order the weirdest drinks I ever made. Take the Paralyzer. You make a white Russian in a big glass: vodka, coffee liqueur, and cream over ice, and splash some coke on top. The worst part is the acid of the coke will curdle the cream so it’s just raunchy, like an Irish car bomb left on the bar, or lemon and cream in your tea.
They also like clam juice in their bloody Marys, and tomato juice in their beer. Every once in a while they would try to put tomato in one of the good ales, and my brother-in-law, the other bartender, would absolutely refuse to make them. What a waste of good beer.
They have the strangest names for their drinks too: rocks glasses are “buckets”, and pitchers are “jugs”. The best Canadian story I ever heard was from this dirty old man from Calgary, Alberta. One night, completely loaded off paralyzers, he told me about a gorgeous bartender that used to work in Whitefish, Montana. She told a Canadian who ordered “two jugs”, “these are pitchers” and she held up two pitchers. Then she grabbed both of her breasts and said: “these are jugs.”
Anyway, the best part of the whole experience was at the end, when I got to perform the ceremony that joined my sister and her fiancé. That’s right, I’m an ordained minister in the Universal Church of Life. All you could be too, really. But how many weddings will you have done, hmm? Anyway, I’d just like to say if you’re reading, congrats to J & C, you guys are awesome together and I know you’ll do just fine.
So after all that was over, I moved to Oakland, CA, where I now sit anxiously hoping I get a call about a job any minute. I’ve got a pretty good thing going on here, I think, so long as I play it right. And I’d really like to get back to doing comics, but I’ve got a long way to go towards being really settled here. I will try to keep writing on the blog, maybe a little less politics and a little more straightforward shit. Straight from the heart, y’know? My computer’s lovin’ the wireless Internet for now, but it is pretty buggy. Hopefully I’ll start working with a little bread left over for a new one.
Oh, and the comments have been officially spammed. If you have been, don’t leave your e-mail addresses on the blog, use user@host.com instead. And I’ll look into turning that off, but that may make the problem worse. I may have to move to a registration or invitation model, or lose ’em altogether. Nobody uses ’em anyway. We’ll see.