it really is in the air.

nate waited a whole year to get tattooed during my visit

and when the time finally came 'round,

he opted for a little good touch/ bad touch big action.

a real 'diamond in the rough', as he put it.

that's some poetry, ya'll.

especially since he was all buffed up baby smooth and shiny.

kewpie dolls and vanilla skies occupied the remainder of the day,

as did some ghostbustin' supermoms.

word...

spring must be en route,

special delivery an' that, too, my ninjas.

because i am tellin' all ya'll;

three days ago it was negative degrees outside.

and today,

it's pretty mutha-uckin' positive, and that's no joke.

so warm and sunny, son,

that i'm not even rockin' my super-sexy topcoat.

at all.

shawn, meryl, and my new in-person friend, camden 

all got up early-shirley this morning,

and headed to the crusty punk-rock hippie co-op breakfast joint.

we all ate a big fat heaping helping of morning glory.

then,

after camden went to work,

the rest of us all went to the walker,

for some art-attack action,

involving books,

some interesting floorplans,

false elevators,

a beat-up buick,

and a truly filthy day-glo AND blacklight post-hiroshima

french avant-garde bestiary of boners.

i'm sayin',

there were so many thick and tumescent yarn and wax weiners on display 

i felt like i was back at home!!!!

c'mon.

that's not exactly accurate,

but those weiners were in full effect. 

when it comes to moths and snails made out of slithery ghost sausages,

today definitely goes to eleven.

recognize.

now it's a brief sunday afternoon work attack,

making never quiet, never soft apparel for your style-point scorecard.

once they're done,

as in:

this afternoon,

you'd better contact me or shawn,

and get your minky little mince-chops on a fresh-to-death piece of the action.

we're here.

it's happening.

it's so good.

never quiet, never soft....

camera-shy?

friday the thirteenth was pretty intense.
i tattooed a very nice important executive lady named debbie,
while shawn and i rocked our collective socks off to
'the rocky horror picture show' soundtrack,
and later on, i closed out the day with my new friend, mr. palmer.
a man who can appreciate a fine posterior,
and has gigabytes of memory devoted to that appreciation.
his phone is a miniature digital altar to the latter day church of butt.
no joke.
i'm actually surprised his phone will even let him call his mom,
because that amount of cheeks-for-weeks passion is so sinful,
that cellular should blush with embarrassment.

in the interest of taunting,
rather than tempting, fate;
there were broken mirrors, umbrellas open indoors, unread, smashed fortune cookies,
and i've gotta make mention of the cameo made by a tattoo of some praying hands
which ended in an unintentional pair of palm-piloted rumpty dumplings
that would've run the hardest hard drive on mr. palmer's phone, had he known,
with the added extra hottness of his sleeve covering all of the hands BUT the butt,
with a banner reading 'hold fast' underneath.
(that's what SHE said)
he also had a lip tattoo that spelled out 'T-I-T-I-E-S'
THAT was pretty serious.
leave off a T, in the middle, i guess,
for extra awful, gollum-y sad, sprung, broken, spring breakable boobs.
on a more fulfilling note;
spring rolls were inhaled,
as were the many different kinds of root-style beer chilling out in the identity tattoo fridge.
shawn skipped 'em, because of his delicate ethical sensibilities,
which just meant more fluid ounces for washing down everyone else's pancakes, an' that.
todd and i enjoyed a pair of big, thick, hard black stumps together,
as well as a heart-to-heart heart string heart attack.
that sh!t definitely went to eleven.
the dude knows what's up.
and that's so flippin' cool,
because not a lot of folks see What Is for what it is;
i'll be honest, my ninjas,
the peoples i got,
i couldn't ask for any better than.
and that's word.

now,
ya'll may have noticed a dearth of photos from my trip thus far.
anybody care to guess why?
yep.
it wouldn't be an albie rock traveling road show
if the airplane part didn't f* up some of my sh!t.
my camera was lost somewhere in transit.
i'll say lost,
and not stolen,
but only because even if it was stolen,
it'll still be lost.
so,
add a new camera to the 'to do' list.
a small price to pay
for the priviledge of spanning time amongst the fine and
upstanding warrior-poets of minneapolis.
we even went out and had japanese food,
complete with dumplings in throat-flaying pain sauce!!
i am grateful for all the generosity of these crazy kids.
i am lucky to have the time i'm enjoying here.
today is the day.
so is every day.
my last day of official work at identity tattoo,
...until the next time.
long talks, long nights, longfellow's tattoos,
it's all really happening,
that's the whole point;
never quiet, never soft....

unlucky number thirteen.

pure evaporated henry weinhard's root beer.
that must have been what the storm clouds were made of yesterday,
because the rootin' tootin' sassafras shootin' thunder was coalescing in the studio
all damn day long.
baked potatoes,
indian goobieblops,
fresh baked maple scones, dropped, and replucked from off the floor at deep discounts,
and some epic vegetable soup, with macaroni magic
all filled my belly to the breaking point.
gastronomically, yesterday blew me away.
so much so, in fact,
that four mere minutes into a movie,
i was dreaming about geysers and wolfmen pretty hard.
yesterday also saw some serious tattooing.
serious as in:
hummingbirds, feathers, and ambigrams.
and it held a healthy portion of time-spanning with my peoples too;
drawing, foam cutting and grocery-getting also figured in prominently.

today is the day.
friday the thirteenth, redux.
the second one in a row.
successive jinx-proof weekend starters can mean only one thing:
this thirteenth has got to go to eleven....
it's the official unofficial party day at identity tattoo.
the root beer is chilled.
the not-casual friday attire is ready to be worn in haute couture high hard style,
and there's probably some pancakes and mapley syrupy aromas somewhere in there, too.
i'm to be drinking REAL coffees, all day,
just to make sure that the nordic frenzy of berserking battle stays at fever pitch.
well after the eight o'clock bell tolls, too.
if you've got asbestos underpants,
today's the day to put 'em on and head on in,
because that's the only way to save your special bits from a scalding skaldic singeing,
i'm warning you now;
the hot fire and flavorful barbarian bouillion are about to be administered in
unfathomable quantities to any and all weak-sauce spots,
in an all-out war on waterbaby sodapants b!tch-sappery.
savage stormswept gypsy stone soup is on the menu, my ninjas.
the lightning-striking vikings at identity tattoo are all on board,
and we're riding this day all the way to valhalla.

no foolin',
it's been great so far over here.
so much so that i really did konk out early last night.
the woodsly goodness,
for all it's Folk Life keep it realism,
does NOT operate at a breakneck city-limits pace.
that said,
i'd rather collapse exhausted into the night,
and wake up at the asscrack of dawn prepared for whatever's clever,
as active a participant as i can be,
as hard as i can be,
for as long as i can be,
than to play the wallpaper wallflower role,
watching the all-the-way-live action, unscripted way of the warrior unfurl around me,
creating What Is bit by bit, moment by moment,
until history is hot on the heels
of the diligently documented really-real happenings of the bet-busy big action.
i'm telling you,
i'm prepared to alter the traditional tar and feather funtimes,
and hit each one of you with a smear-face b!tch-slap of adhesive ointment,
and a big, bad, blowhard huff n' puff poof of trimmed and tossed-out shorthairs, too.
which is to say,
i'll werewolf you!!,
before you catch me sitting on the sidelines,
watching without working.
each and every j.a.f.o. can take it deep.
(just a f*n' observer)
pick a side,
take a stance,
have an opinion.
in or out,
burly badass barbarian or cookie-cuttin' seahorse.
live free, or die.
don't dream it, my ninjas,
BE IT.
have a hand in your own play.
play the role of your own self at the live-action saga of your real life.
just be dope.
or,
f* right off.
....i werewolf you;
never quiet, never soft....

thor's day thunder....

what?
did you think that because i don't go flashin' it
out from under my topcoat,
seeking perverse approval behind some bushes in the park,
that i'd forgotten how?
that's right, my ninjas.
tat-BLASTING is what's a-poppin' up in here.
kyle unobtrusively, quietly, and sort of stoically requested an infusion of hottness,
probably only because it is mutha-uckin' freezing over here.
that non-new england affect, or lack thereof,
is hard to get used to.
i guess it isn't lack of enthusiasm,
but some type of location specific aversion to high-volume
berserker barbarian battle-beastliness.
it's weird as sh!t, i can tell you that.
i wasn't sure i was going to be up to zappin' the fresh-to-death
flashdance destruction while i was stayin' in this area.
i mean, shamrocks, sports logos, and celtic cross memorials
have been the short-order cookout cookoff contest of the past few months,
but,
it turns out,
all it takes is a quick "tribal initials plus teardrops of blood" warm up session,
and i'm ready to rock.
that dancing elephant is doing the 'ed lover dance' for sure,
the booty-wop/stop/drop/roll.....

and without any really genuine surprised looks from anyone,
the cultivated coincidences are rolling in fast and deep.
that's just how the fertile fields get reaped.
shawn rocked his butthole off on a dope viking helmet, too.
and we ate at a different ethnic doo-doo dollop establishment last night.
brown blops of pureed power!!!
indian food, ya'll.
and it was f*n' good, too, my ninjas.
the eleventh went to eleven.
but, i mean,
c'mon,
was there ever really any doubt?

vegan scones.
root beers.
drawing sessions.
the smell of pancakes.
i am grateful for this opportunity.
i am grateful for the worthy warrior-poets i span time with.
thor's day thunder promises to be as entertaining as wotan's wednesday, too.
i predict horseplay, tomfoolery, and cantankerous cavorting
in copious quantities from minneapolis to maple grove and back again.
the winds are blowin'.
still.
but instead of the wind chill icing down everything,
that biting breeze is just fanning the flames of hot hot fire that are blazing
like false-light lighthouses,
luring in the unsuspecting lutherans to a trial by combat
with the battle-bards and art-destroyers assembled alongside me.
we're ready to rock out louder and harder than yesterday.
every day.
and the winds still blow.
i wonder if there's any answers wafting in on 'em.
we'll see, yo.
we'll see...

i'm just sayin',
i realize you had a choice today...
thank you for choosing the wrench;
never quiet, never soft....

time travel and caffeine.

i'm here.
it's dope.
and everyone is always so nice to each other.
i like it.

i had one too many real-deal non-nancypantsed coffees yesterday,
coupled with the back-to-the-futuristic subtracting of one hour from real o'clock,
and delays,
brisk jogs,
bad weather,
and even worse weather.
the result?
stayin' up late,
freezing icestorms,
brown babybooty dirty diaperloads of delicious ethiopian food,
narrowly connected flights,
a jeff goldblum/miami vice impersonating tattle-baby,
some kid named chuck who is definitely gonna punch some other kid,
root beers on demand,
and a pretty healthy dose of much needed awesome.
the amount of excellence we're determined to cram-pack
and jam-stuff into a narrow space is borderline pornographic.

i only hope that my unique bedside manner as a house-guest and a tatzapper won't wear thin with my hosts.
in either place.
a little albie rock goes a loooong way.
sorta like poison ivy, if you feel me....
i'm grateful for the generosity of two absolutely excellent temporary
stomping/watering/resting grounds.
i'm not sure if i'm supposed to bring the thunder,
or the gentle introspective helpfulness of a positively charged participant in the lives of these terrific folks.
i'm leaning, naturally,
towards the thunder.
after all,
it's the eleventh.
it's a full moon.
it's mutha-flippin' freezin',
and it's earlier here than at home.
wotan's day is already ready, already.
thick black burning spring-rolls of nicotiana tabacum
are also rumored to be making a cameo at some point.
i didn't bring any matches,
but even in the steady march lion winds of the prairie,
blazing the cherry-tipped poker ends of 'em shouldn't be a problem.
i mean,
i spit hot fire, right?
never quiet, never soft....

either you make it,

or you don't.
i finished part of the painting.
only the big fun cereal box foreground.
i even added little symbolic insignia!
however,
the background isn't even being considered.
no pictures this time......
there's just too much midwest magic being planned on.
in any case,
i'm packed,
stacked,
locked,
and loaded.

if you see me at the airport,
being strip/body cavity searched,
pop a head in (not into me, into the cubicle)
and say hello.
i'll be the gentleman in the brown herringbone tweed....
or, the naked handcuffed fella.
just look for the handsome beard....
breakfast in new hampshire,
lunch in philadelphia,
dinner in minnesota, mutha-uckas.
never quiet, never soft....

buzzer-beaters.

i may actually finish this stormtrooper of woodsliness after all.
an early evening of acrylic angst is on the schedule for a second consecutive day.
so far, so good.
prussian-style policeman of hot fire and lightningbolt natural law enforcement.
this guy is lookin' more and more like a villain out of indiana jones-
except maybe not an alien....
now,
observing that similarity in style,
i should state emphatically that
in no way do i endorse the belief system of any oppressive movement.
ever.
but let me tell ya,
i have to admit those naughty deutschlanders
had some pimp-ass uniforms.
easily the best-looking military in modern memory.
too bad their whole flavor was a sh!t-salad sandwich.
weak-sauce in fresh coats.
i'm sayin'.

anyway,
i've got a blistering case of the "gottas".
as in:
gotta go and tatzap today.
gotta pack.
gotta get a good night's sleep,
gotta wake up early,
gotta drive far as f* to the airport,
(the woodsly goodness is accessible only by mountain pass, after all)
and gotta mentally prepare
for the hottest fire ever spat out on the plains of minnesota.
oh, and of course,
it's flippin' snowing.
yep.
yesterday,
it was 'dude-guy wearin' shorts-type' weather,
and today,
we've got frosty the inappropriate snowman f*ing up my sh!t.
nice.

just one more day of doo-doo butter, kids,
and then it's goin' to be a whole week of hellfire and damnation!!
by tomorrow afternoon,
the travelin' albie rock one man show will be appearing live in maple grove.
if you aren't ready,
you better GET ready, ninja.
berserker barbarian battle-beasts,
warrior poets,
battle bards,
and lightning-striking vikings.
lock, stock, and barrel:
the wrench in the works is headed west;
never quiet, never soft...

springing ahead.

ate that hour right up,
the springtime savings did.
somehow saving an hour tonight
by losing a sliver of sleep last night?....
we set our sundials ahead at 7 p.m.,
so as not to forget about it later on.
so really,
i was living in the future for 7 whole hours.
flux capacitor, indeed.
what did the time/space anomaly do for me?
well,
we watched a grim, bleak, and depressing movie,
ate some quick and easy dinner,
and i almost finished a book before i fell asleep,
at the same time i always do,
excepting and accepting that the alarm clock alarmingly read the future time instead....
i still woke up at six,
but damn if it didn't feel like 5, y'know?


this morning i got a-crackin' on the arthur-making almost immediately,
after tea and toast,
and only just stopped a second ago.
i'm gonna try and finish this fella before i fly off to full moons
and full friday triskaidekaphobias.
of course,
if i don't,
then i don't.
that's an inescapabale truth, ya'll.
you either make it,
or you don't.
hard-style matter-of-fact brutality.
that's the infinite nature of What Is.
i fail a LOT.
but,
i also have a hand in a whole mess of goings-on at any given time,
so on average,
by sheer volume,
i succeed more often than i tank it.
it still hurts when i don't make the magic happen,
but i look at it as a positive thing.
if it doesn't hurt when it doesn't work,
then how invested in what i was doing was i really?
y'hear me?
if it doesn't matter, then don't do it,
and if it does,
do it as hard as you can, for as long as you can,
in as many different ways as you can.
until there's not much left but spirits and memories.
real life always ends up as ghost circle smoke rings at the end.
use it up,
wear it out,
make do,
or do without.
that's some wise washerwoman wisdom up there, my ninjas.
and it's the big bad action, an' that, if you know how it works.
after every harvest,
after all that toil and trouble,
and after the full-bellied hibernation and preservation,
once the feast is all used up,
you save the seeds and start a new situation,
just as soon as it thaws,
or before, even,
if you know how to trick the temperature to jump-start all that new growth.
heart-wrenching hot fire,
all the way past the 1-10 scale, up to eleven,
has got to extend the growing season a bit on either side....
an hour gained,
and hour lost,
darker lights,
lighter darks,
without that bitter, mutha-uckas, you know....
if you aren't just being dope,
then you're missing the point.
-where we're going, we don't need roads;
never quiet, never soft...

and i'm done with this one....

okay,
so now the guy has a peach or two to snack on.
so why peaches?
is there a symbolic innuendo to be read into?
y'know the sort:
there's pits in every sweetness,
under-the-surface hardcore hard cores an' that....
representational fruit, kids,
like trees of knowledge, long life, or vaginas-
is that what's goin' on here?
nope.
peaches are fuzzy, and delicious.
and, i don't have a lot of different colors of cheap craft paint.
i do have red, yellow, and white, though,
which makes the choice of fruit that much simpler.
bananas, apples, oranges, lemons, and peaches.
i picked peaches.
i like peaches.
and that's the whole insider big action on that.
i also do kinda like the occult seance spell pattern etched into the smoky tooth fire hand.
and i'll be honest:
those time cards i bought years ago have been an endless source of background inspiration ever since.
i even rocked the color-coordinated spirit mites, my ninjas.
those're important details in the world of the woodsly goodness, for sure.

it's springlike as heck outside!
i woke up to high forties temps, and wet windy air....
there's mud, and snow, and red squirrels everywhere.
i'm tellin' ya,
those little rodents are pushy and pouty when the 'compost' doesn't make it outside
on a tight and predictable schedule.
they'd make great organized crime collection agents, y'know?
i wonder, sometimes, if these little agents of ratatosk
aren't delivering some secret-coded blueprint from the super top-secret universal plan....
if so,
my eyes and ears are open,
and i'm huckin' out whole hunks of hot toast in payment for the information.
pity i don't speak squirrel,
although i am passingly familiar with nuts.
as in crazy,
c'mon.
(ok, you got me, AND as in balls!)


what is wrong with me?
i get amped on something,
and then just run away like a shoplifter with it, huh?
german stormtroopin' bobot zombie smokers?
c'mon. c'mon. c'mON.


ice dam damnation.
(now you see where the handy tooth model comes from)
i smashed  sh!t-ton of a lot of cold cold water with a hammer yesterday, too.
that manly business is super satisfying, i can tell ya.
there's just a certain kind of contentment that comes from bashing
the battle-beastly spirits into submission.
i'm sayin',
swingin' that steel striker until my arms go all rubbery feels good.
cold safety-glass sprinkles of abysmally frigid ice do not.
i'm thinkin' about bringin' a minor keyed harmonica to minnesota.
something about a full moon,
on the eleventh,
in the prairie, in a city, with some good peoples,
and a sad sad mouth-music maker,
just speaks out to the woodsly warrior poet in me;
never quiet, never soft.....

some kind of weather.

short leg syndrome.
nothing ruins a perfectly attractive young lady (or ladyboy, even)
than a set of too-short stems poppin' out of a normal-sized torso area....
long legs,
or at least proportionately un-short ones,
are what's up.....
that being noted,
here's some skeleton warrior bobotic ghost breathin'
tooth-handed fire-spittin' poetics....
of course,
without the background,
this guy is mostly a lonesome battle-beastly blowhard.
still,
i'm getting excited about all this new arthur i've been making up in here.
i'm concerned, however,
that the refining process is getting out of hand....
so i'll be using even worse brushes for whatever comes next.
coarse art kicks fine art's butthole right off.

rain. sleet. snow. wind. ice.
and that was before 7 a.m.
it's been in the 40s farenheit all day since...
come the f* ON, for goodness sake!
i'm just not in the mood for ma nature's mood swings.
anyway,
i got some new shirts,
and an epic early-spring hansdomely manicured beard trim explosion, too.
you know i gotta look good for the identity tattoo festival extravaganza.
the due date for delivery is gettin' closer,
and the pick-up and drop-off situations are already arranged.
all ya'll norwegian batchelor farmers had better be battenin' down the hatches,
because the winds of march and marchin' on,
and bringin' 'the albie rock show' with 'em to the prairie....

until then,
i've got three days of incredible un-'tasticness to slog through....
i feel so bad for the sap-suckers who don't come correct
for a sucka-free saturday and sunday...
hot fire is on tap,
and there's a keg-stand of crucial carnage in my future.
(it's a root-beer keg-stand kind of weekend)
never quiet, never soft...

grow.

this little sprout grew up from the saddest sprig of ivy.
he lived in a shot glass for a month,
and kinda just popped out some roots, shoots, and leaves,
and now he lives in a new home.
carpeted completely with dirt.
jess has the greenest thumbs, ya'll.
we had one spider plant, yeah?
and under her auspices it exploded in every direction,
and made enough for you, me, and everyone we know.
i've got a peace lily bloomin' right next to me,
dracaena (that's that good-luck' bamboo) almost 4 feet tall,
and some amazonian man-eaters taking over the living room.
i'm sayin',
it's the mutha-uckin' verdant thumbs!!
no foolin',
she's like that jolly giant, (only really pretty)
or a chlorophyll-colored hitch-hiker.
and while they're incredibly dextrous,
they aren't always opposable.
or at least, maybe i just know better than to try.
hence the greenhouse
not that i don't have my moments, too;
like the rolling stone's song:
under my thumb?
yeah.
whatever, my ninjas.
plants are kinda rad.
not so much when i bag my head on hanging pots,
every day in the same place,
but that's more my inability to accomodate flora in my personal airspace.
the air is cleaner, too.
psychologically, maybe.
but my house is teeming with life.
and that's dope.

dirt.
water.
light.
that's all they need.
and then they're off and running,
or twining, vining, creeping, sprouting, blooming and everything else.
i mean, c'mon,
talk about just doin' what you do!
that's today's plan, ninjas.
synthesizing.
takin' the dirt-dirty doo-doo butter,
the piss and vinegar,
and the warm rosy glow from the hot fire furnaces,
and combining it all to get bigger.
the ass's whole is greater than the half-assed parts, an' that.
yep.
tatblastin', arthur-makin', wrench-choosin', dinner-cookin',
all of it.
doin' what i do,
with only the sovereign state of my arm's reach empire under my feet,
a cuppa irish breakfast tea,
and the bright and shining sunlight beamin' through my window.
i'm hoping that by tonight the world seems a little smaller,
but only because i've managed to fill it fuller
with a larger and in-charger version of me.
larger-than-life livin', even when it is all kept so simple.
expanded horizons proportionate to personal developement.
a landfall landfill of get-busy, get-bigger, taprootin' tootin' and skyward reachin', highfalutin' bearin' fruit, and salutin'
fever-pitch frenzy of green-thumb assisted personal growth.
dirt.
water.
light.
the smallest leaf and the biggest tree, mutha-uckas.
they only need the same three things.
that's all you need.
now to figure out which three things are your magic combination,
that's the green-thumb gardener's ultimate challenge.
never quiet, never soft....