Aric's birthday and Run for Cover.

After brunch on Saturday, Jay, Ivy and I did some shopping on Columbia Road. I bought some disposable cameras and Ivy bought a butterfly shirt at the Latino Hoochie store on the corner. This is the first photo that I have ever seen of Jay. He is the only person that I know without a Myspace picture. Here they are outside of Metro Spirits. I had hoped to buy Aric some Sparks for his birthday, but as it turned out almost everywhere in the neighborhood is currently out of Sparks, because of the distributors. They Metro Spirits employees kept suggesting that I get Budweiser E, but I had to tell them that it was disgusting. So instead I bought the Old English High Gravity 40.

On our way back, we ran into Ben Holland-Arlen and his friend. He was going to a rehearsal dinner for his friend's wedding that evening. I took this photo of him because I don't know the next I will see him. I think Ben was acutally on the phone with Aric when this photo was taken. After we parted ways with Ben, I headed home to shower and get ready for the evenings events.





Here is Ivy in her butterfly shirt, pouring some Margaritas that I had just whipped up. I think that I left the rest of my handle of Cuervo over there. I will need to retrieve that at some point. We chilled on the porch with Jay and Fred for awhile and then headed over to Aric's rooftop deck.

Two weekends ago, Jay had his appendix removed. He thought he was dying, but everyone kept telling him that he was hungover. Eventually, one of his roommates took him the emergency room, where he was eventually admitted after puking all over the waiting room floor. Now he has three little scars with bandages over them on his stomach. I meant to take a photo of them, but I like this one of Jay, he looks very relaxed. Fred is hilarious. I realized when I got these photos back that Ivy and I love each other or Fred is just really good at getting us to show off for the camera. There is a definite progression from this first photo of me and Ivy to the last.



We finished up our margaritas, just as Ian got out of a cab and headed over to the BBQ on Aric's rooftop.
Last weekend, Aric was growing a beard, but after a short trip down to Richmond, he decided that there were too many and shaved it into a moustache. He looks very 70s porn now, it's hot!!

I really wanted to tie a balloon to the top of this teepee thing on Aric's roof. However, I think this is as far as I could make it up. This is the second of Fred's photo shoots.

There is Matt with the High Gravity. I think he ended up drinking the majority of the 40. I love this photo, he looks so damn serious about drinking that thing.

I had wrapped the 40 in the 4th of July tinsel that you can see on Aric's head. I made his wear it on his head for this birthday photo. Below is a cute picture of me and Matt. We are so damn cute!!

Never been more scared in my life.

The original plan was:

1. Me and Liz drink Sparks at Chief Ike's.
2. Meet Matt at 80s nite and let the yummiest orange flavored creation of all time take over our bodies.

Instead, the actual events of last nite took over our minds.

Liz texted me at 8:00: "There's a zombie marathon just starting on IFC. Grab the Sparks and let's kick it." So, I finished getting ready for the evening, which involved cooking a dinner that tasted like shit and then throwing it out and eating nothing. I figured that was okay, because then I wouldn't have to spend too much money on drinks. I stopped by the Super Save Market to pick up Sparks, but as it turns out, the Super Save no longer carries them, so I picked up some High Life and headed over to Liz's.

When I arrived the front door was locked, so I knocked loudly, knowing that she was watching Romero's Dawn of the Dead, I figured I would try and give her a little scare. Liz came to unlock the door for me, I pretended that I was a zombie and pressed my face against the glass pane and tried to walk into the door as she was opening it. I got some good screams out of her, as she attested that she had been screaming a lot since she started watching the movie. I sat down and joined in on the zombie fun.

70's zombie movies effing rule. The blood is red paint, it's very cool. (*Ed note: Much of the fake blood used in the blood packets was a mixture of food coloring, peanut butter and cane sugar syrup.*) There really were no big screams from me during the remainder of the film. Just a lot of, "ah, look at that zombie, he still has his baseball glove on" or "there is a zombie nun" or "why is that zombie bluer than the others?" In the end, the zombies take over the mall and Liz and I started preparing our zombie plan.

The zombie plan has to be similar to our global warming catastrophe plan (this plan of action is headed up by Ms. Ivy, since she is our environmental guru, and was constructed while watching The Day After Tomorrow.) We haven't worked out the nitty gritty details yet, but last nite, we decided that rule number one has to be that we cannot be stoned when the zombies attack. If this happens we are dead because we will not think rationally.

Following Dawn of the Dead, IFC was showing a behind the scenes of Land of the Dead, but we didn't want to ruin the scary parts before we see the movie, so we landed on the beginning of Taking Lives. Ethan and Angelina, you can't really beat that on a Thursday nite. This movie scared the fucking shit out of us. It was really suspenseful and illicted a HUGE blood curdling scream from both of us, within the first 30 minutes.

While trying to figure out why Angelina was able to go down into secret hidden dark basements alone, I thought I heard a knock at the front door. So, I shouted "hello" out the open window. There was no answer, so we continued to watch. Then I heard movement and saw the shadow of a man peeping through the shade of the other window. I whispered to Liz and she said that she saw it too. We tried to chill out as Angelina laid down on the dirty basement cot, but just as she did, an arm reached through the bed and grabbed her and someone knocked on Liz's door lounder. At this point, we both lost our shit and started screaming at the top of our lungs. We bolted for the kitchen, me with beer and cellphone in hand, spilling beer all over the couch, floor, everywhere as we ran. Once we got to the kitchen I grabbed a knife and went into the pantry closet and started to call Matt. Liz told me that I needed to back her up while she went to peek at the front door. She said that someone was there and that they were definitely trying to fuck with us. At this point, I started crying because Matt wasn't answering his phone and I was trying to find an escape route. Liz went to peek again at the door and discovered that it was the pizza guy. Rob had ordered a pizza on his way home from band practice and he wasn't home yet, so we weren't expecting the knocking. Liz went to unlock the door for the pizza guy and he asked us if we were okay. (NO WERE ARE NOT OKAY, YOU JUST SCARED THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF US.)

To wrap up, we were fine, kind of shaken, but alive. The movie was really good.

This was a great test run of the zombie plan. We now know that I am good with a knife and good at calling for help. We also proved that it is a good idea not to be stoned while in these types of crisis situations. Had Liz and I been stoned last nite, we may have just hid in the pantry closet until someone got home, and that would have been stupid and Rob never would have gotten his pizza.

There is nothing more exciting than a new Strokes album to obsess about.

Months before the new album will be released, NME gets to preview the tracks and tell us about them. I get so into this shit.

My feelings are more important than yours?

The Strokes are fired up

News from Rolling Stone . . .

The Strokes have finished recording their third album, which they are mixing with studio whiz Andy Wallace. The album is due out in January.

"I don't wanna go overboard," says singer Julian Casablancas, sitting on a stoop on Fourteenth Street in Manhattan, "but I'm pretty excited. It's like a seedless watermelon -- I like it."

With no deadlines hanging over them in the studio, the Strokes had plenty of time to perfect the tunes, which feature Casablancas' voice front and center for the first time. Highlights of the fourteen songs include Casablancas venting on "Razor Blade" with the cutting line "My feelings are more important than yours"; guitarist Albert Hammond Jr. ripping into a solo on "Vision of Division" sounding like Dick Dale on crack; and the starkly beautiful "Ask Me Anything" (which came to the singer in a dream), featuring only Casablancas' vocals, and Mellotron courtesy of guitarist Nick Valensi.

Casablancas is racking his brain for the album's title and artwork. But he feels like a weight has been lifted off his shoulders. "I'm relaxed now," he says. "Almost done."

The band is revving up for a larger tour than the one following the previous album. "We were a little road-weary after [2003's] Room On Fire, so it was light," says Casablancas. "Now I think we're ready for fatal touring again -- to go all out. We got our energy back."

What do we think about this?

The White Stripes and The Shins at Merriweather?? Is this worth going to??
Oh my god, I think yes.

Matty Zissou

It looks like my brother joined Team Zissou:

The Hard Tomorrows on Myspace.com

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