value_village raze he asks if it would be easier as a brush cut, joking, as david bowie sings about getting to the church on time and i tie my hair back. i say it probably would, and it used to be that short a long time ago. a woman catherine keener would play in the movie of my life comes over and says she has a son about my age who also has long hair and a beard. she asks why people do that. why they hide themselves. i say i guess we get used to the hair and the beard, and then we aren't so sure we want to be without either one, because we're comfortable seeing a certain version of ourselves in the mirror. she says i'm good-looking and i shouldn't hide myself. and i think, hell, if the piece of garbage who shoved me out of herself and into the world used that approach once upon a time, maybe it all would have been a little different. the woman who isn't catherine keener turns out to be brush cut guy's wife, and as they pass me pushing a shopping cart she leans in and whispers trim it, and all i can do is laugh and say i will, because the beard's getting a little scraggly and it's due for some pruning anyway. we end up in line together, after mick jagger finishes singing about how you got to roll him and call him the tumblin' dice. she's waiting for her husband. he's in the bathroom. she says he probably flushed himself. she says they've tried to sell her own coat to her more times than she can count when she's taken it off and put it down at the cash register. she's a character. her husband reappears. he didn't flush himself. she tells him he's paying. he says she's paying for the car wash later then. you can just about see the whole history of their long relationship in the playful ribbing and how comfortable they are with each other. you get so used to seeing people who either hate each other or tolerate existing in the same space and fake their way through it so they won't have to be alone, it's nice to see two who radiate how much they like each other for a change. 161228 ... raze i go back for a little green pig and more pajama pants, and this time it's "ashes to ashes". it's going to be a little strange if i ever show up and there isn't a bowie song playing on the radio. 170217 ... raze it happens. there's no david_bowie on the radio this time. the music is kind of horrible, if you want to know the truth. it's nothing i know. it's nothing i want to know. there's nothing to it. it's just there, until it isn't anymore. but a little bit of the wet snow that's been falling all day and refusing to stick to anything that isn't still growing out of the ground has made a home in my hair, and while it's busy melting into my scalp i find three shirts i like. the first one is a honey-coloured pullover. perfect for the colder weather. the second one is a garment-dyed denim button-up shirt that lives in some uneasy middle ground between pink and purple. the third one is my favourite. it's a grey t-shirt, and this is what it says on the front in big black letters: "sarcasm — the body's natural defense against stupidity." 211115 ... tender_square oh, vv boutique how i miss you. but you gave me bedbugs and i don't know how to forgive a thing like that. 211115 ... raze for the first time since my_ass_exploded two months ago, i have a pair of blue jeans i can wear in public. there's something around the left knee that resembles the remnant of a weary grass stain, and the legs feel a little tight, but they'll do for now. i grab a dvd of "clean and sober" and eye the price tag. then i ask myself if i really want to watch someone's life disintegrate right now, even if it's only happening in a movie. i set it back on the shelf and stick with my old new pants. i have fourteen days to bring them back if i decide they aren't right for me. 220612 what's it to you? who go blather from