Achtung Baby!

Lonely Sunday Chronicles [4]

Dear [C],

While reorganizing things here at the fortress of solitude, I ran into a book that reminded me of you.

I bought The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Vol. 2 with you when we were on our way to a concert (either Deathcab for Cutie or Spoon). It may have been the first time I ever took you to Austin Books. In any case, I bought the book because I had gifted away the actual issues and never bought the last one. Turns out that I have yet to remove the shrink-wrap on this book and still don’t know how the story ends.

Finding Volume 2 reminded me of November of last year when the highly anticipated follow up, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier was released. I was on one of my business trips when it came out. The weather was absolutely crummy and all day long I had talked myself out of going into the city to go buy it. But as the night came on and I sat bored on a boat on the Upper New York Bay, I decided, “Fuck It, I’m going to Midtown Comics Times Square to get this book”.

Well, that turned out to be a misadventure. I had never been to that store, sort of knew where it was and went for it on instinct. I hadn’t really thought about it but I had never been to Times Square at night. I remember coming up the stairs and noticing how it looked like daytime down the street. Anyways, I went to the store, checked it out, got my book, stood in a long line (I’ve never seen a comic book store as busy as this one) and off I went. I was starving but nothing around me got my attention so I decided I would eat when I went back to work where I had some leftovers from Lunch.

When I walked out of the store, my sense of direction became confused and I took the subway going uptown instead of going down to the ferry station. It took me a few stops to notice and I was way the hell away from where I should have been. Ok, I get on the right subway, and off the ferry station I go. By the time I get there I missed it by a few minutes and had to wait twenty minutes or whatever for the next one to arrive. I was starving and you know how cranky I get when I’m hungry.

I get to Staten Island and take the same train I always take back to work. What I did not notice, when I was rushing to make the train, was that they had switched scheduled, or train entrances or whatever, and the damn train ended up zipping right by my stop, and kept going and going to who the fuck cares in way inside Staten Island. I didn’t feel so bad when the people around me were voicing their concerns about the train not stopping as expected. One old lady was really freaking out when she would notice the stop names we were passing by. And by freaking out I mean she was really scared. Another lady told her where she thought we were going to end up and that it wouldn’t be long. What fucking ever, it took forever for that train to stop and I was kicking myself for not having had a hot dog or something in the city in addition to being concerned about where we would end up based on the anxiety of the locals.

Sure enough, the train stops at a station I would describe as dark and dangerous looking. It looked like Jack the Ripper could jump out of any corner and go on a killing spree and here I was watching over a worried old lady. Thankfully the other lady on the platform with us was one tough cookie and had no fear and was nice enough to keep the old lady reassured that everything would be fine and that the right train way would arrive soon enough. Twenty minutes in the cold, rainy weather waiting and waiting until it finally arrived. It took forever to get to my stop, where I had a nice little walk ahead of me in oh so wonderful fucking freezing weather. By the time I got back to the boat I was ready to either throw the book to the ocean or eat it.

Sure, when I was cold and walking and hungry and pissed off, I was thinking about how I had made one bad decision after another that night. But in the end I knew that I would always recall this night fondly every time I looked at the book regardless of the misadventures. So, that’s what I think about when I look at these two books on my bookshelf.

The Kills covering the VU's "I'm Set Free"

Dido: Look No Further

but Among Your Books
Among your clothes
Among the noise and fuss

I've let it go

Being Quotes of the week

In regards to Halloween costumes: "I want an uber-smart, gun suit totting, slutty, flawed and sarcastic bad ass chick, but wishes, horses, all that" - D.

"All I can confirm is that I will be drunk and wearing a catsuit." - B.

"I lived in NYC a short time. Never really got the Brooklyn vibe. Probably because my ex-girlfriend lived there, and she's more dangerous than any Blood..." [via]

Comments

Lonely Sunday Chronicles [4]

Dear [C],

While reorganizing things here at the fortress of solitude, I ran into a book that reminded me of you.

I bought The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Vol. 2 with you when we were on our way to a concert (either Deathcab for Cutie or Spoon). It may have been the first time I ever took you to Austin Books. In any case, I bought the book because I had gifted away the actual issues and never bought the last one. Turns out that I have yet to remove the shrink-wrap on this book and still don’t know how the story ends.

Finding Volume 2 reminded me of November of last year when the highly anticipated follow up, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier was released. I was on one of my business trips when it came out. The weather was absolutely crummy and all day long I had talked myself out of going into the city to go buy it. But as the night came on and I sat bored on a boat on the Upper New York Bay, I decided, “Fuck It, I’m going to Midtown Comics Times Square to get this book”.

Well, that turned out to be a misadventure. I had never been to that store, sort of knew where it was and went for it on instinct. I hadn’t really thought about it but I had never been to Times Square at night. I remember coming up the stairs and noticing how it looked like daytime down the street. Anyways, I went to the store, checked it out, got my book, stood in a long line (I’ve never seen a comic book store as busy as this one) and off I went. I was starving but nothing around me got my attention so I decided I would eat when I went back to work where I had some leftovers from Lunch.

When I walked out of the store, my sense of direction became confused and I took the subway going uptown instead of going down to the ferry station. It took me a few stops to notice and I was way the hell away from where I should have been. Ok, I get on the right subway, and off the ferry station I go. By the time I get there I missed it by a few minutes and had to wait twenty minutes or whatever for the next one to arrive. I was starving and you know how cranky I get when I’m hungry.

I get to Staten Island and take the same train I always take back to work. What I did not notice, when I was rushing to make the train, was that they had switched scheduled, or train entrances or whatever, and the damn train ended up zipping right by my stop, and kept going and going to who the fuck cares in way inside Staten Island. I didn’t feel so bad when the people around me were voicing their concerns about the train not stopping as expected. One old lady was really freaking out when she would notice the stop names we were passing by. And by freaking out I mean she was really scared. Another lady told her where she thought we were going to end up and that it wouldn’t be long. What fucking ever, it took forever for that train to stop and I was kicking myself for not having had a hot dog or something in the city in addition to being concerned about where we would end up based on the anxiety of the locals.

Sure enough, the train stops at a station I would describe as dark and dangerous looking. It looked like Jack the Ripper could jump out of any corner and go on a killing spree and here I was watching over a worried old lady. Thankfully the other lady on the platform with us was one tough cookie and had no fear and was nice enough to keep the old lady reassured that everything would be fine and that the right train way would arrive soon enough. Twenty minutes in the cold, rainy weather waiting and waiting until it finally arrived. It took forever to get to my stop, where I had a nice little walk ahead of me in oh so wonderful fucking freezing weather. By the time I got back to the boat I was ready to either throw the book to the ocean or eat it.

Sure, when I was cold and walking and hungry and pissed off, I was thinking about how I had made one bad decision after another that night. But in the end I knew that I would always recall this night fondly every time I looked at the book regardless of the misadventures. So, that’s what I think about when I look at these two books on my bookshelf.

The Kills covering the VU's "I'm Set Free"

Dido: Look No Further

but Among Your Books
Among your clothes
Among the noise and fuss

I've let it go

Being Quotes of the week

In regards to Halloween costumes: "I want an uber-smart, gun suit totting, slutty, flawed and sarcastic bad ass chick, but wishes, horses, all that" - D.

"All I can confirm is that I will be drunk and wearing a catsuit." - B.

"I lived in NYC a short time. Never really got the Brooklyn vibe. Probably because my ex-girlfriend lived there, and she's more dangerous than any Blood..." [via]