I don’t think I could live in the post-apocalyptic world. All those people living underground, trying their best to survive, scavenging for lemon peels and rat-meat. I’d rather die. You do know the poles are going to dramatically shift in December, 2012 right? You don’t? Eeeeeeeee. Sorry about that. It’s best not to think about it. It’s a little like The Game. Does anybody know The Game? Oh dear! The Game is nuts. Whether you know it or not, check out this crazy website. Some bananas reckon the world is going to lose the game on the 9th of September 2009. Anyway, the point is, learn the game, then remember to forget the poles are gonna shift. That’s what you do.
By the way, did you know the universe is expanding? Can you contextualise space? Everything outside our own universe is just a concept! There are no rules! How terrifying! How beautiful! Let’s take acid! We’ll forget where we are and the room will fill with smoke! Our minds will bend like time-space! Let me outta hereeeeeeeeeeee!
This heat stinks. It’s the sweaty back that really gets me. Anytime you need to ‘peel’ your clothing off is a shit time to be alive. It can only be compared to floating down a stream naked and blind-folded, heading toward a waterfall with a banana in your mouth. Have you ever been in a situation like that? Un-comfortable, to say the least.
In other news, my gay kiwi housemate Joseph apparently kissed a Maori once and compared it to, “making out with a water bed”.
I also saw Sophia Coppola walking along Spring St in SoHo last week. I wasn’t heading anywhere in particular so I decided to follow her from the safety of the opposite sidewalk. I called a friend and said, “Hey man! I’m following Sophia Coppola! What should I do?” And he said, “Just walk up to her and ask her to show you her tits.”
“What the fuck man? I can’t do that!”
“Yeah you can. Just go up to her and say, ‘Hey Sophia! I love all your films. Can you show me your tits? I’m not going to take a photo. If we hide no one will know. It’ll just be for me. Whaddya think?’”
“That’s ridiculous man. I’m not gonna do that.”
Then she opened the door of an apartment building and disappeared inside.
Shortly after, I got drunk and almost got a tattoo.
I don’t miss Australia. Nostalgia and sentimentality are crippling. How are you supposed to enjoy life when you’re constantly thinking about the past? You can’t! Eeeeeeek. But! What they are good for is entertainment. You know, looking back, grinning, chortling, putting life into perspective, etc…
Yesterday I revelled in such entertaining nostalgia for the mother country through the cult Australian 80’s classic, Dogs In Space. Have you seen it?
If a) Yes, please read sub-section c).
If b) No, please read sub-section d).
c) You have? Great! Then you know what I’m talking about right? What a great country to call home! Those brooding Melbournites spilling out of a late 70’s house in Richmond gurgling with drugs and music and ideas - enjoying their youth and shunning the banality of life. My goodness! You definitely don’t need to be in New York City to be cool with a heroin addiction. But for all they did they ended up either dead or fucked up in some way. Possibly even got married and moved to Northcote to start a family. Are you one of these people? If so, email me and tell me what happened. I gotta know.
d) You fool! How could you? Wait! How rude of me. You’re not a fool. Just misguided. Sheltered, if you will. I know what that’s like - before yesterday I was just like you. Wandering about in this world without context or satisfaction. Do what you will to remove the shackles of naivety. You’ll feel all the better for it.
P.S. Dogs was directed by Richard Lowenstein. He also directed this music video for another great Aussie cultural export. Until they made a second album that is.
As I twist my feet into the sand at the Coney Island beach, I can’t help but think about the World’s Smallest Woman. She was supposed to be an optical illusion like the other freaks. Something more in line with Snake Girl or The Incredible Headless Woman. But she was real. And really small. I asked her awkward questions like, “Are you real?” and, “Are you hungry?” She smiled at me and I felt guilty for being tall. I paid another fifty cents to do it again. She asked me, “Why did you come back?” And I replied, “I don’t know.”
I learned something today.
Sometimes life is unexpected. Just don’t act surprised, or else you’ll embarass yourself.
Yesterday I met this guy in Union Square named Steve Anderson. I was sitting on a bench reading The Wall Street Journal when he asked me for a quarter. Being the non-New Yorker that I am, I was happy to oblige. But here’s the problem: My pants are too tight for homeless people. While I’m fishing about in that little pocket made for coins, he sidled down next to me and began one of those ‘homeless tirades’. “I don’t have anywhere to sleep,” he said. “My missus’ kicked me out when I trashed her apartment in Chinatown.” Yikes. You know the type - they get in your face and request a junior burger for lunch.
But alas! Steve is not your average junkie. He just happens to be a cool guy with a Meth addiction. Although his face was scabby, his heart was pure. I could tell. I just could. And isn’t that all we need to find meaning and be kindred souls in this life? Bless his sores.
So I said something like, “That sucks man. I hope things get better for you.” And get this! He says, “Hope is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.” (Word for word, true story.)
I asked, “Who said that?”
He said, “Nietzsche.”
So I said, “Shit. OK, cool.”
When you break it down, we were just two bros sitting on a bench trying to find clarity on our separate journeys through time and space. Nietzsche was totally down with that existential hoo-hah. So there I am, sitting on a bench in Union Square, discussing Nietzsche with a homeless dude named Steve, digesting a giant pretzel, and wondering, “What should I do in this situation?” Well, I surmised, exactly what any loser with a blog might - peel back the layers of a homeless man, in the style of your favourite gonzo-de-jour, with the intent to publish my findings.
Turns out Steve knows these guys who live in Aberdeen, New Jersey, about an hour outside of New York City. He’s got a fistful of quarters for the train ride down but is ten dollars short of his target. It’s his only chance at shelter for the night.
“I’ll give you the ten bucks if you take me along with you now. I want to meet your mates.”
“Mates?”
“Yeah, your friends in Aberdeen. If you take me I’ll give you the ten dollars you need.”
“Sure man. Just gimmi a second. I’ve gotta take a shit.”
I’m not sure if he took that shit or not because he hid in a bush for hardly a second. Whatever transpired, he jumped the fence back to the bench, and we walked the thirty or so blocks to Penn Station for the train to Aberdeen. On the way Steve told me he’d been reading Nietzsche since he was thirteen. Apparently he became obsessed after both his parents died during a murder-suicide in ‘84. His late-uncle was the perpetrator, and in a strange twist of fate, had given him Thus Spake Zarathustra the previous Christmas. Fascinating, but weird.
We got to Penn, I bought our tickets, and we get on the 14.15 train. We must have looked like the freakin’ odd couple - the straight-edge Australian kid and the meth-junkie with a thing for Nietzsche, sitting together on a train, staring out the window. I didn’t talk much - really I didn’t have to - Steve relayed a whole host of theories he’d devised reading Nietzsche. Mainly shit about religion and how it’s ‘life’s nausea’ or some such. It was nuts.
We got out at Aberdeen station (there’s a photo at the top of this post) and walked to the main street. I bought a deck of cigarettes and a Seven-Up at a deli while Steve waited outside. I paid and joined him on the path. While we stood together smoking for a few minutes, he told me that his friends, Barney Dope and Eraser Dust, lived on top of a carpet clearance store on the next street. I was thinking of changing their names to make this sound a little more believable, but they are just too hilarious not to mention. I’m not lying! I’m serious! You can’t make this shit up! I knew you’d be like this. It happened, I swear. Fuck you.
So anyway, by this stage I realise I was a little eager to be the next Hunter McThompson, and today might be my last. Any sane person would have hailed the next cab back to the city and gotten the hell out of there. But not I! I’m a true blue idiot. Give me a break though, Steve was chill and I knew he wouldn’t do anything dodgy. In my mind I’m erring on the better side of caution - whichever side that is. Even still, I thought it’d be best if I devised a plan. This is where I don’t mention the plan and leave it as the cliff hanger to the story. Are you ready? It’s an ingenious plan requiring bravery. I’ll tell the story and you be the judge.
We walked to the next street and I could see the carpet clearance store at the opposite end of the block. Steve told me to chill out the back while he spoke to B & E inside. We followed a path around the side of the store and ended up in the yard. The place was a mess but it was empty. There were petrol cans and car parts scattered about randomly. At the back of the yard there was a shed that had a shopping trolley wedged in its door frame. Steve said, “I’ll be five minutes,” then walked up the stairs and entered the house on the next floor. I decided to go take a peak at the shed while I waited. I removed the trolley and check this out! Here’s the freakin’ evidence.
Meth Lab - Exhibit A:
Meth Lab - Exhibit B:
How fucked is that? So here’s where I unfurl my wonderful plan ahead of time. I hightail it out of there, run to the closest house and hide behind a fence. Like I said earlier, this plan required bravery and a set of Steve McQueen sized balls. I was going to meet the guys inside, say I needed to use the bathroom, and enact said plan. But this was all I needed! Photo evidence! So I’m hiding behind this fence, I wait about half an hour, during which time nothing happens, I finally gather the courage to make a dash to the train station and head back to New York City.
That’s it! That’s what happened when I met Steve Anderson. What a day! Believe what you want, whatever the case, I’m never following a Meth junkie anywhere again.
Not down with Meth Labs? Watch this informative video below.
Check it out. That’s one happy witch. It was drawn by a maniac on a bicycle who got me drunk in SoHo and dinked me to an East Village dive bar where this was drawn. Now my arse hurts and I’ve got grazes on my knees. Life sure is strange. Today Miranda told me, “We make plans and God laughs.” Well if he does, then I hope he pissed his pants.
What am I? A freakin’ news channel? Sheesh. You can all watch the Tait show when this anchorman is ready to fly. If you must know, for the sake of peace among us all, I’ve been off cultivating my inner world and strengthening my connection to the universe. What have you been doing? Surfing the web? I hear there’s some awesome new viral doing the rounds. By the way, who’s seen that Jenny Holzer print at MoMa? Isn’t it incredible? Now there’s a meme worth spreading.
Gosh. That felt good. Let’s do that again sometime. In the interval between now and then, look at these photos and build a picture in your mind about me in NYC.
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Be good kids. You’re sure to hear from me when something big goes down.
P.S. I’m staying until November. We gots plenty of time.
How long has it been since my last post? Like, three weeks? I apologise for nuthin’. What am I to do? I got a job as a call-boy in the Upper East Side, making ends meet looking pretty for old ladies in summer dresses. Mostly we’d lay in Central Park and I’d recite poems by Pablo Neruda while I fed them strawberries from a punnet. That didn’t actually happen, but if it did, I’d be rich! My looks are undeniable!
Here’s a bunch of stuff that actually happened:
- Enjoyed filtered coffee, homefries and eggs in a diner at 3am, drunk as a skunk, after appearing in a photoshoot for a Vice Magazine beer advertisement insert thing;
- Went to the Guggenheim and ‘lost my shit’ over the works of Frank Lloyd Wright - from within a giant model of his work!;
- Watched Sonic Youth play two encores from the front row of the United Palace Theatre;
- Enjoyed the 4th of July fireworks explode from behind the Manhattan skyline while drinking beer from the rooftop of a Brooklyn apartment;
- Stumbled upon a collection of Man Ray’s photography from a private collection, featuring Gerstrude Stein chilling, Max Ernst covered in seaweed and mugshots of Salvador Dali;
- Had a very late night, got sleepy, and rested under the sun’s warming rays in the middle of a baseball field in Central Park at 9am;
I was going to go to MoMa, but Daniel told me to go to PS.1 instead. He said, “It’s way better.” I took his word for it, but not his map, and ended up walking the streets of Long Island City asking strangers where I could find it. It turned out to be the large brick building, next to the subway I walked out of, with ‘PS.1′ written in bold letters three stories high on its side. I, on the other hand, turned out to be the fool with sweat patches and sore feet.
Once inside I hobbled into the multi-room solo exhibition by Jonathan Horowitz titled, And/Or. His work critiqued America, the media and pop culture in the best way possible. If you can imagine me crouching next to a wall, my ear hovering close to a speaker, listening to Jonathon whisper sweet somethings in the voice of Marilyn Monroe, while Britney Spears’ vagina stares at me from the adjacent wall - that’s what it was like.
Tofu on pedestal in gallery was another favourite of mine. It’s just as you imagine: A soggy piece of tofu, in a glass jar filled with water, sitting on a pedestal. It had been kindly shipped over from a Berlin gallery with the help of a host of small business sponsors. People care.
Then I caught the G train, transferred to the F train, and ended up in Park Slope looking for this place - The Brooklyn Superhero Supply Co. It’s there that they sell things like Secret Identities, Particle Guns, Anti-Gravity, and the supremely annoying Thunder Inducer. For those that don’t know, it’s the New York City chapter of the Dave Eggers’/McSweeney’s empire. Basically, the store is a front to the writing and publishing workshop in the back named 826NYC, run for the benefit of young writers in the greater New York City area. I bought a magazine they published called First Magazine, written exclusively by high school students in New York. It’s really very good.
When you buy something you need to recite the vow of heroism. So while surrounded by young children, all fell silent while I spoke aloud:
“I, Tait Ischia,
also known as Lord Eyeball, (I know… WTF? Don’t ask.)
promise always to use my superpowers for good.
I promise to use the items I’ve purchased here today safely,
and in the name of justice.
I promise to remain ever vigilant, ever true.”
After this I went to a BBQ in Brooklyn and ate Lion. True story.
