luck o'.

are you wearing green?
i am.
and even without a pint of guiness to start my morning,
i'm still feeling pretty good about st. patrick.
irish breakfast tea, and toasting bread,
are both on the t-n-t daybreaker docket.
there's a whole dossier dedicated to doo-doo dopeness
especially formulated to make today a good day:
smiley eyes, a peterson pipe, and an aran isles sweater, kids.
that's right, potato-heads-
i'm reppin' my favorite italian-turned-eire snakecharmer.
shazamrocks and fourleaf greenheart popsicles, ninjas.
it's time to get amped on poems, sod roofs,
concertina/fiddle jigs and reels, and even the end of the rainbow.
there may even be a single-shoe cobbler leprechauning his face off.
anything can happen.
it probably won't,
but the option and opportunity is there.
we'll have to wait and see.
*
it's a sunny and sweet snow-melting morning up here.
cancelling out yesterday's mixed-up wintry weather.
that's right, neighbors,
it's like yesteray is being voided-out,
and i don't mean with a stamp,
 i mean it like voiding bowels.
turds, ninjas.
i'm saying that the sh!tspray days are past,
and the big tubers are ripe for rutabagin'.
boiled dinners are for boiled winners, or summat.
just sayin', friends,
that whether there's weather or not,
and whether the woodsly goodness cooperates or not,
there is gonna be sainty and patricky times tonight.
the supermoon insists.
and if you haven't googled that supermoon business,
well,
you'll probably be the first victims of a savage stormswept
tsunami of semi-cannibal homo-canine lupus lupus erectus
invasion.
cryptozoology, wolfmen, skunk-apes, and st. pat.
tonight's the night, kids,
in an ever-increasing sensitivity to full moon fever,
coupled with the inevitability of spring fever,
and with only an ongoing grotesquerie to show for it.
happily,
even looking like a balding werewolf isn't going to stop
the gluttonous gorging of our almost-spring festivities.
you wanna sit at the table with some battle-beasts?
you should,
because this cabbagey hottness is not to be missed.
supermoon earth tides or not,
there will be dinner.
it will be boiled.
and it will unfold exactly as the secret universal plans dictate.
blueprints for blue light,
and floorplans for full moons;
never quiet, never soft.....

wetworks.

wintry mixture!!!!
score!
the only day this week that gets the doo-doo butter,
yesterday, while i was working?
50 degrees of sunny sweetness.
manana?
more of that.
we like to refer to that as a sh!t-slad sandwich, son.
that's correct.
a whole day off,
and the only day i spent getting soaked with suck.
F-.
someone, namely ma nature, is obviously mutha-ucking with my A*.
ouch.
***********
tomorrow is santo pasquale day.
that means potatoes are on the menu,
and in the miki-flippin' house, ninjas.
soda bread?
you know it.
wearing green?
obviously.
i won't be getting drunk, though.
sorry, neighbors,
but the brewed up barley b!tchsap isn't gonna pass these lips.
you can still kiss me, though,
despite my complete and total lack of gaelic genetics.
just beware of the horse-teeth, thin lips, and splintery moustache.
those tasty bits will snafu a snog like nobody's business.
real talk.
plus,
vegan boiled dinner makes for musty mustard mustardation, anyway.
so maybe less kissing,
and more kissing up.
i could use the esteem-raising elevation that comes with it.
wordimus prime.
no smooches,
no sunlight,
no chance of a sweet dayful of activities.
a spanning batch of hours, kids.
a connection between days, lasting 24 hours.
the supermoon is waxing,
and the werewolfen thunder is rumbling.
skins are shedding,
claws are shredding,
and big eyes and teeth are peepin', poppin', and protuding.
the better to spit hot fire with, my dears.
animal instincts succeed where words fail...
howling,
disemboweling,
and scowling.
supermoon, ninjas.
18 year cycles,
closest biggest and burliest high tide high times.
the center earth tide brings mountains closer to heavens,
and makes everything in between seem less like midgard,
and more like asgard,
but for all the valhalla hollering in the meanwhile.
hammers and heartbeats and hellstorms.
it's all really happening;
never quiet, never soft..... 

showers.

dang.
my camera ate the photos of the art show.
maybe they're on someone else's computer?
i dunno.
i just can't find 'em,
so y'all'll have to believe me when i swear it was
super expert turbo-hottness.
because it so was.
the good news,
if you can call a reliable let-down good news,
is that the woodsly goodness largely ignored my absence,
and pretty much disdains my continued presence anyway.
i'm still here,
or i'm back again,
or wherever, whenever.
the mountains and the trees are timeless,
and generally ignorant of my place amongst them.
so,
has that left me with feelings formerly flushed
with the heady glow of victory,
and currently washed-out, washed up,
and feeling small?
yeah.
a little tiny baby bitty bit.
(unintentional pun appreciated, though)
...i mean,
i just had a hit art show,
a week of worthy warrior poetry and active participation,
and an overwhelming spirit of gratitude and generosity...
but as far as up here is concerned,
i'm still just some bearded weirdie
with a great big mouth full of great big teeth.
everything and nothing, my ninjas.
that's what happens in the northerly nooks and notches,
with or without,
for or against,
by and large.
true story.
it's all really happening,
and if it happened somewhere else,
than maybe it didn't...
or did it?
yep.
it's never easy,
and that's not all-
this day is done,
and my weekend is only one day long,
starting (and ending) tomorrow,
with a weathery wetness and wintry mix.
word up, neighbors.
that's how it goes. when it rains, it snows.
at least i get to enjoy some hours with my
most excellent and talented and absurdly attractive wifely hottness.
EXPERT.
that's that silver lining type sh!t, duders.
early to bed, early to rise,
and a whole heaping helping of hump-day hanging out.
i doo-doo that freaky business.
*
i'm having those super amazing joe-joe cookies,
the actual chocolate smearface blarpity ones,
and peanu(s) butter jauns, too,
in honor and remembrance of my absent homies.
i'm filling the hole in my heart,
with whole cookies in my belly.
this is real life;
never quiet, never soft.....

kids and animals.

y'know who likes me?
uh-huh.
kids and animals.
i'm serious.
they have no guile, and as such,
cannot be beguiled,
or so i'm told.
i sure hope so,
because that means i'm still one of the good guys on the inside.
there's fairness and fun mixed in with the fiery furnaces,
y'know,
like darth vader.
little kids, duders.
they can hang out sometimes.
just sayin',
it's like they refuse to believe i'm even remotely
close to as berserk or barbarian as i assert.
check out my new buddy, sia.

c'mon.
that's some adorable cuteness, an' that.
he's casey's kid.
(he is also rumored to hate sleeping)
we didn't plan on matching so well,
but it was a pretty flippin' expert moment, yeah?
yeah.
***********
jiggety-jig, my ninjas,
i'm home again.
back from the frontlines of freshness,
and fast past the point of flustered furloughs,
i'm here.
the woodsly goodness was waiting,
and so was my nice, warm, soft, roasty-toasty bed.
only one leg of my flight-time reality
almost crashed due to gusty winds.
out of a possible two.
so that was invigorating.
a do-over last minute pull-up and do-over.
that'll get the blood pumping, neighbors, for sure.
just not enough to keep the sleepy seeds from taking root.
i got in from the far away airport waaaay late,
and i still got up and at 'em waaaay early,
and tatzapped until tonight, too.
so,
instead of getting into nitty-gritty details,
i'm getting into my pajamas,
and instead of typing to the twenty duders
who peruse these pages,
i'm gonna let my drooping lids,
bloodshot eyes,
dragging limbs,
and sagging spirits
recharge a bitty baby bit.
and when the meter reads 'to eleven',
then i'll regale you with tales of the nittiest and grittiest
greasy-spoons and humid atrium air.
until then,
i'm for bedtimes, hard times, nighttimes,
and good times.
goodnight, wesley, (and y'all),
i'll most likely kill you in the morning;
never quiet, never soft.....

shawn hebrank is my homeboy.

how many people would voluntarily
let a big, loud, hairy apeman
stay in their house,
all up on their sheets and showers and seats,
with a caustic, contagious, outrageous form of 'itis
that is both highly communicable,
and brutally mutagenic?
(um, excuse me duders. excuse me,
but if you hear it getting live
from the low,middle, and highlights,
that's just the things we left behind.)
so,
how many people want to be responsible for unleashing that?
none,you guessed?
wrong.
F-.
there are at least two that i know and love, neighbors.
shawn and meryl have been amazing.
...as usual.
hospitality, patience, understanding,
competent communication,
and a rubberneck spectator check on the wreck
that is this really real roll-call of real life documentation.
i'm tellin' you ninjas,
they can appreciate a hot mess of sh!t-hot firespit
like nobody's business.
the offer amnesty for social travesty, free of charge.
kids, listen up:
the louderhorn inn is perpetually welcoming,
and inviting, too.
a definite home away from home,
and one of the very, very few non-woodsly spots
i like to span time.
mr. hebrank orchestrated, organized,
and in many other ways facilitated an amazing opportunity
for a whole heap of worthy warriors to actively participate in.
and that's no joke.
on the ones, ninjas, he executive produced and promoted
the holy living sh!t out of this whole endeavor.
thanks, man. without your move-making and rump-shaking
and elite crew of hand-picked party people,
the new hottness, and the loudest, freshest, and hardest styles
would've gone straight down the poop-tubes.
yeah.
the people who came out,
the places we patronized,
the gluttonous globs of blops we feasted on,
the times we spanned,
it's been amazing,
and as usual,
i'm leaving still hungry for just a little bit more.
never enough time for enough dopeness, yeah?
because, really, there's never enough dopeness, is there?
uh-uh.
the full bellies, hard feelings, sleepy eyeballs, and salty tears
that i'm leaving behind make it all worth every single minute.
there is a swath of expertise being left in the wake of
this juicy juggernaut of just-be-dopeness.
that's right.
from lowly journeyman acquaintances,
my midwest peoples have been promoted
to fully licensed hot fire and lightning-type experts.

EXPERT.

that's a fact.

*

and now,
after all the sights, delights, burly berserker barbarian displays and arrays
of the art making marathon melee,
it's time to once again get on another 'other jet plane,
back to the sweet home
and lovely wifey i've been missing so hard.
it was fun while it lasted, y'all.
big fun, even.
but the mountains, and the trees, and the t-n-t action
of the Folk Life just calls to me like a sweet serenade from a siren.
the mermaid, not the ambulance, ninjas.
it's due time,
and it's really happening.

***********

minneapolis,
you may be a city,
and that may be pretty gaysplosive,
but we can still hang out.
there's a sure enough soft spot forming for you.
it may be a lot like rot on a bruised fruit, actually-
but the brown bloppity blarp bite is always so much sweeter.
something about authentic battle-damage releases the treats.
it's better than bitter, even if it gets a little gooey.
yeah.
that about sums it up.
thanks for a time.
i'm grateful for all that happened,
the swanky art show,
the epic munching,
the laughs,
the unending stomachache,
and the sleep-deprivation delivery of rapid-fire lava
from my mouth and butthole.
woooord.
long nights,
hard times,
and everything else that makes me feel tired;

never quiet, never soft.....

best and worst dressed.

art.
yep.
i hung out with some well-hung art, last night.
wait?
did i just say i was gettin' live with art?
that's right.
it's not arthur, anymore.
we're better friends than we were,
and on a better-than first name basis.
that's the result of a successful opening.
indeed.
it all went all the way to eleven.
loud, fresh, and hard, for the collective facial area of
all of the twin cities heads.
duders showed up, y'all.
a couple professional appreciators even picked up a piece
fot their at-home collections of makey hottness.
affirmative.
feedback? positive.
turnout? positive.
homemade vegan acorn-shaped cookies? positive.
late night hard-style beaucoup-big-drinkies-crowd interaction?
........expert.
if you didn't make it out,
you pretty much missed out on a good time.
how many times did i get asked what my dolls symbolize?
a lot, neighbors.
how many times did i give the same answer?
none.
what's the meaning of all the imagery?
lavarle cerebro escabeche eskelito.
seriously.
i paint the sh!t that i like.
and if it has a beard, i usually like it,
exempting shellfish, of course.
i prefer my clams to have greenbacks is all.
recognize.
*
anyway, it happened,
and it's gonna happen again tonight, ninjas.
it couldn't and wouldn't have been the surefire flavorful freshness
that we've experienced without the nqns installation experts, either.
cucch, ryan, adam, jaime, amy, rebecca, casey, and meryl.
a worthy group of active participants helped to hook it the F* up.
it's their victory as much as ours.
we're lucky to have such rad ones in our world.
i know i'm grateful.
the secret universal plan pushed me out of the woodsly realm
in a sink-or-swim doo-doo that hottness real world challenge.
and i'm still here.
so there's that...
tonight's the night, kids.
the last one, even.
it's gonna be so good,
and we all hope you can make it out here
to get a little tiny bit.
i mean, we did do it for you;
never quiet, never soft.....

tonight is the night!!!!!

holy crapsticks.
we've taken it to eleven.
we've gone as far as we could in the time allowed,
maybe even farther...
and,
if i was on my own computer,
you'd see so many, many pictures of all of it.
patience,
the suspense should be enough to get you up and out of your house.
for really real.
there's almost not enough time to type this.
a real art opening,
in a real city,
is really really happening.
some of that is cool,
and we've got real-life trees on stands.
cut down and stood up.
woodsly goodness in full effect.
c'mon.
as if there weren't enough reasons to get you here,
there's gonna be homemade cookies.
so even if you hate art, artists, cool kid art-nerds,
cities, hipsters, drunk folks, and site-specfic installations
of turbo hot loud, fresh, hardness,
then at least come out for the cookies.
do it,
because if you don't,
you're missing out.
hard;
never quiet, never soft.....

it's so late, it's already tomorrow.

holy smokes.
when's the last time i missed a day on this blog?
seriously.
that's how hard we've worked to get this show up and running.
all-consuming burnt-at-both-ends candlewick snuff stuff,
on the ones, even.
both ones, right next to each other, as a matter of fact-
eleven.
it is, and it goes there, too.
XI.
the hottness finally deemed itself ready
to show up and stand up and deliver on the promise
of full walls,
site-specific illicit cardstock and sock blops.
cult status gallery, minneapolis, minnesots.
if you're within driving distance of this
two story tower of delights,
then make sure you show up tonight,
some time after seven p.m....
and if you already have a hot date,
then it's time to break up and break north,
and get yourselves over here.
i'm not even tryin' to post any pictures
until the big reveal, later on.
oh,
and if you can't stand to stand up a hot night of hard pounding,
you can come to the countdown to closedown closing party,
saturday night.
forty eight hours of incredible hard, loud, freshness...
for every-mutha-b!tchin'-body's faces.
get some.
***********
we have the best art-makey squad anyone could ever ask for.
cucch and ryan have been there the whole time,
shouting, burning, carving, taping,
and keeping it easy.
adam brought indian food and faux-joe-joe pseudo oreos,
all while painting and spraying and preppin' for two straight days.
and that's just the menfolk, folks.
i'll tell you horny humplestiltskins about all the ladies later.
*
neighbors,
i have drawn more,
worked harder,
and screamed the mantra keywords:
monsieur lavale cerebro.
(senor douche-brain!!!)
more in the last 72 hours than i have in years.
honest to goodness.
if you miss this sh!t,
you absolutely WILL regret it.
so make some moves,
and make the magic happen.
if you're looking for us,
we're right here...
at the FIRE;
never quiet, never soft.....

bone tired and card bored....

without them,
we'd just be us.
and just the two of us would be less than half as useful.
huh?
duders,
we had a whole galleryful of assistants
offering up assistance,
and aides providing aid.
(no, not AIDS, be easy)
never quiet, never soft is doo-dooing it's debut
SO mutha-flippin' hard.
uncounted hours of cardstock, newsprint, duct tape,
and the toxic fumes wafting off of the fuzzy nibs
of a slew of sharp-pointed, blunt-edged, and chisel-tipped
permanent ink-blasting marky-markers.
neighbors,
i'm operating on next-to-no sleep,
next-to-too-much fresh vegan foodie goodness,
and waaaay too much social interaction.
from early-shirley to surely too late,
it's been one holy helluva day.
and now it's done, and none too soon,
because i'm dog-tired, bone-weary, and fading fast.
huh?
no, actually,
we aren't even close to done with any of it...
but thanks for asking and stressing me out even more.
tomorrow,
the entire crew comes back to participate,
with some of the loudest, freshest, and hardest styles
that recycled refuse and potential hottness
have to offer.
even earlier,
even later,
and all the rest of all of it.
ohhhh, man!
it's all really happening, just not as fast as it could.
it's cold, after all,
and things move sluggishly in the cold, yeah?
thank goodness for happy helping hands,
and the teeth they're biting into this project with.
chomp, chomp, swallow, and blow...
this is how it starts,
and it's anyone guess as to how it's gonna end.
the big reveal is still up for grabs,
what say what say what?!
anything could happen;
never quiet, never soft.....

three a.m.

duders,
three in the morning?
whaaaaaaaaat?
leaving the woodsly goodness, in the deep dark
of a hard-style morning.
that's never ever easy,
but just to get somewhere even colder?
c'mon.
that makes a long drive and a long night
even longer.
but now we're here.
in minneapolis, minnesota,
via manchester airport early shirley,
and philadelphia after that.
we smog-monstered them jauns all up and over the
sh!tty city of brotherly love.
ugh.
you ninjas should really see us....
all bleary-eyed, heavy-ham-fist harried,
and lead-limbed with leery, weary light-limned languor.
like i said,
we're here.
and we're beat.
...and full-up to the brim with brutal blops, b!tches.
yep.
ethiopian food has landed in our belly-holes.
T's place had what we needed, and we hit 'em up so hard.
blarpity gutbuster gallons of green, brown, and ochre,
with umber hunks and hulking sap-squats of mango goo, to boot.
and that's not even it, neighbors.
who had a couple of falafels first thing in the twin cities?!
shawn, the cucchie, and me, that's who.
act like you're impressed.
you should be.
that's how the professional shark-glutton gorgers get busy.
***********
art show?
oh, yeah.
that's happening, as well, innit?
well, on that front of this full frontal assault/exposure,
we saw the space,
we sketched a plan,
and tomorrow,
a whole team of worthy warriors and active participants
have been enlisted to cut, paste, tape, print, paint,
and in all other ways be accessible to the NQNS team.
wordimus prime.  
molto work needs doing,
and with miles to go before i sleep,
there'd better be molto promises kept.
i'm just sayin'.
that's real talk.
it's time for bed,
unless ethiopia tries to overthrow my italian innards.
historically,
that's pretty flippin' likely.
it repeats itself,
like expanding concentric circles,
ever wider and wider,
encompassing a whole bunch of right nows,
and soon-to-be's.
it's happening,
the deadbeat exhaustion and digestive destruction,
the preplanning,
and the enacting,
and the whole shootin' match.
holy smokes, it's no joke.
jack is sure to be a dull boy posthaste,
as it's all work, a little (alright a lot) of eating,
and no play, or at least little more than a one act.
thunder?
in my pants, pretty much.
that's the aftershocks of an afternoon of edible exertion;
never quiet, never soft.....

right up until the last minute, even....

i'm sitting in a snow-bog gulag.
mmm-hmmm.
weak-sauce rinse-away washouts,
glassy gulches of icy slicing slick skids,
and secret patches of sabotage on the sunless streets.
days upon days of rain have created
a slogging slush that sits on a murky mire.
for real.
the mountains are totally waterlogged,
from the seven inches of slurried slop on top,
to the deep doo-doo buttery blops of earth
that are supersaturated and soggy.
it's actually pretty gross.
we've even got the above-freezing-temperature-induced
melty-defrost foggybottom smokescreen
settling into the nooks and dales, duders.
that's that mist in our midst,
that makes sure it's hard to see what's poppin'.
as a result, the unfolding events of woodsly goodsly pre-spring fever
are obscured and the occluded cyclonic concentric circular rythyms
make their own plans above and around us in the meanwhile.
what could make me feel better?
how about some tribal tatzappin'?
oh yeah.
that's what's happening,
don't you worry your little heads.
triiiiiibal.
with names.
1-0.
advantage: black spikes.
oh, mountain homestead,
it's like you team up with the secret universal plan
to try and make me excited to leave for a little while.
the operative word here is try.
and we all remember our yoda lessons, don't we?
yep:
do or do not. there is no try.
that's a real thing.
and esoteric best efforts just can't compare
to louder-than-ten travel plans.
here is where my heart is,
but there is where my heart attacks.
love is a battlefield,
and minnesota is the western front.
is it all quiet?
more like never quiet.
y'heard? whaaaaat!
***********
last days are for smooching.
even when many happy return tickets
are already advanced purchased.
i'm looking for love in all the right places,
and preparing for war in all the others.
the blitzkrieg big-head puppetshow preparations
are due to begin in just 30 or so hours.
now that's some sh!t.
look out for stormclouds, midwestern waterbabies-
the hottness of a heatwave is due to butt up against
the cold, dreary doo-doo you know and love.
i'm stocking up on smooches,
and looking forward to so many bro-hugs.
it's all happening,
and it continues to really do so...
listen closely-
that's the thunder we're bringing with us;
never quiet, never soft.....