Nu Jazz Is A Total Scam

A fragment from a previously unknown correspondent:

"I was walking near the corner of Mulberry & Shields in Fort Collins, Colorado, one rainy summer day when it completely dawned on me that the whole concept of 'genre' was a total scam designed to divide, not unite, music lovers. I was staying with this completely easy chick who lived down on Birch & was flunking out of Colorado State, mainly because she had never finished high school & hadn't therefore been accepted into college, but luckily I wasn't visiting her because of her intellectual properties, if you know what I mean & I think you do. But that day I was not to get to bust my nut.

I don't know if you know much about Fort Collins. Everyone agrees it's a shithole, but it's so much less than that. It's barely fifty miles south of Cheyenne, Wyoming, on I-25, which is where the good lord's bloody urine goes when it dies. I can't tell you how that colors a city, even a city with as little color as Fort Collins. But really, I kid Fort Collins. It hasn't been around for all that long. It's been making its own beer, which I appreciate. But I was there not as a tourist, but because I was forced out of Cheyenne. In Cheyenne, I had been asking around about Cheney.

Cheney! How that blowhole haunts my waking sleep! My long-anticipated expose of his Iraq-child-skull-fucking & his ability to fry fish with his spit was so close to being finished! Denise, the randy young coed whom I would never again bed, had rescued me from a Cheyenne diner/taxidermist's called The Artificial Heart, a favorite of the so-called vice president, & home to truly disgusting meals served on trays made from dead animals. My notoriety was such that only my mother knew me, & she never really knew me, because she never cared. But from my first question - 'So, has Dick Cheney stuck his cock in any of these dead warthogs or what?' - I could sense the hostility. Asking for a second cup of coffee has never been so hard.

Denise says I called her with a rambling text message. I just remember one gigantic waitress trying to poke my eye out with a stuffed eagle's outstretched wing. By the time the police arrived, I was able to excuse myself to wash my hands & slip out the back door. A chase ensued, but the wall of fire that separates Colorado from Wyoming proved protection for me & Denise, since people from Wyoming haven't yet discovered fire & aren't sure what it is. They think it's scary. They run away.

We made love, Denise, Colorado & I, that night, & the next day, as I made my way back from Colorado's apartment to get to Denise's, I was stopped short by none other than the so-called vice president's lesbian daughter. She looked more like Anderson Cooper than I had previously thought, but there was no mistaking her Cheneyness. She beckoned me to come & she promised me she would tell all. How could I refuse?

First, though, I will send this missive out to you. I will discover the truth, & it shall set me free & make me not a little bit of money. Just, if you don't hear from me, tell my mother to call the police or the FBI or something, will you? Thanks!"

Six Months In A Leaky Boat

Ah, there we are. I thought we'd lost you.

Friends of this discipline, I apologize for my absence. Not only from this scholarly compendium, but also from the work altogether. It may seem trite or at the very least dull to say "My mom made me get a job," but surely we can appreciate the succinctness & pith of such a simple sentence! We can also appreciate how disastrous to this field of inquiry it would be if I had to move out of the basement where I keep all the files. Alas, six months disappear & all I have to show for it is car payments & a crush on a food prep specialist named Mandy.

As I sit here, feeding the cats on the this, the last day of what will surely be known as 2007, I am tempted to reflect upon the difficulties I've faced - me in particular - in challenging the dominant paradigm of a bullying nation. I am tempted to be reflective upon the gradual shift in University-brand scholarship which, for some reason, seems to allow people from other countries to look over & even critique your writings. I am tempted to get my ass in gear because I gotta be at the Whataburger in thirty. Which makes the other temptations frivolous indeed!

There are many insights to be gleaned from my recent experience, not the least of which is the death of the word "employee" in favor of the more cumbersome "associate," & I promise to continue with this continuous history in the new year. My deepest apologies to you for not keeping you up-to-date with my whereabouts & happenings. I so totally didn't add you as a friend on myspace, & I regret it now.

To Alabaster, one of the most ridiculous factory farmers I know: I will prepare your request for a history of innard-prophecies as soon as I can.

To Sybil, she who writes everything on the backs on cans: I cannot thank you enough for your research into the nefarious goings-on of the Campbell soup corporation. I will include it in my upcoming expose of soup in general.

To Ethan & Earl, keepers of the sacred audio collection: please stop prank calling me & playing back recordings I made as a ten year old. Dudes, we have caller ID. Mom says she'll call the cops.

To Jerry, Geoffrey & Jude: Bowling night was fun. Let's do it again. Only this time, let's bowl!

To Randolph & his PhD clan: While I can't offer academic credit for the work you're sending me, I can offer store credit. Use Chart 5A to see how we translate research into valuable prizes.

To The Society For The Second Self, Inc: Jesus, you know how to push buttons, don't you?

& finally to you, gentle reader: I shan't be away for such a length absence again. Unless I need to get offline to ditch my creditors. You know how it is. It cost a shitload of cash to get that portable scanner & all that whiskey. I had to go into a little debt. I'll let you know if/when I'll be adopting a clever pseudonym.

To the future, then! 2008 will be the year that the whole world - at least more than now - are aware of the War On Sailing!