onyx...

onyx.

it's 4:47am, i'm sitting on my back porch, i just got home from work, i'm drinking a corona, smoking a belmont mild, it's raining, i love the sound of rain painted against the silence of late night/early morning. there is nothing here but me, wind, and water. and my laptop, wireless through the window. i pause, another sip, another drag...

another four days of working. another sunday-to-wednesday. another three days of creativity, my time, freedom...

i finished shooting my short film last weekend. rich never showed up. rich was supposed to shoot the damn thing. we talked the day before...

rich: what time are we meeting tomorrow to shoot?
me: 9:30 or 9:45, we start shooting at 10am. cool?
rich: yeah, cool, see you then.
me: cool.

the next morning i get to the bar at 9:45, with two coffees in hand. 10am rolls by. nobody. 10:15, my first actor shows up. 10:40, my second actor shows up. still no rich. 11:10, my third actor shows up. no sign of rich. i phone his house, talk to his stepmother.

stepmother: he never came home last night.
me: uh, oh, uh, he was supposed to meet me here at 9:30.
stepmother: sorry, no sign of him.

i phone his cell, no answer. 11:30 rolls around, i'm at the bar, waiting for rich, three actors sitting there, waiting to shoot their scenes. i go on msn, gavin is on, he has the same camera as rich.

me: hey man, what are you doing?
gavin: nothing.
me: hey, uh, fuck, we're supposed to be shooting my film right now, rich never showed up, i know you have the same camera, so, uh, can you spare two hours? i'll buy you a case of beer or shoot you some money or something.
gavin: yeah, that's cool.
me: wicked.

so, gavin comes through, we shoot the scenes, and yeah, i'm done shooting. (thanks gavin.) i still haven't heard from rich. i hope he's okay. editing will begin in a week or two, i just have to find an editor. was thinking of asking gavin, but he's moving to toronto next week, so nix that...

shooting a video this saturday for child in rhyme. mindbender's coming down for it, he's doing the chorus part. it's gonna be sick.

looks like we might need some people to be in it. want to be in it? get at me.

it's weird around here, i move out of this apartment in two months, but it feels like i've already left. so strange when your lease is almost up and the landlord starts showing your place to people, and you have to keep it all clean and organized so it looks all catalog-nice to keep your landlord happy. it's like, for the last two months of living there, you're not really able to live there, you're living in a shell. like the reality of your borrowed/rented accommodation suddenly becomes apparant, revealing itself to be the transitory experience you had forgotten it was. i won't live here in two months, so i have to pretend right now that i don't live here, so therefore, i never did. something like that. hey, it's now 4:59am, don't expect the clearest thought transmissions right now. thanks for understanding.

my mom is not in a good place right now, i don't think. shit, i have work to do. my brothers and i have work to do. this road trip this summer, shit, it's been two years in the works, we need this. well, fuck, maybe they don't need it, but fuck, i need it. therapy. our childhood. what the fuck happened?

still no words. nothing. i no longer exist. put that in your pipe and toke it.

random, i know.

things are progressing though. ran into joey today, he's got more shows booked for the tour. updates coming soon, i'll let you know as soon as things are confirmed. i'll post the tour dates on our myspace page.

i'm listening right now to a new beat i got from dj moves. we're going to be doing some stuff this summer when i'm in van.

one of my problems has always been that i always try to do too much. fuck, i've worn so many different hats, often at at the same time. i was going to book this tour myself, but you know what, i'm so fucking glad i've got joey booking it. one less thing i have to worry about. sure, i'll make a little less money, but you know what?, fuck money, who cares?, i don't have to think about it, that's worth more than any extra money i could keep doing it myself. he books it, i spend my time doing what i should be doing, finishing my film, and recording songs for my new album. done. deal. signed. sent. delivered. i'm yours. no, not yours, yours...

i got a festival in b.c. confirmed, shows on the east coast confirmed, and montreal, toronto, calgary, and edmonton all look like they're coming together. ok cobra motherfuckers.

i'm going to have a rap contest night at my bar soon. i'm going to make a mix cd of obscure early 90s rap shit that nobody's ever heard of, i'm going to invite people to come down and have some drinks while i play my mix cd. whoever can correctly name the highest number of songs off the mix cd, i'm going to give them a hundred bucks. you down with it? maybe we'll do it like a betting pool, everyone pays five bucks to enter, winner takes all.

i don't know where i'm going to be in four months. i hate/love that feeling.

it's thundering in the distance. thunder. distance. it's.

so, if we get our shit together, the album is in stores across canada the first week of july.

i got some cover designs back from the publisher for my book. the first batch were bunk. the new ones look good. i'm stoked. fuck, i mean, how cool is that going to be when the door bell rings one day and it's the ups guy dropping off a box of my books to me? jesus. i can't imagine. i mean, i can imagine, it feels so right. it's been time.

so many random thoughts, so little filter, so much time, so much entropy.

i want to write more kids, and i have music to share, but i'm juggling so much right now, it's like having three full-time jobs, dealing with this book, album, tour, movie, recording, and finding time to just chill and relax and paint and read a book once in a while. my friend elise gave me a book to read months ago, that i've been carrying around in my bag, and still haven't read yet, so much going on, and right when i'm typing this, feeling this chaotic commitment, or commitment to chaos, comes a huge gust of wind and rain, downpour, spiral, noise, the sky echoes my emotions, the leaves speak movement to my fingers, tiny drops of mist settle on my computer screen, and the gods tell me to go to sleep, to get warm, to get rested...

you have a lot to do tomorrow ryan, be ready.

and i still...

yes, i still...

and ***** knows...

and i know...

and none of it matters...

because i'm wrong, and i've always been wrong, and i tell myself that over and over, knowing that one day i'll convince myself, and i'll believe it, knowing that one day i'll be wrong for the rest of my life...

"it's perfect, ain't it?
this world, even when we hate it..."

good night sweet world,
sweet dreams to all of you...