the tinyblog

I have tasted the maggots in the mind of the universe.
I was not offended,
For I knew I had to rise above it all,
Or drown...in my own...shit.
-Funkadelic, Maggotbrain

Today there was an earthquake in Seattle. Here's what other Seattleites had to say about it.

As for me, I was sleeping in my underwears when it happened. It woke me up and I got up on my knees and looked out the window while I felt the earth roll underneath me for a spell. It was nice. Nothing fell or rattled even. Then I went back to sleep. Planet Massage! When I woke up I forgot about it 'til I tried to go to school and no one was there! I've had snow days, but never an earthquake day.

Posted by tiny daniel at 11:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I went to say hi to my new friend Yushi today who works at Apocolypse tattoo in Seattle. He's Japanese and does both traditional Japanese Tattoo, and Kanji flash. He was telling me that he sees people almost every day that have Japanese tattoo art that doesn't mean what they think it means. Most often done by a westerner who knows nothing of the language, one time he had a guy come in and ask him what a tattoo meant. Turns out it was the name of some noodle company.

I asked him if he wanted to go out to dinner. He initially said no, because he was excited to go home and cook on his new George Foreman Grill. He said that a lot of people made fun of him when he brought it in to work to show everyone because he was so excited about it. "Look," he told me he had said, "It even has the signature on it!"

He rescinded though, and we went to Hing Loon Seafood Restaurant in Seattle to get "shredded chicken and corn in soup with fish maw". All he could talk about was that George Foreman Grill. He lives alone in an efficiancy apartment with no kitchen, just a hot plate, so the George Foreman Grill has signifigantly improves his quality of life. "My friend had one," he said, "and I made fun of him, but then he cooked this piece of chicken and it was done so fast, and it was cooked perfectly."

Then later, as we were walking to the bank, "You know, you can put some asparagus in there, and then put your meat on it over the top, and it cooks both of them." Is there a little George Foreman Grill cookbook? "Yes, but it's really bullshit."

I clearly have no beans. via brigita

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:20 AM | Permalink

I Am the One Who Is Going to Bed

I am so tired like I just ate a bunch of MSG
The hotness of a bath will drain me of this
I will smile and fade into sleep where I will
have dreams that I do not remember and
wake up a brand new person. I cannot
predict how he will act, bless his heart,
tomorrow is for him, not for me. I am the
one who is going to bed.

Posted by tiny daniel at 11:28 PM | Permalink

Let My Looping Gentle Down

Let my looping gentle down
gentle down
gentle down
Let my looping gentle down
gentle down.

Let my breathing ready rare
gentle down
gentle down
Let my eyesight bright aware
bright aware
bright aware
Let my breathing ready rare
gentle down.

Let my eyesight bright aware
Let my breathing ready rare
Let my looping gentle down
gentle down.

Posted by tiny daniel at 11:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

17 Islands

Sturdy shoulder blade of a goat
A porno or a princess
One last spot of tarnish resistant to polish
A child is yelling at Fred's, Mom is embarrassed
Song comes on the radio, imaginative!
Time for new stories with dangling endings
"We'd like to go back to our original way."
Hot Sam's Grand Slam Speakeasy
It's that part that connects old TV's to cable
A man, a plan, a canal, panama
Evergreen state: a big cement building
Cat went back to Philadelphia
An unbelievable talent for arranging flowers
The ruby slippers, the poetry pen
Enormous amounts of cathedral
She stopped coming to see me after that
A breast, a blessing, a ban, a beast

Posted by tiny daniel at 11:25 PM | Permalink

So, this is the last 3 poems of the Blue Pen-Tab Book Poems. Let them invade your very being, and then write a detailed blogvoices comment on each and every one...even if it's 3pm and the server is a dog. I expect your report on my desk first thing monday morning. Really though, if you have actually taken the time to read these I am very appreciative, it's kind of nice to share these tender things with the world and know that some small percentage of such has seen them. It's hard to have enough of an attention span for me to read poetry online when there's 50 million forms of instant gratification out there...so I know those few moments can really be a sacrifice. So, without further ado:

Posted by tiny daniel at 11:24 PM | Permalink

Blue Pen-Tab Book
Five Limes

5 limes stood with me 'til the end of time.
If it were a computer simulation
all 5 limes would look the same.
But instead they have only enough similarity
to make them all limes (all 5)
Each moment they are new limes,
5 limes in 2 weeks
would not be limes I'd like to eat.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:32 AM | Permalink

Set Everything Near me Aflame

I looked gently in those places where there was once so much heat
and now so so so so cold

When an evening and a night and a late nite
stretched out before me
a newly blacktopped road, no signs yet
I hunched my ears down to listen to my heart
their tips got frostbit from proximity
so so so so cold

Was I ever well? Or just trying desperately to set
anything near me aflame?
It's so painful to relinquish my matches
and watch my little flames burn themselves out
so so so so cold
and turn myself until I am
pointing towards the true source of heat
and begin walking.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:31 AM | Permalink

(written in red crayon)

The morning makes me feel so feeble and tiny
I can only drink coffee and hope the DJ
plays me something sweet

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:30 AM | Permalink

I'm Such a Touching Boy

I'm such a touching boy
if I could just touch you god!
this loneliness would be so much easier.

The paper, at least, I can contact it
but you... you may be all around
but my hand passes through you
on it's way to the TV knob.

You made it so easy to love someone
when they have a body
warm ribs that bend ever so slightly to
the weight of my head.

Why do you not have such a body?
Only a thin wafer
dry on the tongue, the body of...

I know.

That kind of comfort is not what you offer.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:29 AM | Permalink

The next book of these daily poems was a Blue Pen-Tab wide ruled notebook. There's 7 of them, so I'm going to do half today and half tomorrow. Please enjoy them, or at least make little cooing noises while you read them and you can convince your brain that you are. I know most of these are a bit maudlin and naive, but keep in mind that they were often the last thing I did before I went to bed, and I knew I would have to look at them in the morning...so they were often meant to be some kind of inspiration. Like Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handy.

Oh, as I was looking for a deep thoughts link...I found this one.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:19 AM | Permalink

to love a ghost

It's no damn good to make a list
of what I had or what I miss.

I remember what passed between I and she
but I don't trust my memory.

Memory the guest, and I the host.
That's what it means to love a ghost.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:52 AM | Permalink

The Very Next Moment

Smoke on the head of incense,
waiting to be released.
The faucet head
trembling with its even stream of water inside.
A cat
paces pensively at the door.
A jigsaw puzzle,
so close to wholeness,
all its 2000 pieces lying side by side in the same box.
(A few even held together by a tiny bit of cardboard)
James Brown on the turntable,
needing only rotation and a needle to
get on the scene, get on up.
Fingers
resting on the light switch
All waiting pregnant
for the very next moment
which of course never arrives.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:51 AM | Permalink

Asymmetrical

My left foot is smooth and callused,
slides against a hardwood floor and warm.
My right foot is tender and articulate,
quicker to become moist in hot conditions
otherwise it is cooler.

Look at the two of them stepping my
slightly crooked path.

They do the job.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:49 AM | Permalink

that still place

it looks exactly like love- but
In my graveyard mumblings
I don't know how to reach into it
In my greedy grabbing
I don't know how to let it
In my spinning I can hardly sit with it
In my faithless speeding
I don't realize I can run with it
In my self-conscious hyena laughing
I forget I can chuckle with it
Who is penetrating whom?

I will take some time and make friends with it.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:48 AM | Permalink

Today I continue my every day poems. Today's poems are the poems that were in a book with a bunch of flowers and their scientific names on them.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:47 AM | Permalink

BlogSpot blog of the day: Riley.
Riley's blog description is: i found out about blogger in the newspaper. i never knew that peole acually made logs and put them on the internet for people to read.
He seems to have picked it up pretty quick.

Posted by tiny daniel at 2:17 AM | Permalink

Joy: blogvoices
Sadness: It's too sad...I can't say.

Posted by tiny daniel at 2:02 AM | Permalink

(what is this?)
untitled

The Dalai Lama is on the radio
He is saying,
"I don't know what to do about that."
That is both good and scary to hear.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:37 AM | Permalink

(what is this?)
untitled

Work it out Work it out
Work it out Sometimes it's
hard to work things out with
little spiny things poking into
my back and dry dreamy
drills mangling my head.
It takes faith and work
and time and work to
Work it out Work it out
Work it out It's always
evolving but there's always
something to work out
Work it out, something is
working but then something
else is not, you have to
Work it out, there's no
substitute but Work it out
Work it out Work it out.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:34 AM | Permalink

I'm going to do something different this week. When I lived with my last housemate, I wrote a poem every night for almost two months! I just went over there to pick up my mail, and there they all were in a little stack! How sweet, so I will now share them with you. They were written in 3 formats, in a little red steno book, in a book with flowers on it, in a wide-rule blue pen-tab book, and on various loose sheets of paper. So, for day one, I now present to you, the little red book poems:

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:33 AM | Permalink

BlogSpot Blog of the day: *veggiesomething. Very tiny. Intense colors!

Posted by tiny daniel at 10:44 PM | Permalink

I've been feeling like my good side has been underrepresented here on the tinyblog, so I just wanted to take a moment to extol my good qualities:

- I truly love anyone I have ever loved, and so I feel quite confident saying "I love you".
- I learn really well in school and try to help other people in class who aren't getting it as well.
- I am good to my mom and my sister.
- I know that I'm not perfect and am always working towards rooting out my own confusion and correcting it.
- I don't maintain or nurture prejudices towards others based on race, gender, social class, sexual orientation, or anything else.
- I'm open to every person and would never shut someone off from communicating with me (even if communicating with them is very painful).
- I'm good at touching people and creating an environment where people feel alright about being touched. (I'm a massage therapist).
- I'm a righteous performance poet.
- I'm always nice to people when they first wake up in the morning.
- If I realize I'm wrong about something, I always try to correct it instead of covering it up.
- I don't hate anyone.
- I try to make people comfortable about their own wierdness, I really respect all of the variations in human life and character and really work to accept all of them.

Hm...I feel better. Thanks.

Posted by tiny daniel at 10:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

BlogSpot blog of the day: In the Face of Midnight. It's in spanish...I think. I wish I could read it cause, hey, what a great title!

Ok, and I'm re-instating Dorky BlogSpot blog of the day: ....you'll just have to go look for yourself.

Posted by tiny daniel at 6:40 PM | Permalink

Go watch The Apostle and then come back and read the rest of this blog...I don't know why I love this 1987 Robert Duvall movie so much...maybe because it portrays a man who is both holy and a sinner, both beatific and debauch, both a man of God, and subject to the weaknesses of the flesh....very subject! This is not something often portrayed in movies with such sympathy. Then there's the fantastic preaching scenes, especially the one where it's being translated into spanish and he's going "we're gonna stomp, stomp on the devil" and stomping on the ground, and the translator lady is saying it in spanish and mimicking him...stomping on the ground in time with him.

I don't think I go to such extremes in my life, but I deal with the same issues. Cammy used to say I was a hypocrite, because I practiced the dharma, but still lost mindfulness and acted like an jerk sometimes. I always tried to say to her, "That's WHY I practice the dharma...because I have no other idea how to stop being an jerk!" There was no talking to her though, sometimes. I always thought it was just a woman thing, but then, recently she told me she was diagnosed with BPD, and that there's actually a real disorder. I should have known, really, I always give people the benefit of the doubt.

I just know that the line between scoundrel and saint is a thin one sometimes, and I think the closer one gets to one's own tender heart, the greater temptation increases. That's why it's important, I think, to have guidance in spiritual endeavors..when I'm really having these powerful experiences, it's easy to get out of perpective unless I have someone to tell me, "Don't accept them, and don't reject them...just keep practicing." Lama Tashi really brings me down to earth. Plus, he's one of those wonderful spiritual teachers who although he has a great deal of insight and power, also has a great deal of stability, and doesn't seem to fall into the same traps that Robert Duvall's character fell into. He does have a weakness for cable TV though.

Posted by tiny daniel at 6:31 PM | Permalink

// Programming art!

#include "iostream.h" //it strips out the brackets?!

void main ()
{
cout << "You have reached tinyblog" << endl;
}

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:26 PM | Permalink

BlogSpot blog of the day: Fuzzy Logic

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:07 PM | Permalink

BlogSpot Blog of the day (I think maybe it was insulting to call them dorky, they are really very good.) : 13 Days From Monday.

Also, on there was a link to this poetry site. My favorite three:

1.
Have I mentioned lately
how much I love you?
I meant to.
I'm sorry.
Good thing there's this holiday, huh?

2.
I wish I could give you that sunset.
I wish I could give you that rainbow.
I wish I could give you that wedding you always wanted.
Here's a Hershey bar.
Have some patience, please.
I'm only one fucking person.

3.
You know I love you.
We shower together.
And you make me stand in the drafty spot.
I don't complain.
I get a better view of your ass that way.

Wow, that actually reminds me of how nice it is to not be in a relationship.

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:38 PM | Permalink

Happy Valentine's Day (*)

Sometimes the light of love just seems so dim, and where can we find it in order to nurture and cultivate it? The Booge has been asking all of these spiritual questions lately, but this is my real question: Can I overcome my own confusion and be a generator of love, even when it's coming from nowhere else? And if so, where is it to be found, and how can I get access to it.

A man in a prison will think day and night, "How can I get out of here, there must be some way for me to escape." That's how I feel today, like a man in prison. I had to stop reading Crime and Punishment, becuase it was just accentuating the desperation of my state of mind. I tried calling some people who I thought might be some good influence, or a little TLC*, but it seems like the grown-up thing is to make plans in advance, and no one just hangs out on the spur of the moment anymore. Now people say, "February is not good for me."

Oh bother! As Pooh would say. I know the Dharma helps, but to get started praciting ther Dharma in any given moment, I have to really stop running from my pain and sit down and look at it, and that certainly doesn't make it go away right away by itself, it is just the first step. So many little waves of anger and resentment, all radiating out from the tender hurt part that doesn't want to be hurt anymore.

Sheesh, do I sound like a self-help book yet? Well, banal psuedo-wisdom is really not what tinyplace is about, so I will quit here, but I just wanted to share the reality of my lonliness and make the aspiration that all are freed from lonliness and feelings of seperation, and that every last being experiences the joy of connectedness with every other being.

* Tender Loving Care

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:06 PM | Permalink

Dorky BlogSpot Blog of the day: Small Failures

Posted by tiny daniel at 2:24 AM | Permalink

Which Winnie the Pooh character are you? Winnie The Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, Eeyore, Owl, Rabbit, Kanga, Roo, Gopher and Christopher Robin, plus there's a bug, but I can't remember his name. I've been told I'm Owl, which is probably true.
Read: The excellent A.A. Milne Books
Do not read: Anything Disney.

Posted by tiny daniel at 2:14 AM | Permalink

Okay, dorky BlogSpot blog of the day is: Dogongo Dislikes Smoke.
One of the contributors looks remarkably like the very sexy photo of Al Green on the cover of his greatest hits album.

Posted by tiny daniel at 2:01 PM | Permalink

Ok, I too had to try Rob's Amazing poem generator with this page.
Truly astounding, I got:

tinyblog archives * tinyarchives * outstanding australian blogs Shauny.
even cooler than that apartment I just
had
mentioned it casually in front of my
Mom sister again.
Then,
just my Sister Me on another
continent or develop a bloody pulp, and
watch someone destroy themselves in
my ass. 10:years I watched her being
sold .I think
she even order
my own tender body, listening to John
Coltrane, and my stepdad came into the Lincoln Park
link, worth it.

That is out of control. Word to the wise...don't destroy yourself in my ass. It's not pretty.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:25 PM | Permalink

Dorky Blogspot of the Day: Rhymes With 'Bee'.
(From a guy named Chree.)
Killer rollover. This guy may go on my sidebar.

Posted by tiny daniel at 10:10 PM | Permalink

I needed a place to go sit and be creative...all the parking was taken where I wanted to go, so I went to the place closest to where I had to be in an hour... The Cuff, a gay leather bar in Seattle.

I sat down to draw and write and, I didn't even order my drink before, "Is this seat taken?" He looked like a decent chap so I said no. He was nice. A flautist with a cowboy hat. He confessed that he used to be a clarinetist (I wasn't aware that this required a confession) but got sick of broken reeds and such. So he switched to the flute. No reeds, he said, you just blow.

By the way...if for no other reason than that the blogger frames don't seem to work right in it, Netscape 6 eats my ass.

Posted by tiny daniel at 10:04 PM | Permalink

Dorky BlogSpot blog of the day: Be the Love.

Posted by tiny daniel at 12:32 PM | Permalink

Written on a piece of paper on in my new apartment last night (boy I'll be happy when I have a working dial-up at home):

I feel so aware of myself and so...so sexy! I want to just take a hot bath, listen to John Coltrane, and settle back on my futon and just get my groove ON if you know what I mean (and I think you DO.)

So why wouldn't I? Well, I decided to be celibate for a year. (It's 5 months and counting, as of tomorrow.) When I told my Lama about it, he said he thought it was a good idea. Then, he sort of cleared his throat and said, "Well, Daniel, does that include making love to your hand?"

I said I wasn't sure and he said it was probably more beneficial if it did. I agreed. I continue to agree.

But oh, when I'm here in my pretty little apartment and my own tender body, listening to Tom Waits and PJ Harvey somehow it just awakens this part of me. Thank God my secret valentine lives on another continent or I would be at her doorstep tonight and I would be TROUBLE!

Posted by tiny daniel at 12:27 PM | Permalink

Dorky blogspot blog of the day: There is a horribly sad face on this stapler.

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:49 PM | Permalink

I don't want a pulmonary embolism
I want all of my blood flowing and oxygen getting to my brain

I know, I know, it has to stop sometime, but what an insult...
pulmonary embolism
ending my life.

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:41 PM | Permalink

Dorky blogspot blog of the day: Geek-tastic*.

Posted by tiny daniel at 8:26 PM | Permalink

I think I'm blessed in that I don't look at the site stats, so I don't know how many people are looking or where they come from or what bizarre search engine requests led them to me "transsexual midget porn" and such. So no pressure...as far as I know I'm writing for Shauny and The Booge and maybe a friend or two of mine has seen the site.

Imagine the pressure Kottke or LoobyLu has. Hmm, hate to say it, but it doesn't seem to keep them from writing some serious drivel from time to time. And then there's Harrumph...how does she DO it? One would think she was a career blogger.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I moved! Now I live here.

First I lived with my mom and dad, then just with my mom, then with my mom and sister, then with my mom, sister and cousin robin, then with just my mom and sister again. Then, my stepdad came into the picture, and for 10 years I lived with my mom, my sister, and him. Then, it was just me and my mom and sister again. Then it was me, my sister, my mom, and my mom's third husband. Finally I moved to Chicago to live with my dad and my grandmother. For a brief time I lived with my friends john and mike in Chicago. Then, I moved back in with my mom, sister, and dave. Finally , I moved to seattle with my friend stephanie. She moved out and for the last month at that apartment I lived with tim. Then I lived in a VW bus for a month or so with joe, rob and brett.

We ended up in Colorado where I lived with just rob (and the rest of the staff of the devil's thumb ranch resort). Then I lived with my mom, sister and dave again for awhile before moving back to seattle to live with my friends eli and jill. Then I lived for a month with a man whos name I can't remember. Then I lived with my friend Erica. Then I lived in a rooming house run by mr. aminul islam, and a cast of a dozen, then I lived with my girlfriend aimee and her son aiden. After I moved out I lived with andrea and augustin until they moved out and kris and a girl who's name I can't remember moved in. Then I left and moved in with the lovely and talented lorelei. Then I moved up to the tulalip indian reservation to live with my girlfriend camella.

After a year of that I lived for three months with miriam israel, and then one month in temporary digs with ladonna.

And now, after 25 3/4 years of this...after last night I live alone. I feel so lonely and so free.

Posted by tiny daniel at 1:03 AM | Permalink

Ahhh, the business of keeping others entertained. I watched someone do it with style last night. How to keep the drinks and the conversation flowing and everyone having a good time and feeling relaxed and like they belong. Suggesting the next thing that might satisfy an anticipated craving.

I watched a friend tend bar last night at Coastal Kitchen. I watched her take no sass from the wait staff while treating them with respect. I watched her suggest drinks and menu items to bar customers with paced prescision, in a way that made you feel like she was doing you a favor.

She even knew in advance what I wanted to drink. (I had mentioned it casually in a conversation days earlier.) There was never a pause too long in between suggestions, giving you a chance to finish your drink and mull over your level of satisfaction, but not long enough to feel that you were being ignored. It also never went too fast, in a way that made customers feel like they were being "sold".

I watched her hand pour drink after drink, and thought about the business of serving alcohol and what it must be like. One must have to sit there occaisionally and watch someone destroy themselves in front of you over a period of time. Or develop a series of relationships that is purely about the other person's hedonistic impulses.

I do massage, and it can be similar in the way that it is really a service relationship that I develop with people, but a little different because there's a health aspect to it. I suppose though, that being taken care of at the bar, paid attention to and served good food and beverages can be healing as well. It certainly was for me.

Posted by tiny daniel at 10:17 PM | Permalink

Showing someone how to blog.

Posted by tiny daniel at 2:13 PM | Permalink