Taylor profile picture

Taylor

Damn the man!

About Me

I try to be creative--playing music, drawing, photography, biochemistry, pharmacology, these things I've studied. I like the outdoors, biking, camping now and then (would like to more). Big into movies: Guffman, Mighty Wind, Best in Show. Yes. I'm getting to be a good shot at pool, a decent bowler at times, and am learning the best game on earth. This game is called GO, the national game of Japan, and the most popular game on earth, and the oldest, and the toughest. "Is that some kind of Eastern thing?"%D%A%D%AI'm a big fan of the Big Lebowski, a Coen brothers film, two of my favorite directors. I quote it all the time. Once a few years back you might have seen me dressed as a shoddy Donnie in Louisville at the Big Lebowski What-Have-You fest. This was truly a blast...not some random loser friday night at the bar, which so many people tend to mistake for "having a blast." Try taking over an entire hotel with Lebowski fans, Maudes running around everywhere, drinking caucasians and smoking doobers IN the rooms. The swimming pool was a sight common to anybody who walked out of their room and looked down into the open lobby, a giant puddle of water.%D%A%D?s for the day to day in Akron, Ohio here, call me restive.%D%A%D%AI play funk/jazz based music on my Fender Rhodes electric piano, transcribing Steely Dan, Stevie Wonder, Miles Davis, and other artists' songs for my own enjoyment. The day might actually be nearing when I join a band. This would be fine by me.%D%A%D%AI'm overmodest, pensive at times, and generally a thinker. In my pasttime, as a young brat from Medina suggested to me in a genuine MySpace e-mail, I try to be some sort of half-artist or something.%D%A%D%AOh, and due to studying Eastern religions, like taoism (actually a philosophy, not a religion), and buddhism, I've given less and less a care to my ego, or pride, so anything that I find insulting to my pride I generally find harmless or inviting. Unless it's verdantly felonious.%D%A%D%ASome pharmacological reading for those interested:%D%A%D%AZERO TOLERANCE POLICY/DREAM:%D%A%D%Ahttp://www.opioids.com/cogmood/morphine .html%D%Ahttp://www.opioids.com/morphine/morphine-biosynthes is.html%D%Ahttp://www.opioids.com/tolerance/paincontrol.html %D%Ahttp://www.opioids.com/tolerance/damgo.html%D%Ahttp://ww w.opioids.com/antidepressant/history.html

My Interests

Singing, playing saxophone, trombone (used to), keyboards, and a bit-o-bass, but I have small hands for that. Les Claypool has king crab pinchers! I like to write poems mostly, but trying to learn to write short stories (i've only written one). Reading is important. I still do it. I still love it. Nothing can force your imagination to entertain itself more than any other situation over reading. Just gotta find out what you like to read. Drawing: these weird 2D ink designs of mine used to take hours but turned out so interesting. I'll have to scan those. Botany and the cultures of the world and THEIR uses of botanicals. Chemistry, biochemistry, pharmacology: how drugs affect consciousness, or more importantly, how they shed light on what consciousness really is. Taoism, how to live with the grain...such a skill takes an open mind and a little reading.Billiards, the game of GO (oldest board game), crosswords are fun and educational. French kissing is my favorite all time interest.

I'd like to meet:

Someone with soul, baby. With funk, with drive. With fire behind them.%D%A%D%ASomeone who can relate to this work by Don Marquis in Archy and Mehitabel:%D%A%D%AThe Cheerful Cricket%D%A%D%Ai can t see for the%D%Alife of me what there is%D?bout crickets that makes people%D?all them jolly they%D?re the parrots of the insect race%D?rying cheer up cheer up%D?heer up over and%D%Aover again till you want to%D%Aswat them i hate one of these%D%Agrinning skipping smirking%D%Asenseless optimists worse%D%Athan i do a cynic or a%D%Apessimist there was%D%Aone in here the other day i was%D?eeling pretty well%D?nd pleased with the world when%D%Ahe started that confounded%D?heer up cheer up cheer up stuff%D?ellow i said i am%D?heerful enough or i was till%D? minute ago but you%D%Aget on my nerves it s all right%D%Ato be bright and merry%D?ut what s the use%D%Apretending you have more%D?heerfulness than there is in the%D%Aworld you sound%D%Ainsincere to me you insist on%D%Ait too much you make%D%Ame want to sit in%D? tomb and listen to the%D%Ascreech owls telling%D%Aghost stories to the tree toads i%D%Awould rather that i heard a door squeak have%D%Ayou only one record the sun%D%Ashone in my soul today before%D%Ayou came and you%D%Ahave made me think of the %D%Aworld s woe groan%D%Aonce or i will go mad your%D%Avoice floats around the world like%D%Athe ghost of a man%D%Awho laughed himself to death%D%Alistening to funny stories%D%Athe boss told i listen to you%D?nd know why shakespeare%D%Akilled off mercutio so%D?arly in the play it is only%D%Ahamlet that can%D?ind material for five acts%D?heer up cheer up cheer up he%D%Asays bo i told him i%D%Awish i was the%D%Awoolworth tower i would fall%D%Aon you cheer up cheer up cheer%D%Aup he says again%D%A -archy%D%A%D%AI wanna meet someone who has the capability to be grim, and also utterly blissful, because humans aren't supposed to have ONE SET MOOD all the time unless we're on lithium. I want someone real and perceptive enough to understand what experience is all about in the first place. Oh yes, this is the romantic life, and I know other people know how to live it to, not just one subtle boy in Ohio. I know there are girls that walk the earth who have inherited the adventurous bug like me. For us the life romantic!%D%A%D%AI wonder how often people think about just wondering off to nowhere from whatever they were doing....homework, job, in a verbal fight, whatever. In my case, I feel like wondering across the vast Atlantic to France, building a habitable house out of mud, hooking up electricity to it, and living the rest of my life facing West across Normandy.%D%A%D%AI hate money but am forced to use it. I guess I hate those pieces of paper because someone, the U.S. Mint, has printed malarkey all over them. They could have been used for something better, I'm sure.%D%A%D%AI made a hackey sack today out of an empty box of milk duds, oil dry (professional environmental clean-up cat litter), and several feet of scotch tape. HAH!

Music:

Steely Dan. Jazz--mainstream and backalley. Funk. Joe Sample. Stevie Wonder, Average White Band, Primus, Jim Widner (good luck finding who he is), Ladd McIntosh (my uncle is a composer of big band music played by top studio players around L.A. in his big band, he also orchestrates film scores), anything sung by the incomparable Natalie M ;-), Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Allman Brothers, Doobie Brothers, Jazz Crusaders, and the Crusaders, Joe Sample, Dr. John, Afro-Cuban jazz, Tower of Power, Average White Band, Christopher Washburne, Kenny Barron, Kenny Drew Jr., James Carter, Dave Grusin, Scott Ruggles (soon to be famous, he's best friends with Jared Leto for chrissakes :-)!, Joshua Redman, Aesop Rock, Mr. Lif, DefJux, Vast Air, Eyedea and Abilities, Atmosphere, BUS DRIVER (is completely great), ya know, Coleman Hawkins, Coltrane, Bill Evans, some of the old No Doubt and Green Day, but that's chump change compared to Bill Evans, who would be a million bucks if he was still alive. I'm kind of diverse. I'm extremely eclectic.It's really too bad...everything on the Dillboard is noisy gruel.

Movies:

IFC baby---lots of indies and foreign films. I love one french movie called The Hairdresser's Husband. Sad, but very good. I love Mel Brooks, Blake Edwards (directors) too. I can't really go by titles, more like writers and directors.Christopher Guest, Bill Murray and Brian Doyle Murray movies, hay-soos, there are just too many.

Television:

Live in the moment?:: Few realize that this refers to Buddhist enlightenment, so no, I'm not quite FULLY living in the moment yet, but I got a good idea.| Think you'll get married?:: When and if I settle down.| Have a dream that keeps coming back?:: This one about someone else's car, some series of dormitories I've never seen, and running from the Man.| Play an instrument?:: Keyboards, sax, trombone, guitar, my vocal cord. Believe there is life on other planets?:: So much it would make your hair stand on end.| Remember your first love?:: I have never fallen in love.| Read the newpaper?:: I do crosswords.| Have gay/lesbian friends?:: Yeah.| Believe in miracles?:: When I experience them.| Believe its possible to remain faithful forever?:: Absolutely.| Consider yourself tolerant of others?:: Yes, tolerant (of lighter things but not heavier issues like excessive assholism), and forgiving.| Like the taste of alcohol?:: Which one? isopropyl-no, t-butyl-no, phenethyl-no, ethyl-it's kinda not great at all, but I can handle the taste of beer if I want to.| Fave candy?:: Wintergreen Lifesavers.| Believe in astrology?:: Nah.| Believe in magic?:: I believe in energy.| Believe in God?:: Not the crusty mean old Christian God, but the Lakota parallel: Wakan-tanka.| Pray?:: No thank you I'm fine.| Go to church?:: No. The holiest most spiritual people have no need for church.| Have any secrets?:: yeah, but nothing extraordinary. I usually don't tell people who I dislike that I dislike them, which has pros and cons. I'm too considerate!| Any pets?:: Weiner dog, a black and white cat which was once alpha male (before his balls got chopped off). Now he wavers between being really sweet and affectionate to being a biter. It depends what minute it is!| College?:: I've got enough credits and knowledge to graduate with a biochemistry/pre-pharmacology degree, but I transferred and fucked my chances for awhile.| Major?:: Biochemistry/Organic chemistry.| Have an obsession?:: music, doodling, playing pool, making botanical potions with Vodka and plants from my backyard. Collect anything?:: My own artwork. The lock-picks left over by the street sweepers, and the Wisconson quarters.| Have a best friend?:: Yep, he's schizophrenic yet he's the sanest person I know.| Wish on stars?:: We don't get too many of them

Books:

History books, Biochemistry Books, Poetry, Lord of the Rings, anything where I learn something from it. Archy and Mehitabel! Class by Paul Fussell. Naked Lunch - William S. Burroughs. All of the books, short stories, the play, and lectures delivered by Kurt Vonnegut. I just finished Galapagos and it was fantastic. I wish he had more time left to write. People still haven't read him like they should.

Heroes:

Donald Fagen, Walter Becker, Paul Fussell, Tolkien, Alexander the Great, Alfred the Great, Miles Davis, Dr. Candace Pert, Stevie Wonder, Osvinski (an inventor in Akron), Harold Rhodes (inventor of the Rhodes electric piano), Dizzy Gillespe, Stan Getz, Jimmy Carter. Bill Clinton. The Bush's are fucking sub-nosed idiots. God, STUPIDITY REALLY DOES REIGN!

My Blog

Santa Cruz Island (Channel Islands)

A weekend camping on Santa Cruz island 25 miles west of Ventura.  I stayed at the ranger station.  It is an arid hilly old volcano with the highest island peak stretching up to 2,500 feet......
Posted by Taylor on Wed, 01 Nov 2006 12:49:00 PST

Sequoia, Tijuana, Pacific Beach, Isla Vista, and downtown Santa Barbara

I left L.A. with no plan.  I parked in a garage on the beach at a place called Treasure Island in Laguna Beach.  I met some young people and partied with them a bit (late-night parking ...
Posted by Taylor on Wed, 01 Nov 2006 12:16:00 PST

Not Blogging in the last half a year

I'll be terse but thorough here.  Or i'll try. From rural northern CA I've trickled south to L.A.  Cities are so loud.  Culture shock in my own country: interesting. I'm going to Burnin...
Posted by Taylor on Sat, 14 Oct 2006 09:27:00 PST

Northern California REVISED

What can I say.  How can I start? Grower-culture, as a friend put it, is quite a thing to see first hand in ______county.  I have become a pseudo connoiseur on the subject (pseudo b/c I have...
Posted by Taylor on Sat, 17 Jun 2006 12:24:00 PST

Unexpected Miniature Essay on Knowledge

It is time for my bi-yearly blog.  Personal journals are not for everyone to see.  A blog is.  So it should only be very occasionally that they are self-published.  This is what I ...
Posted by Taylor on Mon, 15 May 2006 11:49:00 PST

Snippets on a Thursday 12:34 am.

I just won at pool, another win for Manny's team the "Balls in Hand!" Hehe. I got wasted.  I was karate kicking the walls and absorbing the shock with my knee, and gently falling to the grou...
Posted by Taylor on Thu, 19 Jan 2006 09:36:00 PST

None and All

Since no one sensible would ever want to read anyone else's blog, in case someone does here, I'm just going to make this a streaming series of adages and advice: Read Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., listen to jaz...
Posted by Taylor on Thu, 01 Dec 2005 12:56:00 PST

Sketches of September Sunday

Welcome back.  September 11th.  Ahhh, the date of the great American Divide.  BTW this is my first blog of 2005.  Cheers. Driving around is expensive.  It used to just be for ...
Posted by Taylor on Mon, 12 Sep 2005 11:22:00 PST

Short-takes (from friday night out on 4-23-04)

Left pool game at the door.Was oddly drunk off of three beers.Beer Pool = Don't hustle people until you fully sober up!For the absolute last time: the skimpy-clad women with frizzy hair and plether pu...
Posted by Taylor on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST