We're Eleven Names. We Can Do Whatever the Fuck We Want.

Hi everyone. Tonight is the last night in a while for Eleven Names updates, because:

Blogger isn't supporting our native method of uploading new content to the site, which I understand to be some crazy homebrew shit involving FTP. So. It is up to Zach to migrate the content, because only he has the root access. Suffice to say that right now, Zach has other things on his mind and will probably get the time to do it starting in about a month.

Which means, there will be no new content on Eleven Names after tonight for the next couple months. We briefly talked about killing Eleven Names and just having tonight be the goodbye post. It makes sense. Zach doesn't have the time to devote to it, Tom hasn't posted in years and I, in theory, should be finding more ways to write for blogs that have a larger audience.

And if reading that, you honestly thought we'd shut Eleven Names down, you have less patience for unprofitable fun and you will go very far in life and we're proud of you for it. This is Eleven Names. Of course we're coming back. We're too disorganized to stay dead, anyway.

Hell: I'm running a thirteen part series about an oft-ignored melodic punk record in which I compare the songs to lessons in my life. The title is not just wishful thinking, it's the truth: We can do whatever the fuck we want.

Yes, I will be getting my own blog as a result of this, because my words need some kind of outlet that's not subject to the whims of anyone else, whether it's my wonderful friends and comrades at Pastepunk or Issue Oriented. There's something that goes unexpressed in that statement and it's this: Eleven Names is bigger than me. Eleven Names is bigger than Zach. Eleven Names is bigger than Tom.

Here's what Zach tells me about the ETA of the new site: "[I]t won't be all that long until it's running again. Promise. (I liked the Valve Time description, though.) " Odds are, "[the new site will be] Nothing too extravagant. Just maybe migrating content to Wordpress."

So. You have now heard what I've heard. It may be that I run out of time to update Eleven Names later on, or I say everything I wanted to say in the Eleven Names venue in the future, but rest assured: I have at least 8 posts, minimum, if I leave Eleven Names.

We're still not dead. Social media links to capture our spasms follow. Thanks everybody.

You can follow our YouTube channel at: elevennames.

You can follow Zach on Twitter at: iconoclastzach.

You can follow me on Twitter at: elevenjames.

Marathon: Ignore The Overdraft Charges, They're Useless Anyway (6 of 13)

This Marathon song, Gouge 'Em Out, They're Useless Anyway is about what we put into the earth, how we poison it and how incredibly short-sighted that is, given that we're doing damage to the thing that keeps our shaky proposition up, and because the incredible demand for more more more now now now wreaks havoc on this planet that has supported life for eons.

Fair point: I don't know that much about ecology except that it makes sense that we're poisoning the earth by putting exhaust into the atmosphere.

So, like in Home Is Where the Books Are, I'm going to cheat a little bit. There is a deadline hanging over my head, I'm well caffeinated, so I'm going to riff on this idea of my body being the earth and the terrible things I do to myself and my terrible personal upkeep.

Hungry and not thinking straight, I just walked upwards of six blocks to buy a bottled Frappuccino from 7-11, drank it immediately, only to remember that there was CVS a block away from my original destination, that had the same item for cheaper.

The CVS itself is a quarter of a block down from a Dunkin Donuts, one that I've been patronizing more and more, because I go to the destination more and more often to get work done, but ends up being more "being on the internet" time. The work's easy enough that I can get it done in maybe a quarter of the time. I bought two more of the Frappuccinos, I would drink another one when I settle down on the laptop and I squirrel away the third in my bag. I throw in some Honey Nut Chex Mix, to remind me, again, of friends far away.

I had lunch four hours since and in between, nothing to eat.

Our progress is regressing quickly...

I leave the sterile CVS and head back to the campus center, head immediately to the basement, where the student lounge is and I ended up writing the first part of this. With headphones on the entire time. I mean, at least I'm not in my house, but I'm doing the whole reclusive writer thing again. And that shit's old meme (link possibly NSFW, FYI). Did I learn a goddamn thing? It appears not.

Aside from the fact that I'm reminded again, I'm like the human beings myopically poisoning the planet, shoving two caffeinated drinks in my body without something solid to help digest the caffeine, then wondering why an hour later I'm dried out and my stomach is angry with me.

A strange thing, though. There's Starcraft 2 news all over the tubes (speaking of old memes) this week and yes, it's possible to get the beta codes, but I'm not mourning every minute that I'm not playing the game. Years ago, I would have stopped at nothing to get one of those beta codes, but now? I'm zen. I'll buy it early when it comes out. I hope this is growing up. Man, because if it's not, I'm sleeping on Starcraft 2.

Can my computer even run it? I can't tell.

But I need it. Or I think I do. I will need to consume it because it is the sequel to Starcraft and that it is something else to consume and poison my time with.

Wait. Did I just get back to the point of the entry? I think I did. Of the things I could spend my time with, there is a GRE study book to my immediate right, I would spend it on Starcraft 2, a pastime that while not bad, does not have any meaningful positive net effects further down the line. And that's how I'm short-sighted.

That's how I connect to the song, these days, in my bad decisions that do not retain foresight. I'm walking, happily into the poison of my own laziness and if I keep it up, I'll deserve every listless night I spend sunken into it and every day or two it takes to get me out of that rut, paid for with my sweat or with my credit card.

Let this be my memorial to the things I do when I don't pay attention.