Well, now that I've got you here, these are my favorites:

Guitar
Steve Howe
Jimmy Page
Phil Keaggy
Duane Allman
Dicky Betts
George Benson

Voice
Leigh Nash
Jewel
Neil Young
Denzel Washington
Joni Mitchell
Canadians, eh!
Thomas Builds The Fire
Eric Clapton

Author
Tom Clancy
Sheri Reynolds
Sherman Alexie
Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Movie
No particular order:
George of the Jungle
Dave
Smoke Signals
The Mummy
The American President
Jurassic Park
Toy Story (both)
While You Were Sleepng
You've Got Mail
Star Wars: Phantom Menace
The Matrix
Shanghai Noon
Antz
Dances with Wolves
The Fifth Element
12 Monkeys
A Bug's Life

TV Show
X-Files
The Lone Gunmen


The Archives

Nothing here yet

Update: August 20, 2001

What are Willy's Picks?

Fender mediums, of course. We've got them laying around everywhere handy - you can never have enough picks. Thom has an Apple "authorized dealer" coffee mug in which he saves all his worn-out picks. For some reason he insists on using a pick until the absolute last moment, until it is either worn round or completely cracked and broken. It's some kind of a game, dumb one at that. When he finally gives up on one to "pick" up a new one, he berates and chides himself for holding out so long. Or so he says.

Don't you just wish you could find some of these crawling around in your back yard! I do. The best I can come up with is an ocassional shield bug, an assassin bug here and there, and darkling and other ground beetles. I am a true fan of Coleoptera (beetles) and Hemiptera (true bugs). The rest of the insect world barely garners a glance.

I had a great collection of local bugs, beetles and others (no butterflies and moths). Had 50-60 different varieties - even had a praying mantis one of the boyz found in eastern Washington. During the great remodel of '96 I put the collection in a basement cabinet. This is all that was left after the mice had a country buffet of it: a bunch of wings and one darkling beetle. That's when I declared war on the mice, got "mouse-be-gone" or some such POISON and nuked their furry little butts. Note the glass on the cases above - not taking any chances.

This is cool. I don't know what it is, though. It hangs on the wall. The Girl brought it home one day, but hey, I like it.

Maybe it's one of the deplorable little monsters that ate my collection. I guess I hate it.


Sherman Alexie

Tonto & Lone Ranger Fistfight In Heaven, Indian Killer, Reservation Blues and Smoke Signals.

I would have to say my little corner of the world is inhabited mostly by white folks, a lot of farmers and loggers (though both are a dying breed these days around here), mill workers and retail. Of course, there's a smattering of hispanics, slavs and asians, with blacks being a distinct minority of minorities. And the Indians. There are a great number of Indians around here; I just don't see too many of them; but then, I don't get out much either. Or maybe, they generally keep to themselves, except for the few you always see downtown staggering and swaggering around, looking fierce and pathetic at the same time.

I like Indians. In fact, I admire their culture, when it was a viable culture. I am told that the local tribe used to spend two days gathering and preparing a week's worth of living; I spend five days minumum. However, they ate all sorts of things picked up on beaches and in mudflats and their clothing left a lot a bare spots like legs and shoulders - maybe fine for summer, but not winter (I've seen the pictures!). So I guess it's all relative to what you're used to. Believe me, there are things I just have no interest or desire to get used to.

I used to live in southern California, but it was an inhospitable and destructive environment - to me. Plenty of people love it and would never consider leaving it. Fine. Not me. It was either leave or spiral to my doom. So, I left. I didn't know where I was going or what I would do or how I would do it. Didn't matter. Self preservation is an extremely strong biological force. Self preservation and the confidence (or desperation) to pick up and go elsewhere. When people look at America, trying to figure why it is such a success story (success at what price? you ask! Another time.), the answer usually focuses on natural resources and democracy. While those, obviously, played a crucial role, I would say it is the American Spirit: self-reliance, willingness to take risks, willingness to go and do whatever is needed to be done, regardless the personal price to pay. These characteristics describe the true builders of America: the immigrants.

This is hard to write. Europeans basically landed on the eastern shores of America and pushed their way west to the ocean, consuming and taming all that stood in their way. That was then. This is now. I often ask myself what kind of person I would have been had I been involved in the pushing and consuming. I can only speculate and hope I would have been more enlightened, more compassionate, more humanitarian - but one only knows his true character when push comes to shove. One thing to remember, however: even the Indians were immigrants themselves from asia. Their only advantage was there were no people to push out of their way. But after they got here, there are plenty of stories of neighboring tribes not getting along, arguing over not-so-happy hunting grounds, stealing and keeping slaves of each other: generally behaving no better or worse than the rest of humanity when push comes to shove. And white folk always just seem to push better - they are relentless.

I think there is a Darwinian principle at work here: natural selection, survival of the fittest with a smattering of alpha male dominance: getting all the babes and passing on the most successful genetic characteristics. Which brings us back the the American Spirit and immigration. Why is America so strong? We got all the best genes. Before the great welfare state took over in America, coming to America meant leaving everything behind with no guarantees of success or survival, only unfailing hope and trust in one's abilities, one's strength, one's stamina. Coming to America was not for the weak, the feeble, the lazy, the insecure, the downtrodden. It was for those whose sense of self was immense (though lacking in opportunity) - they could and would take whatever the new world dished out. It was that genetic soup that produced America and is still at work today, though much diluted through welfare state and handme generations. My answer to the lack of opportunity in the inner cities: leave, immigrate out. There is a big world out there just waiting for your dreams, your labors, your spirit. But you might just have to leave friends and family; and you might have no guarantees; and it might take extra effort just to keep afloat. But that is exactly what the early immigrants faced, endured and triumphed over. Yes!

Now, this is going to get me in trouble. I was just looking across the table while Scoots was reading the front page of the local paper and chuckled. He asked why. I read the headline: "Tribe imagines safe, inviting school to replace old, crumbling fire hazard." The picture I had was of a bunch of Indians sitting around imagining such and such, "Yeah and wouldn't it be cool if..." and so forth. So I asked, "are they doing anything about it or just waiting for the federal government to hand it to them?" Typical cynical me. Here's a quote: "For more than a decade, tribal officials pleaded with the federal government for money to build a new school...[they] finally got $24 million for the school in this year's budget." Wasn't too far off.

Now, if my little town wants to build a new school, they have to present a bond issue to the voters. We approve it and then we pay for it. When the Indians, in their sovereign nationstates, want to build a new school, they plead and then we pay for it. You're right. I don't get it. What's to get? That the white European immigrants displaced the "original owners of the land" (remember: they too immigrated here) and destroyed a way of life? That was then, this is now. If theirs was a viable "way of life" today, I might think otherwise. But I don't see them walking the beaches, digging up wiggling and squirting things to eat; or pounding cedar bark for clothing. I see them with all the trapping of modern civilization: electricity, store-bought food (no more hunting and gathering except at the Food Barn), cars, casinos, tax-free cigarettes. That old way is gone - at least around here. You're right, though. I don't understand.

Which brings me to Sherman Alexie, a Spokane Indian who grew up on the reservation - and immigrated out. I believe he lives somewhere in Seattle. He, like his most engaging, endearing and likeable character - Thomas Builds The Fire, is a wonderful storyteller, accurately, I think, portraying a contemporary way of life foreign to most non-Indians: the reservation.

Tonto and the Lone Ranger Fistfight in Heaven is a collection of stories describing the depressing, hopelessness of reservation life. And that's the feeling it leaves you with. If I hadn't read Indian Killer and seen Smoke Signals, which was supposedly based on Tonto, I would probably not have made it through the whole book. Two of the stories, however, stand out: stories of storytellers. In one a young boy would rather sit at the feet of an old storyteller, listening to the old tales, than play with his friends. In the other a young boy gladdens his mother's or grandmother's heart with his own stories. While stories don't put food on the table or beat back the cold or make a drunken husband sober, they do put a stamp of authenticity to life: others have gone before; other will come after.

Indian Killer is a mystery / crime drama that takes place in and around Seattle's U-District and waterfront and is full of magic and prejudice. Now, I don't believe in magic. But, I also don't disbelieve in magic. The magic is a spirit killer, ritually killing white folk and leaving a feather or some such symbol of Indianness. The prejudice is the white folk not seeing beyond their whitefolkness, the Indians not seeing beyond their indianness, and the readers falling into the trap of thinking Victor or Junior killed the white boy at the casino. I love the O Henryesque end of the actual killers, but I don't think the story solved anything: the spirit killer was still unknown (magic), white folk were still bigoted and clueless, and Indians really didn't belong anywhere.

Reservation Blues brings us out of the doldrums: it's chock full of magic, and for once, a happy ending - the hero (Thomas) gets the girl (an Indian girl) and leaves the reservation. Oddly enough, this seems to be Alexie's answer to the debilitation of reservation life: leave. This tale is about Thomas Builds The Fire, Victor, Junior, a magic guitar, a battle of the bands contest and an almost recording session. It is this novel that cemented my appreciation for Sherman Alexie, a storyteller with a wonderful tale to tell. Init.

Smoke Signals is a true jewel, a vision quest, road trip journey of discovery in which Alexie gently chides the Indian and the White equally: we laugh at them, with them and at ourselves. This is no in-your-face invective, us-against-them battle. It's almost an attempt at reconciliation: we are all just plain folk underneath it all, no better, no worse. I'd seen it on the shelf at the video store and passed it over many times. Finally, after reading Indian Killer I picked it up and noticed Sherman Alexie as screenwriter and gave it a shot. Good choice.

Victor is a twentysomething angry Indian brave with no battles to fight except those within - his father abandoned him, his mother and the reservation when he was ten or so. Thomas Builds The Fire, Victor's contemporary and childhood "friend" is a storyteller who sees life as a continuation of stories to pass on and to be passed on to future generations, keeping the culture alive, rejoicing over government cheese. The two take a bus trip to Arizona to retreive Victor's father's cremated ashes and pickup truck. They discover the truth about Victor's father. They discover some truth about themselves, each carrying home some of the ashes, sharing in Victor's father. Victor went to Arizona to bring back a truck and returned with a mended soul. Thomas would have more stories to tell.

The actor who plays Thomas is a university student who travels around the Northwest speaking at colleges and other venues, capitalizing on his hard-won fame and affection: crowds shout out and want to hear him say "Hey, Victor!" I guess he talks about the Indian situation, but people don't want to hear that. They want stories and "Hey, Victor!" His voice is absolutely perfect: you cannot but sit and listen when he tells a story. At one point he and Victor are walking to the bus station; two Indian women stop and ask if they want a lift. "What will you give us?" they ask. Thomas offers a story. He tells one. They accept it and give them a ride. I think that is an awesome scene - they too need to hear the stories. It's only Victor who is sick of listening to Thomas and his stories. But Victor doesn't believe in anything, not even himself - only his anger.

Sherman Alexie, like most writers, writes about what he knows. He knows the reservation, and he left the reservation. He also writes about being Indian, giving the reader a glimpse of the joy: frybread, fancy dancing, the magic - things I don't understand but appreciate and would like to understand. Alexie doesn't seem to have an ax to grind - or tomahawk to toss - because I don't think he has the answer to it all any more than the rest of us. He may criticize the past, but he doesn't blame the present. He's lived off the reservation among the rest of us and realizes that the reservation is a state of mind that we all share - we are all screwed up: there are Victors and Juniors everywhere and we are all yearning for the storyteller to make sense for us.

What about Sherman Alexie's latest offering: The Toughest Indian In The World? Don't bother. Sorry, Sherman. You know, it's like when an actor or actress finally gets popular - they gotta do sex scenes - Jeeez, close the door. So, Alexie gets popular and now the big issues are sex. Well, I got through two stories and put in on the shelf. After the cornhole I'd had enough. Init!

5/26/01

Henry's Dark

Willy's pick used to be Henry's Porter, but it seems the new owners didn't think the porter was economically viable. Either that or the local marts are holding out on me. My only complaint with HD is its inconsistency. Sometimes every other bottle has a metallic taste and a bit too much effervescence. But when it's just right - it's just right.

I have to thank my younger brother for enlightening me to Guinness Draught in cans. Now there's a smooth brew - and it really tastes pretty darn close to the tap version, at least from Elephant & Castle.

Want to keep up on Weaselworks happenings? New music? Videos? Join the email list? It's easy. Just click!

Go for it!

To the top

WeaselWorks  |  Tunes  |  Videos  |  Words  |  Software  |  Stuff  |  The Weasels  |  Willy's Picks  |  TBGraphics

Blah, blah and a whole bunch of more blah, blah.  |  All text, images, video, and music ©2000-2001 WeaselWorks
Wayward Willy