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.

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Some more links.

First, and for-sure-foremost, i wish Henry a very happy birthday! I swear, if i could sign up somewhere to eventually have a kid that precocious i’d totally get on the list right now :p

Meanwhile, the ever-educational JillMatrix provides some enlightening links on the topic of Internet Radio and Conglomerate Takeover. Though i generally tend to side with record companies when it comes to what they don’t consider fair use, i do object to the neutering of my home computer and my electronic media. Sadly, these two positions tend to conflict with each other … while i feel that the record companies have the right to object to illegal distribution of their artists’ songs, i don’t feel that rendering a compact disc unplayable by a computer or making software i use to record and upload my own songs illegal is any kind of answer. I enjoy listening to cds on my computer, i make music rather than stealing it, and i probably spent 1000% of the typical American’s yearly expenditure on albums and concerts last year. I’d appreciate it if i receive some respect with the next cd i buy instead of a stupid anti-theft thing stuck to the inside of the cd tray. Thank you.

On a related topic, Rolling Stone‘s new darling the Recording Artists Coalition has a website up to help you understand just what they’re complaining about. Headed by such industry luminaries as the venerable Don Henley and the Grammy-magnet Sheryl Crow, the RAC is looking to win recording artists more rights when it comes to being employees and when it comes to their own songs. One major point of contention is that a typical recording contracts signs an artist not for a number of years, but for a number of albums. This means an artist can wind up stuck with a record company for their entire recording career, whether or not they have the best interests of the artist in mind. Examples include Aimee Mann, whose label left her hanging when it came to her last album Bachelor No.2; after having a smash critical hit with her songs on the Magnolia soundtrack, Mann bought the album back from her company and released it independently. Even on her own she’s still having to battle labels both big and small, as this letter shows. But, back to the RAC, i find it rather amusing that they needed to run four fundraiser concerts and get biweekly coverage in RS while Courtney Love is slowly achieving what they’ve set out to do on her own.

On a slightly less musical note, ClosetBoy had a bad sitcom moment where he felt like Vonda Shepard was going to loom up behind him with her piano and start crooning. I find this amusing because today i was following Izabelle and Amy around while playing guitar and they turned around to remark “I feel like i just walked out of a break-up scene on Dawson’s Creek or something, and you’re the sad breakup music just following me out.” A year ago i would’ve cringed but, aside from the current Dawson’s renaissance, Peter Mulvey (my personal idol) was played on Felicity a year or two ago. So, who am i to scoff at the WB?

On the subject of getting effed over by corporations, the usually user-friendly DreamHost seems to be pulling a con-job on good-ol’ KevRock. Definitely a bit underhanded, in my opinion. And, in other SurvivorBlog Alumni news, why the hell isn’t Josi on my sidebar anymore? I surely don’t have a clue.

Finally, i am officially addicted to Cafe Latte Jelly Belly jelly beans. Can you argue with a jelly bean that actually has caffeine in it? Nope, didn’t think so.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/03/75041577/

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While cruising around on Meg’s Not So Soft tonight my attention was drawn to a story concerning college apartments and seating rules. Having recently had a number of guests in my house that easily outstrips the available number of seats in both the parlor and kitchen, i am well aware of our accepted seating policy: we function on the “fives” rule, where seats are up for grabs unless the person vacating calls fives, which will reserve the seat for a span no longer than five minutes. This doesn’t always leave everyone happy with the seating situation, but not too many people complain.

Meg’s college apartment apparently only featured two pieces of furniture suitable for planting one’s bottom on, and so it was strictly every man and woman for themselves. It is here that her story begins…

I can’t really say anything else without ruining the story … just trust me on this one. As if Meg isn’t funny enough without surefire oddball material to work with.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/03/75039207/

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At some point during which i was surely raving about my website and how much fun i have writing for it and meeting people through it, Elise decided to set up house on BlogSpot, though she didn’t tell me about it until i mentioned something to the effect of that she could only get sexier if she — in addition to being incredibly intelligent, acting as an op on a MUDD via telnet, and playing a bit of guitar — had a blog. Of course she did, because her sexiness rates off the scale, and she’s actually had some really sparkling moments of blogging in the month she’s been writing so far. Funny anecdotal entries from math class, reminiscences reminiscent of the stylings of Martha & Rabi, and entirely flattering opposite-view accounts of things i’ve mentioned us doing here.


Without much discussion we decided that my linking to her, via sidebar or upon any mention of her name, would result in too much strangeness to be worthwhile. As such, our two respective blogs exist in entirely separate universes… while hers is anonymous in name and design, mine is here for all to see along with over a year of context, songs, and occasional photographs. Somewhere in that distinction, i have found that i rely on her accounts of our collective life to remind me of what has gone by rather than my own. My reluctance to air actual personal details aside, i am simply uncomfortable with making more than an obscure mention of a day spent in New Hope, marathon sessions of Secret of Mana, and her having fallen asleep in my bed.

I can peg this reluctance for you exactly; it’s a fear of us winding up anything like Selina and i did last year. Rereading entries from the two months we were dating reveals a sickening half-and-half mixture of short-sighted starry-eyed rambling and oddly prescient airings of my complaints. As the relationship lurched towards its final implosion what i said on the page turned my actual words and emotions into something akin to a third wheel — i was trapped between half-fictionalizing what was happening only to be held to the letter of what i said, or relating it in actuality only to be skewered for saying what i felt.


Of course, i can’t honestly compare a healthy and happy relationship to whatever it was Selina and i were drifting through last winter, but with that as my only other experience i’m sometimes left unable to do anything but that. If i had three or five or ten girlfriends’ reactions to my page to go on, i would be less hesitant to chronicle more of my current daily life here. But, i only have one perspective, and a skewed one at that, which means i’m left reading sparkling details of what i’ve been doing with my life over on BlogSpot and i can’t even give you a link to them so you know where i’m coming from.

Watching favourites Shaun and Alison battle with personal disclosures lately has inspired little faith on my part, but the different enthralling ways that they describe those experiences have lead me to realize that if i don’t talk about them at all i’m not only cheating myself, but i’m not being interesting at all.

Speaking of not being interesting at all, i can’t believe you just read all of that :p . Or, am i all wrong; is it not the obscured mentions or the explicit ones that interest you, but instead my inner-turmoil on the matter? I suppose i’m just stuck on how to best portray this particular crushing aspect of my life to you. Dare i ask… any thoughts?

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/03/75038525/

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The lack of motivation i’m exhibiting today is truly astonishing. First off, i definitely lacked any drive to get out of my bed … my eventual departure from its warmth and comfort was a combination of having to use the bathroom and falling off the side of my bed. These events had no correlation to any amount of ringing and/or screaming provided by my alarm every forty-seven minutes, which meant it was already past the time i said i would show up in work to hang out (and maybe actually work). In Peter-logic, being late to something is typically an excuse to blow it off altogether, and three hours later i found myself planted in front of my computer on the twenty-seventh page of Wonder Woman images from across the web in a highly whimsical and misguided campaign to redesign the site using Golden Era Wonder Woman art. Having failing in that endeavor of misguided ambition, i decided to cruise aimlessly on Amazon, which for me has become nearly a Olympic event. From stationary i already own to a video game i have absolutely no reason to buy to reading negative reviews of a book i already definitely like based on the four or five times i’ve read it. Somewhere in there i ate a cold piece of pizza and wrote a check for our electric bill

Yes, it’s non-stop excitement here. A virtual house of fun. Excuse me while i organize my guitar picks into ROY G BIV order with subdivisions for gauge and manufacturer…

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/03/75038470/

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Asking an adventurous pesco-vegetarian, a finicky omnivore, and the master of Lipton side dishes and grilled cheese to decide amongst themselves what meal they can collectively cook and eat is somewhere between comedy and challenge. Last Tuesday Laurel came over to make dinner with Kat and I, and after a limited amount of fussing we wound up taking a stab at a spinach quiche recipe that my mother and i have been making for years now. The quiche met all of our pre-requisites … meatless, cheesy, and relatively basic in preparation. We added a side order of perogies and suddenly we had a healthy (and rather yummy) meal assembled within the span of an hour. While serving up the food i lamented that i wanted a cookbook that was “Vegetarian, but with meat. You know, like, a cookbook for lapsed and reformed vegetarians.”


We all got a laugh out of my meandering description of the perfect cookbook, and yesterday while wandering in and out of used book stores in New Hope with Elise i actually found what i was looking for. Almost Vegetarian is a smartly compiled book that veers between rare herbivore delicacies and more modest meaty fare, peppered throughout with tips on advanced preparation and vegetable shopping in green ink. I bought it immediately, for a surprising eight dollars, considering it’s in absolutely perfect condition.


I love those coincidental moments that life offers up, as though a bookstore was fated to carry a particular book on a certain day just because i was too inarticulate after baking for nearly an hour to describe what my ideal cookbook would really feature. Chalk one up for serendipity, i suppose.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/03/75036195/