Sunflowers aren’t the rarest flowers in the world - there’s no shortage of them in my neck of the woods this time of year - nor are they the prettiest, but they certainly impress me every year with a) their ability to attract all kinds of birds to my yard and b) the fact that they can grow to be 12 feet high in what seems like no time.

Almost August Already. To me August means that Jim and I will note another year completed of marital bliss, that the garden is getting away from me, that a bunch of crap I meant to do didn’t get done, and a host of things I wasn’t planning to do did get done.

… that I don’t listen to enough music. I never think to put it on anymore. I love it when it’s on, but I am rarely one to actually put it on. What’s that all about?

Thinking I’d shake some cobwebs loose, I downloaded a bunch of old CA punk rock stuff this evening - mostly stuff that appeared on the SST label out of CA, like Husker Du and Black Flag and Wurm, whose song “I’m Dead” was my favorite song to get ready to go out to in 1989. I still remembered how it went, much to Jim’s amazement. Thanks to Pig State Recon for the inspiration.

Tonight: no beer, no ice cream. It’s a new beginning.

Well, lately I’ve been frequenting Memory Lane:

These guys were all seen as totally retro, and not in a respectful way, in 1991. While a few in the scene I inhabited in MPLS back then turned up their noses at KQ92 fare such as Yes and Steve Winwood, I was never one to turn down a free ticket, and I was certainly not about to turn down seeing, live, some of the artists I grew up listening to. I attended the Yes show with my friend Dave whilst in the throes of relationship drama, and I attended Steve Winwood with my dad shortly before I made my final decision to leave MPLS for good (due, in large part, to aforementioned relationship drama). Both shows were, of course, incredible.

[It reminds me, a little, of the time years later I saw a fan club only Pearl Jam show on the South Side of CHGO. (1993? 1994?) I took a coworker who was having THE BEST TIME (as was I) and then, during post-show drinks at Ye Olde Hipster Barre he COMPLETELY and TOTALLY denigrated the evening we had just had. I think CHGO was really much more hipper-than-thou, actually, than MPLS.]

I haven’t been alone whilst ambling down Memory Lane. My dear friend LAP, with whom I was just about to form a posse when I up and left MPLS has, thanks to the Facebook thing, re-entered my life. Even after losing touch for 16 years (how embarrassing), we appear to have led somewhat parallel existences:

She was, as it turns out, exactly right about the D&G Fall 1996 collection (lower right). While I will always remain a devotee of Tom Ford’s collection for Gucci the Fall before, there was something about 1996 (Gucci, Cerruti, Calvin Klein) that wasn’t as louche, a little more severe, that I find totally appealing to this day. Come on, fashion people - bring it back.

At any rate, having LAP back in my life, skipping arm in arm down Memory Lane, hasn’t been an exercise in living in the past as much as it’s been a lesson in context and Getting On With It. I mean, 40 looms. Let’s ALL do - do a zine, do a podcast, blog, collaborate over great distance, write letters, romanticize the past, feel wrenching sadness because we weren’t there when we should have been, plot the future, design a life - there’s more to all of this than a nagging sense of futility and being chained to a version of the past.

So, yeah, that’s one of the other places I’ve been.

I had dinner at Prairie Fruits Farm in Urbana, IL. Taken by Cody.

There’s been a lot of blogging about blogging around the bloggy, bloggy blogiverse, so I’ll keep it short. I’m a little bored with it, the blogging. Mine, yours, Anthony Bourdain’s, everyone’s. Don’t take it personally - it’s just that, after 7 years (plus a return to full-time work that I really dig, and a massive garden, and a really fun and amusing and busy family, and a whole herd of really good neighbors and friends to hang out with), I’m finally just going to admit it: I have Blog Fatigue. I think I may even have a touch of Internet Fatigue. Everyone’s a commodity! It’s exhausting. That’s all. Here’s a picture - Cody took it:

Jim’s band, Centaur, is playing with New Ruins at Mike & Molly’s tonight.

I will be there, in full effect. Good times, lots of noise, drinking.