micah holmquist's irregular thoughts and links

Welcome to the musings and notes of a Cadillac, Michigan based writer named Micah Holmquist, who is bothered by his own sarcasm.

Please send him email at micahth@chartermi.net.

Holmquist's full archives are listed here.

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Sites Holmquist trys, and often fails, to go no more than a couple of days without visiting (some of which Holmquist regularly swipes links from without attribution)

Aljazeera.Net English
AlterNet (War on Iraq)
Alternative Press Review
Always Low Prices -- Always
Another Irani online
antiwar.com (blog)
Asia Times Online
Axis of Logic
Baghdad Burning (riverbend)
BBC News
blogdex.net ("track this weblog")
bobanddavid.com
BuzzFlash
The Christian Science Monitor (Daily Update)
Common Dreams
Cryptome
Cursor
Daily Rotten
DefenseLINK
Democracy Now
The Drudge Report
Eat the Press (Harry Shearer, The Huffington Post)
Empire Notes (Rahul Mahajan)
frontpagemag.com (HorowitzWatch)
globalsecurity.org
greenandwhite.com
Guardian Unlimited
Haaretz
The Independent
Information Clearing House
Informed Comment (Juan Cole)
Iranians for Peace

Iraq Dispatches (Dahr Jamail)
Iraqi Democrats Against Occupation
Iraq Occupation and Resistance Report (Psychoanalysts for Peace and Justice)
MetaFilter
MLive
Mr. Show and Other Comedy
The Narco News Bulletin (blog)
NEWSMAKINGNEWS
The New York Times
Occupation Watch
Political Theory Daily Review
Press Action
Project Syndicate
Raed in the Middle (Raed Jarrar)
random-abstract.com
Reuters
Salon
The Simpsons Archive
Simpsons Collector Sector
Slate
Sploid
Technorati ("search for mth.blogspot.com")
thi3rdeye
United States Central Command
U.S. Embassy Baghdad, Iraq
venezuelanalysis.com
War Report (Project on Defense Alternatives)
The Washington Post
Wildfire (Jo Wilding)
wood s lot
www.mnftiu.cc (David Rees)

Blogs that for one reason or another Holmquist would like to read on at least something of a regular basis (always in development)

Thivai Abhor
As'ad AbuKhalil
Ken Adrian
Christopher Allbritton
Alli
Douglas Anders
Mark W. Anderson
Aziz Ansari
Atomic Archive
Bagatellen
James Benjamin
Elton Beard
Charlie Bertsch
alister black
Blame India Watch
Blixa
Blog Left: Critical Interventions Warblog / war blog
Igor Boog
Martin Butler
Chris Campbell
James M. Capozzola
Avedon Carol
Elaine Cassel
cats blog
Jeff Chang
Margaret Cho
Citizens Of Upright Moral Character
Louis CK
Les Dabney
Dack
Natalie Davis
Scoobie Davis
The Day Job
Jodi Dean
Dominic Duval
Steve Earle
Eli
Daniel Ellsberg
Tom Engelhardt
Lisa English
Faramin
Barbara Flaska
Brian Flemming
Joe Foster
Yoshie Furuhashi
Al Giordano
Glovefox
Rob Goodspeed
Grand Puba
Guardian Unlimited Weblog
Pete Guither
The Hairy Eyeball
Ray Hanania
Mark Hand
harveypekar.com
Hector Rottweiller Jr's Web Log Jim Henley Arvin Hill Hit & Run (Reason) Hugo Clark Humphrey Indri The Iraqi Agora Dru Oja Jay Jeff Lynne d Johnson Dallas Jones Julia Kane Blues Benjamin Kepple Ken Layne Phil Leggiere Brian Linse Adam Magazine Majority Report Radio Marc Maron Josh Marshall Jeralyn Merritt J.R. Mooneyham Michael Scott Moore Bob Morris Bob Mould Mr. Show and Tell Muslims For Nader/Camejo David Neiwert NewPages Weblog Aimee Nezhukumatathil Sean O'Brien Patton Oswalt The Panda's Thumb Randy Paul Rodger A. Payne Ian Penman politx Neal Pollack Greg Proops Pro-War.com Pure Polemics Seyed Razavi Rayne Simon Reynolds richardpryor.com Clay Richards Mike Rogers Yuval Rubinstein
Steven Rubio
Saragon Noah Shachtman Court Schuett The Simpsons Archive Amardeep Singh Sam Smith Soundbitten Jack Sparks Ian Spiers Morgan Spurlock Stand Down: The Left-Right Blog Opposing an Invasion of Iraq Aaron Stark Morgaine Swann Tapped (The American Prospect) tex Matthew Tobey Annie Tomlin Tom Tomorrow The University Without Condition Jesse Walker Warblogger Watch Diane Warth The Watchful Babbler The Weblog we have brains Matt Welch
Alex Whalen
Jon Wiener
Lizz Winstead
James Wolcott
Wooster Collective
Mickey Z

Saturday, July 26, 2003
 
Power outages

Four years ago this summer I was living in Ann Arbor, Michigan and was depressed to the point of being suicidal. To deal with the situation I would often listen to the David S. Ware Quartet’s May 2 and 3, 1996 recording Godspelized, particularly the title track. The tempo laid down by bassist William Parker and pianist Matthew Shipp combined with the expressive drumming of Susie Ibarra provided the perfect background for saxist David S. Ware to shriek like Ayler on Sunday morning and in the process soak up my pain for a little while.

One early Thursday evening, July 8, I had just begun “Godspelized” when the power in my apartment went out. The temperature outside was in the 80s and it was humid. To deal with the heat I went to see Spike Lee’s Summer of Sam (1999). I had seen the film the previous Saturday and been moderately impressed –I thought it was Lee’s best work since Do the Right Thing (1999), a position it now holds in my mind even though I thought 25th Hour (2002) was a superior picture for a while- but didn’t figure I’d see it again on the big screen, if ever. But when the power went out I quickly knew I should go and see it again, in part because the fictional story of life in New York City during the summer of 1977 mentioned the electrical outages that the city faced but also because I needed the air conditioning of a theater and it would feel good to look at people who were at least as fucked up as me, even if their pathos and mine were different.

Seeing it again was one of the smarter things I ever did for exactly reasons I did it.

The power was back on when I returned to my apartment.

***

Two years ago in May I saw Ibarra perform a solo set at the HotHouse in downtown Chicago. Afterwards I told her how much Godspelized had meant to me. Ibarra, who by the time was long of the “Parker Axis,” hugged me in response.

***

Two, at a little before two p.m., the power went out again. I had been listening to Marzette Watts’ self-titled ESP Disk, which presents the results of a December 8, 1966 session featuring vibist Karl Berger, bassists Juney Booth and Henry Grimes, drummer J.C. Moses, guitarist Sonny Sharrock, reedist Byard Lancaster, trombonist Clifford Thornton and Watts bass clarinet and tenor and soprano sax performing primarily improvised music which seems like a precursor to the work of leaders like Peter Brotzmann in terms of its antagonism. When the power went out I briefly felt emptiness but pursued other activities, primarily reading. Roughly five and a half hours later, the power returned.