So I'm a "Character" now.

Not sure when it happened. Probably around age 28. Around when I stopped giving a good god damn. Around when I realized that people weren't going to remember me for my striking violet eyes or my luxuriant pompadour. It's fine; it worked out pretty good in the showbiz thing aside from the eventual crashing and burning and failing and leaving a quahter million dollar hole in the pockets of those who foolishly believed in me.

It was tough when I had to get a secret clearance for this I.T. gig I had in San Diego. It was awesome. Apparently people here in Northampton got a "visit" or two. Old employers and landlords and whatnot told me they'd had conversations with Men In Grey Linen Suits. I love that. I went out there to do music and supported myself with computer crap and everyone here thought I was like going to assassinate Gorbachev or some shite.

I'm not really the tiresome guy who has to make a joke out of everything? I'm not that guy. I don't like having my conversation mined for funnies by some fat wank. I am a deep believer in Listening. Within reason.

I'm more like the guy who is unbelievably chaotic to straight people. Artists have no problem with me at all but The Straight, the second I'm out of the room they're like scratching their heads and looking quizzically at one another. Quizzzllllquizzlllley. And I think in the workplace they sort of enjoy having me around because my chaos and my long nights of rock make me a little larger than life to them. yeah, I hope it works out in the end.

If stuff like worked out in the end it would be the dopest. If I was like a Christer I could just relax and sink back into the sophoroophus rose hip soup of mental indulgence and know All Was Fine. I'd probably be a lot happier. yeah, that's what i'll do i'll accept Jeekers Crispie as my parsonal lard and slavier. Then when I'm all at church praying on my knees to Monstanto I can feel all peaceful.

Instead of wracked with fear and always sore in the stomach from laughing.

Laughing is going to be my personal savierre. The laughing is going to get me through. For each year I lose from worrying and living without sleep and smacking the cageritte I will gain 18 months from laughing. I laugh every fucking day at least a hundred times. If it gets to bedtime and I've only had 99 I take down my pants and look at my ass in the mirror.

If I go substantially over it's fine but every now and then I'll hold one back just to stay in the ballpark. It's usually when some nimbskill tells a joke that I'll stare blankly and when they get offended I'll explain that I've got 6 or 7 laughs on credit. They seem to understand.

Because I'm a "character" now.

I like to drive my "character" car and speak in my "character" voice. My political views are "character" political views because I just want to fill the white house with vast truckloads of all manner of unctuous shit and whatnot. Things redolent in pustuality. Fucking tell me that wouldn't solve some problems. I'm about "action" the way a "character" is.

I'm not the guy flippin' the bird at the company picnoc snipshot. I'm more like the guy that goes and rides the swanboat thoughtfully for hours. Pedaling, pedaling and broody characterishly. I did that on a company picnoc snopshit once.

So, I'm a "character" now. Why? Well, because I like to amuse people and lighten their load. And I like to think really hard. And I don't believe in living too far in the future. Haven't you ever seen dead people? They're all, "I should've taken that painting class" and "I should have fucked that girl in accounting she was way into me" and "why didn't I ever go to Sandusky". Ha ha. Why didn't I ever go to Sandusky. And I want to do things that are out of the ordinary every day. It is extremely important to do things that are out of the ordinary every day. I have no idea why. I mean, I don't. Nobody does. For long. you get yer days where some shit goes down and you write a Pucciniesque masterpiece about having your heart break forever and hearing her voice in the rustling, coppery twilight and about the labyrinthine streets of Venice and the windblown maroon fastness of Mars and suchwhat. Then you get the black X days. The days you mark on the calender with a black X.

I don't do that on all the days on my calendar. Just the ones where I don't do anything out of the ordinary.

Then, when I'm on my death bed I can look at all those X's and curse the clappering bells of Saint Aloysius of Chippendell for the waste.

Until then, I'll have to address my tendency to assess life from the vantage point of imminent demise.

Oh, O.K.- I'm done. It's because I'm a "character".

I'm not, like, the guy in school who gets stoned and does an interpretive dance at the basketball game. I'm not the guy with the "Don't Blame Me I Voted For Alfred E. Neuman" bumpersticker. I'm not the guy with the maximus mandibillius morphicum who da te com te la ambrus nokium telemarketus nobisquitum. No furnicating way, canus.

Let's call each other "canus". It'll be so money. We'll be the hoppiest of the hip hoppers with the "canus" shit. "Yo, canus". "Whattup, canus". "Here's some bullets for yo' head da's wh'am sayin.............canus".

Anyway, you're more like that guy. Yeah, that's it. You're that guy. Not me. So you're that dude. So I'm not.

So I'm a character now.

But I'm not that other thing because that's you. The other thing. It's cool, you know? The other thing is cool. You're fine. Don't get weird about it. You'll get chicks being that other thing. Chicks love that. Where you're all "I'm that other thing that isn't a character". What chick likes a character? Character's not going to bring it home. character's not going to be on time. Character's not going to have a big nestegg socked away for that all important domicilius suburbus. People who go through a quarter mil of other people's money don't have the big nest egg. They'll have a story or two but that's good for 5 minutes and a crippuccinio.

Crappincino. Cappiciana.

Cappuccino.

Great, it's only a quart past midenit. I can still ply the piano for 5 hours.

Try to make it not a black X day.

Y'all try too, now, y'hear?