THE END OF AN ERA

today it was over. the final days of his madness have now ceased... the hair is gone. yes. cut off. gone. its really short. on a whim i thought id do it. ive been ranting about wanting to do it for a few months, and people said it was something id have to be ready for. i dont think that had as much to do with it as they thought. but it took a bit of courage. ive had my hair like that since well into highschool. now its gone. today the old era ended. ill write more later today. still trying to get the itchy hairs off my neck and face.

Peeling Away

gross. i hate peeling. i spent all day in the sun at the rod and custom show in Des Moines with my dad and brother; im paying for it. my mom said its a pretty bad sunburn. grandma even commented on it... and shes having eye surgery soon. . i dunno. it doesnt really hurt. i suppose that could be bad... damaging all the nerve endings and pain receptors. or its good, it just doesnt hurt too much. but now my head is peeling. it itches, and when i touch it, it tends to sting. im expecting the next 3 days to be the most embarassing of it all; when the skin on my scalp and forhead peel and look like i have massive dandruf flakes. goodie. i keep playing with it. i know im supposed to stop poking it. maybe i just think it will stop itching. yeah right.

other than that, i spent the day in iowa city. meetings and such. i thought my job ended a few months ago? nope- they just stop paying me i suppose. its nice seeing some of these people. i lie well. its really aggrivating dealing with them sometimes. theres only so much these people with phD's tend to listen to punk undergrads, and after an hour long meeting in a room; im sure ive used up all my minutes. although im bound to confidentiallity; i can divulge [for those that care] that progress is being made rapidly for the new Director of Residence Services; we've selected down to a small group, about 6 i guess... maybe less.... to bring to campus. but thats as of now. theres a million steps that Affirmative Action Office takes before that happens. 2 people already pulled out of the pool as well. but we do have some good candidates. i was suprised by the quality of a couple. appalled at the quality of a few others. it will be interesting to see where it moves on to in the next few weeks. too bad i miss out on the best part; seeing the end result. im done and gone from the Department in any official sense, and even my name and memory will be ghostly by the time this person takes office. just as well.

also met an EXTREMELY cool person today. Terri in Risk Management Office. i thought she was just a receptionist or clerk; my guess was she wasnt much older than me. damn gina. blonde, blue eyes, gorgeous all over. turns out she is 36. has 2 kids. is married. yeah wow. couldnt have been farther off the mark there, could i? nevertheless; she is very cool. she seems to know damn near everything going on; real open to talking... ended up spending 2.5 hours talking with her for a 10 minute question. turns out shes the Claims person. anytime someone makes a claim of insurance against the university, it pretty much goes through her hands. she had some interesting stories. shes also had an interesting life. hadnt been that into a conversation in a long time. since i met Erin L. really. turns out Terri got married and had kids at 19... didnt work out right, one day got a divorce and decided to go back to college at age 30 something. so she worked fulltime hours 9 to 5, has 2 kids, 2 dogs, a house, and still took college classes. shes pretty amazing. i know people that bitch about school and 10 hours of committment per week... i grumble when the workload hit 30 hours and classes... but ive never had to deal with kids and things like that along with it. total respect in my book for her. kinda funny standing there talking about life to a complete stranger and feeling like the other person understood it all. she did give me some advice, which was also cool of her. felt like advice from mom, but from an older sister or something like that. but, as far as business goes, i got lots of good information for my new pet project. also, the big shit kicker was shes interested in it! that was a feel good thing. she and i have some similar ideas about how to approach this thing at this university and how to remedy some problems. thats about all ill say about the new venture. im keeping it my secret till it gets moving some more, ill have time to do that it looks like; since Student Legal passed me over. i was pretty furious at the moment. still thinking about asking for written reasons why, i cant honestly see people more qualified than i; and i knew everyone in the room interviewing me... only one would have given me a bad rating. yeah. whatever. she can eat asshole. probably still mad about the alcohol discussion pannel that happened in the spring.

iowa city is a strange place. everytime im there i loose track of when it is. [well today was obviously Ho Season, judging by the attire], but i mean i run in to the damndest people all over. Donnice [koosh ball] was in the IMU, so was Piek, Bender, some dude from my Holstein lecture whose name i never learned, on the street i ran into a hall coordinator, a girl from my rhetoric class [yes shes still hot], and a guy from my freshman year floor. scary. worse yet. i saw someone who was an absolute dead ringer for Erin L. i think i would say i know her intimately enough that i would know her or not in a crowd... i swore it was her. she had a total erin outfit on, an erin purse, was on the cell phone constantly, same pink jewel toe ring... i went up and tapped her on the shoulder when she was outside of Subway. she turned around, and it wasnt her. but damn. i was totally fooled. thats scary. if i saw this girl more than 15 paces away, id swear it was her, she looked that much alike. but i felt like a tard when it wasnt her. i think i pissed off the poor girl too. ugly fat men in day light do that i suppose.

aside from that i just had a general feeling of wanting to talk. after starting it up with Terri, i just felt so in the need to sit and talk to someone today... i tried calling a few people. no answers mostly. a certain someone hung up on me, then dumps me to voice mail when i call back. its aggrivating. i dunno. i make myself available for people all the time to talk; and when i want to--- nada. generally no one cares. no one listens. people hang up. truth be told, i miss the kind of conversations i had with someone. hanging around Terri today reminded me of that. relationships arent all about sex and looks; there is infact a big emotional interaction as a part of it. kinda missing that part lately.... kinda bad.

X

similar to last post, ive been mulling over some of the better voices; oft over looked from the rock/metal world, that people dont make time for in their busy pop and bubble gum shit world. record stores couldnt keep this album on the shelves in the early 80's, now you couldnt push the bullshit rap albums off to make room for it. sad. anyway, Dio shows up on my list. few people in the industry have the set of pipes this man has. hes played with some heavy company in the past [Iommi and co. with Black Sabbath, and was a founding member of Ritchie Blackmores Rainbow], and can still bring it nearly 30 years after getting his break in the music world. for those of you thinking of checking him out... the song below is good one to start with, album wise check out his first 2 with Black Sabbath [Heaven And Hell, and The Mob Rules] {{Dehumanizer, the 3rd album is good for completists}}, and check out Ritchie Blackmores Rainbow [i think thats how it was labeled and marketed on the first 2...] then his best of cd, The Very Beast of Dio, which has all his solo stuff rom 84 to 98ish... excellent stuff.... standout songs--- solo work: Holy Diver, Rainbow In The Dark, Straight Through The Heart Rainbow: Rising, Mistreated [cover of Deep Purple song], Kill The King, Man On Silver Mountain fuckin rawk on! anyway, ill write more later; but check out this song... the riff has been in my head the past couple days, and this song is the sleeper favorite on the Mob Rules album from like 82 or 83... i forget... but the middle choral section seems to be unique to Dio's work, sab' rarely pulled something like that out, Dio makes it a staple in his work. the lyrics are below [even though i detest people that purely post song lyrics as a post], and ARE NOT NECESSARILY AIMED AT ANYONE IN PARTICULAR! [so consider that before you all get mad at me], just thought id share as i was checking in tonight. i fell in love with a country girl.... da nanananaaa nuh na naaaaa ooooh morning sunshine. ill post more later, time to rock out.


Black Sabbath [version 2.0 with Ronnie James Dio!]

Country Girl from The Mob Rules album


Fell in love with a country girl, morning sunshine
She was up from a nether world, just to bust another soul
Her eyes were an endless flame, holy lightning
Desire with a special name, made to snatch your soul away, yeah

We sailed away on a crimson tide, gone forever
Left my heart on the other side, all to break it into bits
Her smile was a winter song, a Sabbath ending
Don't sleep or you'll find me gone, just an image in the air

In dreams I think of you
I don't know what to do with myself
Time has let me down
She brings broken dreams, fallen stars
The endless search for where you are
(Sail on, sail on)

Fell in love with a country girl, morning sunshine
She was up from a nether world, just to bust another soul
Her eyes were an endless flame, unholy lady
Desire with a special name, made to snatch your soul away, oh!

Don't sail away on a crimson tide!
Don't leave your heart on the other side!
Her eyes are an endless flame
Desire with a special name
Don't ever fall in love!
Don't give your heart away!
No never, never fall in love with a country girl!