BLIND EYE'S VIEW

In looking around a recent listing of upcoming record releases, I noticed that the corporate doofuses (a Japanese term, meaning "more than one doofus") at Sony (a Japanese term, meaning "more than one doofus") finally decided to release five of Miles Davis's live albums from his experimental electronic period of the early '70s on CD. O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! I gave a whoop of delight to someone who looked like he could use a whoop (if you whoop about your new haircut, it's a whoop de do), and off I ran to order these aural delights (ask for some of those from the nearest member of the opposite sex and see if you don't get slapped). This is some of my favorite music ever, but it's not for the faint of heart. It's loud, weird, distorted, sick, and twisted like a pretzel made by a serial (or perhaps cereal) killer. It's also very complex, dense music, thicker than the proverbial pea soup. However, you'll no doubt do better popping any of these five discs into your CD player than you would by popping in either a proverb or some pea soup. Then again, whenever I'm hungry, pea soup sure sounds good to me.

From complex music, we move swiftly along to the complex facing the music. There comes a time in all of our lives when we are confronted by assholes of proportions far too generous to prevent the passing of, say, an aircraft carrier. The outcome of confronting such walking anal orifices can be a real crap shoot, as it were, but you can get a mighty nice feeling from standing upwind of these backdoor bullies, slapping them silly with the legal equivalent of a tube of Preparation H, and forcing them to face the consequences of their own ill-advised, stinky actions.

Just what the hell am I talking about? I assumed that anyone who bothered reading this column didn't care and just had nothing better to do. For those of you who do care, here's the deal: (Note: all names have been changed to protect the innocent-me-from suits involving libel, slander, or a wool-blend of low quality.) A certain harmless editor I know learned the hard way that his apartment complex was a dump-literally. The folks running the complex started letting big piles of trash accumulate not far from our hero's doorstep. We've heard about trashing one's apartment, but this was ridiculous. After several complaints about the vile piles resulted in no action, our hero simply refused (or refuse-d, as the situation would have it) to pay his rent. This got action-legal action. Our hero got his butt hauled into court (the rest of him simply drove to court) for eviction due to nonpayment. Fear not, gentle reader. I, er, our hero won the case, thereby avoiding eviction and late rent fees. Ain't it nice when the system sides with the little guy fighting for justice over the interests of a virtual slum lord? And it just goes to show that solid waste is a terrible thing to mind.

An interesting aside: Blame it on Ellen DeGeneres if you will, but the thespians are loose in the Triangle. I recently attended the gala first performance of a play, or a reasonable facsimile thereof, put on by my son's summer camp group. The daring drama consisted of many adorable kids doing many adorable things, such as trying to discreetly inform one another that they were spouting the wrong, or sometimes no, line ("psst, you're not saying anything"). All the kids performed wonderfully, and the play brought a tear to my eye and a cramp to my finger (no one told me I could have pressed the tiny camcorder record button once instead of mashing it down throughout the whole 20-minute play).

An interesting aside of beef: Much grilling was done at the first annual Prism pot-luck (which has nothing to do with finding the stash you thought you'd lost) picnic. Many dogs were put to the fire, but the ASPCA people caught wind (broken, no doubt, by a walking anal orifice, although we're not sure if Mr. Helms really was in the vicinity or not) of such abuses and we were then left to grill the wild tofu (a Japanese term, meaning "more than one doofus"). After much feasting, carousing, and just general milling about, volleyball was the sport of the day. We at the Prism showed our, uh, true colors and gave democracy, at least Democracy South, a sound thrashing. At next year's potluck, we plan to challenge and trash, er, thrash the ASSHOLES (Association of Slimy Slum-Housing Owners Leaving wastE to Sit) in their own backyard, and they will be pot, or perhaps shit, out of luck. Seeya there.