Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

self-aware

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I hated Napster, mostly. The way i saw it, a bunch of cheap college kids were using it as an excuse to short-shrift their favourite artists of hard-earned profit. It did have its high points, namely tracking down obscure and out-of-print Tori songs, but it wasn’t something i was very fond of. In fact, I may have cheered a little when it bit the dust.

Really, how could i help but hate any service that makes cd shopping somewhat obsolete? I live for cd shopping! Even with statistics indicating that cd sales actually showed signs of an upward trend for many of the demographics engaged in trading audio files over the internet, somehow i could never reconcile the idle sampling of a new album with myself — it takes all of the fun out of blindly buying something and then falling madly in love with it. Looking at some of my recent favourite albums, i don’t think i would feel the same about choirgirl, distillation, or poses if i had gotten any sort of substantial preview of them … part of the wonder i hold them in was my initial discovery of what they had to offer A lot of college students might have wound up buying things that they never would have previously, but for a completest like me the entire concept is the sonic equivalent of peeking at my Christmas Presents on December 22nd.

250+ purchases later, tonight i found myself warming to the concept of trading files for an entire opposite reason than i would have suspected Freshmen year. Essentially: my purchasing plan for Winter 2002 is already upwards of a dozen new releases — with my time and money already tied up in snapping up albums by the myriad of performers that i am already practically subscribed to, i can’t always afford to find & snag other random recommendations that people make to me. You could argue that i have enough new music to keep myself occupied, but i could be missing out on my next favourite album every time i blow off a suggestion! Tonight i found myself chatting with Andy, and we made reciprocal recommendations to each other. However, rather than add these people to our ever-growing shopping lists, we proceeded to neatly exchange a handful of their mp3’s, and now it would seem that i’m as destined to own a Mason Jennings disc as he is to buy a Peter Mulvey album.

I never thought of it this way, but i really am a one-stop shopping center for a shocking array of artists; i own between ninety and one hundred percent of the catalogues of Garbage, Madonna, Tori Amos, Ani DiFranco, Peter Mulvey, PJ Harvey, Weezer, Death Cab For Cutie, Erin McKeown, Velvet Underground, & Garrison Starr, with significant holdings in Alanis Morrisette, Melissa Etheridge, Radiohead, and a slew of other artists. Of course, i collectively have under 10 mp3s on my computer of songs from these umpteen albums, but it’s sort of neat to think that someone who was interested in one of these artists could really hear anything by them via me. I think that i’m finally softening to owning mp3s because the odds are if i’ve listened to something more than once or twice i intend to buy it. I still can’t endorse things like AudioGalaxy and the like because i know that i am a highly unusual music consumer, and also because of my possessive singer-songwriter issues, but there’s a difference between randomly downloading a hot new single and making a calculated attempt at triangulating whether or not you should get addicted to an already established artist.

I don’t know why i felt the need to bring that up; i definitely wasn’t volunteering to hook you up with Madonna’s complete greatest hits, that’s for sure. Of course, if you were offering to introduce me to the collected wonders of Lucinda Williams, i would gladly give you three reasons to love PJ Harvey….

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/01/8773094/

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Six college students sitting around on a Sunday afternoon after a late brunch. You might imagine us taking part in an enlightened conversation, going outside to get some exercise, or even making plans to see a movie or go shopping.


You would be wrong. Try again. Whoops, wrong again. Here, let me just tell you what we did.

The six of use opened up a collection of Millers, WineCoolers, and CiderJacks, and whipped out the Sorry! board. Now, being an only child with a significantly less-than-average amount of friends, i apparently didn’t get to experience the entire broad horizon of board games. However, i think i can safely say that Sorry! is the meanest game i could ever inflict upon a child. It’s similar to Parcheesi in that your two main purposes are to get your piece “home,” and to fuck over everyone else. And, trust me, four slightly buzzed college students with a cheering faction of two is pretty good at fucking.


We played Sorry for two hours, during which i might have been threatened with physical removal from the game area if i didn’t “shut up and sit the hell down.” Yes, this means i won the first game and that everyone was pissed — can i help it if i am a blood-thirsty player and not a sore loser? (Apparently pointing that out directly after doing one’s victory dance is considered bragging. Did i mention that we were drinking?) After my stunning come-from-behind victory (two pieces landed home in two turns) we invented a drinking game and a turbo version.


I knew that higher education was good for something…

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/01/8660256/

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(This is my first article for “Finding Your Voice in Journalism.” It’s supposed to be about something i hate. Note that i took liberties with the timeline to compress the article into the assigned length. Commentary is greatly appreciated.)

I suspect that as a rule most boys must hate shopping with their mothers. For me, shopping with mom always carried the weary, claustrophobic sensation of being trapped in a space much smaller than the boy’s department. I have always been subject to a special kind of terror: I am an only child, and with my mother as a single parent I really had no choice but to browse the racks with her in tow, thrusting patently ugly garments under my nose for examination and publicly questioning whether or not I needed to buy a larger size of underwear.

This year I found my nightmare playing itself out in two locations over my Christmas Vacation, both with their own special set of embarrassments. The first seemed simple enough; she had to make an exchange, and I wanted a pair of boot-cut jeans.

Of course, even my best laid plans go awry when shopping with mom; when I met her at the counter with my pants she proceeded to loudly lament that I was looking a wee bit chubby around the middle on Christmas morning, and that I might be wise to upgrade my accustomed waist size by an inch or two to accommodate my ever-expanding girth.

Though I neglected to refute her point about my weight-gain, as we edged closer to the cashier I reminded my mother that I had taken the same waist size in jeans since I started high school. Every single pair of jeans in my bureau were of the same dimensions as the contentious pair I was holding. They fit fine.

“That might be true,” she acknowledged, “but I won’t be the one whining when I get home to find that my jeans don’t fit well.” Never mind that I had tried them on. And, anyhow, “that’s what belts are for,” apparently, buying jeans that are too big for me to start with.

Since I was the one paying for this purchase, my opinion won out — although I found myself unconsciously sucking in my “gut” as I said hello to the girl behind the counter. As I stepped out of the store with my shopping bag in hand I breathed a mental sigh of relief: one down, one to go.

Our second spectacular shopping extravaganza took place in the discount warehouse of Syms, where I intended to find a suit jacket to wear on Co-op interviews. “I just need a jacket,” I told myself, “we’ll be in and out in a flash.”

Alas, it was not meant to be. Before I could even get my bearings amongst the overwhelming aisles of short, athletic, and double-breasted styles my mother had picked out two corduroy suit jackets that looked as though they were only making a brief stop in the store before an engagement at the Salvation Army. My solution to this problem was to brush past her to find my size, but she pursued, claiming that buying a jacket was positively wasteful when I could buy an entire suit instead.

I begrudgingly agreed with her, if only because she was paying for the shopping excursion. However, in my head I knew that she was prolonging our shopping trip by adding our pre-rehearsed waist-size argument to the already complicated decision between a short and a long cut.

Sure enough, my “in and out” turned into an excruciating three hour dilemma as I was bounced from size to size, offered peculiar suits with plaid-like pinstripes, and accosted by salespersons who did nothing to detract from my mother’s own general hovering and thoughtful fashion consulting.

All in all the experience was draining. Yes, there was shouting across the store. Yes, there were heads stuck in-between dressing room curtains. Yes, there was a rendition of the aforementioned waist-size drama. By the time we made it to picking out new shoes (“Might as well!”) and having alterations made (“They’ll do it while we have lunch!”) I found my psyche located somewhere between a thundering explosion and a teary resignation.

Never mind that I came out of both situations with clothing that looks good on me. All that sticks out in my mind is my absolute terror at entering a clothing store, and the childhood urge to either throw my level-best temper tantrum or to find a circular rack of clothing to hide inside. I know that my mother cares about me, and that she’ll always love me, but that doesn’t mean she had to ask me in a stage-whisper if I had worn out my underwear yet while we were in line at Kohls.

Or maybe it does. I suppose all of that is what mom’s are for.

(Any thoughts? Remember, this is being turned in sans the context of my blog, and it’s supposed to express hatred of something and a use of a distinctive journalistic voice. Responses of any kind are welcomed.)

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/01/8504516/

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There’s a unnatural desert wind through the chill of my room every twelve minutes or so as the heater in Lindsay’s closet warms the house with its breath, and in the breeze that just passed a picture came fluttering down from my wall. I picked it up to affix it back to the wall by my door and saw that it was a picture Ross had just given me a few weeks ago – one of Laurel and I at my first Drexel party.

It was taken over two years ago.

Two years ago, and as i pressed my fingers against its shiny corners to cover up the bare rectangle of wall it had left in its wake all that i could was that life is a strange and mazelike thing. I thought about how i spent all that week decorating her house along with her roommates, namely Kate and Erika. Kate wound up moving away at the beginning of my Sophomore year, and then Laurel moved away for a while and Lindsay took her room. I moved into a different house with with Lindsay and Erika this September, and Kate just came to stay with us for the remainder of the holidays.

Two years ago, and i only wound up at their house so much in the first place because i got into the play that four of them were starring in, and i was only there decorating so often because i developing a crush on Laurel, and i only went back last year to hang out with Lindsay, which brought me back into their social circle again. And now i am friends with Laurel, and her boyfriend from back then was just in my living room, and Kate is staying here for New Years, and life doesn’t seem to do anything but endlessly coil and snake around itself anymore.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/12/8268451/

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I happen to really need a razor. Like, alot. I am down to my last disposable razor, and it seems to have lost it’s sheen. This is not to say i suddenly have some sort of mutant five o’clock shadow or anything of the kind, but i definitely start looking like a gang-member if i don’t shave in any given 36-hour period. It all would seem to add up … lack of razor, razor in the checkout aisle, me with a large margin between the price of eggs and saran wrap and the $20 i have in my hand. But, do i buy the razor? The shiny, new, rubber-grip, extra-blade, sleek, black, razor? Do i?

Of course not. Why? Because i am too embarrassed to pick up a razor and have it rung in the middle of a supermarket. I might get away with it at CVS, where they deal regularly in those sorts of things, but i feel like if i had attempted to buy it last night the cashier would’ve responded in the fashion of “Damn, boy, if you’re gonna buy your daddy a razor for Christmas least you could do would be get him an electric.” Or, you know, something else to that incredibly embarrassing and demeaning effect.

I’m afraid to buy men’s toiletry products in public. God help us all if i ever have to go and buy condoms*.

It’s just as if i’m done being a boy, and we all know i’m not a boy anymore, but the Man-Fairy will not come down and wave his magic wand to make the whole thing official so i can do things like buy shaving cream, or fuzzy-handcuffs, or anything else a man might buy.

I mean, i…. um, did i just say Man-Fairy? With his magic wand? Was i seriously blogging about that for, like, an entire second there?

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/12/7924530/