sitar hero

i get a huge kick out of that concept. it emerged from a great discussion question posed by my sister: what would you put in your own personal version of guitar hero? our consideration inevitably turned to the beatles, and i lobbied for 'while my guitar gently weeps', but she wrinkled her nose and announced that she would pass on george harrison's stuff. thinking about george a little more, i made the crack about sitar hero. i don't really know what the mechanics would be like; i don't think i've ever seen someone play a sitar, and i know i haven't, despite a couple of consecutive birthday/christmas requests in my misguided youth. i doubt any company is marketing a sitar starter kit through big box stores. perhaps a little too niche. mechanics aside, i also couldn't come up with a big roster for a theoretical game. the small percentage of beatles tunes where george does it, gabby lala playing with les claypool, and the india's greatest hits cd (i wish it was called that, it was like indian masters vol. IV or something, came with a pouch of some black gram lentil dish i ate at work once) are pretty much the limits of my sitar experience. suggestions welcome.
over the weekend i went to delaware (wikipedia pages for states are always great). ostensibly the trip was a beer run, but we wound up traversing the whole state, which sounds impressive, but is not so much when you consider the whole thing is like 100 miles long. in fact, most of the experience was somewhat less than impressive, but it was still pretty cool. i guess my midwest background gears me to expect new states to be notably different in some way. actually the whole terrain reminded me of michigan, if a little more marshy in some spots. mostly the whole place seemed dull and kind of depressing, although i didn't really stop in to check out wilmington or dover. our original destination was supposed to yield discounted alcohol and a chain location of a restaurant called "cluck you". these were to be found in newark, which is militantly pronounced new ark, like some sequel to the noah narrative, to distinguish it from a certain city in the area with the same spelling. anyway, newark is the home of the university of delaware. i am pretty sure i am grateful i did not for any reason choose to attend that school at any point; the town left some things to be desired. i figured the local booze shop would be pretty decent, having a college community to serve. this was not the case. i was so unimpressed by the selection and pricing that i got nothing. also, the alleged cluck you seemed to have vanished. but there was another wing place sharing the parking lot with the liquor store, so we ate there. it was really a pretty nice day if a little chilly, and the driver at some point suggested we just go all the way to the beach.
and so we did, and i got to see plenty of delaware in daylight, although that faded far before we reached our destination. we traversed a strange bridge; i think the wikipedia page calls it the only of its kind. it was a suspension bridge, but instead of having the work on either side, there was just one structure in between the two directions of the highway. its lighting gave it an even more surreal appearance on the drive back. i was in the front seat the whole time, manning the radio. because population is fairly dense in this part of the country, the dial seemed much more saturated than back home, but it still has roughly the same percentage of unlistenable garbage. however, i eventually went painstakingly through the frequencies, finally arriving at 107.9. and it was fantastic. some sort of a community radio station. when we were listening, an elderly man enthusiastically deejayed an assortment of ancient rhythm and blues records, mostly from the early fifties. mostly songs and performers i could not claim to be familiar with, although the music was undeniably an early evolution of so much i have listened to. the deejay's enjoyment of the music was incredibly well conveyed, so much so that i think he could have talked me into appreciating the music if i wasn't already.
as the station began to fade depending on where we wound up stopped in traffic, i noticed a sign proclaiming a prodigiously large liquor store approaching in approximately half a mile. this stop yielded much more fruit than the last. after much perusing and some difficult decisions, i came away with a twelve pack of sierra nevada pale and a six of troeg's nugget nectar for a little over twenty bucks. can't beat that with a stick in my book. i don't need to preach the timeless virtues of sierra nevada pale to anyone here. the nugget nectar, though, demands additional exposition. this is a fantastic beer. i wish i had bought more of it than i did; as i have not had great luck locating it in the city. it proclaims itself to be an imperial amber ale, but at something ludicrous like 93 or so IBUs the malt bill means a little less. i can still detect more and different sweetness on the finish than with even the most aggressive double ipa, but the hops are still what does the talking in this one. beautiful pour and head retention, the lace lingers like the pleasure of consumption itself. the commercial description itself even uses the word 'heady' to describe the hop blend. not a whole lot more need be said.
the beer quest continued, however, as the beach for which we headed was rehoboth beach, home of dogfish head. actually *a* home of dogfish head. although i didn't realize it on the way down, the rehoboth beach location is just an alehouse, in fact one of three in the region. the brewery is somewhere else in the state, and does not have a pub attached. the one i went to is where the distillery is, but it was too late in the day to get to check it out. this was the most initially unsettling microbrewing experience i have ever had. the place was packed out, not in a cozy way, but rather uncomfortable. a lot of money in there. lots of dressed-up food that probably cost a lot more than it should. smelling seafood might always make me think that though. it was damn near impossible to get a beer; the bar didn't have a service area or anything and the bartenders were really busy. the maitre d kept asking us to move one way or another. we weren't trying to be in the way, but in the way was the only way to be. i was about ready to say screw it when my buddy caught the bartender's eye. a fresh draught of ninety minute hit the spot like no other. as it turned out, there was a whole upstairs to the place. it was much more microbrewery appropriate. chilled out, spacious, a couple families, couple guys shooting pool, much quieter. we enjoyed our pints and played a little lord of the rings pinball. i totally won an extra play. then four of the most obnoxious people i have ever had the displeasure to hear disrupted the atmosphere. we finished what little beer we had left and called it good.
then we walked through the rest of the town to the beach. there probably wasn't a whole lot to the town; we were definitely on the main drag. the whole layout and content made me think that this is precisely what saugatuck or grand haven would be if they were on the atlantic instead of lake michigan. lots of nifty-gifty shops, all the perfunctory beach-town type things, few antiques places, lots of restaurants, seasonally empty hotels on the horizon. it was quiet enough that i could hear the ocean getting a louder little by little as we approached. i had never actually managed to see the ocean before, and although it was dark out, i really felt like i accomplished something. it felt good to hear the waves and gaze over the shadowed expanse. we agreed that something endemic to humans makes them like to be near the water.
i wandered away a little bit and stared at the waves slamming into and away from a small jetty. i looked up at the sky, so much clearer than it is with all the light pollution in the city, and i saw a perfect gibbous. some things were incredibly visible and i thought about people navigating the vast sea with only the stars as a guide. i thought about the turn-of-the-sixteenth-century dutch colonists who landed at modern-day lewes, just one town over. theoretically they could have actually arrived right where i stood. i turned around and looked back at the town and reflected that if some benighted seafaring people landed here now they would have to immediately assign some significance to the pizza franchise that somehow occupied each of the two corners where the road to the beach broadened and looped. i thought about american history and its procession over four hundred years and then looked back up at the sky and then turned back to the waves. it felt good to remember how small i am.
i had occasion to revisit that feeling to a lesser degree and in a different way as i took a long walk through the city the other day. i already knew i was in for some walking; i had to make it to my somewhat inconvenient vet to purchase outrageously priced scientifically formulated cat food. however, i did not plan on the subway not running. for some reason i have yet to discover, it was not. the lady in the booth advised me to take the bus. at this point i realized why there had been massive crowds next to the bus stops back above ground. fuck that noise, i thought. so i just walked. i like to do that. it was kind of cold, though, and it snowed a little as my journey progressed. but i saw so many people doing so many different things, and so many businesses of so many kinds in such varying states that i remembered what i like about the city. the city is people, and so am i. from allegedly unoccupied husks of buildings to magnificent homes cannibalizing first floors as garages to venerable specialty stores to a kfc sign promoting their new roasted warp (that's what it said) to hopeful new bars to starkly differing schools, to all the different people i saw at all these different places in between, i felt somehow connected and intrigued.
all of this in turn led me to consider law school in a new way. i realized that at root, the process is an ontological campaign to restrict and otherwise taint my being in the world. it demands a mechanical monofocus, eschewing organic experience and consideration. it is designed to foreclose possibilities and impose a fascist way of being. meaningful engagement is discouraged. but i have to hold myself accountable too. all of this opportunity for reflection and with possibility effervescing around me, yet all i do is find a new way to articulate and explain my distaste for my present circumstances. at least i can say i made it to delaware?