what was that? is that all there is? who is this? this is it.

kickstand

Doug Nufer        1999

Kickstand is antic ink.

A tack in a sack, a snack in a cask, a task.

As an ant is an acid tank and a kid in dank ick can stink

Kickstand is an act and a stand. It can

Sin, sic a cad at staid kin

As ticks sink in skins.

Kickstand can scan ants in sand, skin cats, stain a saint

Nick, kid, kick, stack, and sack a sick and sad anti-antics din

As it aids kids. It isn’t AIDS

And can’t stand tan Dan and Candi’s tics in a skit

In skin. As I sat and stank, I said

Kick it, kids. Dan, dick Candi! And Candi said,

It ain’t in, it’s an act: a knick-knack, tic-tac, sin-din in a tin can

An act can’t stick its dick in.

In Kickstand, I said, it can.

 ###

I have no recollection of how Doug Nufer got these words to me. Perhaps he handed it to me at the Elysian. Or he handed it to a bike messenger and they handed it to me downtown. Maybe he sent a fax to WA Legal......

There will be no dress rehearsal

There will be no stunt double

There will be no Buckys training day

There will be no dry run    

There will be no phone-a-friend  

There will be no backup plan

There will be no practice test

There will be no grace period

There will be no second chances

There will be no window of opportunity

There will be      

a continental breakfast served in the lobby

complimentary for building tenants only

up this high at twice the price it’s easy to see

suckers buying one to get one free

the revolution

will not be super-sized

after the locals leave

before the tourists show up

there’s a lull  a pause  a hiatus

that’s the place that is the place I want to be

reading at the low point on the meniscus

between two peaks a valley

the truth is out there

or maybe it’s in here

gold star for robot bro

Is the check in the mail

The check is in the mail

The mail is in the check

In the mail the check is

Check the mail in the is

Mail the check is the in

I finally got this book in my hands. Got my hands on this book. Resisting the urge to drop $30 at my local independent bookstore when it came out in July, I put my name on the hold list at the library. Now here we are in October and I’m actually reading it. 

We’ve discussed it before when the reviews in the NY Times and the New Yorker were great reading in and of themselves. 

I’m about 47% into the book and recommending it to you again. The author is not your average Cliff Claven slouch. He’s a graduate of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop. He’s my age. He has kids. He lost his very high-paying “consumer strategist” job when covid made it go away and he took a mail carrier job because he needed health insurance. It happens to be in Blacksburg, Virginia, home of Virginia Tech. 

In no way do I claim to be a full-on USPS mailman. I’m an electric ass Mr. McFeeley on a large college campus. But the amount of mail I sort and deliver gives me a taste for things this guy is describing. And he describes those things very well. 

 ...

My other barstool is a bicycle

My other bicycle is a barstool

My barstool is a LYON made in Aurora, IL

My bicycle is a SOMA made in Japan

My barstool and bicycle are heavy ass steel

My barstool is on the playoff baseball bandwagon

My other other barstool is a sawed-off lawnchair

My other other bicycle is also single-speed 

My BIG TIME bicycle is locked outside

My BIG TIME barstool is #11

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took 40mm off this handlebar,

And that has made all the difference.

You could call it an inch & a half. But it’s kind of a big deal in this context. 720mm to 680mm is rolling into a different timezone. It was rather labor intensive with the half-ass hacksaw I had hanging around. However the cost benefit analysis is coming up Milhouse after just a brief spin around the block. It now feels like my bike. Sincerely for real. Really.

What did you do today? 

is it a dickstank day?

is it a kickstand day?

either way. anyway. both ways. 

Two sides of the same coin. The same sign, two sided. The arrows point the same way. It’s a double edge sword bro. Cuts both ways. The good with the bad. Cost-benefit. Pros. Cons.  Flip a coin. Take your pick. dickstank. kickstand. 

Over the summer this sign pointed the way to some kids’ computer camp on campus. Then the summer ended and the kids went back to school. But the sign lingered on in a...

10-9 Day

as well as

87’s Birthday

ten, nine, eight

zero-seven

six, five, four

three thirty three

to two-two too

two twenty

two twentyone

whatever it takes

867-5309

2 7 5 4 8

98195

10-9?

07

Rolling the wrong way on Okanogan Lane all day — day in day out but today someone rolled up behind me and grabbed my hoodie. My brain rolled through all the what-the-fuck possibilities of who it could be — wishfull thinking — excluding all the fucked up whack job U-district shit show oh shits…  …it was Matt Messenger and we had a little chat as I final fifty fucking feet flipped another AMAZON package. This photo is SIX years old but it’s the same shit different year bro dawg.