In my perusal of this morning's news, I happened upon this in the Guardian UK:

Somewhere out there, either in the skies of California or many miles beyond - floating down the Thames, wafting across the Mississippi, bobbing over the Sargasso sea, - there is a gigantic inflatable pig that belongs to the Pink Floyd frontman. And he wants it back.

Waters' giant pig balloon was last seen on Sunday, during his closing performance at the Coachella festival. As Waters played Pigs (Three Different Ones), the two-storey-tall dirigible was released over the crowd.

Contrary to what you'd think, this is not the first time that a giant pig zeppelin has gotten away from Waters. During photo sessions for Pink Floyd's 1977 album, Animals, a helium-filled pig made a break for it from above Battersea power station. Flights were cancelled as the pig passed near Heathrow Airport, on its way to the dark side of the moon.

But this time, Roger Waters wants the pig back. Coachella organisers are offering a reward of $10,000 and four lifetime tickets should anyone find the blow-up porker. How to get in touch with them? Email lostpig@coachella.com, naturally.

Directions: Imagine Mr. Brother living another day, as always, with music playing. Whether it’s one of his trusty iPods, or his home stereo, or working the soundtracks section of Amoeba Music Hollywood, Mr. Brother is eating, sonically, with the mouths of his ears.

To simulate this experience, as you read the below story of a day lived, you will be given certain music clips to play. These are inserted to provide you with the same tunes Job was hearing as he was doing what you’ll be reading.

For example, while he was writing the above directions, he was listening to this:



So, I was at Target the other day, looking to see if Method had launched any new cleaning products (which they had – a new toilet bowl cleanser, so I was happy), when I found myself looking at the pet toy section with fresh interest.

I decided to purchase a cat laser. That is, a little plastic mouse which shoots a red laser point; the idea being that the cat will think the red spot is some kind of living, flying, glowing thing and chase it around. Not every cat registers the laser, however, so spending the four dollars was a real risk on my part. You know me, though – I live on the edge. Cat laser? Purchased!

Before I left Target, I put my courage to the sticking place and ventured into the men’s restroom. The men’s restroom at the West Hollywood Target reminds me of jail, somehow. And yes, I’ve been to jail, thank you for asking.



Everything was going well – if not for my olfactory sense. I was washing my paws. A few sinks over from me was an old man in a porkpie hat. I watched, transfixed, as he removed both his upper and lower teeth and set them on the very public, men’s restroom sink.
I quickly left. I didn’t want the janitor to have to clean up any regurgitated Vitamin Water on my account.

I’ve been working at Amoeba Music for over three years now (although I often still feel like a newbie) but it wasn’t until last Thursday that I had co-workers over to my house for the first time.

The reasons for this are many, and complicated. For one, whenever you have humans over to your house to visit, there’s all sorts of things one must do, like… talk to them… and… well, talk to them. It’s daunting! Nevermind the fact that my cat, Fangs, is only one moment away from figuring out how to eat someone.


You’ll remember (unless you won’t) that some time ago I blogged about the film crew of “Alvin & The Chipmunks” using the front of Amoeba Music Hollywood for a shoot, for which I was an extra (cast as a bouncer).

Charlie, who works in the classical music department, and Smithy, who works soundtracks (with me) and pop vocals, and I had tried to goad each other in going to see the movie in the theatres to find out if either Amoeba or I were actually in it, but none of us were willing to pay the huge (if justified) price of an ArcLight Cinema ticket, especially considering the film looked painful.


We decided, therefore, that when the movie came out of DVD – which it recently has – we would congregate at my apartment, drink enough booze to buffer any psychological damage that watching Jason Lee interact with CGI rodents could have and face the beast.

Corey spent the night last night. We threw him into a hot, bubble bath and played some Julie London…





…all to undo the stressful day at work. (By “we” I mean the royal we, of course – I wasn’t assisted by a gang or nuthin’. Gangs are terrible at helping people relax. Have you noticed? Like, when you’re sitting under a cork tree and smelling the flowers, a gang – say like, a gang of Japanese whalers – will amble by and be like:


And you’re all, “Japanese dudes, I’m just trying to smell the flowers!” Or, you’re picking at some rhyolite in hopes of discovering an opal to polish and give your sweetie during the famous aria from “Gianni Schicchi”…





…and the two of you lock eyes and, in that one moment, you know that you’ve always been lovers – that every sonnet and song that’s ever been penned for love – have been about the two of you, and the devotion that binds you beyond the restraints of bodies and time and a gang of Crips, some Grape Street Crips say, come along and cause you to accidentally drop your foot-long hoagie over the balcony seating and it lands on Princess Diana’s head (this is before she’s died, obviously) and they’re all, “Gee whiz, we’re sorry. We were just hoping to find some slobs to curb,” and you’re all, “If you think any Bloods are gonna be caught at a Verdi opera, you’re crazy! Come back next month when there’s a performance of ‘Peter Grimes’ – they’re all over that Britten sh*t!” and they’re all, “Thank you. Sorry about your butty,” and you’re all, “Huh?” and they’re all, “Butty – it’s a British slang for sandwich,” and you’re all, “Oh yeah. Okay,” and there’s an awkward moment when they don’t leave but no one says anything and then they finally get the hint and go away but by then the People’s Princess is in your face and yelling at you and being totally unreasonable and for a moment – just for a moment – you think to yourself, “Just you wait, girl – you’ll get yours.” But you feel bad immediately afterwards because no one deserves to die in a car crash. Nobody.

I don’t have much time this week; I’m nipple-deep in spring cleaning. I won’t sleep until this apartment shines like the top of the Chrysler Building.

As with everything I do – from cleaning, to cooking, to not doing math homework, to faking my way through a treatment of complicated parapneumonic effusion and pleural empyema by video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery – I do it with music.

Here then, are some of my favorite things to hear when I’m wielding a Swiffer or yanking my Toilet Duck:

While I was polishing my silver bullet collection, I couldn't help but notice that my fellow Amoeblogger, Billyjam, posted an interview with me, which you can read by pressing the word "perambulator" in this sentence. It's really too kind. My only complaint is that he neglected to include the scratch 'n' sniff portions.

Now then, back to cleaning. When I'm done, you're all invited to my house for pickles and chainsaws. It's not really an "activity" per se, just two things I have way too many of.