One of my all-time favorite quotes is that 'the pen is mightier than the sword,' but i, personally, believe that two can be equally powerful- when your 'sword' is a chef's knife. It is my opinion that writing and cooking are the two most effective ways in stirring emotion in other people. 

If you were to write the greatest essay, story or poem of all time, it would have to be one that hit hard in the minds and souls of everyone that read it. All of the stops that may or may not exist in your writing would have to be pulled, some grammar laws would have to be mutilated in order to convey your correct message, exactly how you want it to appear on paper. It wouldn't be pretty at first, but eventually it would be the greatest thing ever.

the same thing happens with cooking a dish- if you set out to cook the best dish ever, you could steal the hearts of the masses, and like writing, it would be messy, it might not be a healthy dish, or it may not be something that many people are willing to eat- like certian parts of an animal such as foe gras, or pork, but if you create it exactly how you want to, it could be the best thing ever.

so is the pen mightier than the sword? i'd like to know.

if i'm sinking and laughing at something sunken in, i am 

This post is way overdue

On May 18th, what is probably my favorite active band- The Black Keys- released their sixth(ish) album called Brothers. A couple of days before the album was released, the album streamed on NPR and I listened to it, and to be quite honest, I wasn't too impressed. The songs themselves seemed to lack the thing I loved the most about The Black Keys- grit. I felt like the blues bones that made up the band softened up and were more like R&B bones, I felt like the band just didn't seem to be as extreme as they used to be, I just felt like they got soft. In no way did I dislike the album, I just wasn't too impressed, maybe I just had high expectations, or maybe it just wasn't what I perceived it to be.

Then... some time after May 18th, the release date, came along, and I went out and bought the CD. I felt like something changed from what was streaming on NPR, this album was full of grit, it was completely bluesy and not in the least bit soft.

I took a long pause here, and sort of forgot what my point was, it's not that NPR makes music suck, I guess that the message somew[here] would just be that Brothers by The Black Keys is a great fucking album. Thanks.

-DaveyJones

It was a bad week, that led to a bad night.

My buddy T picks me up and we head to a parking deck to smoke cigarettes for a while since it was raining. He calls up a mutual friend, K, to check up on him- he'd been arrested, our buddy, and he had the drugs on him that me and T wanted. Finding out everything was cool, we let K know that we'd be by his place later on to pick up some of them green pills we loved so much.

In the meantime, we headed over to the European coffee shop near my side of town, real shady shit- old Bosnian men gambling away at those annoying fucking slot machines. We've won at them before- but I know they owe me way more than I've given them. Drinking our coffee, we decided to dip out to his place to play pool, where we didn't have to pay for it.

He fucked his ex earlier that day, I knew it'd be bad news. She was ringing him up the whole damn day, before we got in his Buick to head to his place, he tossed his phone in the trunk muttered "fuck her" and threw his cigarette butt on to the pavement of the tiny parking lot in front of that dark, lonely feeling coffee shop.

We get to T's place, shoot some pool and have a bite to eat. Later, we head to K's place to pick up our Klonopin. We take two right there and head out to meet with our friends. After keeping it real for a while, we decide to hit K back up and place another order.

We swing up to where he is, pick up the goods and dip out. We go back to where we were with all of our friends but I don't leave the car. T gets up to go talk to his ex while I break up a kpin and snort it right up. Feeling pretty good.

We decide to head to our friend M's place to chill for the rest of the night. Her dad is making shots for all of us, but as the night goes on, i'm the only one taking shots with him, so it's like a 12 ounce shot. Start getting fucked.

He, M's dad, breaks out his piece packed with some good weed, I usually don't like smoking it, but I did to keep him company. Head's fucking spinning.

M's dad goes and makes me and him more shots, this is about number twelve.

Next thing I remember is I'm in A's car, with J and M, no idea where T is, and I pull out two bucks cuz i want a gatorade. I get my drink and they take me home.

No clue what else. I'm just going to accept that.

Aaron had a slouch...

...like from scoliosis or something when he was young. He looked around my apartment with a bit of worry in his eye, he hadn't been in it since I moved in three years ago. He eventually plopped down in the red puffy chair next to the side table, which was littered with cigarette ashes, coffee stains, and the ads that fall out of the New York Times.

Aaron and I weren't great friends, we knew each other for years, but went to school on separate sides of the state. We never really made a point to keep in touch.

We had just gotten back from a concert, a small blues show in a venue that used to be an old church. Aaron and I ran into each other at the show and decided to catch up. "The place looks nice," Aaron was affixed on the ceiling, even though there was nothing up there, "It's so much bigger than I remember."

"Thanks," I sat down on the brown sofa, nothing in my apartment matched. I flipped on the T.V., "I think the Sox game is still on."

"Sweet." Aaron fumbled through his pockets and pulled out a pack of Pall Malls, "Is it cool if I smoke in here?" As if the stink of stale smoke and the obvious ash trays weren't enough.

"Yeah, it's cool. Go for it." I pulled out my own pack of Camels, and grabbed a match off of the coffee table to light a cigarette. "So How's Rae?"

Rae, or Reagan, was Aaron's girlfriend. I'd been sleeping with her, way longer than I should have been, but Aaron had no idea. Rae got kicked out of her house a while back, and she moved in with me, and I guess out of boredom we started fucking. It wasn't anything emotional, we just enjoyed each other's company. She knew what I liked, and I knew what she liked.

"She's good, she flew up to New York last week to visit her sister." I already knew that.

"Oh that's nice." I felt bad, about Aaron. Looking him in the face gave me the biggest wave of guilt I've ever experienced. "You care for a drink?"

"Sure, why not." Aaron rarely drank, he had a drunk dad who was extremely quick tempered. Aaron just kind of had an aversion to alcohol.

"I'm not sure if I have anything," I told him as I was getting off of the sofa. On top of the fridge was an old bottle of scotch that Rae's dad had given me for my birthday, "Scotch?"

"Yeah, sure" he told me, as I grabbed two glasses out of the cabinet. I walked back to the dark living room, lit only by the flicker of the baseball game and sat back on the sofa, and poured Aaron and myself drinks. "Thanks."

"No problem." We both turned our attention to the game, Sox were ahead and when Victor Martinez hit a homer. We both cheered.

"We need to go to a game," Aaron suggested, "It'd be cool. I haven't been in so long."

"Yeah, they're pretty fun." The firm I work for gets tickets all the time, pretty descent seats, I could let you know-"

"Yeah man, let's do it." I don't think Aaron ever really got out much. I don't even really think he had many friends except for Reagan. So I felt good knowing I was giving him a good time.

We drank for a few hours, the baseball game was long over, and we were just talking and relaxing, finishing the rest of the scotch.

"Where'd you get this stuff anyways?" Aaron was really drunk.

"Huh?" I didn't want to have this conversation.

"These bottles, this scotch, it's just like Rae's dad's stuff. Did you get it from him?"

"I don't think-"

"Wait a second," Aaron interrupted me and picked up the bottle of scotch and looked at the etch marks on the bottom. I didn't know it said anything. "Yeah dude, JFC- Jeff Fucking McCandless," His middle name was actually Frank, "That's Reagan's dad!"

"Oh," I had no idea what to say, I got a feeling that my stomach dropped to my feet.

"Dude, what the hell? I've tried to get one of these bottles for so long! How the hell did you get one?"

"Well, when she stayed with me for a while, I guess her dad wanted to thank me." Seemed like a good excuse.

"No way dude, these are his most valued possession," Still holding the bottle upside down, he saw more etchings, "This is one of Reagan's bottles! She gave this to you! What the fuck, she knows that I wanted this! What's going on, dude?"

"We're fucking." I couldn't believe the words coming out of my mouth, I didn't think Aaron could believe them either.

"What?" His mood completely did a one-eighty.

"I'm sorry Aaron- I wanted to tell you," I didn't want to tell him.

"Dude, why? I've never done anything to you, I thought she-" His voice was starting to crack.

"I'm sorry man, I really am. It just sort of happened." We were both still pretty drunk at this point. Aaron was starting to realize that Reagan was cheating on him, and that she wasn't worth anything to him anymore. "Can I make it up to you?"

"How?"

"Hit me."

"What?"

"Yeah, common, hit me anywhere above the belt as hard as you can." Aaron was much weaker than me, if it weren't the case, I'm sure he would have kicked my ass by now, but that would never happen. "Just do it," I took off my glasses and put my arms out, waiting to be punched.

"I don't see why-"

"Come on man, I know you want to, you're not going to hit Reagan, so maybe this will make you feel a little better."

"I guess-"

After a little hesitation, Aaron wound back and hit me right on the side of my face, giving me an impressive bruise the size of a baseball right under my eye.

That's how I got this black eye, and why I'm really good friends with Aaron now.

I know it's long over, but I'm still having to deal with it..

TOMS shoes bugs me. I get that it's a great service, you buy a pair of shoes for someone else when you get your own, but the day without shoes seems a little ridiculous to me.

I get the point of it- to raise awareness and all, but the people who are fans of this erk me a bit. They are willing to shell out $40 to $70 for a pair of shoes (yeah, it's kind of two, but canvas shoes don't cost that much. TOMS are bad quality and are also straight up ugly) and then not wear them? It's pretty pointless, in my opinion.

Not only are people [over]paying for a product they aren't going to use, not wearing shoes is not the best way to raise this kind of awareness. Instead, how about a shoe drive, where people bring in their slightly used shoes, or just donations.

Also, there are many kids in the world without food. So when they all get a pair of shoes, they don't have to starve barefoot. At least if TOMS were leather shoes, people could eat them.

This kind of charity is profiting off of a dumb fad, too many people just buy the shoes just to get the sticker. It's an American attempt at doing something good that is only working out for a few people.

(Picture is kind of unrelated- but she's barefoot)

Things I wish we had blogged about.

Although I plan on keeping this blog for some time- as a portfolio of sorts- there are some things I wish could have been assigned to write about:

• I would have liked to write about accomplishments in my life, although I'm only a freshman in college, I would have liked to have a chance to write out all of the things that I've been proud of doing.
• I would have liked to have interacted more with classmate's blogs. I think part of writing blogs as a class is so we can learn more about each other, and in return, it would help us evolve as writers. 
• I would have liked to have been assigned to write creatively, it's one of my favorite things to do in my own time, and even though I have written a few creative posts, I wish that writing creatively was an assignment at least a few times. 

Mr. Miller did a great job at supplying posts this semester. I will do my best to find his blog for next semester, so I constantly have prompts, which helped me incredibly as a writer.

-DJB