...most of it anyway is in emails I write to pals.

So I feel the need to break that sacred trust of correspondence and make them into open letters (or my side, anyway).

And here I go:

Me? Two kids takes up an amazing amount of time. I think I've pretty much
resigned myself to the fact that I won't get to do anything solitary and
fun for the next decade-and-a-half or so, and I think I'm starting to
understand the philosophy of the long-term resident of federal penal
housing. After the first few months/years, the newness wears off and you
start accepting the fact that it's gonna take a lot LESS to excite you on
any given day.

Not that it's that full of dolor. Like most parents, I take great joy in
my urchins (for one reason because the boy developed a huge fondness for
the Ramones and Sleater-Kinney before "Greasy Grimy Gopher Guts" took over
as the apple of his ear) and their antics - when they're not spurring the
wife and I into ugly acts of infanticide (they seem to amazingly be able
to walk that tightrope very well - being incredibly cute and lovable just
enough to allow them to skate through their next hair-pulling and
ulcer-inducing acts of mischief). Having been on the receiving end of
endless 'cute' stories about other people's kids back when I was a DINK, I
try to avoid inflicting the same on others.

Musically, I've been falling into this weird American music thing
(sometimes called 'freak folk'). It appeals to my sense of the avant-garde
and experimental enough to keep me interested in this dreary time of emo
and mindlessly robotic pop music. I've also been reinforcing my belief
that Sun Ra was a freakin' genius.

Again, how 'bout you (as my close personal friend Ronnie van Zant used to
sing)?

Spiritually/intellectually, I've been reading more and more Buddhist stuff
(especially, recently, a book called "Hardcore Zen" by an ex-punk rock
bassist become Zen master and monster movie player in Japan no less). I
get a lot of political books from my neighbor the bookseller, but I
realized this morning that the point out the obvious truths to me so much
(we're going to hell in a handbasket) that they just depress me. I
recently bought a cheap 50-pack of bad/classic Hong Kong chopsocky and
find myself turning more and more to it (as I once did M*A*S*H* reruns)
for easily digestible and simple morality tales where evil is always
vanquished and good always triumphs.