What I ate today: Cold pizza for breakfast, chicken fingers for lunch, hot pizza for dinner, two Oh, Nurses! at cocktail hour.

[I know, I know. Theater Book of the Week is on hold as I build up reserves to start a designated area of this site just for theater stuff. You got a problem with Comics Book of the Week?]

The Norm was the break-out comic strip sensation of a time when newspapers happened to be dropping strips, not adding them. Originally about a young single man who doesn’t like his workplace very much, it abruptly and cleverly shifted scenarios wholesale several times. Norm got fired. He had girlfriends. Ultimately, he got married, to a friend who’d been around for the whole history of the strip yet hadn’t been considered a romantic interest. The most brilliant bit about the marriage was that Jantze refused to dwell on the engagement and wedding and newlyweddedness. He simply fast-forwarded a year or two, as if announcing “I’m not going to waste all our time on that stuff.” The Norm became its own sort of marital sitcom—wife Reine’s parents moved into the house next door and badgered the younger couple relentlessly to have children.

But for all its Blondie-esque normalcy (the style and casual air respect and honor the funny-papers rules laid down by classic strips), The Norm always seemed contemporary. It trades in the usual clichés about geekiness, 9-to-5 nonsense and awkward romances, but it stays honest and human. There are plenty of arguments, but also frequent strips about the sheer joy of being in love, or of being outdoors, or of being alive. There are gags about the complexities of modern life, but I can’t imagine this dialogue happening between Hi and Lois:

Reine: I like my cell phone too much to quit using it. So I bought an earpiece! This way the radiation won’t give me brain cancer…
Norm: Where do you set the phone when you talk?
Reine: In my lap.
Norm: Isn’t that where you keep your ovaries?
Reine: AAAAA!

The Norm never got into a lot of newspapers, but its creator Michael Jantze proved to be a canny marketer, creating new opportunities for The Norm to be found by the faithful. The strips were collected in book form, comic book form and various coffee-table or collector’s-box formats. There were shirts and stickers and buttons. Online, it’s been an Apple desktop dashboard app, an annotated site where Jantze jotted down commentary on each strip, and a jandy device which flashed a different Norm trip every 30 seconds. (One of the most deliriously distracting computerized comic strip concepts of all time.) Currently, The Norm persists on gocomics.com, which posts a “new” old strip every day.

Yesterday came news that The Norm had been adapted to yet another medium, the Kindle. Several hundred strips from the dawn of the 2000s, originally packaged as the “Ball Collection,” are available for $10 from amazon.com. The selection includes a sequence where Norm and Reine start dating—as subterfuge on her part.

Norm: You told your folks we’re dating?
Reine: Actually, we’re real serious.
Norm: What? Why?
Reine: It was a slip! My parents only judge my successs by…
[Her mother strolls into the room. Reine throws her arms around Norm and kisses him. The mother whistles cheerily.]
Reine [breaking the liplock]: So when they started in about my brother…
Norm: Okay, rule one! If we’re just pretending, then put the tongue away!

The Kindle device itself is not a great place to read comics—you can’t pinch them larger, and if there are several on a page, the print’s too small to read. The Kindle App, on the other hand, lets you read Kindle books on iPods and iPhones (where you can expand them to readable size, even though the device you’re reading on is smaller than a Kindle) and especially on iPads and home computers.

The Norm only ever existed when newspapers had already shrunk comic strips to their smallest conceivable sizes. Jantze is a skilled designer (when The Norm had its own grandiose website, it was a clean, colorful, easily maneuverable joy) and strives to make that confined area work in his favor–with the iconic slumped-over figure of Norm waking up in the morning, for instance.

I don’t like that The Norm doesn’t get produced anymore (Jantze appears to have been having success with animation and other artistic projects), but I happily read the old strips over and over, and the Kindle edition gives me another option of how to do that. This Ball collection is only the tip of an enormous Norm archive. May many more Kindle Norms follow.

By Artie Capshaw

The guy behind the counter at the Strange Ten-Inch Audio Recordings shop used to be lead guitarist in a band. OK, you’re not surprised.
The woman in the back office of the newsstand next used to play electric bass in a folk-rock act that had a houseband gig for over a year at a now-defunct bar a few towns over.
And the lawyer who’s hung out his shingle in the office space on the second floor of that building used to be in a REALLY good band, which toured the East Coast and would have seen their album released on a major label if their singer hadn’t gotten locked up.
The music scene’s not all at the Bullfinch, you know. It’s everywhere. The lawyer tells me he still keeps his sax in a closet at work, and plays it after hours on lonely nights. The newsstand manager once heard him, went over to STAR Records, and brought up not only a bass she’d borrowed but the guitarist from behind the counter.
You think you know the fairy tale ending. The trio found a drummer, formed a band, and are playing the Bullfinch or Hamilton’s or, god forbid, D’ollaires, this weekend. Stop thinking that way. They get together and jam once in a while. End of story. Fame and fortune’s not the point. Music’s the point.
Will they EVER play out? Would you like to hear them? Well, they’ve gotten beyond aimless jams and written a few songs which they practice fairly often. They haven’t told practically anyone about their little after-work get-togethers.
So how do WE know? Funny you should ask. We like to buy magazines in the evenings. We especially like to hear original music wafting from unexpected quarters like legal offices. We love our job.

Bands playing ON the beaten track soonish: The Blue News, Brookers and De Rebus at Bullfinch, really abusing that “b” consonant… Trials Digest (the smaller version of Trials, without the horn section) at Hamilton’s, with local musically bacnkrupt supergroup-in-their-own-minds ABIJ opening…. Kentucky Bench & Bar, the Southern rock sensation, at (where else?) D’ollaire’s, where whisky shots will be a-flyin’ from 10 p.m. until closin’…

Joined a medical study and joined a pre-Law study group. The study is for people who stay up late and don’t eat well. So is the study group.

A new publication touting the exploits of some marvel-minded superheroes is entitled Fear Itself Sketchbook. It’s being distributed as a come-on for a full-on Fear Itself periodical with the reality-TV type concept of confronting esteemed superpowered world-savers and crimestoppers with “threats they’ve never seen, including the Asgardian God of Fear, who’ll take them to their limits, and change them dramatically.”
We’re scared already. What is it with fear and insecurity now as a main motivating factor in so many superheroes’ day-to-day business? Whatever happened to incentives such as rescuing people from cataclysm, or creating new opportunities for goodness in the world? Inspiring others? Rooting out obvious mortal evils like dictators and world-conquerors and damsel-distressers? Have we jumped straight to the Fear, past all those affected by fear who could be helped along the way?

The Fear we would like to see chronicled in full-color slick-periodical glory is the famous late-‘70s California punk band Fear, founded by hardcore heroes Lee Ving (vocals, guitar) and Derf Scratch (bass). Their original second-guitarist was even surnamed “Good.” The superheroic strain is also indicated by these interuniversal conflict-friendly headlines: “Give Me Some Action,” “Foreign Policy,” “Let’s Have a War,” “Honor and Obey,” “Null Detector” and, since nearly all superheroes are pro-urban, “I Love Livin’ in the City.” On several occasions, captured onscreen, the band Fear took social norms and raised all known mortal standards of speed, noise and attitude: In their interviews for The Decline of Western Civilization; with their competitive cover of the blues standard “Hoochie Coochie Man” in the film Get Crazy! (where the Willie Dixon song is also interpreted by Malcolm McDowell and Bill Henderson); and in their liberating, mosh-pit maelstrom of an appearance on Saturday Night Live in 1981.

Yes, they also do a song called “Demons Stickin’ Pitchforks in My Brain,” but we argue that there’s more to Fear than there is to Fear Itself. Occasional pure-evil oppression is cool as long it’s not relentless mindnumbing fear all the time, such as the fears which Thor (“Do You Fear… Family Secrets?”), Captain America (“Do You Fear… A Loss of Faith?”), Iron Man (“Do You Fear… The Legacy You’ll Leave Behind?”), Spider-Man (“Do You Fear… Tomorrow?”), X-Men (“Do You Fear… What You’ve Become?”) and Hulk (“Do You Fear… Losing Control?”) will reportedly be facing. If we were the Hulk, what we’d fear most is the apparent loss of the adjective Incredible in my name.

Superheroes are still struggling with a long period of death, loss, bereavement and awkward inheritance of legacies. Now comes fear. Truly the winter of their superdiscontent. They should go listen to some Fear records and feel better about themselves.

Spent last week in two different basements. House parties both, but as differently directed as the one-way streets which distinguished them both. Can’t reveal too many details here, for the same reasons that we can’t talk about these shows before they happen. These are private residences, and any intimation that the general public is swarming to events at them would put the proverbial kibosh on this overwhelming underground movement.

First basement was a luxuriously laid-out love pad in the Peacock section of town. Leather, vinyl, plush carpeting, a corner bar area with tall stools, cheesy landscape paintings—all of it purchased from hotel going-out-of-business sales, we were told. In the midst of this tacky splendor stood The First Hipsters, the self-styled lounge band we wrote about a few weeks back, had heard about the place and called a few friends (not to mention two other bands suited to the decor: Lite Source and Oakland Living). This was a genteel cocktail party with casual conversations you could actually hear and take part in. Somebody should bottle this atmosphere. Then either the partygoers could spin it and play a kissing game, or The First Hipsters, who delight in discovering new rhythm devices, could shake it or tap on it.

Bottles played a part in the other basement show we caught, and sent one poor woman to the emergency room. This was the more conventional application of the basement rock bash, the kind where the organizers really don’t have the wherewithal to rent halls, apply for permits and all that malarkey. They just plug in and let word of mouth take care of the rest. Two mobs had formed well before we arrived—the kids clambering to get in and the comparatively elderly neighbors tut-tutting across the street, waiting for the police to arrive.
We got the nod from someone in the house and were allowed special entry. Good thing, because we only saw very short songs by Jet de Sang before the cops came—and “saw” is really the wrong verb; all we really saw was the back of some football player’s right shoulder. We look forward to catching JdS in a more expansive space sometime—an attic, perhaps.
The mass egress was relatively orderly. No arrests, which dismayed the neighbors no end, and that bottle-throwing injury actually happened a block away, after the show. So it hardly even counts, right?

We don’t have a basement ourself, but if we did it’d be a mix of the two above: everyone in colorful stripes, bell-bottoms or short skirts, but hanging from the pipes instead of slithering in the shag. When our dream is realized, we’ll have you over for pretzels little hotdogs and hard liquor served in paint cans, while the Rock Pirates play their eyes out and our mother finishes doing the laundry in the next room or something.

Mar thinks she saw a mouse. The rest of us are pretty sure it was our ghost (now called Warwid, which rhymes with “Horrid.”).

King Arthur’s association with loaf-shaped foodstuffs predates the musical Spamalot by a couple of centuries. Just returned from The Baker’s Store & Café run by the King Arthur Flour Company in Norwich, Vermont.
Here’s the receipt:
A round clay cloche pan, for baking breads and biscuits. My last one cracked last month after years of use. This one’s a different brand, made in Virginia, and looks even sturdier. The pan itself is a round dish over an inch deep. The cover resembles a pith helmet.
Another flat clay baking thing: A rectangular baking stone suggested for cookies, though I’ll be doing bread and pizza on it.
Colored markers that you can write on food with, since the ink is really food coloring.
A batter-stirring implement that’s a circle of thick wire imbedded in a wooden handle. This is only marginally more effective than, say, a spoon for stirring bread. But it is way cooler.
Parchment paper. In case I want to write something on parchment, I guess, like a declaration of independence or something.
Sprinkles. It was raining really hard outside, and sprinkling within. Yellow shiny “sanding sugar.” “Mini-flower”-shaped “edible confetti.” Edible flowers, by any other name, would sprinkle as sweet.
A 2-pound bag of Ancient Grains Flour Blend. “Ancient Grains” has become a natural-foods marketing buzzword. I’ve bought Ancient Grains granola from Costco. I first heard the term from King Arthur, however—being a monarch in the 5th century A.D., he ought to know from ancient. Ancient Grains, somewhat disappointingly, isn’t some stash of long-lost flour dredged up from a mummer’s plot outside Stonehenge. It’s just stuff that we have on good authority was used in baking a long time ago. Like wheat? Well, like amaranth, millet, sorghum and quinoa. It’s gluten-free, but it’s not really meant to be the only flour you use; King Arthur (the company) suggests you replace one fifth of the conventional flour in a recipe with this. So you can feel ancient. Or maybe the dough gets ancient while you don’t—the Pizza of Dorian Gray!
A donut pan. A pan, that is, with circular indentations, like a muffin pan, only not so deep and with holes in the middle. Baked donuts are not technically donuts. These would be better described as donut-shaped mini-cakes. But who’s complaining?
A 10-pound bag of King Arthur White Flour, just like you’d buy in any supermarket. Only I bought it at the King Arthur Company in Norwich, Vermont, so there.
Two slices of cheese pizza, a roasted veggie sandwich, an egg salad sandwich, a chocolate cupcake with white chips imbedded in vanilla frosting, a dome-shaped sticky pink dessert, two cups of organic coffee, a couple of esoteric brands of soda pop and a long baguette pulled and trimmed to look kind of like a palm tree—all from the store café. Lunch, yet so much more than lunch.
On the way out, I took photos of my daughters sitting on an Arthurian throne inside the entrance of the shop. I half expected the Lady of the Lake to arise from some nearby trout pond bearing a sword with which she would slash the baguette in my hand into fine slices (to serve at a round table, naturally).
We’d barely hit home before several of these items had already been put to use. Donut-shaped mini-cake with mini-flower-shaped edible confetti, anyone?

He went in his room. Didn’t bother to turn on the lights. Put in the disk, put it on repeat, plugged in the headphones, stretched them to the bed. Lay down.
I can live this way, he thought. If this song is on, I never have to leave this room. He fell asleep.

He’d been passed out for hours, headphones around his head like a helmet. He woke up halfway, aware of an extra beat. Then it was a bang. A pounding, like his head had before. He was more up now, and got it—someone was knocking on his door.

He took the headphones off. Instead of dark and quiet, the room was dark and noisy. His favorite song was blasting into the entire room, not just his ears.

“Son,” he heard his father say outside the door. “It’s late. We’re going to sleep now. Could you turn it down?”
He started to answer, explain that the headphone plug was loose and he didn’t know, explain how shocked he was that he’d brought someone else into this world he’d created, and oh no, what they must think of him. He didn’t get a chance to apologize. There’s no way his father was hearing him above the music. And he realized he wasn’t being asked for an apology. He could tell, he just knew, that his father had made his request, turned around and shuffled back to bed.

He shut down the player, just slammed the power off. Even though it had just been a little red light, having it off suddenly made the room that much darker. And quieter. Colder.
He had no idea what time it was. It was very dark.

He tried to think. His father—he’d calmed down. He hadn’t yelled. He hadn’t even come in. He’d heard the same noisy, crazy, angry, excruciatingly sad song playing over and over and over for hours—maybe in the far distance, if he’d been downstairs or in the attic, but there’s no chance he couldn’t have heard it. And he just let it go on, until he needed to sleep.

There was some kind of understanding there, wasn’t there? That people just needed to recover themselves, and other people really ought to try to let them do it. Even if, he knew, they never ever really would understand.

He’d gotten away with something, hadn’t he? He’d lit up the skies, brought the thunder, pummeled others with his private thoughts, transmitted through the song. But he didn’t feel bold. It was a stand he’d planned to take. He didn’t feel pushy or strong. He felt like something had escaped, something he had hoped to keep for himself.

He needn’t have worried. In just about every possible way, he needn’t have worried. He woke early the next morning, still in his clothes but with plenty of time to clean up and get dressed and check over his homework and face the day.
He almost didn’t, but then had to: He plugged in the headphones tightly, then played the song, then played it again.

Gar needed a sandwich in the middle of the night and woke us all up about it. He was drunk and hungry and angry that we’d given all the bread to the birds. We made him instant oatmeal and he passed out in the bowl.
The birds have not eaten the bread.