no more

ew.
november.
so gross.
i mean it.
i've had all i can stand, and i can't stand another day.
huh?
oh.
this is it?
it's all done?
well,
that IS good news.
in other other news,
i had a whirlwind stopover popover from some of my peoples.
yup.
my very special co-conspirator, shawn,
and my homegirl amy,
rolled on up from the far reaches of southern new england,
away from family and other tedious trials,
and traveled further and farther to the whitened-out and wintry northern mountains.
we ate cake,
we laughed hard,
we chowed down on some dinner,
and then they headed back down south.
uh-huh.
as quickly as all that, it was over and done with.
a fast-paced powerhouse one-two punch of hangouts,
high fives,
and snacks.
i'm just sayin',
i really needed it, too, neighbors.
because november is, was, and always will be a real A*-hole,
and there should be more experts around to temper the grim grey gayness.
that's no joke.
anyways,
shawn looks a bit older these days.
harder work and higher altitudes may be maturing him a bit.
like,
he might almost actually look 20, finally.
which is fitting in the woodsly goodness,
as the whole place is ten years late to current events, too.
check the worse-than-peter-pan-type teleport:

awwwwww.
if daniel radcliffe and k.d.lang ever got gene spliced together,
i think i have a pretty decent idea of what the result would be.
***********
it's the last day.
and it's the last day of family togetherness, as well.
mmhmm.
in a short bit,
i'll be doing my own roundtrip roundhouse to asscrackachussetts,
and back up to the white mountains, and back to work by midday.
yup.
harvest and maple head back to the b!tch-burbs of connecticut,
and i get back to getting busy at the tattblastin' shack.
we rep a hard style when it comes to goodbyes,
and i have to tell y'all....
...i miss 'em already, and they're still fast asleep.
ugh.
at least november is over with.
today is the day,
but tomorrow is a better one,
only,
without those two brightest spots,
which outshine even the excess of XI-mas lights;
never quiet, never soft.....

advanced.

hot on the heels of the new no joke fifth edition of the
core rules for Dungeons & Dragons,
my buddy wayne found and delivered a crucial piece of throwback history.
that's no joke.
check the late-80's-type teleport:

that's right.
it's the advanced D&D monster manual, 4th edition(?!),
from 1979.
holy sh!tballs!!!
that's pretty F*ing advanced, huh?
wow.
i'm reminiscing on some no-foolin' back-in-the-day memory jauns, for sure.
i will say, too, as a means of big thank-you's-
it is super nice of a guy to think of me on thanksgiving,
when he's digging through his old junk.
anybody could've tossed it aside,
and most duders would've.
not wayne, though.
he knows the value of gratitude and generosity,
and he usually comes through in the clutch.
(that's why i make so many apple-style treats, neighbors...he loooves 'em)
the thing of it is-
i appreciate it.
a lot.
and i'm just feeling pretty good about this little glimmer of expertism
here at the end of another 'nother no-hope no-thank-you november.
***********
and speaking of little glimmers...
there's a chance a surprise guest-star may pop up this evening for a little
activation in the woodsly goodness.
mmmhmmm.
we'll see.
i'll give you a clue, though-
he wasn't even kind of born in 1979.
and he can't even hang out with fantasy and/or games at all.
mmhmm.
should be a ton of fun, huh?
well,
it will be loud, and fresh, and full of hard styled hardness for your face.
if snow doesn't doo-doo buttersmear the best plans and intentions.
ma nature may see fit to derail the evening's doings.
she always wins,
and it IS november still, after all;
never quiet, never soft.....

stay black.

it's a white winter woodsly wonderland
of cloud-covered foggybottomed mountain vale
that i've woken up to on this blackest of fridays.
ugh.
the weather is perpetually not my favorite.
and black friday is the least enjoyable friday of the year.
hell,
good friday is better,
and we're celebrating torture and murder!
then again,
maybe that's what we're celebrating today, too?
seems like it.
however,
i'm not shopping today.
i'm working.
hard.
all damned day long.
but that's not what's important right now, kids.
nope.
what's on my priority action item report at the moment
is making sure y'all get a good look at my most expert thanksgiving spread.
yep.
check the teleport:

the shark gluttony was so intense, and so over-the-top,
and so fat and filthy and filling...
i actually really needed a whole other 'nother plate
just to fit everything i'd made onto the table to munch up on all at once:

woohooo!
i brought a sidecar of dressing and gravy and stuff!!
that might be gross, huh?
noooooo.
c'mon
what are you?
an A*-hole??
don't be dumb.
it's F*ing inspired.
more plates means more food and less trips back and forth.
when there's too many different things, and not enough places to put 'em,
we now know the secret-
more places means more room for more of all of it.
that's the key, kids-
too much is the right amount,
and i took that whole philosophy to heart, and had matters well in hand,
before the first corner of my cloth napkin dabbed the gravy off of my face.
expert overindulgence.
forever and ever.
that's a thing.
so what did i make?
i made a lot of everything.
homemade vegan roast, no recipe, no guidelines,
just a baby bit of culinary know-how and a ton of garlic.
yeah.
mashed pink beans and pureed tofu;
wheat gluten and nootch and bean flour and tapioca starch;
all the spices;
all the herbs;
brothy froth, and liquid smoke;
cloves on cloves on cloves of sharp garlic;
olive oil by the glug-glug-glugful;
tamari today and every day, and a pat of buttery spread.
oh, yeah,
and some fancy multigrain rice and corn and carrots,
and some celery and mushroom and red onions,
and made that all into some succulent stuffing:

a doughy doo-doo diaper of massive beige meatless mess,
rolled and rested, baked and basted, and definitely delicious, too.
it seems that homemade roasts were all the rage this season.
who would've guessed i'd be so au courant?
that's no joke, either.
*
steamed vegan sausages, from scratch,
made our cornbread stuffing so much more elite than years past.
the palatability was increased a thousand fold.
and even though i made cornbread stuffing,
i also made that three grit-ground grain maple-sweetened cornbread, too:

that's right.
more is what we want, and more is what we get.
it was very necessary, when it came right down to it, too.
after all,
not much makes my vanilla-cider cranberry sauce taste better than it already does:

what with the pectin punch of burst berries,
in a little brown sugar and a splash of syrup, broken down with a dash of lemon juice,
and then simmered slowly to a sumptuous sauce in reduced apple cider....
but that cornbread combo has got what it takes to make it go to eleven and beyond.
i made mushroon gravy,
in addition to my regular custom golden-roux Folk Life gravy.
but,
why two gravies?
because different sh!t tastes better with different gravy, neighbors!
for example,
mushrooms, stuffed with re-activated rice from the roast-stuffing,
with peas and more mushroom, and leeks, and parsley and scallions,
need mushroom gravy for maximum flavor concentration.

obviously!
but, some things don't even need gravy.
y'know?
it's true.
like maple-brown sugary, lightly season sweet potatoes,
with caramelized shallots and tempeh bacon bits:

that's a banger all damned day, all by it's lonesome.
word up.
these roasted rainbow root vegetables, however,
especially with the addition this year of parsnips,
need a little lube to slide on down the gullet.

baby tiny teeny potatoes and onions and baby carrots?
oh my!
*
garlic'd collard greens?
yup.
garlic mashed potatoes?
with a little onion, and so much butt(ers)...?
yeah!
how about steamed and then roasted butternut squash,
with cinnamon and dried cranberries and pecans??
heck yes, guys!
too much food.
too many options.
too much gravy.
too much of everything.
oh MAN,
it was just right.
*
gratitude and generosity,
and family togetherness.
that's how we get blacktivated on fridays...
especially THIS friday.
we overdid it,
and we'll do it again tonight.
that's our move,
and we're making it happen;
never quiet, never soft.....

pumpkin pie.

thanksgiving desert times pretty much demand a pumpkin pie.
i think that's actually a rule?
well,
y'all know how i love a good rule,
so you know how much i had to get busy with it in the kitchen.
yup.
i didn't just make too much food, neighbors.
i also made too much treats.
yeah!!
creamchee' and brown sugar;
tapioca and a scoople of wheat flour;
maple flippin' syrup;
cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, allspice, mace, and cloves;
a whole mess of pureed pumpkin;
flax seeds and vanilla and maple extract;
and a pinch of salt......
all of that, together forever, in a thankful disc of dirty dopeness.
huh?
oh, well, without eggs, and without silken tofu,
that super-smooth vegan creamchee' made the whole thing incredibly velvety.
i mean it.
what, now?

you'll have to see it for yourself?

ok.

check the pumpkin-pie-is-mandatory-type-teleport:

mmmhmmm.
there is cinnamon oatmeal streusel mashed into meal,
with graham crackers, and brown sugar and butterish,
and those two types of crunchy goodness
are teaming up to make the most expert piecrust you've ever even heard about.
that's real.
it's so good, i spread it up and over the top,
onto the filling and towards the center, for extra crumbly super-hottness
all around the rim.
oh, yes, i did-
and in turn, that inspired idea provided a base for those cinnamaplecider swirls.
y'know?
the crumbs kept 'em from sugarmelting into the pie, guys.
and that made all of it even more enjoyable.
***********
the kids love cake and pie,
and i love the kids.
we all had all of it, and e made it happen through our own intense
active participation in the test kitchens of this cold and wintry Fortress.
it was nice.
a clan of battle-beastly bakery barbarians being ourselves and producing results.
we do what we do,
even when we don't know what we're doing.
confusing?
tell me about it.
the thing of it always is that it's all always really happening.
unfolding outwards and enveloping us in a fully-formed-fully-functional
fresh-to-death Folk Life.
we're pretty F*ing lucky.
we could've just watched a parade and some college football.
i'm thankful we aren't that kind of people.
real talk;
never quiet, never soft.....

thanks.

i've got my girls

and i've got my Folk Life & Liberty Fortress

and everything else is bullsh!t.
there isn't any eloquence adequate;
no articulate literate list that can equal the importance;
and no elucidation that will do justice to the peoples and the places
that make woodsly goodsly warrior poetry a worthy worthwhile endeavor.
good is good, and bad is everything else,
and that's the realest talk i've got for you, neighbors...
i am grateful for the time i have been given,
and for the people who choose to span it with me;
never quiet, never soft.....

gratitude.

hey-O!
it's thanksgiving day, neighbors,
and we're keeping it molto fat up here in the woodsly goodness.
believe it.
also,
we're getting especially expert on all kinds of extra treats.
mmhmm.
one of my daughters looooves pumpkin pie,
but,
the other one really loves apple bits and pieces to pieces...
don't worry, we got up early and made both.
i mean, what are we thankful for, after all?
excess, clearly.
for realsies,
too much is the right amount.
yeah.
friends,
we are taking it up a level, too,
with our super fancy unnecessariness.
check the teleport:

oh, why, yes...thanks!
whole crawnchy mcintosh apple chunks up inside it,
with cider as the wetness,
and whole lots of cortlands sliced and softened,
and slathered in a luxurious layer over the tippity-top of the ultimo-moist crumb.
mmhmm.
that's what's up.
we didn't stop there, though.
why not?
because we know about getting extra hottness in everything we do, duders.
that's why not.
in the interest of that superfly dynamite dopeness hapening in our mouths,
we freaked it off with cinnamaplecider creamchee' frosting accents.
wordimus prime.
we doo-doo that arduously ardorous activation.
what i mean is-
we love it.
yep.
and we show it how much we love it by overdoing all of it all the time.
if you aren't prepared to do something so hard you ruin it forever,
then i'm skeptical as to how much you really do in fact actually love it.
that's our way,
and that's our means,
and that's the sh!t that wins our hearts and minds.
destructive creativity,
and hateful loving.
you have to be willing to make something turn inside out and opposite,
because that's the only quantity that we understand.
i'm giving thanks for all the things i take for granted,
and i'm taking for granted all the generous gestures i give out.
there's a lesson in there somewhere,
but i'm too full to process anything non-digestion-related.
overdoing it,
and undervaluing everything else.
it's all really happening,
and that's the whole point;
never quiet, never soft.....

heavy flakes, heavy weights, heavy waits.

the woodsly goodness has been buried
in a well-prepared for and overly-anticipated much-hyped blizzard.
that's a thing.
big ol' burly billowy pillows of wet snowfall have blanketed every available surface.
for real.
we're inside, now, but we were out and about in the flurries
as they forcefully fermented into a full-blown free-for-all of free-fallin'
foul-flyin' frozen flechettes.
yikes.
the important part of all of it, though,
is to remember that today is a mutha-b!tchin' snow day,
and that always means that anything can happen.
rules is rules, after all.
of course,
just because something can happen, certainly doesn't mean it will.
for example,
check the forever-F*ing-up-the-photo-type teleport:

mmhmmm.
straight-out clownin' every time i try to capture a little bit of that
semi-sentimental real life documentation.
we all represent on a hard style.
it's kind of a family tradition.
word up.
*
but, on the ones,
winter fires with my little saplings are SO expert, anyway.
one match, every time, to spark it up.
even in the wind, even in the wet,
even when it's dripping down from all angles.
we doo-doo what we do,
and that is extra true when it comes to hot fire.
check the barbarian battle-bier, bro:

yep.
because that's what's poppin', when we get it together, all together.
nice.
and naturally,
we fed it what it wanted to eat.
treats aren't just for worthy warrior poets.
the blazes pull their own weight,
and we reward them with more fuel.
teleport:

yeah!
*
now,
as the snow fell,
and the fire sizzled,
and we got colder, and wetter, and it got darker,
and windier,
and worse in more than a few ways,
we also got creative.
neighbors,
we charred up a pumpkin and turned it into a coal dumpling.
that's a thing.
teleport:

hahaha.
we make our own amusement,
wherever we go,
and we find fun, or it finds us.
one thing is definite-
we always have something to do,
and we always do it better than the best.
we're on that snow day snow magic sh!t-
and the snow silence,
with the muffled mush masking the world around us,
and  making it all about us.
everything else has faded away into the white.
it's nice.
today is the day,
and it's a good day;
never quiet, never soft.....

breaking faster.

lightly sweetened with those big ol' raw sugar sprankles.
what?
oh.
sorry, neighbors-
i was just thinking about how flippin' expert our busy bakery
breakfast business was with my daughters this morning.
normally,
its Tea'N'Toast, because i dig it the most...
but, this morning,
we celebrated our family-style togetherness with something else.
mmmhmmm.
these lazy teenagers slept way in,
and i did so much move-making before they rose and shone....
once they were up, and at them, with me in my kitchen,
deep in the pre-snow blizzard-heightened woodsly goodness,
all comfy, and cozy, in the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress,
we mixed it up a bit,
and baked it off in record time.
check the morning-glorious-type teleport:

corn muffins for your ever-lovin' FACE.
yuuuuuuuuup.
and those are freeze-dried extra-sexy blueberries up in 'em, too.
friends,
those crawnchy berry jauns really take it all the way to eleven.
no foolin'....
goobiebloppin' batter blarps make for a whole textural magic situation.
plus,
two kinds of cornmeal are exactly what we all want.
right?
you know it.
that silky smooth masarepa,
and that gritty polentafied bigness, too.
yeah!
me and mine know about breakfast.
we have a relationship based on active participation,
and professional appreciation of the important aspects of our day,
especially when it comes right down to our literal daily bread an' that.
mmmhmmm.
it's a derailed day of doing very little,
so what we do,
we do to the max.
this is it.
from the first cracked open eyelid, to the last lilting lens,
ultimate involvement,
and so much real talk.
i tell it like it is, and they listen,
then we switch places, and i'm all F*ing ears for a spell.
today is the day;
never quiet, never soft.....

you corny.

hey there, neighbors!
it's that time.
yep.
cornbread o'clock.
check the just-baked-in-the-pan-still-type teleport:

mmmhmmm.
y'gotta make it early on in the thanksgiving preparations,
so it can sit around and stale up for a spell.
yeah.
because stuffin' and dressin' need thirsty crumbs, kids.
too moist, too fresh, and it just dissolves into mealy mush,
and on the ones, y'all-
i cannot, and i will not hang out with budget cornbread.
also,
i'm a northerner.
i mean it.
like,
i can't hang out too well with anywhere else.
northeastern united states,
northern new england,
northern new hampshire,
northER than north conway.....
and i rep my woodsly goodsly yankee doodles like a champion.
what i mean is-
i like my mutha-'ucking cornbread to be maple sweetened.
that's real.
and when it's time to get really real, and be real, and stay real,
it's all i can do to not clap my hands with gleeful cheer an' that.
true life active participation is what i want,
and it's what i need,
and not for nothin', but it's what the F* i DO, duders.
yep.
the little things,
like extra buttery hottness in that yellow batter,
or the eleven degrees hotter oven,
for the last eleven minutes of baking,
or the true grits in with the grains for textural diversity in every bite.....
i get involved,
because i give a sh!t.
...yeah,
i do.
it all matters, in the spirit of gratitude and generosity.
how much effort is expended is what increases the intrinsic value
of all that activation.
i want my daughters to have the best time,
and i want to eat the best food,
and i want our one-uppin' worthy warrior poetic family togetherness
to be the best part of the big picture.
i know i look forward to it for weeks on end, all year long.
a few have had the feast, and y'all already know what's up.
it's gonna be good, and it's already gotten underway.
that's the truth.
*
i get the girls tonight.
yeah.
harvest and maple,
my two brightest spots in these darkening days.
we will be together for all the big fun a whole day early,
at the expense of another 'nother half a day of derailed workweek.
uh-huh.
i sometimes forget,
out of sight, out of mind, and out of reach,
about all the diaperbaby seahorse sallycakes in
the flatlands from where i originally hail.
the mere suggestion of snow shuts down their whole world,
and the hintings and whispers of a flurry or even a fleeting flake,
will have the best-laid and firmed-up plans all going straight to hell.
i'll just say it now, so we're clear-
road-toad fearfruit waternancy drivers, your sauce is F*ing weak.
word up.
so,
now, we're meeting up and switching seats today.
tuesday in the car with dad.
that's it.
yes,
i'll get an extra day with my daughters, and that's expert,
but,
i'll lose a day and a half of doing everything else,
it all always costs more than i have,
and i always pay it early and in full.
life is expensive,
and time is at a premium.
i'm spanning and spending and spitting hot fire,
and all of it is really happening.
i wouldn't want anything else;
never quiet, never soft.....

imperfect echoes.

neighbors,
i don't just like to eat pizza....
i LOVE pizza.
everywhere, all the time, in my face,
and in my bellyhole,
and in my oven, and on a plate, or in a box,
or whatever, whenever, forever and ever.
me and pizza are best friends.
that's no joke.
because pizza,
even at it's low-down dirty and most sh!ttiest moments,
has never let me down.
in fact,
as pizza and i have grown up, and matured,
and experienced life together,
we've only gotten closer,
and more expert,
and more fulfilled by each other as two entities that support and respect
our intertangled symbiotic synergy.
we're a woven work of art, pizza, and i.
i mean it.
i'm just sayin',
ever since i started using my elite underchee' method of crusty hottness activation,
i feel like pizza and i are more in love than ever before.
for realises.
cashews and tofu and garlic and olive oil and nootch and g.p.o.p.,
and smoked paprika, and cayenne, and turmeric, and black pepper,
all in together now, all working towards a powerful protein pesto,
and spread out behind the scenes and beneath the glamorous goodness
on a rough circle of doughy dopeness?
mmmmhmmmmm.
if you can't hang out with the underchee',
you actually just can't hang out.
that's a thing.
anyway,
last night a pizza saved my life.
well,
at any rate, a pizza or two, found a way to improve my evening.
yeah.
check the one-two-combination-type teleport:

too F*ing right!
caramelized baby sprankle brown sugar vidalia onion pizza,
with simple crushed tomato sauce,
over underchee' shmears,
on a beer-batter sourdough crust, with daiya(rrhea)chee' accents,
for that super-official cheesy pull.
can you feel me baby?
and i know you can.
hey, listen, man-
that was the first full-blown flavorful freshness i'd been feeling in a minute.
but,
of course,
that's not enough...
(it never is)
i had to go down on a whole other 'nother big business burly 'za blast.
check the double-dose-of delicious-type teleport:

too F*ing right, times two!!
brick-colored canadian-style smoky bacony chunks of vegan weirdie jauns,
and braised up, lightly seasoned sweet potato slices,
over that cheesy pull,
over that simple sauce,
over that underchee' on that thick crusty slab.
duders,
the baking stone did it's job,
and made the crust SO flippin' perfect.
overall, these babies got top marks,
and underneath, they got it poppin' with intention, attention, action, and overreaction.
there's a system in place,
and it works.
too much is the right amount,
and all of it all the time is really happening.
that's the whole point;
never quiet, never soft.....

apples to apples.

oh, man!
my saturday was as labor intensive as i'd imagined.
really,
the ins and the outs of time, in proportion to money,
in relation to effort,as it pertains to satisfaction,
was a total sh!t-salad sandwich of hard styles and harder feelings.
basically,
it wasn't my best day.
however,
my nighttime routine was altered slightly,
and i took the time to terrorize some fruit on the stovetop.
yeah.
the highlight of my spanned saturday timeline was slowly simmering
a squadron of apples on the stovetop.
uh-huh.
that's real.
slow cooking brown sugar and maple syrup, and vanilla beans,
with pulverized apple bits, and sweetened lemon juicy juice,
with a dash of all the pie-type spices, forever and ever,
was what my hands were busy stirring on throughout the dark hours, duders.
mmmhmmm.
homemade vegan apple butter business is the business i'm in, i guess.
why?
because i knew i was looking for something extra special this sunday morning,
and i am always aware that too much is the right amount....
so,
neighbors,
in the interest of unwarranted rewards for being alive and unwell every damned day,
check the expert-sunday-morning-special-type teleport:

maple brown sugar apple muffins!
so good for my face,
so much better for my morning,
so much best with that apple butter in the middle.
yep.
maple syrup sweetened crispy crawnchy cortland apples,
stewed down to a juicy compote,
and added into the oat flour and the wheat flour and the brown sugar,
and all the other other ingredients,
making the moistest mountainous molassesy mass of tuff-enuff muffin mix.
mmhmm.
and a whole mess of oats and cinnamon and butterishness,
and oatflour, and a dash of toasted coconut, for that dutch-style streusel.
because chunky autumny sprankles are SO rad on top of a muffin,
and that's real talk forever and ever and always.
no joke.
the thing is,
on their own,
these muffins have got the flavor and the freshness and the texture
and the hottness all poppin' off on point,
but with that dark, deep, dense, sweet-tart sweetheart jumpstart of
activated apple butter blasted basting??
it all goes instantly to eleven.
and that's where the worthy warrior poetry gets going.
yeah.
i may make it look easy,
like sunday morning,
but i go hard on my kitchen action,
every time.
i expect the same from my apples, too, guys.
i'm sayin',
if i'm ready to represent on hours of stirring the pot,
withOUT causing a commotion,
just for six bites of pure bliss?
well, yeah, right?
i mean it.
all that attention for a far shorter term of rewards.
now,
what are you gonna doo-doo to get freaky-diki with YOUR sh!t?
it's always worth the effort.
anything else is really unworthy of respect.
nobody likes lazy, nobody likes quitters,
and nobody likes a muffin without more to it;
never quiet, never soft.....

big fat frenchy fries.

baking up a tray of steak-cut thick slabs of french-style fried potatoes.
by the fourth friday in a row without dinner,
even i get a little disquieted.
and when there've been weeks of weak sauce seeping through the seams,
and nothing being really just what it seems,
i 'll eventually need to get activated,
and take that disquiet to the loud fresh hard limits
with gobstoppin' shark-gluttonous mouthfuls of beige.
huh?
yes.
beige.
like,
what color are frenchy taters?
yeah.
like that.
neighbors,
check the regionally-french-influenced-site-specific-suppertime-type teleport:

poutine.
poutine.
poutine.
ugh.
if you don't know, you'd better cherchez the internet, amis.
that bowl has got all the fatness, some of the hottness,
and so much gravy.
mmmmhmmmm.
that's what happens when time elapses and color fails me.
buff, dun, beige, blocks and chunks and slabs and blops.
all of it, in my face,
full of flavor and loathing and self-indulgent self-destruction.
i mean,
potatoes are like underground blarp lumps;
and gravy, even with a perfect blend of savory herbs,
is liquid fat sauce.
the broth-braised chee' chunks i used to simulate curds?
so heavy, and so good.
in it's uncooked state it's browner than the yelowish hue it holds afterwards.
that's because of the cayenne and the smoked paprika that complement
the cashews, garlic, nootch, and tofu.....
turmeric is a come-from behind kind of spice, though, kids-
it'll get a foothold, and then take right the F* over.
that's no joke.
oh,
and there are extra-super-turbo-firm tofu cubes in there too,
for a double-tan two-fer of cheesy simulation,
and added pig-out poutine protein justificiation.
i doo-doo that explain-it-away-to-make-it-ok style sh!t.
i'm like that, it turns out.
-
anyway,
i represented on some beige on beige on beige on beige business,
and i felt fuller in my stomach,
and desolate everywhere else.
real life, encapsulated in one monochromatic mealtime.
that's it.
***********
the weekend is here for y'all.
that's probably fun?
i dunno.
i'll be busy until tuesday at the tattbomb shop,
and then i'll be even busier in the mutha-'ucking kitchen
when i'm not on the road back and forth between hard places
and traffic jammie-jams.
today is the day for too much tattoo in not enough time,
tomorrow looks worse,
with too much tattoos and not enough money,
and monday?
being busy is good, but making progress is better.
i'm looking for bright spots,
but the dark circles under my eyes are drawing off the glare,
and keeping the bigger picture out of focus, just past the corner
of where i can see.
the day will unfold, that's for sure,
and the creases will create the contour map
for the highs and lows of another 'nother long november;
never quiet, never soft.....

cookies, correctly called.

no-bake!
uh-huh.
neighbors,
not baking is as delicious as baking sometimes.
specifically, this time, the oven was off but the range was roaring.
i mean it.
quick oats and fancy dried flake unsulphured coconut, and vanilla,
plus a hot pot full of vegan butter and raw sugar and peanut butter,
a whole heaping heck of a lot of cocoa,
with the added gluey gooey goodness of melted chocolate chips,
all mixed into a mass of  mushy magic!!!
yep.
i spent some time shaping blarpity blops of that shiny chunkin' chocolaty stuff.
and when i had some circles set up,
i brought the big action to bear with a clean thumbs up thumbed down
into the middle of each and every one,
and added a dollop of coconut and peanut butter and vanilla and cream chee'
and soymilk, all swirled into a thick chick-o-sticky stamp of super sexy sweetness.
c'mon.
you'd have to be an A*-hole not to be all about it.
don't be an A*-hole, guys.
it's bad for you.
do, however check the stovetop-cookie-type teleport:

yeah!
and i mean, YEAH!!
with a serious stripe of dark chocolate across each and every one,
to let you reaffirm that vegan bakery Folk Life activation is NOT F*ing around.
those little extras are big deals around these parts, kids.
because good enough is never enough, y'know?
that means finding ways to take it all to eleven all the time.
with that at the front of my mind, foremost in my thoughts, an' that-
i'm gonna be honest with y'all, though...
...i don't really always feel like it.
but,
i always DO it.
rules is rules, after all,
and since the consensus was reached,
and the decree was made to
  just be dope, or F* right off,
i'm forever doing my damnedest to be the best possible version of myself.
i'm pretty tired, too.
the thing of it is,
NOT doing it would be so much worse.
taking it easy is for jerks.
that's a thing.
try hard, pay attention, know stuff, and eat a cookie.
this is the way we live now;
never quiet, never soft.....

mo' mocha.

cake?
yeah!
coffee?
yeah!!
chocolate?
yeah!!!
all at once???
you'd better believe it, neighbors.
you know what i'm all about, right?
depth  and breadth, and complexity within a framework.
extrapolations between strong themes and intricate ingredients,
and also,
cake, b!tches.
that's a thing.
so i got out my bundty b-hole bucket,
and i filled it with all kinds of doo-doo brown batter.
yeah,
what?
stop it.
i mean, c'mon......i've been talking sh!t for decades,
so take it easy....i'm obviously like that.
and,
once all the ground espresso beans and cocoa,
instant coffee dust, vanilla and coffee reductions,
and melted chocolate magic were all combined and baked,
a buoyant ring of righteous rich, dark, turbo-charged super-hottness resulted.
that's real.
go ahead,
check the teleport:

mmmhmmm.
and i boiled down a coffee syrup, with confectioners sugar and soymilk,
and extracts of expert elixir-style driplets.....
i felt like i had to.
why?
because a glaze is sexy on a big bumpy brown donut of doom, duders.
the one fact i needed to consider at this point?
uh-huh, that only too much is the right amount.
so,
i also added creamy soyamilk chocolate icing stripes
to top and the sides of the whole dang thing,
just to take it to eleven.
fudgy cakey super rich mocha cake,
straight coffee-style glaze,
straight chocolate-style drizzle,
one hundred percent activated.
yes, indeed.
*
i take my day off pretty seriously.
i get a few hours of daylight to do what i want to.
usually,
my compulsion is to fire up the oven, and get busy with my bakery styles.
i love it,
and it gets results, too.
i mean,
a well-raked yard would only appreciated by my neighbors, really;
whereas a fresh baked block of barbarian brown bread is good for everybody.
i pick my spots,
and i choose my battles.
what's more,
i do what i do, always and forever.
i'm into it,
and i'm out of sorts when i'm off my game.
therefore,
it's all really happening,
and it's not okay to not happen.
more and more and more,
forever.
that's the plan, and it's being implemented every dang day;
never quiet, never soft..... 

the low low

well, neighbors,
i still do tattoos,
and i still haven't been able to transfer a decent picture from my phone,
which makes 'em look awesome,
to this computarded screen,
which always looks busted.
i did this on a friend, and it's pretty flippin' big....
the picture isn't winning, though, and that's no joke.
teleport:

low-down lotus jauns in full effect.
i figure i should at least show you something about what happens
during the time spanned across the middle section of almost every single day.
i have a series of overlapping systems,
and i've come to rely on their perpetual reliable presence applied to every dang day.
one of those systems is the one that makes pictures of tattoos
look worse than the real-life tattoos.
i expect it, and therefore it happens.
cultivated coincidences require a steady stream of fuel to feed them,
or else they're just be neglected happenstances, right?
right.
-
anyway,
i've been woring on a lot of large tattbombery stuff,
and i've been at work more than i care to be.
the thing of it is,
a grand don't come for free,
and that grind date is always right around the corner....
that means doing more all of the time.
it's kinda tiring, even for someone who only sleeps when their body
finally collapses into a spent heap in need of rest and repair.
but never relaxation.
never that.
ew.
when i'm asleep, my dreams are F*ing crazy.
i've never experienced more disappointment and resentment;
and panic, and far-reaching to-and-fro anxiety over formerly far-fetched flights
of super-fancy unnecessary nightcrawling and creepy creeping;
and anger, to eleven, and back again;
and all of that sort of other other sucky sh!t,
than i do when i'm sleeping.
welllllll,
except for whenever i'm awake.
.....i guess there is THAT.
awwwwwww, man.
cold days and long nights and hard styles and all of that,
all really happening, awake or asleep?
yeah.
that's a thing.
and i think it's MY thing.
i thought bad documentation of my days' labor was an uncool thing,
but this business of waking dreams and dreams about the waking world,
one lucid enough to seem real when it isn't,
and the other nightmarish enough to seem fake, when it's real?
it's worse.
sometimes,
a whole month of bad days is what's on the menu.
F*ing november, friends.
every. single. time.
*
a cursed and jinxed and bewitched entire page of the calendar?
believe it, or not, but it's still a thing regardless.
and what's more,
bad luck or not,
november can seriously go eff it's own A* right off of itself.
word up.
that's the only sentiment i can summon up to send past my sentient senses;
never quiet, never soft.....

enough is not enough.

i've got ivy going OFF in the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress.
constantly reaching, stretching, creeping, crawling, inching
every day, incrementally, inexorably, undeterrably towards something.
and i sure do like that.
check the one-windowsill-of-many-type teleport:

nature wins,
because nature doesn't compromise,
that's probably why i like my house full of plants.
they need what they need,
and they'll let you know what that is.
plants don't pretend everything is fine-
if it's too dark, they die.
if it's too wet, they die.
if it's too dry, they die.
if it's too bright, they die.
if it's too hot, too cold, too whatever,
they F*ing DIE.
talk about certainty, huh?
that means they like what they like,
and that's all that they like.
i can relate.
we have an understanding, and we stick to it.
i keep them alive and well,
they keep my air all kinds of cleansed up.
rules are rules, after all,
and we, my plants and i,
are the children of infinite nature and mother nature,
and we know about rules.
*
long nights, and cold ones.
holy crapola!
sixteen degrees is just not enough degrees.
that's not cool. or, anyway, it's TOO damned cool)
in a drafty old manor like mine,
it takes a lot of fire to warn off the chill and warm up the bones.
which means i'm shivering,
and i'm shaking,
and i'm wearing outside clothes inside,
over robes and fleecy frocks an' that.
it always gets harsher out in the woodsly world around me
in sympathetic symphonic sync with my moods.
that's really weird,
but cultivated coincidences are my specialty, i s'pose.
i hate november, guys.
it makes for a meandering mess-up of moulting, melting, and musing.
it gets kinda stale,
every november being such a bummer,
and it gets sorta suffocating,
even with all that ivy pumping out the freshness for my lungs.
it's that there's nowhere to go, only things to endure.
november is a whole month of grey sameness.
***********
sometimes, it seems everything is working out.
...and then, just like *that*, ,
all of a sudden,
it's just too much, all at once.
yeah.
i like that.
y'know?
a threshold is crossed,
supersaturation is achieved,
and thought becomes action.
too much is the right amount, neighbors,
and when there isn't any more room for adding on,
i think most folks start replacing old things with new things,
or sometimes,
replacing old people with younger ones for old times' sake.
that's an unfolding sequence of cause and effect,
it makes a whole new What Is, in the here and now,
while affecting the way things progress,
and distorting the memory of how things were,
when there isn't a way to keep doing what you're doing,
you've gotta do something different,
even if it's not that different at all....
it's like having a yard sale to make room in your garage or whatever,
just so you have the space to fill up with different sh!t.
we all want more,
even when there isn't any more around to be had.
heck,
we'll go out looking for more, elsewhere, when that's the case.
and what's worse, and less explicable to me, anyways,
is that we'll break what we've made,
just to experience the illusion of progressive motion,
when in reality, it's just repairwork to get back to where we were.
damn.
do y'know what the problem is with a plateau?
no.
it's not boredom.
c'mon.
boredom is what happens if you're boring.
i'm too busy to be bored.
huh?
ok, listen.
the biggest problem with leveling out,
is that you're now surrounded on all sides with slippery slopes.
i don't know about you guys,
but to me,
it sure seems like that would make it awfully hard to move forward.
so,
once you think you've reached a plateau,
it seems you're sorta stuck doesn't it,
unless you want to start back at the bottom.
which makes life start to seem a lot like a garage sale.
or am i crazy?
oh, ok.
but,
am i wrong?
that's right.
and that's more like it.
but,
if the only direction you'll travel is downhill,
where do we go from there?
december, actually.
i'm pretty sure that's where we're on our way to;
never quiet, never soft.....

why, yes, i'd LOVE some pie.

i want sweet treats,
and i want warm feelings,
and i want a seasonally inappropriate sass-blasting slab of sexiness
for all my tastebuds to enjoy as hard as possible.
the great news about all those wants?
i have the capability to make that sort of thing a reality.
and that's just precisely what i did.
neighbors,
check the pie-game-on-point-type-teleport:

yeah.
that creamchee' puffy flaked-out pastry crust activation is what's up.
thing is,
it's harder to do fancy stuff with the delicate crumb of that stuff.
so sliced out stars, and pinched edges is all we get.
however,
the inside is totally flippin' expert.
i mean it.
there are slivers of strawberries layered along the very bottom,
and there are vanilla-bean-infused, raw-sugar caramelized bartlett pear
ALL up in it, for maximum soft, sugary, syrupy succulence,
and then even MORE strawberries on top of that,
all hiding out under the cover of that buttery blanket of dough, yo.
mmmmmmmmm.
wait.
strawberry-pear filling?
does that even work?
oh yes.
it works, and it works well.
duders,
i get busy with a slice of pie.
especially when it's thick, and wet, and also sweet,
and also in my mouth.
ummmm.
yeah.
....oh, c'mon!
***********
not talking is hard.
well,
for me anyway.
but thinking is also tough to do,
when there are too many things that need musing
and mulling
and working out
and puzzling over,
peering into,
and pondering upon,
and all of that sort of heavy-duty heavyweight wearing worry-type jauns.
yup.
i think fast,
but sometimes,
i gotta slow it down, rewind, and play it all back a few more times.
my mind isn't exactly racing these days,
but there's a fire roaring in there all the same.
i gotta think about it,
before i can be about it.
thinking isn't the same as doing something,
but it sure helps get the ball rolling,
especially if it's headed downhill;
never quiet, never soft..... 

am i blue?

holy sh!t, neighbors.....
y'know what i woke up to this morning?
yeah!!
a mutha-flippin' snow day?!?!
indeed i did.
and that means anything can happen.
check the first-bluish-blush-of-winter-type teleport:

awwwww, man.
it's too soon for my tastes,
but it sure is pretty.
and we all know i'm a sucker for pretty.
i get down with that super official superficiality.
what can i say?
i'm an aesthete.
i'll go for pretty on the skin, and ugly from within more often than not....
y'know?
opposites attract, after all.
and pretty is not what i've got going for me.
being old and busted is what i do.
but, then again, as a result, so is being dope.
y'gotta balance it all out somehow.
that's a thing.
i s'pose it IS a fair trade.
anyway,
back to this day's snow magic-
the wintry cotton puffs are falling off the trees in slouching sloughing sloppy slumps,
and it's already getting grosser outside.
that's the infinite nature of ma nature, isn't it?
bringing it on, and then taking it away.
pulchritudinis ruinas, after all, y'all.
fleeting flakes are still arriving, too.
too little, and too late.
i guess that's how it all really happens.
anything...everything...and nothing, all at once,
overlapping and icing over into interconnected crystals,
dissolving back into water,
evaporating upwards into clouds,
and moving across the woodsly goodness in great gray crashing waves.
today is a snow day,
and there's a special kind of spellcraft in that.
ugly can be beautiful, as long as it goes to eleven.
but pretty?
that can't ever be much more.
here's to all of us,
taking this snow day to the darkest and then to the brightest,
and back again.
today is the day for making magic-
today is the day for doing something;
never quiet, never soft.....

breakfast in beige.

so much oatmeal.
i mean it.
but, not that chunky jauns, though.
i'm talking about ground up oat groats,
all floury an' that.
oaten magic is delicious,
especially on cold mornings.
i got a bowl, and i dropped a stick of balanced earthy butteriness in it,
and then a dollop or three of vegan creamchee',
and all the flours.
oat, mostly,
but also wheat,
and tapioca, too.
i had a half a cup of ground coconut hiding in my refrigerator,
and i added that in (to no noticeable effect) as well.
the thing is,
i wanted scones, or so i thought...
but it turns out i wasn't feeling especially prone to the nostalgia of scone activation.
so,
i improvised a little, and made some new new hottness.
once i added a little sugar and salt,
and some rising agents,
and some wet blops and glops,
i folded the dough sixteen times,
in half and with a half turn, each time.
SO many layers show up when you do that, neighbors,
and that's expert.
i chopped up some dried cranberries,
but that seemed inadequate to my needs,
so i also got two kinds of raisins, for extra big action.
those little golden baby ones,
and the burly brownified elderly grape sultana blops,
in equally large handfuls,
made the dough super official.
i cut 'em into circles.
i did.
i mean,
it turned out what i really wanted was burly barbarian biscuits, b!tches...
and those round-style jauns are what's poppin'.
check the teleport:

yeah!
with some lemon-almond drizzle stripes,
and a dusty puff of cinnamon, too?
c'mon.
i'm not trying to slouch on my big breakfast business.
no way, not once, not ever...
*
there will always be treats.
i said it;
it's documented;
i meant it.
consider it a decree.
no matter what else is swirling around,
there are things that need doing.
and i do what i do.
i even do too much of it, too.
that's supposed to be the right amount.
(it might be not enough)
i guess i'll just keep it up,
because what else would i do?
that's it;
never quiet, never soft.....

looking forward...

y'ever look at the world around you,

and wonder how you're a part of it, 

and not apart from it?

i mean,

i do things, i make things, i say things- 

and i do a lot of all of it, and often.

but that occurs within a mountain vale,

widely invisible from practically everywhere else,

and equally unnoticed by almost the entirety of right here.

yeah.

so really,

how much of it is indispensable, and how much of it is disposable?

none and all, in that order, neighbors.

i couldn't get by without active participation and competent communication,

but those things aren't gonna weave their way into a wider world of

worthy warrior poetry.

maybe,

just maybe, 

the small sphere of woodsly goodness IS my entire sphere of influence.

that seems pretty small. 

but,

probably, (and far more likely)

the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress, despite being a big ol' house,

marks the even more limited and constricted edge of rememberance,

and the beginnings of forgetting the hard works and soft spots of, and for, 

my hard hands and harder styles....

yikes.

that's quite possibly why i write this, friends-

to refresh your memory.

i don't want t have to tell you to think of me,

but i want there to be something to think about if/when you do.

i make stuff and i show you, 

i think stuff and i tell you,

i do stuff and i document it in real life, 

for posterity far more than prosperity,  

introspection and reflection on the value of intangible ideas is tough, guys.

i mean it.

and i'm applying the template i've learned to rely on.

uh-huh.

i just told y'all what is is.

alright, allow me to repeat it, one more time, with feeling:

just be dope, or F* right off.

that's all there is,

and everything else is suspect.

in fact,

i have a nagging suspicion that my nagging suspicions 

are more like cultivated coincidences than insightful gut instincts.

i may be a werewolfen battle-beast when it comes to conversation and appetites,

but i'm too cold and calculating to apply rosy-colored lenses to my honey-colored eyes 

when i'm looking into and seeing What Is.

do you follow?

no?

ok,

check it out:

see?

that's the way the secret universal plan works....

you can't tell what's gonna happen up ahead,

but there's still enough path visible to formulate some sort of plan 

for the traveling that lies beyond this exact instant. 

veering off path because there might not be as much road as you thought?

that seems like a bad idea. 

slowing down, and looking closer might serve you much better, no?

yep.

i thought so too....

i'm barely moving a muscle, but i'm trying to see what's beyond the fog. 

***********

word words words words words.

ugh.

the thing about november?

.....is that it sucks ALL the balls.

and what's more, it does a bad job of it every time.

as a result, 

i find myself at a loss....

no. not for words.

never that.

just of whatever wasn't bad a little minute ago.

and, because  tippity-tap and type the true story of spanning time

with the walls of a finite calendar page...

and it is FULL of words.

this is that time of year when the overlapping circles 

of spirit and memory tend to show their seams,

and the lumps and bumps of those imperfect spheres

produce nothing but broken-record-style broken echoes, 

repeating themselves, over and over,

except there's no refraining from the refrain,

and it doesn't fade away...

the next verse is the same as the first,

only a little bit louder, and a little bit worse.

ew.

november travels along a moebius strip with the most obvious taped-together joinery,

i see where it starts and ends, but i'm still rolling along the entire length of both sides,

and there's no splitting it back into a top and bottom.

so, i guess, really, it's pretty one sided after all.

real life continues to unfold, just within the eyeline of today.

and today is the day, just like every day;

never quiet, never soft.....

no-vember

i see a lot of stubbly dummies these days.
i guess it's no-shave november?
alas, neighbors,
i just don't believe in that sort of thing,
as i am clearly a man every day, around the clock, all year long.
i don't reserve thirty days for playing dress up as a burly barbarian.
don't get me wrong,
it's cute the way these guys are trying out full-fledged man status for a minute.
i guess that's a thing that goes on these days?
trial-sized experiences, and taste-test samples of really real life?
y'know something, guys?
i can't hang out with that.
i do what i do, and i don't make decisions i haven't weighed first.
i s'pose i'm alone in that?
maybe.
i'm alone in the Fortress today, at any rate,
and the skies aren't cooperating with my plans for kamikaze blitzing all the leaves
piled inches high across the grounds,
covering every inch of the earth around my house.
the idea was to clean up my mind and clean up the gardens,
and amass all that A* into huge heaps...
...or pyres, really,
for burning down the house and tidying up the unfinished business
of another 'nother tough autumn.
yeah.
however,
it doesn't look good for doo-dooing much yard work.
i mean,
it's already masochistic-
ruining a whole day with responsible adulthood's worst attribute.
uh-huh.
i'm talking about maintenance, of course.
it's SO much less rewarding, (and apparently very boring)
to just keep up with what you've already got.
but then to also being cold and wet the whole time you perform this most odious task?
that seems just plain stoopid.
and if there's one thing i'm not, it's stoopid.
at least i've already got a beard, huh?
mmhmm.
*
i think it would be more appropriate, really,
if we put forth an idea i think we can all actually endorse.
no-hope november.
right?
check the teleport:

ugh.
i found it today,
while pulling out the dead and busted crusty bits
from the leafy leavings along my entryway.
that's what hope looks like, amid the dregs of a northern autumn.
pretty ragged, very haggard, not the least bit hearty, hardy, nor hale....
i'll be honest,
i really don't think it's doing too well.
can you dig it, kids?
i figured you could.
no-hope november.
it's surprisingly easier than not shaving will ever be;
never quiet, never soft.....

there will always be cake.

no matter what, neighbors,
the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress does NOT get cheap with the treats.
that's real.
i get up early and i get going almost immediately.
it's just that i really respect hard work,
and i really really respect results.
also,
i am very frequently cold.
like,
it's cold outside, it's cold inside,
and i'm cold inside and outside.
the best way for me to get a little warmer, in all regards,
is to fire up the oven.
y'know?
it's a whole big ol'  bunch of expertism,
having a hotbox doing double duty as a sugar-and-flour alchemy spot,
and an ambient-temperature raising rig,
and it's both of those things while it also boils water for my tea.
today is the day, duders.
11-11.
yup.
that's the hottness, all damned day long.
and it has to be,
because those are the flippin' rules.
anyway,
i love treats,
and i need to make 'em when i'm feeling like there's a storm brewing in
the woodsly goodness.
no.
not like a cold front.
like a savage stormswept raging battle-beastly berserker-style jauns.
baking is an exercise in methodical patience.
it's good, and it's good for the meditative calm it imparts on me.
mmhmm.
but when i woke up this morning,
i knew i needed to get loud, fresh, and hard for your face,
because a double eleven is a serious thing.
check the teleport:

wu-TANG!!!
coffee cake.
no. not coffeecake.
coffee. cake.
like,
there's coffee in it.
not for it.
i used allllll the styles, too-
instant dissolved stuffs,
triple-espresso cold-brew business,
and a dash of the extract, too.
yeah!
coffee cake.
and in the middle, between that moist and magical split brown crumb sh!t?
creamy, dreamy, incredibly expert coconut creamchee' frosty blops.
yup.
that's no joke.
and on top of all of that elite sweetness?
coffee-laced, and coffee-infused coconut frosting.
wordimus prime.
too much is the right amount.
and that's how you know it's on point.
i do what i do, no matter what.
*
today is the day.
and i'm busy.
like, super busy.
all day long.
and that's good news, too.
i mean it.
nobody likes lazing around.
nothing happens when you do that.
and really, when we are discussing Folk Life in these mountains,
i'm pretty sure it's ALL really happening.
which is not to say things aren't happening elsewhere.
i'm SO sure they are.
it's just that this is my life, here,
and that's all i can speak on.
the good news?
i'll speak on it at length,
through a mouthful of cake.
there's always something good, kids.
it's just not always proportionately capable of overcoming;
never quiet, never soft.....

hard truths.

it's just easier to be hard when you're a true storyteller.
y'know?
saying things that are actually things,
no matter how much they reflect the hot fire and lightning
of a conscience-less secret universal plan?
that's a hard style.
but,
of course,
the wrench will always turn itself if you're take too long to choose it.
i'm not saying warrior poetry is the paean of the path to happiness.
far from it, really.
after all,
when you're a truth teller telling stories,
you only tell true stories.
and that's the damned dirty hard-edged rough-ridden bitter brutal thing of it...
you gotta tell the truth.
otherwise,
really real life will find a way to bite you in the A*-hole.
it always does.
sure,
a good delivery goes a long way towards administering the bad medicine sometimes,
but,
even the glibbest tongue won't support a flawed fable.
rules is rules,
facts are facts,
and nobody stays here by faking reality in any manner whatever.
the worst part about looking at What Is?
seeing What Is.
i mean no matter how beautiful the language,
no matter how balanced the storyline,
and with plot twists notwithstanding,
the truth is pretty ugly.
i guess that's probably what i love about it.
you gotta stay ugly, and you gotta stay dope.
i like what i like,
and everything else can pretty much be destroyed.
ummmmmm,
good morning, neighbors!
i just remembered,
it's november.
truly,
it's always the worst;
never quiet, never soft.....

out of focus, on the level.

maple star.
that's my daughter.
and this is her hallowe'en costume....
check the aether-style-airship-captain-type teleport:

bowler hat;
power glove;
dirigible-pilot privateer goggles;
aviators' airship earhart scarf;
glowing tesla-style plasma pack.......
neighbors,
when it comes to that steamy punkiness?
yup.
we GOT they.
*
awwwww, man.
it isn't ever easy-
having family togetherness, apart from each other.
but photographic evidence of the expert active participation
we produce through overlapping our spheres of interest is proof-positive
that the investment of time and energy is well worth it..
we do our best to be a team,
even though we aren't geographically proximal.
i guess the important thing,
the one i keep reminding myself of,
is that i'm a pretty lucky ugly duckling, duders.
i get to span time with the good ones,
and that's some pretty good news.
maybe not every minute of every day all the time.....
which sucks on the face of it.
but,
we make the time we have matter more for the scarcity.
it isn't special if it's always.
that's real.
i'm glad i got this picture, better a little late and a bit blurred,
than never ever...
...and i AM grateful that i was considered at all.
that's a whole other 'nother bonus.
there are worse things than being apart;
never quiet, never soft.....

cooking.

i haven't made dinner in a little minute over here.
that's the truth.
sure,
i make food,
and y'all already know i'm still going hard at my treats game,
but i haven't made a meal in over a month.
that has got to be a new low for the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress test kitchen.
it's not cool.
and just swallowing down nutrients, unnurtured and denatured,
for sustenance without substance?
i'm pretty sure that's a bad thing.
intention and attention are important when nourishing the big picture, neighbors.
it's kind of the whole point, y'know?
like, ALL of it is what's really happening.
so,
ALL of it is important.
i s'pose i need to get up on it,
get off of this weeklong maker's hiatus,
and start this stove the F* up.
on the ones,
even though my morning routine is tremendously comforting?
uh-uh.
teleport:

it's not cooking.
Tea'N'Toast i love the most.
but i'm missin' the passion of pots and pans.
real talk.
and all that beige on aqua-colored stoneware just makes me more motivated
to get way more expert, and dominate this week in culinary hottness.
yikes.
it's not just about knives and forks-
that's more of a symptom than a cause-
in really real no-foolin' actual life?
it's all about shortcomings.
ugh.
well,
shortcomings and the ability to critically look at yourself.
right?
alright.
the thing is,
the rules are the rules when you're reppin' warrior poetry....
and rule numero uno is the all-encompassing template for active participation.
you know what it is don't you?
yuuuuuup.
that's correct-
just be dope, or F* right off.
yeah.
if you were making a plot summary of worthy woodsly goodfellowship,
that would be the one sentence to accurately distill and describe the concentrated essence.
mmmhmmm.
it's a hard style, and there are no grey areas between the dopeness and the doo-doo butter.
damn.
that also means it's past time for your favorite hairy hermit to stop F*ing off.
yuck.
i just took up a whole week of making nothing?
gross.
no costumes, and no dinners, either?
am i not invited to my own table?
take it easy, kids.
i'm ON it.
there will be more of all of it,
as of right now.
cuisine is on deck,
costumes are in the works,
tattbombin' craptasms are unfurling their minky tendrils every day,
and i'm even gonna get that yard-work tard-word rake jauns poppin',
as well as my cake reality all the way on point.
there's more to do than time to do it,
but all of it has to get done.
more more more more MORE MORE MORE MORE.
that's what we want,
that's all there is;
never quiet, never soft.....