#178

June came in with a bang around here, thundering huge and spitting lightning with a hail and a thick downpour, but also it has been sunny and bright and mild and calm through parts of the day. High-key stuff. It's been a savage year, really digging it. June is one of my favorite months, desperate and magnificent. Challenging and glorious. I am thankful to live to see another June.

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June first also happens to be the day of Saint Justin Martyr, who doesn't even sound real but is the patron saint of philosophers and was a gangster (you can kinda guess the main outline of how he died and got sainted) so I don't really care one way or the other, this dude and his dorky-ass name are on my team.

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There are few stories as metal as the stories of the Christian martyrs of the early centuries. Crazy shit, astonishing shit, even if a bunch of it is fake. I sorta thrive on made-up crazy shit, personally.

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I've been doing some warmups on my bass guitar as I've been writing this. The A string, which is the lowest string on my thrashed-ass old beater* had come unsprung, what with the advent of summer an all. I hooked it up again and he's all in tune and sounding sweet and sound as a bell like he does. My guitar is very special, a real blue dog, one of those Fenders that rolls off the line with a magic spell on it, loud and clear with power in the wood that only grows as the neck warps and the body ages and cracks and breathes all kinds of smoke and takes all kinds of dirt, it's all magic enhancement, and will stay on in the pieces if I'm lucky enough to live to play it to kindling. I call him Stray Dog and I have wailed on him with full abandon and he has sounded out a fearsome joyful noise for twelve years now.

Anyway, I'm going to get down to business, and when he and I are through I'm going to work on some other stuff. I sense a productive June in the offing.

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Next post I'm going to describe some lamps!


--JL

*only need three strings to kick much ass and whip up a fiery frenzy and I will prove it any day