Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

krisis

Krisis has been creating Crushing Krisis since 2000, writing songs since 1996, and reading comics since 1991. He is a Customer Success and Digital Brand Strategy executive, serial organizer, parent, and feminist, among other things. Based in Philly through 2017, he now resides in Wellington, NZ.

Gimme a Head With Hair

by

I am emerging from my ugly phase.

Last trip to the hairdresser – just for a trim – my shampooer warned me. “You’re going to go through an ugly phase,” she matter-of-facted at me, before admonishing, “and don’t go cutting it off just because you’re in the ugly phase.”

Because, cutting it off means my hair has won our little battle.

The ugly was seductively convincing. Hair in the eyes. Messing with complexion. Head is too fat now to look good with long hair, anyhow.

The litany was in full-effect last week, and it became clear I would have to beat my hair into submission before it would end. So, I did something unprecedented (which cutting it off wouldn’t be, if we recall the Mohawk and other such endeavors). I walked into the bathroom, lined up my styling products, and took out Elise’s curling iron, hairdryer, and an array of brushes. An hour later, I emerged with feathered hair.

You have to understand that – long or short – hairstyling with anything other than a hand and some mousse is against my personal aesthetic. In high school I grew my hair into a pony-tail to avoid styling, and subsequently chopped it all off for the same reason. Every haircut I’ve had has been motivated by wanting to have to style less.

But, desperate times call for the most desperate of measures, and so style I did. My hair is perhaps a wee long for framing my face with feathers, so I wound up slightly more Farah Fawcett than John Travolta from Kotter. Before bed I carefully wrapped my work in a series of bandannas to preserve it for the night, and the next day I sported stylish (though slightly flattened) feathering at work. And, I didn’t feel ugly!

I have yet to reattain the epitome of my prettiness, but I have escaped the seductive “cut it off” allure of the uglies to inch ever closer to unspeakably desirable rock star look i’m cultivating.

Thoughts Right Now

by

The most awesome part of Eight Minute Abs is that the instructor totally doesn’t mind when you scream obscenities at him on every exhale.

As an added bonus, if you continue this habit (even under your breath!) after picking up the phone mid-crunch for a telemarketer they will find a way to hang up with you as quickly as possible!

In other news, i was just a quarter inch shy of my longtime dream of crushing a rat to death with a flip flop, except it was a mouse and a box of wine. Still, so close!

The Long Tail of Things I Enjoy Doing

by

I’ve recently been reading The Long Tail, which I was originally turned on to completely separately by the original Wired article and via author Chris Anderson’s brainstorming blog (still ongoing).

I haven’t formed a complete opinion on the book yet (I should probably finish it before doing that, eh?), but something I have enjoyed so far is that certain passages have made me put the book down to do my own research, or to start my own discussion. A good book should do that!

It isn’t really necessary to understand what “The Long Tail” means to appreciate the rest of my post, but if you’re interested Wikipedia can tell you, or you can just trust me to summarize it as follows:

The Long Tail is essentially a model (not necessarily of business) where end users have an tremendously huge number of choices – a number typically impossible to amass in any kind of bricks and mortar establishment (think of Amazon’s book and CD selection vs that of Borders or the currently liquidating Tower).

Given this huge number of choices, it turns out that significant user demand for choices continues far past the initial popular choices – ranging even beyond the choices typically offered in a more limited format such as a bricks and mortar store. For an eBusiness such as Amazon or Netflix that incurs relatively low cost to keep these seemingly infinite choices in stock, a significant portion of their profit will be generated by those more obscure choices that a physical storefront would never offer – in effect, the “long tail” of the choices being offered.

Anyhow, back onto my topic.

One passage that had an extremely visceral impact on me as a read was this one: Labor – forced, unspontaneous and waged work – would be superseded by self-activity. [Eventually] nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes … to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, shepherd or critic.

It isn’t author Anderson’s writing – it’s a quote from The Pro-Am[ateur] Revolution: how enthusiasts are changing our economy and society by Charles Leadbeater and Paul Miller (DL it here), who are in turn quoting Karl Marx’s writing from between 1845 and 1847. And, though Marx’s meaning is diluted when taken out of context, the quote resonated with me.

(Marx’s point is that Communism will ultimately find success in the many crafts of its people, as society will “regulate the general production” through the varied skills of its members. For more on the idea of crafting, visit Craft Research)

The quote resonated with me because of a certain conversation I had towards the end of high school. I was talking about potential college majors to my good friend Robert (who I owe a call), and he said something akin to, “Peter, I want to be a jack of all trades, and a master of none.”

Now, I was familiar with the phrase, but I had never thought of its practical application to a person. Why would anyone want to be halfway good at everything and perfect at nothing? It seemed unfullfilling to me at the time.

Robert’s words reverberate in my head from time to time as I take up yet another new hobby – piano-playing and MYSQL, as of late. I don’t know that I have a hope of mastering either skill, but it hasn’t stopped me from pouring time and energy into either. So, am I a jack of all trades, and in the process have I mastered nothing?

Marx’s quote resonates because it gives Robert’s some perspective. According to him – and I agree – none of us are meant to function solely in a single dimension of production. Yes, most of us have a proverbial “day job,” but our passion carries us to work just as feverishly at acting, or mountaineering, or homebrewing, or any of the other interests of my many friends, and we shouldn’t necessarily despoil that passion by attempting to thrust that work into focus in our lives by majoring in it or making it our business.

I love communications as much as everything, and it’s a perfect thing to take up my 9-to-5 because I would never contrive quite so much communications to work on in my free time. What if I do spend my weekends struggling to debug my own code or master a new instrument? It doesn’t mean I have to get my degree in IT or Performance – if I did I might not like either as much.

That’s just one instance of the trains of thought departing from The Long Tail station; even if it’s not a superior book, it’s a superior catalyst.

Or, For Short: I Play Guitar

by

In the midst of a lengthy conversation over dinner and several bottles of wine I got into a bit of a chat about guitar playing with our friend Geoff.

Being a relative folky (though, i think that’s a bit of a misnomer), i don’t typically venture into those sorts of discussion. Any non-rocker has surely been put in that position – one side of the conversation is about sick speed riffs and crazy gear, leaving you and your acoustic by the wayside.

Over the years I’ve learned to hold my own in those conversations – especially after my lengthy hunt for a perfect acoustic. It doesn’t matter, because Geoff is mostly of the jam-band persuasion – i don’t know that i’ve ever seen him play an electric guitar. So, in this instance i was actually fairly evenly matched (though that’s also a misnomer, since Geoff was a guitar wiz when i was just learning to read sheet music).

In any event, i was whinging about how i need to wear my wrist braces more often because all of my recent keyboard practice is making my hands and wrists a touch sore for guitar playing – a bad sign in the short term and the long term. Geoff, rightfully skeptical of my sometimes exaggerated conversational gambits, asked, “Well, just how much do you play guitar?”

I was stymied. Last summer i know it wasn’t very much because i was counting the hours. That was before i met my beautiful Breedlove, which i truly never get tired of playing. Since i received it this May i feel like i’ve hardly put it down.

I ventured a guess: “If i play at all, i play for two or three hours at a time.”

Geoff clearly thought i was exaggerating, if ever so slightly. Not a surprise, since we had just been talking about my many hours of keyboard rehearsal, and before that about our nightly Netflix habit. On those two accounts i seemed quite sure, so my estimate must be high?

The whole point of this ramble is that i’ve been paying attention since our dinner, and i actually play that much or more. It’s usually one of the first things i do when i get home, and one of the last before bed if i don’t fall asleep watching a movie. It’s probably what i do the most other than sleep and work. This weekend i very nearly put in ten hours.

You’d think that with all that time logged that i would be able to shred with the best of them, but i spend all that time alone, and most of it singing – not an environment to unlead my inner speed demon. And, if maybe i’m now playing more than i ever have before, i’m finally feeling the impact.

The other night at the keyboard i mused that songs always seem to take forever when you’re learning them – a mid-tempo five-minute version of a pop song can seem like an eternity when you’re the one suffering under its weight. I feel like that at the piano all the time, but i can’t remember the last time i felt that way playing guitar, other than maybe while trying to slowly count out the timing of a ridiculous solo.

The short of that incredibly long story? Well, for one, i wasn’t lying to Geoff. More to the point, this whole train of thought made me realize that i finally feel confident when saying “i play guitar” – no disclaimers, no exceptions. Ironic that this came almost half-a-decade after the first time i felt confident saying that i was a singer, since sometimes that’s doubtful, but i’ve arrived, nonetheless.