Sets from the Floor/Totomoshi show at the Uptown 4/25/11

1)
Heart - Magic Man
Karma To Burn - 19
Saviours - Cavern of Mind
Every Time I Die 0 - Wanderlust
Witchcraft - No Angel Or Demon
Red Fang - Prehistoric Dog
The Jesus Lizard - Mouthbreather
Ghost - Con Clavi Con Dio
Mercyful Fate - Nuns Have No Fun
Bison BC - Slow Hand Of Death
Fu Manchu - Godzilla

2)
Baroness - A Horse Called Golgotha
The Sword - Warp Riders
Kvelertak - Bloodtorst
From Ashes Rise - The Inner Beast
Pentagram - Forever My Queen
Trap Them - The Facts
Judas Priest - One For The Road

Playlists from 4/24/11 at the Ruby Room

1)
garden variety - in all respects
trusty - there goes sally
challenger - blackouts
minutemen - history lesson part 2
joyce manor - constant headache
quicksand - how soon is now?
dinosaur jr - whatevers cool with me
the jealous sound - anxious arms

2)
unwritten law - cpk
seaweed - kid candy
handsome - dim the lights
mr t experience - more than toast
the undertones - teenage kicks
rancid - alleyways and avenues
the explosion - reactor
screw 32 - blindspot
death by stereo - sow the seeds
saves the day - choke

3)
the exploding hearts - shattered
the murder city devils - ready for more
black cat music - red velvet and roses
q and not u - y plus white girl
braid - please drive faster
jejune - early stars
the get up kids - off the wagon
dillinger four - shiny things is good
kid dynamite - pacifier
sleater-kinney - end of you

4)
rites of spring - for want of
moss icon - kick the can
the promise ring - e texas ave
hum - stars
sunny day real estate - seven
lemuria - in a world of ghosts
descendents - pep talk
the lawrence arms - right as rain part 2
samiam - routine
the loved ones - 100k

you say positive? i say ok

the actually lyrics to that song are "you say positive, i say fuck that" by a band called in control. the song is called "gimmie some reality", and to be honest, in my humble opinion, is one of the greatest hardcore songs written of all time.

i took a lot away from that song from the time i heard it growing up. it helped me to accept reality not always going the way you want, and it had a kick ass mosh part to boot.

My blogs have been vague and short because personally, I find myself struggling in all sorts of different ways personally. Sometimes I feel like I could lay out all the things I'm sorting through in my head like a grocery list. A lot of people like to take blogs as an opportunity to complain about their lives, or as black hole for people to throw pity into. I'm not going to act like I haven't written in here in a fashion that be considered that. However, I think its counter-productive to healing, health, and happiness.

For every curveball and fucked up situation life has thrown at me, it has turned around thrown me a sweet, over the plate fast ball that I have sent into the center field bleachers. A lot of people tend to think you need leave your surroundings in order to get happy or change yourself. recently, for another blog, i wrote how taking lsd basically changes your visual perspective of what surrounds you. uprooting your life is bullshit. in my opinion, taking yourself and your fucked up problems to a place you know even less well is a recipe for distaster. it just ends up leaving you alone and upset versus being upset with at least some people you love, and others you can tolerate to fashion some sort of support system out of. lately ive had some friends that ive known for some years spend some time with me and let me in on their lives in ways ive never known before. it doesnt replace lost hormones, or undo any damage ive done to myself, but i see hope where i am. i see weapons to fight my disease and my problems i didnt even know i had.

at times i feel like i have enough friends. at times, i carry myself like an asshole and put people off and limit my involvement with people. to be honest, i feel like its for their own good, not mine. but tonight i spent some time with a good friend and it was awesome to see someone ive known for a few years in a whole new light, and to talk with that person and spending more time together doing creative things and just being fucking sweet bros.

tragedy and illness and hardships are unavoidable, and a part of life. i feel like through every hardship thats thrown my way, even the ones that have cut the deepest, have made me who i am, and have presented so many positives that without them, i wouldnt be who i am today, and for the first time in years, i look in the mirror and im proud of what i see.

transitions

im going to just come out and say that last weekend fucking sucked. im not going to get into why it sucked, or that it was everyone else's fault, and that i didn't play into it, but it just sucked. it was the sort of weekend that leads someone to making the ultimate poor decision. i rode it out without doing anything too stupid (other than missing some sweet shows i had ins to).

however, today was the sort of day that restores your faith in life. since starting hormone replacement therapy, ive generally started to feel better, physically and mentally. in addition to that, ive made appointments with a psychiatrist to start really figure out what the fuck is up with my head, and how much i may have messed myself up over the years. so on top of that, i had day that involved good people, good music, good drinks, good food, good opportunities, meeting new people, and reconnecting with old people that you connect with in unusual ways.

yeah, youre annoyed that this is vague, and to be honest, a lot of this shit isnt your business...yet. but i just wanted to vaguely gloat that in the face of hostility, i rode it out and was rewarded.

felt fucking good.

Apparently...

...I should stick to typing responses because when I verbally try to use English, some other language comes out.

I can make the words sing in print, but when I use my mouth, I end up sounding like Chris Barnes and do no right by speaking.

So I guess I'll stick to what I'm good at. Doing this. See you not around.

10-10-97, Rock Springs, Wyoming...

...as far as I can tell, I just don't miss you anymore.

A great line from a song called "I Keep A Diary" by a band called Braid. While a sentiment that seems somewhat harsh for why I've actually been moved from getting out of bed to write this, but the more I sit and listen to this song and actually think about how it applies to what I want to say, it oddly works.

I'm a week into testosterone replacement therapy and while the gel often leaves me feeling sick and incapacitated, I am slowly becoming the normal, functioning guy I was back in June. We're a long way off from perfect, and I still have three months of self-lubrication to go before I even hear what the next move in, but its refreshing to have a doctor provide me a solution that has tangible, noticeable improvements to my health.

This whole nightmare has unearthed something that probably really wasn't even much of a secret. I think it is obvious to anyone who is really close to me that I suffer from some sort of depression that has equal parts biochemical and behavioral elements. At times, especially throughout most of March, before getting the appointment at the endocrinologist, I was in a mire of a bleak, dark, hopeless existence. I'm sure it sounds a bit melodramatic, but fuck it, it was true. I'm not quite out of it yet to be entirely honest, but over the last twenty-four hours, I feel like my life is turning into some sort of John Cusack-esque romantic comedy movie, but in the best way possible.

Without divulging too much in the interest of not jinxing myself and protect the identities of all parties involved that aren't me, what seemed like a lifetime ago, but was really only twelve years ago, I went on a date with someone that, while this may hurt the feelings of some of you, was more or less the best date I ever went on ever. It was an impromptu Valentine's Day date. Nineteen year old me even did his best to dress up a little bit, which I'm sure looked as awkward as it felt, and then I braved a rainstorm in my Toyota pick up truck and drove from Santa Cruz to San Francisco to pick up a fellow college aged girl with a foul mouth and the same sort of ill-timed, tasteless sense of humor that I have. She dressed up, far better than I did, and I recently learned she bought a leather skirt which she wore for twenty hours straight while it was wet so that it would highlight her ass, which honestly, even though its been twelve years and running tab of intoxicants potential into six figures, did enough to make my pants smaller without the leather skirt. We went to Jay's for their award-winning seitan sandwiches and then to the Bottom of the Hill to see The Plus Ones and Bracket (I remembered offhand that we saw The Plus Ones, but she had saved the BOTH schedule that included the full line up, including Bracket), neither of whom we were incredibly huge fans of, but the company was far more important than the entertainment. I'm pretty sure that I bought her a fake rose from a Chevron station in Half Moon Bay, but there is only one way we will ever know for sure, and the way in which we will know for sure is what floored me and got me out of bed. I was at least one, potentially more, entries in someone's diary.

Could this have been the case in other situations with girls I've been with? Certainly, but none of them have ever told me, and alluded to me being even more than one entry. I've been in love. I've been there for the high times, the low times, and all the times in between. I've had profound, life-changing experiences good and bad with other relationships in my life, but something about this persons coming and going and the memories staying so vivid isn't something I can't ignore, and I'm just lucky enough to have it come at a time where I'm smart enough to make some sense of it, and at a time when I can use all the positive influence I can get.

So getting back to that obscure Braid quote this entire post is stemmed from, I keep a diary now, and I'm starting to leave this rough part of my life behind. Knowing someone found me special enough to forever commit me to paper via ink is enough to make the hormone therapy induced nausea and exhaustion a little easier to bare.

Who knows where life takes us, but I feel good about what it's showing me right now.