If You Wanna Make A Move, Then You Better Come In

Hey.

So, some stuff's been happening. Let's start with the bad.

Last week, my grandpa's sister (my dad's aunt, or my great aunt, if you please) passed away. She had been suffering from dementia for a couple of years, but held together pretty well. She lived up in Duluth, MN. I hadn't seen her in a few years, but when I was a kid I remember going up there and visiting her a lot. Everything about that town was so amazing to me, and I loved going up there. So last Thursday was the funeral. I had to work, but talked to my boss and she said I could come in whenever, and to take my time. The time frame sucked though. I got home from work around midnight on Wednesday, ate some food and decompressed like usual, and fell asleep around 3:30-4. I had to wake up at 5:45 to get ready, and we had to be at my grandparents' house by quarter to 7. Usually, it's only a 2.5 hour drive from my house to Duluth, but my parents were riding up with my grandparents, and I was following. Plus there was a decent amount of road construction on 35. So in all it took us about 3 hours to get there, right on time for the 10 o'clock visitation.

I got to see some family that I hadn't seen in a while, and it was nice to catch up, even if it wasn't under the best circumstances. I was wearing my black suit that I bought when my grandpa died, and everyone kept saying how nice I looked, until I pointed out my shoes. I didn't want to drive all the way up in my dress shoes, since they're fucking uncomfortable, so I wore my hiking boots like always. Was planning on changing when I got there. Well, since I'd only gotten about 1.5 hours of sleep, when I walked out the door, I thought I'm wearing shoes, so I'm good. Not until I pulled into the parking lot of the church did I realize I forgot the dress shoes. So I was in an all black suit, with dirty brown hiking boots. Since everyone kept saying how nice I looked, I said they'd start expecting that from me, so I had to keep it low class somehow. It got a few chuckles.

The service was a service. More or less the same as any other funeral I've been too. Originally, my grandpa was supposed to be one of the pallbearers, but with his age and health, I was asked to step in. So I had my first experience with that. It kinda creeped me out. Also, it wasn't as heavy as I would have imagined. But I guess having six people carrying takes off some of the weight. Since I was bearing pall, I had to go to the graveside service too, which was a first for me. But I must say, standing in the sun in an all black suit, with no wind, when it's 78 degrees out, kinda sucks. Was really sweaty. After that, I said my goodbyes while everyone else went to mingle or whatever. I was off to work. My mom was worried about me driving on such little sleep, but I said I'd be fine. Which was true, until I started blanking out, and couldn't really remember that I was driving. It all seemed like a dream. So I stopped for some caffeine and did some jumping jacks and kept going. Got to work around 6 and had an incredibly busy night, since everyone was getting ready to go out of town for Labor Day. Got home around midnight again, and crashed around 1. What a wonderful night's sleep that was.

OK. Enough of the sad. On to the good! Where to start....

First off, I talked to Erik the other day, and they successfully survived Burning Man. They are currently in Yosemite for a couple of days and then are going to Death Valley. I asked when they would be coming home, and he said in October. The 4th is Demian's birthday, and he wants to be back to see Chromeo play that day. But they also want to see Further at Red Rocks the weekend before that, and don't want to rush, so we'll see. But they're slowly working their way home! I can't wait to hear all about it.

I finally got my audio interface to work properly. I ended up having to re-install windows on my computer, and somehow that fixed the problem. Just sucked that I had to back up my whole hard drive. Took flippin ever! I still haven't reloaded all that back on. I haven't found a time where I won't need my computer for 9 hours. So now we can FINALLY start recording our cd and get that out there. I'll keep you posted on that.

And finally, the big event.

My friend that I work with, Aaron, has been looking to buy a house for the last few months or so. He talked to a mortgage guy and got approved for a loan, got in contact with a realtor who has been sending him houses and stuff. It was decided that I, and his friend Nicky, would move in with him. His mortgage guy did some calculations, and his monthly payment should be around $700 a month. Which works out to about $233 a person, plus utilities. Which is pretty damn cheap, since we'll be in a house.

Anyways, he met with the realtor yesterday to look at a house, and then called me last night to ask if I could cover his shift for a couple hours today so he could meet with her again. So I said sure. Then he comes running into work today with a big smile on his face, and says he put an offer on the house. !!! Sweet! I'd seen pictures, and we'd driven by a few days before and I saw it from the outside, and I really liked it. Around 1500 square feet, and a HUGE back yard. Then, I get a phone call from him earlier tonight, and they accepted the offer. There are some things that need to be fixed before he can close, but the seller is paying to have it all fixed, which is nice. If all goes according to plan, he should close around 11/11/11. So come mid November, I'll be moving out! Fucking finally!

I like living at home, and it's free :-P, but it'll be nice to finally get out on my own. I'm 21 for fuck's sake. So I'll be living on the Greater East Side of St. Paul, which is a whole new world for me. I've never been a big fan of St. Paul, because the streets confuse me. In Minneapolis, the streets are more or less in a grid shape, and they go numerically and alphabetically. Not in St. Paul. The joke is that the streets were laid out by a bunch of drunken Irishmen. Guess it's time to learn.

So that's been my life for the last little bit. Some good, some bad. I'll keep you guys posted on the cd and the house.

Hope you guys are well!

143

_Kevin



Oh yeah! I lost all my email contacts, so if you want me to have your email address, or whatever, send me an email so I get it back! Thanks!

'I Go Fag, You Die'

Heard that at work today. It irritates me that there is still so much hatred towards gays, and that it's still socially 'acceptable' to call things/people gay, fag, whatever. We live in a rather 'politically correct' world nowadays. Most people will at least look at you weird, if not say something, if you were to go around calling black people niggers, or asain people gooks, or assuming all middle eastern people are terrorists, or any of the other 'once acceptable' terms for people other than white. Shit, I'm surprised that they are still allowed to sell a chewing tobacco called Red Man, with a generic Native American chief as the logo.

I'm getting so tired of hearing people say all that. I can tolerate it when it's some random person, but when it's people that I know, people that I care about, it really tears me up. I'm glad no one in my family does it. My younger cousins do, but I'm trying to fix that. It's hard though when everyone they hang out with does it too. I did try to explain to them that there could be people around them that they care about, that are gay and no one knows, and that saying that really hurts them. They hadn't thought about it that way, so maybe there's hope.

I don't know. I like to think that it'll change, but I really don't know anymore. I wonder sometimes what the people around me would do if I came out. Most, I like to think, wouldn't care. But the ones that say all that shit all the time, I wonder if they'd stop, keep doing it, or just abandon me altogether.

The other day, I was hanging out with Anthony after work. He occasionally uses gay as a derogatory word, even though he doesn't have a problem with homosexuality, and has a lot of gay friends. He asked if it tore me up inside every time he said it around me. And so I told him, yes. But it wasn't as bad with him, since I knew his feelings towards gays. But I was glad that he acknowledged the fact that he said that around gay people, and that there might be repercussions.

I don't know. I need sleep. I'll fill you guys in on what's been happening soon. Going to the 'Great Minnesota Get Together' (state fair) tomorrow, so I should get some sleep.

Hope you guys are well.

143

_Kevin

Came across this video and thought it was cool. Vulgar, but cool.



This song was written about racism, but I think it holds true for sexuality too. One more reason to love Rancid!