and much more
coming soon, including
Hour One

6 Feb 2006

Another info-packed bulletin from Fort Saint Davids HQ! The weather continues on its mellow globally-warmed way and we're not complaining. February is the new March. The Superbowl is the new World Series. Snow is the old thing that doesn't happen any more.

ANNOUNCEMENT: FREE MILTON
The "Free Milton" campaign will be starting soon and here's the heads up on what it's all about. Basically this: True Jersey, Volume One is supposed to be a book. Everyone who tells us "I saw your website but it's hard reading a book on a screen" knows this. Truejersey.com exists only as a pale shadow, a kind of spirit self transmitting the book onto our planet until it can be born in its true, intended form: as an object that you can hold in your hands, with pages you can turn. Free Milton will be our endeavor to make this a reality. And maybe you could see this coming but yeah...uh hey, you? Yeah you? Listen closely — we need your help. Updates to follow.

COMIC BOOK WE READ THAT WE LIKED, LEADING INTO A LONG TANGENT ABOUT A REALLY SHITTY JOB I ONCE HAD:
Ganges #1 by Kevin Huizenga

Cutest strangest part — dude is in bed with his wife but can't sleep because he drank too much coffee while reading the book he got from the library. His wife is dozing in and out of sleep. He says, "Do you want to go to the airport? And get a sandwich at the airport?" After no response he says "Let's go find a lake..."

Both of those ideas are so packed with images! It's like midnight, maybe later...the airport! Just for a sandwich! At a concession stand, I guess? Or one of those sandwich vending machines with the clear plastic shelves and the "spinner" with a nearby microwave so you can microwave the sandwich? (I have been obsessed with vending machines since I was a kid. I didn't know the 24-hour diner existed back then, and "24-hour shopping culture" — like the 24-hour CVS — didn't really exist yet...but the vending machine predated it all. A transaction you could make at any hour — without the aid of humans! Robot-served 50¢ soda, mmmm!) I couldn't figure out what town the comic takes place in. The lake is in reference to the book he was reading, also a cool idea to do in the middle of the night (far-off bodies of water at night — another Fort Saint Davids obsession!) but the airport really took the cake. Anyone who wants to take a trip down to the Philadelphia International Airport some night for a sandwich, get in touch! (Incidentally I worked at the airport for nearly a while, 1997. National Car Rental. You pulled your car into the lot, I got in it and started it up and got it in line with the car in front. We straightened the cars out into rows. The cars were pulled up one at a time, advancing the rows up to the gas pumps. The guys at the pumps filled the tanks and cleaned out the cars. "Bear" was a really big, scary guy who would yell, like a menacing bear, "NO VANS! NO MOTHERFUCKIN' VANS!" If a van wound up in his row you were fucked. You'd have to find a way to get it over to a different row — no small feat. It was stressful. Bear didn't do vans because you got paid by the car and vans took longer. Bear had just gotten out of jail. Everyone said he had no fear of going back and I believed them. No motherfuckin' vans indeed. Sometimes I'd work two shifts — taking a break then working a second shift into the evening, sitting in the checkout booth and waiting for after-hours car deliveries. Few came. Sometimes I'd have someone with me in the booth. Dwayne told me how he had slept with every girl in his graduating class by eight grade but that wasn't unique because everyone had a chance to sleep with everybody if they just tried. Kay told me about her pet rats and how she thought "Wild Horses" by the Sundays was the greatest song ever written. At night, in the booth by myself, all I can remember is it was extremely cold, just a little portable heater that only burned your legs if you were near it, and airplanes, overhead, all night long. Man, what a bad time.)

On second thought, maybe going to the airport for a sandwich isn't such a fun idea after all.

FOR YOUR VIEWING AND COLLECTING PLEASURE, WE ARE PROUD TO PRESENT TRUEJERSEY.COM FLYER #1.



Look for it in finer coffee shops and taverns citywide!

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