Black Metallic

I’m sitting at work, decompressing from the infuriating 100 minute commute (to cover the vast distance of 27 miles — thank you Los Angeles for your oh-so-useful mass transit system that is currently useless to me).
I’m supposed to be writing for my show, but, seriously, I’m so dang frustrated from the drive, that I’m taking a few minutes for myself to catch my breath and settle down.
I gotta stop drinking coffee when I drive, too…and I shouldn’t listen to democracy now. It just gets me all riled up.
Couple of things: I really enjoyed reading the trash-talking and back-slapping that went on in the last two posts. I’m happy to see that there are other people around who know what and what not to take too seriously…and if you think I got worked up about hockey, just you wait until baseball season starts. I’m calling out all the Giant fans right now. Now that I think of it, wouldn’t it be cool to do a WWDN fantasy baseball league, at Yahoo? I’ve played in those the last two seasons, and it’s really really fun. I’ll add that to the TODO list.
Drew, from FARK, who has become a sort-of friend of mine, is doing this really cool thing, that you should all check out.
If you live in or near the City of Angels, and you enjoy your old pal Wil Wheaton, and you enjoy the live theatre, you can come and see the two combined, starting in two weeks, because my friend Keith and I are kicking off a whole new season of the J.Keith vanStraaten show!! I’m really, really excited about this season, and I sure hope that lots of WWDN readers will come out, see the funny, and then introduce themselves after the show. Unless, of course, you’re a freakin’ weirdo. Then I’d prefer you go see shows at The Groundlings.
Heh.
Ahh…I feel much better now, thanks to the cathartic process of writing, and the soothing sounds of Catherine Wheel, who give us this entry’s title.
I hope you all have a wonderful day!

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165 thoughts on “Black Metallic”

  1. Cool. I’ve been wondering when I could come see you perform. I’m excited now.
    Can’t sympathize with the commute. I usedtacould. I used to have a 32 mile commute from Oceanside to Del Mar, but with my new job, I have a 3.8 mile commute to work. Besides, LA is about 5 times the population of San Diego.
    But, I know how you feel about traffic. I HATE IT TOO!!!!

  5. yea, traffic sucks sometimes! i hope you have a good day wil. catherine wheel, lol, my older sis at wb, they nick-named her wheel after that. when i worked there as in intern i was the training wheel, and my little sis is the thrid wheel. just thought i’d share

  7. Yeah, commuting in the Twin Cities is really rough, too. It took 20 minutes to go 20 miles 😎
    Of course, there is a down side. We’re looking at single digit wind chills today and below zero temps tonight. At least we can get where we want to go in record time!

  8. The Roughy show’s been going on for days…weeks, months…over a year, even!
    Admission: 1 piece of cheese.
    Stop over.
    Stoop over if you’re Canadian.

  9. HI! Dodgers baby!! Dodgers!! LOL!!Baseball is only good if you are there. Every summer on my birthday they have a game at Dodger stadium and we go to see it. Lets plan a trip to Magic Mountain. They have some wicked new rides.

  11. Damn. Another reason to like you. Catherine Wheel is awesome.
    I grok the commute thing. Seattle has similar traffic problems and it’s impossible to live near where you work unless you work from home or happen to have large piles of cash stashed in your basement. Oh, and we have all these gorgeous-but-annoying geographical features like lakes and things that require the bottlenecking of bridges everywhere. The poor Hubby does an hour each way every day, and that’s without rain or baseball games to fuck things up further.
    *Snerk*
    At least we don’t have the smog 🙂

  12. You should have seen the start to our day here! Good lord, we had to take Jeni to school, mom didn’t realize dad plugged the car in. We backed out of the driveway and got a quarter of the way down the street when she noticed. Needless to say, it wasn’t one of mom’s cooler moments!
    See, now this is when I really wish I lived in LA! See, being in good ol’ Calgary Canada, I can’t make it to any shows =( *sniff sniff* I have a good idea, you should come up for the Stampede! *wink wink, nudge nudge* Do some shows and enjoy us cowfolk! =D heeh! EVERYONE should come to the Stampede =D
    Well I hope yer day gets better! Peace out peoples!

  14. My BlueSox (the Cubbies!) hear your challenge, and this season we’re gonna win the whole damn thing!

  15. The drive to my work (otherwise being called a “commute”) is only about 7 minutes each way. 😮 ) One of the upsides to living in a small Texas town of 20,000. There are downsides though, believe me….
    Would love to try and see you in one of your shows sometime, Wil…you’ll have to take it out on the road! 😮 ) Bring Anne and the boys too…I guess you could always kennel Ferris.
    Take care,

  16. Oh, and FYI…
    WFS is doing a live chat today at 1:30 PDT/4:30 EDT. Through MSN.
    Just in case y’all wanted to harass (and that’s huh-rass. Not har-ris.) him.

  17. I must not be music-literate enough to know who Catherine Wheel is…guess I’m showing my age here. 😮 )

  18. And Penguin. I can so sympathize with that. When I lived in the Twin Cities, I was commuting from Richfield/South Mpls to Minnetonka (Ridgedale). Would usually take me an hour. (I was working at the Best Buy at Ridgedale) Then I was able to transfer to the Edina store and it wasn’t quite as bad…..Driving in a parkway picnic with a stick shift SUX!

  19. Hey, I live in Seattle, and I’ve got a whopping 15 minute commute in the mornings, and 20 minutes in the evenings.
    ‘Course, that’s using the Doc Martens express.
    Living in 1st Hill and working Downtown has definite advantages. Until the walk home, which is 5 minutes longer because it’s all uphill.
    There are times I miss having a car. Then I look at the traffic conditions in Seattle…and grin and walk right by all the cars and buses, and realize that I really don’t miss it all that much most of the time.

  24. Hrm, a Jail-a-thon?
    My boss took part in one of those. I just about had a heart-attack when the “police” came to “arrest” him.
    And yeah, how IS Felix?

  25. The commute… ahhhh the commute. Back in the days when I had to do such things it commonly took a bit more than an hour to do 30 miles into Boston from my vast country estate. Now that I telecommute, the run to work is about 50 feet.
    But I do recall the stomach-acid-churning drives and the sips of coffee that did NOT help (but did taste good).
    Currently listening to space music…
    Baseball? Yeah. Right. Like the BoSox will do anything this year. I used to root for the Rockies back when I was a mountain lady… but no more. Now, if you wanna talk football — the Broncos have always been mah boys.
    And Wil… one other thing … you have inspired me to create my own blog. I always had a web site, but never gave a blog a thought until I read yours.
    Keep up the good work!

  26. Funny, space writer, it’s inspired me to do the same. I purchased my very own domain name today. Now I’m pouring over my “Creating Web Pages for Dummies” book so I can get started.
    Next step is hosting thru logjamming.com. Once I have something to put up.
    Stay tuned for the launch of
    http://www.sarcasticcheese.com
    (i’m sarcastic and from WI – thought it was fitting)

  27. Traffic = Evil
    Los Angeles = Traffic
    Los Angeles = Evil
    I have to go to LA on occasion for medical stuff. Good thing I don’t drive, I get confused by the tangle of roads and freeways and annoyed by the traffic just bein a passenger.

  28. NOworriesmon:
    I started a web site back in 95 when I was working on my master’s thesis — sort of for relaxation. All about astronomy. The blog is sort of an extension of that; easier to update (mostly because I’m being a lazy arse and letting blogspot do the heavy lifting on templates, etc. for now). I get email through the site from people who have questions about astronomy and it seems easier somehow to answer them by posting to the blog.
    Kinda fun and it helps me get focused in the mornings before I sit down to my book writing or video editing (whichever comes first).
    I look forward to seeing your new blog.

  29. I know this is gonig to suck, but “Go TIGERS!!!” I have to love my hometown underdogs.
    In regards to the commute, be glad that you don’t have to drive in blizzard conditions.
    I really enjoy your site Wil. It’s one of the first sites I go to as soon as I turn on my computer in the morning, besides the news.

  31. Wil,
    I sympathize with your commuter nightmare: I live in the Washington/Baltimore corridor. It takes me an average of 1 to 1 1/2 hours to commute 18.5 miles. I loath the morning drive. It’s not so bad coming home, because at least my husband doesn’t scowl when I’m late!
    Two other things: check out Worth1000 – my husband did an entry today that features your site banner prominently. I haven’t seen it yet, but he says it’s pretty witty. The contest is “Mate Worth1000.”
    The other is, did you see the article on MeFi about hacking Greymatter?
    Wish I lived near LA. I’d love to see your live performances.
    Corky

  34. When I used to go to college, it would take 20 mins by car and 40 min by bus except one day it took my over 3 hours to get to college. I would have given up and stayed home except I had a very important assignment due in that day so I ahd to get t o college. Man public transport sucks. I love to drive, I don’t mind getting stuck in traffic either because it gives me longer to listen to my music. Roll on the day I can afford my own car.
    Spike
    8.38pm GMT
    26th Feb 2002

  36. Wil, any chance you are coming to the UK anytime soon. It’s kinda hard to come see you when you are several thousand miles away!

  37. Dude, The Dodgers?! The Kings AND the Lakers?! Yer gettin’ too way much flourescent light. The Phillies are gonna rock this year.
    Although I have a feeling that the STUPID olympic lay-off is gonna kill all the momentum the Flyers had goin’.

  38. I have to agree with Sayre:
    “See, now this is when I really wish I lived in LA! See, being in good ol’ Calgary Canada, I can’t make it to any shows =( *sniff sniff* I have a good idea, you should come up for the Stampede! *wink wink, nudge nudge* Do some shows and enjoy us cowfolk! =D heeh! EVERYONE should come to the Stampede =D ”
    Only I live in Red Deer (150km North). I also have to point out the fact that I commute 2/3 across town on my bike in, if it’s not windy, about 25min 😉 OTOH I’m commuting on a bike when it hits -25..-30 (~-17F) regularily (overnight).
    So ya, I’m thinking I would trade my lack of traffic for some beter weather & a little lovin from Unkie Wil!

  41. I used to commute all the time until I moved to Chicago. Now, it’s a 10 minute walk to a bus stop, a 20 minute ride to the El and another 20 minutes to the Loop. I am split. 50 minutes in my onw car with my tunes, fighting traffic, vs. 50 of walking, bussing and “El”ing. I think i prefer the later. It’s good reading time.
    Go Cubs (I like to get my hopes up and then have them crushered–see Bears)
    Wil, If things get really bad, try the environmental Rain Forest CD. It’s so soothing and there’s even a lion roar!
    Peace.

  42. My commute is 30-40 minutes, and I should consider myself blessed, because for a lot of it, I get to see the majestic Koolau Mountain range every day, and sometimes there are waterfalls streaming down the slopes!
    Depending on the route I take, I will see the Pacific Ocean, Kaneohe Bay, or both.
    Damn I’m gonna miss this place.

  43. Jun-Would we be here if we were?
    Commuting sucks.
    Commuting sucks.
    Commuting sucks.
    Telecommuting-good. Sure wish I had the type of job where I could do that.
    I don’t hold out hope anytime soon that my city of Detroit would ever put in mass transit. It would bite into the auto company profits.
    Not that I should complain as my livelihood depends on it.
    I’ll stop babbling now…

  46. I think I’ve made the suggestion before, but why not videotape one of your live performances, convert it to Real Video or something (easy and cheap these days), and slap it on the site?

  47. I can see my place of work from my window. Well… today I can’t see it because… it’s SNOWING!!! It’s finally snowing in landlocked south-central Indiana!!! That makes this snow-belt born-and-bred girl really happy.
    Of course…I paid my dues in rush-hour traffic in the ‘burbs of Cleveland… they’re always trying to “fix” something that isn’t broken, and wind up with traffic snarls that last for 20 miles. (I remember the day it took me 96 minutes to go ten miles…TEN MILES!!!)

  48. If you lived in Olympia, Washington and WANTED to be riled up, you could listen to Democracy Now on this station called KAOS, and then — well, on Monday mornings at least — you could *un*rile to this really cool music show from ten til noon…
    (Really, the citizens of Olympia and listeners of KAOS would be proud to see that link on your site.)
    L.A? L.A. rocks. I’m jealous of that comment-er above who got to be an intern, even if it was at the WB.

  49. I can almost sympathize with the work commute thing. I live in the Phoenix area, so the freeways aren’t as bad as LA, but they’re getting close. You need to plan a show at our new Dodge theater so that your fans here can see your show. If I could afford to go to LA to see you I would.

  50. My last job (first one too) was 15 miles away, give or take. When I took the expressway, it took me 30 minutes to get there, 15 if I went the same speed everyone else was going.
    Then on a lark, I went down the main city road…took me 30 minutes.
    What was the point of spending 70 bucks a month on the expressway when I could go down the regular road for free for the same amount of time? Granted, the regular road clogged up more often, but generally it was 30 minutes to work and about 45 minutes to get home…but I enjoyed the ride home so I didn’t mind the time.

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