death and taxes.

i should be reading the shitload of books i bought from the states, but my attention is drawn elsewhere. specifically to raymond carver's excellent ultramarine. i like the feeling of staying home all day and not doing a single thing. well nothing except playing with my adorable niece, who has a new name for me, - big. whoa, diet time.

i should have worked on replying to the inquiry on my tax returns, esp since i was way late, and i should have sent them the "evidence" on why that lazyass (haha) of a mother, isnt working her butt off since at 60+ she's pretty "young", and more because, i think it just doesnt feel governmentally right to be claiming relief because of her.

ah i'll write them tomorrow.

which brings me to the funny story of how the guys in my office concurrently decided, 3-4 days before i flew to the states that it was the appropriate time to submit ourselves to the tax dept.

naturally we were all bloody late. dean, the guy who casually asked the rest whether we did our taxes, was pleasantly surprised that there were 3 other guys who didnt grunt back that painful yes. so he had company for that ira trip. besides that, he also had something quite like a court appointment for the non-filling of tax thingys, so he didnt really have a choice. the other 3 of us were cowed by that officially looking paper and decided that since there was company we might as well troop down together.

upon reaching there, Jon, decided he wasnt really done procrastinating, so he sat outside. dean dilligently trooped upstairs to the more severe looking office while j.s. and i, (his bosses) waved cheerfully at him, and urging him to call us, if he need bail.

we went in. confronted with the impressive looking help kiosk, i, an audio visual entreprenuer, capable of solving complex audio visual systems, and mouthing off impressive-sounding theories on light rays and colour separation, turned immediately to the middle-age admin officer standing next to the kisok and said:

"uncle, press which button?"

followed by his cheerful retort:

"this one, the one that says "press here to start".

as a cover for my dim-wittedness, i, in my most intelligent voice said:

"ooohhh, wow, high tech huh?"

looking at the other queue, J.s. was looking equally dumb-founded. (and he makes this trip each year without fail.)

we got ushered to young admin officers (possibly arts and soci or biz ad grads) who beamed at us with brilliant smiles.

mine asked me:

"you mean up till now you still havent submitted your tax details?"

from the cubicle next to us, J.s.'s voice could be heard, apparently he was asked the same question:

"thats nothing, my colleague sitting in the next cubicle, one more is outside wondering whether he filed, and another one's upstair hoping we don't have to go up to bail him out."

i smiled as sweetly as i could to the pretty lady.

****

listeningto: joni mitchell - you turn me on i am a radio
reading: carver's ultramarine

bye bye hero.

another poetic hero has passed on. arthur yap passed away in his sleep yesterday. first kunitz then yap. oh well thats life.

actually made plans with cy and gaston to go kinda pay the last respect thing today but the interview for the new guy dragged into small talk, and discussion of plans for the year ahead took too long, and by the time i was done, it was over.

i suspect i subconsciously avoid funerals and wakes. i have exceeded the total amount of fingers i have for the number of funerals and wakes i have missed.

i dont really know how to behave at a funeral. its just me, but i tend to fidget, crack jokes and smile too much. i dunno why.

when my granduncle passed away, i was the only grand-whatever who wasnt present. and i was quite sure i was his favourite. i am not making any excuses now, but i wasnt sad for his passing then (i was 14) and since i knew i couldnt behave appropriately so i figured i make an excuse for my absence..

till date, i am still fondly thought of as being filial but unfortunate.

maybe i need a new heart.

or maybe i just need to be reminded. ha.

***
listening to: the verve - the drugs don't work
reading: mark strand - selected poems

overbudget.

i am back. a little spaced out, a little out of touch, but back nonetheless.

america is ... weird. okay, to be fair, orlando is weird. portions of everything are ott. way over the top. save for the first day/midnite's fiasco with the service staff, the people over there are eh... more friendly than i gave them credit for.

i blame free alcohol (courtesy of the fellows from pd) and the tackiness of hooters.

managed to squeeze in a looky-look at the mall area on the last 2 days before the flight home and made the mistake of going to the barnes and noble and the fye stores.

bought:
ted kooser - delights and shadows
various old/dead people - tales before tolkien (the fantasy fan in me still alive)
nikki giovanni - blue
carl dennis - practical gods
emerson - late wife
bukowski - mockingbird, wish me luck
billy collins - sailing alone around the room
mark strand - selected poems
latest issue of the new yorker
1 x moleskin notebook
way too much anime - samurai champloo (whole set), TAG (whole set) ninja scroll, gilamesh, blood, etc etc.

oh and got dragged in to this, i went willingly, of course:

sin cere.

there is something to be said about sincerity in poetry.

i think it's a "pre-"prerequisite. an over obvious pre-starting point. like a list for making fried rice would state rice, oil etc, but won't include the wok becoz it's understood. sincerity only matters if the poet is any good. becoz ultimately, almost all poetry is sincere, but it doesnt, by any stretch of will, make the poem good. in fact, sincerity is also an important ingredient in bad poetry.

i echo harold bloom's (who quoted oscar wilde) statement that sincerity isnt nearly enough to generate poems. yesyes, while as an aspirant, i may be guilty of flouting the rules (badly) sometimes, but as a reader, it is my right to claim bloom's stance.

skill/talent/meaning/execution cannot be put aside merely because we feel the poet was sincere in the protrayal of his theme (often political or with social baggage). the sincerity of his theme cannot be bigger than the rest of it or else the poem will be sunk by its ambitions.

yes, i've been reading bloom. haha. and cross referencing his introduction in best of the best american poetry (1984) where he makes a spirited rant against how people read and judge poetry by the wrong criteria.

tess gallagher says something to that effect about too many new poets using the sympathy for the tragedies in their lives as currency to buy readership. the "me-me" rant is so american.

thats what i been thinking about.

good news in the local poetry scene - excellent new entrant (well, to me new lah) in the form of a ms grace chua, the recent softblow update saw 3 interesting pieces from this lady and i must say one thing:

f-*, i was writing crap crap crap at her age. brillant stuff.

see esp. the 2nd poem, homesick. wow. nice. a simple repetitive poem, that has a banger of a closing line, an interesting progression of the repeated line with meaning and all that in 20 concise lines.

major cool.

other news: at present time, still trying to decipher american mentality. encountered something strange, why does the world's most capitalistic country have such protectionistic rules? the norway guys were trying to set up the system today at the convention hall, when a couple of them thought it be a good idea to focus the projector on their own using a ladder they borrowed from the other booth. well, end result, a $500 fine from the trade union for doing something the rigger/setup crew have to do. and they used 11 people to set up 4 parcans; 1 to each parcan, 1 to direct them from the floor, 1 to advise the guy directing them, and god knows where the rest were. talk about american efficiency. well, at least they looked garung.

and to add to last night fiasco with the room reservations, we were locked out of the room today again. apparently we weren't in the room last night, we never appeared, the receipt issued to us last night was a mysterious unexplainable event, so was how our luggage got into the room, how we somehow mysteriously got our keycards and according to the system, we didnt appear until just now when i started speaking harshly to people. however, the system did somehow remember that we had to pay for last night.

i can't remember how many times the same guy asked for our names. f-*, i thought i had bad short term memory.

and the statistics are wrong, 1 in 3 people here are not obese. 1 in 3 people here are considerably healthy. the rest are miraculously alive. i feel thin here. :) how their planes take off, and how they manage to shove their butts through the aisle i have no f-* idea, but i am impressed. diabetic medication must do well here.

***
listening to: jason mraz - geek in pink (when in rome do as the romans, when in america, pls deposit your cow senses at the customs [livestock restrictions] and it will mailed back to when you leave the country, thank you and have a nice day.)

o.c.

ok, after a sleepless 19 hour flight, neckache, stomachache, headache, plus a 3 hour long connecting flight + distress from 20 odd screaming female high school hillbillies on what must probably be their 1st flight anywhere, a 60$S cab ride with no change back, blur as f-* front desk hotel staff, no ciggies!!! and some momentary distress in getting the internet up, bad food...

i am finally properly in orlando, orange county where i'll be till the 13th/14th before making that f-* trip back.

f-* its 3.24am. and i can't sleep. and no smokes, coz its a no smoking room and i have no ciggies!!

nabey. x 1000.