Synapse to synapse (How my mind works, Green & umbrellas)

Sometimes I think my mind (perception?) works like the Internet, maybe. Is it the same for everyone? I don’t remember it always being like this. It jumps from one idea to the next, often I can barely keep up. From one related concept to another. Like… stream of consciousness, free association or I dunno what. The ideas just branch out infinitely, like that Chemical Brothers video, you know, “Let Forever Be”? @ some point this became my reality. I just almost always associate things, involuntarily & immediately. Usually words, lyrics, images, things I’ve heard/read. Stuff ppl have said (well-known ppl or just ppl III know). My memory’s good, which helps.



The other day I went to this place ppl call Plaza Borges with my friend Martin. It was really green. So right away I thought
- “Green”, the Dandy Warhols
- “Green machine”, Apples in Stereo
- “For Reverend Green”, Animal Collective
- "A certain shade of green", Incubus etc etc etc...

Green is my friend Sofi’s fav color, I remembered. & in 1st year of Uni, we had to make a collage describing ourselves. She had cut out the words MUNDO VERDE (green world) & put them near the center of hers. I’m pretty sure there were also jungle leaves & a photo of Charly Garcia (maybe el Flaco Spinetta too?) but I could be wrong about that. Nyssa liked green too, but yellow better.

Green was my House @ school. See, @ my school here (a private, Catholic, all-girls) in Buenos Aires, the English department divided students into Houses, like I guess the private schools do in England. In Harry Potter, Hogwarts has got Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenclaw & Hufflepuff. We had the Green, Blue, Red & Yellow Houses. Each had a patron saint. Blue: St Thomas More, Green: St Bede (who the hell?). Don't remember the others.

I enjoyed being in Green House as I always favored the color, still do in fact. My most comfortable pair of Chuck Taylors are green, FYI. I’ll think of my House mates such as Lucy A & Ceci D, both of whom I still really care about. Blue was pretty nerdy, IMO. I think the best grades ("top marks") usually went to Blue or Green. Cali was in Yellow. No offense but as far as I remember, Yellow tended to be fairly mediocre…am I wrong?

All this came up bc today the internet said Paco was listening to “Son of Mr Green Genes” by Frank Zappa. The next track was “Little Umbrellas”. Right away this orchestral-sounding line played in my head

♫ Just when I thought that my vista was golden in hue

one thousand umbrellas opened to spoil the view ♫

It's from one of my fav songs off Skylarking by XTC, recommended by Romo in 2006. The others are “Ballet for a rainy day” (which reminds me of ppl who paint -Pool, Consu L, Daniel Dubois, Kata, etc- bc it has this line: I push my paintbrush to conjure a new world as this one is slowly washed away) & “The man who sailed around his soul”.

See what I mean? But there was also

- “Preparen sus paraguas”, Fantasmagoria from the Clearence EP, which possibly my VERY fav song by them (”La Laguna”) is off
- “Under my umbrella”, Incubus...BEFORE Rhianna's! One of the last tracks from the album “Morning view”, the last album of theirs I really loved.
- Well of course the Rhianna song, although I h8 it. EHH EHHH…NO THX. Not even after the Manic Street Preachers covered it. I do recall NRS had the chorus line as her MSN name though. Only I remember these things, right?

So, it’s mostly got to do with music. But not exclusively. I also thought of how Jime P (schoolmate) had an umbrella with Tweety Bird (Looney Tunes) wearing a raincoat on the handle. "Mary Poppins", "Singin in the rain" (one of my fav movies), Gene Kelly "walking down the lane with a happy refrain", the girl from the salt I grew up eating in the States...



...how Laurita forgot her umbrella the night of that party on Altolaguirre (what a night that was...in my life, anyways), how I forgot my umbrella @ Lucinda's bday last year, the same night I met someone who didn't know who "Rock the casbah" was by (I couldn't believe it either).

If I hear something about the subway I’ll think things like “Subterranean homesick alien” by Radiohead or “Subterranean homesick blues” by Bob Dylan. When riding the Deutschebahn across Germany I thought “Train in vain” by The Clash & “Strangers on a train” by Lovage, although I knew there was a film of the same title. I haven’t seen, although Tute mentioned it when we talked a lot. I did seen “Stranger than Paradise”, the Jim Jarmusch movie, though. Richie had recommended that one. Esteban really likes Jim Jarmusch. & I saw a photo of Sol S with him (JJ) once. & so on…& so on…& so on.

Progressive rock: Yes, etc

So a while ago I downloaded a few albums from the 1st Progressive Rock post on Romo's Taringa page.



- "Trilogy", Emerson, Lake & Palmer -- bc I like the name of the band
- "Thick As A Brick", Jethro Tull -- bc I'd only heard the LP Aqualung & wanted 2 hear more
- "Red", King Crimson -- bc the band worked with producer David Bottril who did Silverchair's "Diorama"
- "The Sky Moves Sideways", Porcupine Tree -- bc Jazzin & Tute were often listening 2 this group
- "Close To The Edge", Yes -- bc I'd heard a bunch of loose songs by them & really dug

Gotta admit I'm pretty shit when it comes to musical genres/classifications so I wasn't/am still not quite sure what Progressive rock is. Alas my favorite songs out of the lot are

- "The sheriff", Emerson, Lake & Palmer
- "One more red nightmare", King Crimson -- makes a nice combination w/ "Red sleeping beauty" by Mccarthy, imo : )
- "Close to the edge", Yes

Speaking of which...often when reading books I underline stuff that I like then copy it somewhere or type it up, especially if it's something I've borrowed. Well, a couple of years LokarX had lent me this book about punk rock, I think more specifically about the Clash, & among other stuff I copied these

"...post-hippie teenagers still sitting cross-legged on the floor as though they were watching Yes..."

"A declining post-colonial nation in a state of terminal identity confusion"

So when Yes is concerned, I always recall that 1st quote, & think of long haired kids sitting indian style wearing bell-bottoms, headbands & stuff like that. It's a nice image : )

"I have always had a repulsive need to be something more than human" - David Bowie

Me too! That’s probably why I’ve always been drawn to angels, fairies & other beings with special powers, such as mutants. As a kid I was an X-men fan. In 3rd & 4th grade back in the USA I’d watch the cartoon & collect trading cards, like one of the boys. Believe it or not, I was actually something of a tomboy. As for actual comics, I only had/have about 12. For one xmas my brother got me the very last one, a thick golden issue called LegionQuest (right?) about Xavier's son.

Jubilee was my favorite. One of the main characters on the show, a 13 year old orphan, blue hair, always (when not in uniform) wore a yellow knee-length jacket, pink sunglasses & tall blue boots. She could throw firework like stuff from her hands. Now I suspect she was supposed to be a raver/club kid of sorts. I adored her. I even called my pet rabbit Jubilee. Also had a hamster called Beast, after another character.




Then Kitty Pryde aka Shadowcat. I her in the comic books, not on TV. She was a dancer & could go through walls. Nightcrawler was her good friend. She didn’t seem to be a central character which is why I was happily surprised & excited when I saw her make a brief appearance in the first movie, which I went to see @ the cinema in NY with both my brothers. I haven't seen any of the subsequent films.



Jubilee, Shadowcat & Dazzler = my 3 faves. I wanted to be like either of them. The only place I ever saw Dazzler was in this trading card. When I was 10 we got the internet (ProdigyOnline). It was nothing like now, no InternetExplorer or Mozilla browser or anything like that. But there were screennames. My very first one was Dazzler14 (or 16)…although I was only 10 : P



Back in 2004 it was Quique’s bday @ Potlash. I had this conversation with Paco & Romo about the love between Jean Grey & Gambit (Rémy the dude from New Orleans with the Cajun accent who threw playing cards). Don’t recall what was said but I’m sure it’s written in my diary. I do however remember that the lit end of a cigarette fell onto my jean miniskirt & it took a while for me to notice (I was kinda trashed), burning a neat little hole right through the fabric.

As things about *special* people, a few others I’ve enjoyed/wanted to be like throughout the years

The girl from outer space TV movie about a girl…who was actually…from outer space
The secret world of Alex Mack 90s Nickelodeon show about a kid who develops powers after being involved in an accident with some chemicals
Bewitched old black & white series about Samantha, a cheerful housewife who also happens to be a witch, & her husband Darren
Of Love & Other Demons book by García Marquez about Sierva María de Todos Los Ángeles (Epic Name) who may or may not be possessed by ~SATAN~
Evangelion Japanese anime about the only 3 kids capable of commanding some “robots” necessary to save their post-apocalypse city from extra-terrestrial attacks
Harry Potter books & films about a boy who discovers he’s part of a world of wizardry & magic that exists within ours
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events where the 3 Baudelaire Children have special abilities

“Cartoon music for superheroes”, Albert Hammond Jr
“Cartoon heroes”, Aqua
“That’s really super, supergirl”, XTC
“Waitin for a superman”, Flaming Lips
“Heroes”, David Bowie
“There goes my hero”, Foo Fighters
“God! Show me magic”, Super Furry Animals
“Your magic is working”, Of Montreal
“Subterranean homesick alien”, Radiohead
“Yes, I’m a witch”, Yoko Ono
“Circles round the moon”, Geri Halliwell
“As If By Magic”, La Roux
“I put a spell on you”, Screamin' Jay Hawkins (I like the version by Bryan Ferry)
“There was magic & then”, Gentle waves
“Starchild”, Jamiroquai

Bands: Os Mutantes, 4hero, Magic Dirt

"That boy needs therapy!"

A sample of this exclamation is @ the beginning of the song "Fronteir psychiatrist" by The Avalanches. That song is linked to late 2004 for me...November, to be exact. Pato's Flower Power Party at an awesome house on Heredia. Breakfast @ McDonalds with Nico & Luciana afterwards. They were also the days of the Sugarcubes & Meat Puppets.

"I think I think too much", Richey Edwards.
Me too. Gemini also is the most rational sign of the Zodiac.

I'm tied down with stinkin thinkin
Stinkin thinkin gets you nowhere
I'm weighed down with stinkin thinkin
Stinkin thinkin comes from somewhere
- "Stinkin thinkin", The Happy Mondays

According to Richey, Stinkin thinkin is "the best therapy song. It's a brilliant lyric". I like it too. Simple, to the point : ) I put it on a mix CD I made for a dude, once...A few months later we listened to it with Kata in her car & she thought the track sucked/was LOL-worthy : (

Too much thinkin's got you down again
- "The thrill of it all", Roxy Music



I started watching this show last year. Romo recommended it. The patients are real life people: comedians like Ray Romano (long before "Everybody loves Raymond", which I don't rly btw), Gary Shandling ("The Larry Sanders show"), Janeane Garofalo (who starred in "Reality Bites" with Winona Ryder). It's done with an animation technique called retroscripting (by the Retroranch! or sth like that, which I know nothing about. It aired on Comedy Central in the mid 90s.

I like stuff from the early/mid 90s. I always think about where I was & what things were like @ the time these things I learnt about much l8r (Nirvana, Real World San Francisco, My So-Called Life, Richey, MSP's first 3 albums, Dr Katz, etc) were going on.

Once I dreamt of running into Lucas Marti -formerly of Tirador Laser (Argentine band)- @ a party in a castle & he said "I remember you from the 90s. I think the year was also 2004.

Bonus:
LOST season 6 premiere Many interesting & intelligent theories in this post by Sean Adam Simpson.
How to tell if your cat is plotting to kill you Mine is...most def : P
Lucy = Lucifer. Pool always said so.