November 22, 2009 8:15 p.m.

"Shoot him again. His soul is still dancing."

The film Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans has just been released, and I think that we can all agree that I need to see this movie, probably immediately. Putting aside that it is directed by the brilliant and probably crazy Werner Herzog. Forgetting for a moment that it appears to star the Leaving Las Vegas Nicolas Cage, and not the National Treasure Nicolas Cage. Utterly ignoring its implicit claim, however tenuous, to the sensibilities of the insane over-the-top original Bad Lieutenant. Or even the return of Val Kilmer. Watch this trailer and tell me that you don't have a strong desire to catch this flick promptly. Because then I will know never to hang out with you.

November 19, 2009 9:53 a.m.

Everyone has a past. I was reminded of mine when my friend Mike wrote the following e-mail about his new interest in an the 80's band Loverboy and their song "Working for the Weekend":

I was not necessarily a big fan of this song when it came out, or even years later when 80's rock started coming back to the radio. Second, I generally do not care for cover bands. Nevertheless, I totally rocked out when I heard a cover band play this song a couple of months ago at the Clarendon Grill. Now I can't stop listening to the original. Am I just nostalgic? Also, is that Will Ferrell playing guitar? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7E82ozXyNjk&feature=related

My response:

I saw these guys live in ’83 at the Brendan Byrne Arena in Jersey in ’83. I am not even kidding. I had seventh row seats. I was there for the opening act, a band called Zebra, a Rush wanna-be group that had some moderate success during the nascent days of MTV (you know, back when they played videos). You can look them up on YouTube--their “hit” was “Who’s Behind the Door?”, and I used a lyric from it for my high school yearbook quote. I wish I was making even part of this up. Having been there, though, I can attest to the fact that women loved these guys. By the second half of the show the first twenty rows had essentially rushed the front of the stage. They would have stepped over their grandmother to catch a drop of sweat from the bass player. Totally incomprehensible in retrospect.

Someday I'll be telling my kid, "I saw Def Leppard in '82 back when Rick Allen had two arms." I'm pretty sure it won't end well.

November 13, 2009 9:54 p.m.

For six years, every time I go grocery shopping, I see this and it makes me smile. And I don't even like yogurt.

November 5, 2009 8:19 p.m.

Dear Mom:

Howdy. Thanks for dressing me up like a gay cowboy. I really appreciate it. I guess they don't sell assless chaps at Babies R Us. You know, I think I'm a little young to be trying out for the Village People. Just a thought.

Love, your son

Dear Mike:

I know we haven't met yet, but this isn't me. You have to trust me on this.

Cheers, Jude

October 10, 2009 8:17 a.m.

Everyone has a plan unitl they get hit. My last fifteen minutes.

The concept behind this little project of mine was simple. Occasional semi-factual accounts of my recent past, to-wit: my last fifteen minutes. Unfortunately, my previous fifteen minutes is pretty much the same as any randomly selected fifteen minutes of my life since my son was born: a combination, in no particular order, of sleep, baby, work and fantasies regarding sleep. It's all a very good time, and very sweet, but it's not the tone I'm lookoing for. Before my son's arrival, I promised myself that I wouldn't write anything here unless I had something to say that wasn't either sentimental or cliche. It turns out this pretty much eliminates everything having to do with babies. So, in breaking what I'm certain is only the first of a series of promises regarding my son, I need a new plan. So, I'm going freestyle. Well, that didn't take long.

Acting Class

It turns out that spending time with the boy has given me the opportunity to work on some thespian exercises. The following is directly from the script of Pretty In Pink, the John Hughes film about a plucky girl in thrift store clothes who falls in love with a boy fron the country club set. In this scene, a young James Spader is playing a rich, good-looking, self-centered and arrogent, but secretly insecure, leader of the rich kids. Andrew McCarthy is playing Andrew McCarthy. Spader, who is upset that McCarthy is dating a girl from the other side of the tracks, is telling McCarthy that their friendship is in jeopardy. [For maximum effect, you can watch it here, at the 4:30 mark.]

As the scene opens, my one-month-old son is laying on couch in a onesie; he has just been fed, and he's looking out at me with those half-closed drugged-out eyes of a heroin addict who just scored a fix (or like Andrew McCarthy in most of the scenes in this movie). I'm sitting in a chair across the living room wearing an oxford with the first four buttons undone, holding a spit rag.

Me/Spader: I've seen your mother go to work on you, Blane. It's vicious. When Bill and Joyce finish with you, you won't know whether to shit or go sailing. [getting up out of my chair] Listen, I'm getting really bored with this conversation, Blane. If you want your little piece of low-grade ass, fine, take it. But if you do, you're not gonna have a friend.
My son/McCarthy: [moving his arms around until he holds them above his head, signalling a touchdown] La!
Me/Spader: Yeah, that's right. If you wanna make the choice, go ahead. I personally wouldn't trash a friendship over it, but I'm old-fashioned, so...
My son/McCarthy: [spitting up white formula through his mouth and nose like the android Ash at the end of Alien]
Me/Spader: [tossing the spit rag onto my son's lap] Why don't you take a shower? You look like shit.

And . . . scene. The kid is a natural.

September 11, 2009 10:42 a.m.

The times they are a changin', my friend. My last fifteen minutes.

So here's something interesting. I'm changing my kid for the first time, and there's Mexican black tar heroin coming out of his ass. And this prodigious output has continued. In other words, I've thrown away dirty diapers with a street value of at least fifteen thousand dollars, according to the chart I found at the Department of Justice website. And those are friend prices.

September 10, 2009 11:01 a.m.

Where snarky self-satisfaction meets sentimental reality. My last fifteen minutes.

I admit that the entire idea for this web page came about as a reaction to the here's-what-I'm-doing-right-now-blog-and-twitter nation, etc. I admit that it wasn't necessarily an original idea. I also admit that instead of commenting on this cultural phenomenon, I just endined up trying to do it smarter and with more restraint (with uneven success). Probably the only thing more pathetic than a person who spends his time publishing everything he just did or thought, is the man who spends his time making fun of that person.

That being said, I am now sitting in the delivery room with my lovely wife, waiting for her to deliver a little bundle of awesome. That's what I'm doing right now. I don't have a joke or anything, it's just that if you're going to have a blog titled "The Last Fifteen Minutes", you should probably take advantage on one of those occasions when something truly eventful is happening.

So instead of enjoying every minute of this special moment, I'm engaging in the kind of empty narrative and parochial commentary for which I have developed such a profound distaste. So, basically, on this one, I suck. Yay, me.

I am, for the moment, unredeemed.

August 30, 2009 9:53 p.m.

Reaching into the icebox and taking the lid off of my last fifteen minutes.

I have just discovered the greatest thing, probably, ever. Ben & Jerry's Half-Baked Ice Cream. A mere recitation of its constituent parts (chocolate & vanilla ice cream, brownie and cookie dough) fails to do justice to the poetry within. This ice cream is impossibly good. The guy who discovered the combination of peanut butter and chocolate was a hack. This recipe, friends, is real genius.

At no point does a man, in a state of nature, cease consuming this frozen confection until the pint is spent. As the first spoonful enters his system, the subject's body begins releasing endorphines, his eyes roll back in his head, and the reptilian core of his brain urgently states: "This is good. I should keep doing this as long as I can." On a molecular level, your body has been programmed to understand one thing: that it is better to be eating Ben & Jerry's Half-Baked Ice Cream than not to be eating Ben & Jerry's Half-Baked Ice Cream.

According to the American Psychiatric Association, addiction is "characterized by three major elements: (a) compulsion to seek and take the drug, (b) loss of control in limiting intake, and (c) emergence of a negative emotional state when access to the drug is prevented." In other words, we all scream for ice cream. To paraphrase an author writing about drug addicition: "At a certain point, [Ben & Jerry's Half-Baked] usage ceases to be a voluntary action: this is the onset of addiction. The positive reinforcement of the sensation of euphoria eventually alters the brain so that the use of [Ben & Jerry's Half-Baked] is obligatory." Exactly.

Now, I know that this product lists among its ingredients, in separate entries: sugar, liquid sugar, brown sugar and corn syrup. Also (again, listed separately): eggs, egg yolks and egg whites. I know that it contains heroic amounts of cholesterol, sufficient to permanently alter my body chemistry. But it's only at the bottom of the container that you can find the secret ingredient: a layer of fresh regret, laced with bits of real shame.

I am still hungry.

August 17, 2009 10:34 p.m.

The doctor is in. Diagnosis: my last fifteen minutes.

I am gingerly removing the bandage where the bloodsuckers got to me. An early morning physical followed by a bloodletting at the lab. Now I remember why I have assiduously avoiding going to the doctor. It involves three of my least favorite things: needles, waiting rooms, and a stranger grabbing my junk. Good times.

I am cured.

August 15, 2009 2:03 p.m.

And there was much rejoicing. My last fifteen minutes.

Dude, you're not getting a Dell. My old Dell laptop is almost defunct, the Geek Squad having placed the "Do Not Resuscitate" sticker on its chart. Now operating only in Safe Mode, it cannot speak, it cannot listen, it has no memories.

And so I have returned home with a new Toshiba Satellite, with its sleek black design and backlit keyboard that make it feel like I'm driving a good German car. Just the physical act of typing on this splendid machine creates a sense of well-being and calm that normally only results from the judicious use of quality pharmaceuticals.

But before I say anything more about the Prosperous Mr. Toshiba, allow me a final word about the Unfortunate Mr. Dell.

My former machine was eventually consumed by the Blue Screen of Death, a deeply evil phenomenon about which I was previously ignorant. The BSOD arrives without warning, turning your computer screen . . . blue. Cryptic language appears informing the user that Windows has shut down to avoid damage to the computer. What could be the problem? Software? Hardware? Memory? Good question. If you look on Microsoft's website in search of answers, you are essentially told: "Do you have the blue screen? Wow, that's too bad. We really don't know what causes that. It could be anything. So, anyway, good luck with that." The Geek Squad, or whoever, can run diagnostics, but basically they don't know. What you do is this: try a bunch of things (system restore, uninstalling software, reinstalling the operating system, professional help, other voodoo) until something works. Or it doesn't. If it works, stop asking questions and just be happy your old friend is back. If it doesn't, well we're sorry--maybe you should call the manufacturer.

My takeaway from the dealings I had with these witchdoctors is that the computer repair business is as soaked in dishonesty and false confidence as the palm reading industry. I fully recognize that the previous statement may be the product of bias.

My laptop is dead; long live my laptop.

This time it will be different.

August 3, 2009 10:23 p.m.

We are experiencing technical difficulties. Please stand by for my last fifteen minutes.

My possessions are causing me suspicion. What began as a friendly correspondence was undermined by my laptop's self-destructive bent. My computer is on suicide watch as I attempt keep sharp objects out of its grasp. I am writing this in "Safe Mode", which is like trying to play a sonata on Thorazine. I should have simply written a letter. The e-mail, apparently unsendable with my current technology, follows. Res ipsa loquitor.

Mike:

I wrote a reply earlier, by my laptop shut down like Bobby Bonilla with a minor injury in a noncontract year. So that was awesome.

Then I wrote another entire reply. And my machine crashed again before I could hit "Send". I reboot, and I am informed that Windows experienced an unexpected shutdown. Oh, do you think so doctor? And it shuts down again. Keep typing. Another blackout. Dear Everyone: The weather is great. Wish you were here. Love, Sisyphus.

Anyway. [generic "work is good" stuff].

The kid stuff is pretty much locked down. I know this because [playful comment about my lovely wife]. As reward for my diligence, I have literally weeks of guiltless Golden Tee. It's a sin to live so well.

Fruit for breakfast. Soup for lunch. A sensible dinner. You watched me smoke the last cig I had over a month ago. Not much point in drinkng, what with the joy of my existence bleeding out on the floor. Like a watercolor in the rain, as Al Stewart would say.

So, yeah, it's the best job in the world. That's what I tell you guys.

When my computer loses consciousness, by the way, the screen goes blue and white typeface explains that the computer is "dumping physical memory". Dumping Physical Memory. That sounds serious. It also sounds like a shitty liberal arts college band.

And now I'm done. So much time into it, I might as well post it on my page.

Fuck it, we'll do it live.

Jack

I am delivered.

July 18, 2009 9:21 p.m.

Light up and breathe deeply. You are smelling the residue of my last fifteen minutes.

There are, according to Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. They are not necessarily experienced in order, and not everyone goes through every stage. When I quit smoking four weeks ago, I skipped the first three stages and went straight to depression. Real, genuine depression. In the interest of full disclosure, I was also reading Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" that week, a combination that in hindsight was not a cocktail for emotional contentment.

And now I've found a new stage, one which hasn't made the textbooks yet. It's the one you learned from your parents.

I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed.

July 15, 2009 9:17 p.m.

Peeling back the rind to find a juicy center. My last fifteen minutes.

Tonight I began systematically purchasing fruit in a futile effort to stave off my inevitable demise. The fruit has been acquired with the intent of consumption, kind of like when you bought that Nautilus Bowflex machine with the intention of getting back into shape. Now it sits in your rec room room, mocking you, and performing admirably as a constant reminder that even your most modest aspirations are apparently unattainable.

I have the same relationship with fruit. For example, I just purchased more grapes than I have ever consumed previously over the course of my life, which is equivalent (in weight) to approximately one and a half pounds. This is not an exaggeration. And when faced with my failure, and the fact that I don't really (as it turns out) like grapes that much, I will bring them to work where frankly anything could happen to them. My wife thinks I'm being healthy, and I don't have to process the silent mockery of a bag of grapes on a daily basis. Everybody wins. Try doing that with a Nautilus.

Not that all of my exposure to fruit have been unpleasant. Some of my favorite fruit related experiences:

Orange juice
A slice of lime in my gin and tonic
The poem "This Is Just To Say" by William Carlos Williams
Watermelon Bubble Yum


This Is Just To Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

--William Carlos Williams

This Is Just My Dinner

I have eaten
several tacos
that I found in a
Mexican restaurant
near our house

although I purchased
grapes and told you
earlier
that I would eat them
for dinner

Forgive me
they were delicious
so warm
and so crunchy

--Jack Altmiller

July 13, 2009 10:09 p.m.

Shifting gears as I approach the onramp to the information superhighway. Destination: my last fifteen minutes.

I am pondering whether material possessions can truly bring emotional fulfillment. Whether felicity can be bound to computer chips and LCD screens. It has been said that money cannot buy happiness, but that it can buy a better brand of sadness. And I am all about brand loyalty. So, behold the technological poetry that is the LG enV. Humble yet confident, its reach never exceeds its grasp. A numerical face before an alphabetical heart.

This new addition to family follows on the heels of the loss of the bad seed that was the Verizon Trio. A gift from my partner that became a curse upon all of our houses.

Can a cell phone be evil? Good question. The answer is yes. Those who knew me in the dark days of early 2009 have heard of my deep and abiding hatred of this malevolent tool. So poisonous that it was not safe to allow it near any other electrical devices. Its poor design and difficulty of use was complimented by its tendency to call random individuals (seemingly at its own whim) and to cease working entirely for reasons known only to its own black heart, and (perhaps) its diabolical creators. If the phone performed the task you intended, you could be certain that it was only the result of coincidence. Hatred is a strong word. It is appropriate here.

The facts. Yes, I did fantasize about the violent death of this device. I did suggest that I would set about to killing the phone, while making it appear to be an accident, or perhaps even a suicide. But I am innocent in its disappearance, which occurred while hiking in the wilderness of northern Westchester County. In the real world, that phone could hold a charge for no more than eight hours; it sucked more power than a small village. In the woods, it probably wouldn't have lasted until dusk without a charger. Search parties were not deployed.

Back home, they informed me that the machine was insured. Really? Yes, we can send you a new phone in a few days. The same phone? Yes. The same model? Yes, it won't cost you anything. No thanks, I'd rather spend the two hundred dollars to own a phone that doesn't suck so badly that I've had detailed hallucinations about what it would like if it was on fire. Shhh. The nightmare is over.

I am released.

June 10, 2009 4:24 p.m.

Relax. You are feeling very sleepy. And now, my last fifteen minutes.

Bob Slydell: You see, what we're actually trying to do here is, we're trying to get a feel for how people spend their day at work... so, if you would, would you walk us through a typical day, for you?

Peter Gibbons: Yeah.

Bob Slydell: Great.

Peter Gibbons: Well, I generally come in at least fifteen minutes late, ah, I use the side door - that way Lumbergh can't see me, heh heh - and, uh, after that I just sorta space out for about an hour.

Bob Porter: Da-uh? Space out?

Peter Gibbons: Yeah, I just stare at my desk; but it looks like I'm working.

Peter Gibbons: The thing is, Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care.

My office is strangely quiet. The only constant sounds are the hum of my computer and the distant pecking of keyboard from a cubicle outside, as I sit in a dark office that looks like it came straight from the set of a David Fincher movie. The sound of my thoughts, normally loud and distracting, are now dark and syrupy. I have to get out of here right now. Slipping out the back door. I'm done with you people.

I am missing.

June 6, 2009 8:38 a.m.

They can't all be winners. My last fifteen minutes.

The Lord have mercy and protect us, I've been eating soup for breakfast. I make odd food choices. This is widely understood.

I just realized what Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup tastes like: disappointment mixed with acceptance. It is the comestible incarnation of your sense that you will probably never even graze the bottom of your aspirations, but that, on the bright side, you probably won't starve to death. Cold comfort in a warm bowl.

I feel nourished.

June 3, 2009 9:38 p.m.

Consciousness, diffuse and slippery, cries for a narrative. Therefore: my last fifteen minutes.

Falling into the rabbit hole of Facebook, I realize how this new drug acts as an intensifier. Excitement becomes expanded. Sadness is now more textured. Boredom finds a new sun to orbit. I took the Facebook "How Annoying Are You?" test and learned that the answer was "Incredibly" [capitalization in original]. When will the "How Ironic Is This?" test be available? I can't wait. Seriously.

I feel vacant.

May 30, 2009 8:38 p.m.

Temporal joy and momentary regret. My last fifteen minutes.

I just watched a good beer die.

May 14, 2009 1:05 p.m.

An epicurean odyssey. A culinary apocalypse. My last fifteen minutes.

Hit and run at Chipotle, and now this guy is working its way through my intestinal justice system, just trying to taste freedom like Andy Dufresne. Will it come out angry, or will it escape triumphantly?

May 12, 2009 12:16 a.m.

It's all coming at you. Brought to you with a smile. My last fifteen minutes.

Spending the last fifteen minutes in South Carolina with my best friend Mike. Talking about politics, religion and--of course--my blog. There's a name in computer programming for the this self-referential loop. But Mike can't remember this term. It frustrates him. Failure unfolds before me. My time slips away.

I am at sea.

May 4, 2009 8:15 a.m.

Fifteen minutes ago I was asleep. It was bliss.

May 3, 2009 1:02 p.m.

Sharing my momentary existence. My last fifteen minutes.

It's raining now. On my way back from the Jiffy Lube, I bought a bubblope at CVS for my wife. As I begin to work, I can hear the muted sound of the rain on the deck. The lights are out in the house, and the day seems coated with the gray patina of emptiness. Everything is broken.

I'm tired.

May 2, 2009 11:14 p.m.

This is dedicated to the moment. Life as it happens. The last fifteen minutes of my life.

What have I been up to? Let's see. Well, I've been typing this post. Before that I set up this blog. That took a few minutes. Of course, I had to come up with the idea. Actually, that didn't take long. I was watching the basketball game before that--wait, that might have been twenty minutes ago. Things haven't been that eventful. It's not like I've been grabbing life by the throat lately.

What I've really learned in the last fifteen minutes is that the moment is usually rather uninteresting, at least in comparison to what has happened and what will happen. I have come to grasp the true nature of futility and despair. Don't bother. Most ideas aren't that great, and this is one of them.

I'm bored.