Under The Pink

It was always about naps on Peterborough st after lunch, me on my yellow couch, Beth on her blue one. My semester off, 2nd semester, sophomore year, the first half of 1995. Kurt Cobain had been dead less than a year, nobody knew who Monica Lewinsky or George W. Bush was, and the towers stood. I was living at 109 Peterborough with Nathan and Jaysin. Jaysin was the guitarist of a metal band called Poets and Madmen. They were pretty good for a metal band. Bowls were packed, spliffs rolled, beers drunk. Rare occasions would bring magic mushrooms, which I never did after February of that year. Tim Dog Afro lived upstairs, Tim Dog Dreadlocks would come over and visit. White Patrick was a liar and a scoundrel. He wouldn't let Sonia and Beth leave his apartment one day, talking some smack about how they were his hostages. He wasn't really serious, but that wasn't really the point. Nathan threw him down a flight of stairs. Jamaican Patrick and Traveling Ben were the candymen; they showed up with Pringle's cans that contained no Pringles. There was a guy named Derby who lived downstairs, and he told me one night out on the stoop that he had killed dozens of Iraqis during Gulf War 1, which was just called the Gulf War back then. Jim, Heather and Matt lived next door. Jim Birch was in a band called Sally Ride Rocketship, and he was a damn good guitarist. Jim worked with Jaysin at the Pizza Ring down the street delivering pies. You ring, Jim bring. Matt had hair that looked like Sideshow Bob's, and he saved my life one night in February when he knocked on my door and asked me if I wanted to watch cartoons with him. Heather was breathtakingly beautiful, but so chill and down-to-earth. She and her best friend Channin partied hard that year, a lot harder than I did, and I partied hard. Outside my window across the street was a red brick building; many were the days I would stare out the window and watch that brick melt away and drip on the sidewalk.
I had a job at the cafeteria at school, and I only worked lunch. I would meet Beth in the lunchroom or the dorm after work and we took the short walk back to the apartment. We would put on some music and lay down on our couches for a long nap. For a while, Under The Pink was our standard nap music, and we both loved it so much.
Now Under The Pink has taken on new significance. Something has happened.

Toast, toasters, and getting toasty

Hilary Clinton is toast. No butter, no jelly, just dry burnt toast. Why doesn't she just quit already? She seems determined to stick around and poison the air just long enough to spoil any chance the Democrats have of getting into the White House.

The man in the hat is Brother Cavil. He is a Cylon, made to look human. He is a toaster, and there are many copies of him, as there are many copies of all the other models. On New Caprica, this particular copy of Cavil advocated reducing the human population to a more manageable level, like under 1,000. As much as any one model has a role to play, the Cavils are preachers. Robots with religion, the Cylons worship the One True God, while the humans worship 12 gods, who just happen to have the same names as the 12 Greek gods. Cavil seems pretty sure it's all bullshit. Whenever he says "God," he makes those little quotemarks in the air with his fingers. It's funny because he's a preacher.

Getting toasty, you say? I'm not going there, you'll have to use your imagination, unless you were there, then you can just remember. Were you there?

Tom Waits lyrics, Vol. 4, Come On Up To The House

Well the moon is broken
And the sky is cracked
Come on up to the house
The only things that you can see
Is all that you lack
Come on up to the house

All your cryin don't do no good
Come on up to the house
Come down off the cross
We can use the wood
Come on up to the house
Come on up to the house
Come on up to the house
The world is not my home
I'm just a passin thru
Come on up to the house

There's no light in the tunnel
No irons in the fire
Come on up to the house
And you're singin lead soprano
In a junkman's choir
You gotta come on up to the house

Does life seem nasty, brutish and short
Come on up to the house
The seas are stormy
And you can't find no port
Come on up to the house
There's nothin in the world

There's nothin in the world
That you can do
You gotta come on up to the house
And you been whipped by the forces that are inside you
Come on up to the house
Well you're high on top of your mountain of woe
Come on up to the house
Well you know you should surrender
But you can't let go
You gotta come on up to the house

You say that it's gospel,

But I know it's only church.