nicholas katsafanas

Abstract: In a terribly pedantic, some might even say dystopian, parallel universe, popular livestreamer and entirely fictional character Nikolaos Enrique Iglesias engages in a series of episodic "streams" that accurately act as his autobiography. But he's now strongly considering transcribing said "streams" into texts for an increasingly literate American public. In this endeavor he'll employ the generous assistance of his close friend Curtis, who, in addition to being a successful bisexual porn star, has an inveterate knack for transcribing spoken words into text. (nickk.net)

Mode: >.75 542:602 .900

—01 (181:211 .854) Listening to heavy metal but screwed and chopped I reflected on taking my friend Farhad, who came to town from Chicago for the first time ever this past November, to a place called The Avery, where the bartender, who alleged she remembered me following a few rounds of drinks despite the fact I had no recollection of meeting her ever, yet I respected her depth of knowledge when it came to Mezcal— she gave me a particular brand she said contained animal fat, which intrigued me enough to break my vegan streak, figuring distilled animal fat perhaps didn't count, and after a few rounds she poured us both a shot of Malort which Farhad, being a Midwest resident, acutely refused to shoot down, I, however, having heard horror stories decided to indulge and considered the liquor endearing— it wasn't bad at all!

—02 (109:118 .924) Being outside sans smartphone, what a feeling! even if it's brick and you have a bad case of sciatica your wife may have passed onto you and the trash is filled with rats the size of small donkeys you could saddle and ride downtown like Lyfts for free on frigid days like these, when you carry three bags of shit you no longer need, yet I digress (William Williams denouncing usury was unexpected but I usually keep an open ear for Fed polemics) but back to the bar—

—03 (66:69 .957) One hundred fourteen bucks struck me like a lot as a tab until I considered the amount we both imbibed of allegedly top shelf liquor, it was possible, I supposed, that animal fat Mezcal was marked up more vociferously than the typical vegan options.

—04 (89:89 1.00) In any case since Tree was probably about done doing her makeup we wandered back to the flat to scoop her up plus discuss dinner options, of course filling up a couple coffee cups of Japanese whiskey as we considered all audibles, just like old times, almost twenty years ago or so when we'd get shitfaced with Mexican cooks after shift's end.

—05 (97:114 .851) But we were aged now, more mature, I no longer fornicated beside the linoleum sidings of immigrant cooks' colonial homes, sure perhaps I liked a couple glasses of Mezcal when my friend was visiting the city I currently occupied, but that was actually quite grown up I considered as we walked to Ogie's which was the last time I entered that establishment for reasons I probably don't need to divulge right now.

Mode: >.75 542:602 .900

—01 (181:211 .854) Listening to heavy metal but screwed and chopped I reflected on taking my friend Farhad, who came to town from Chicago for the first time ever this past November, to a place called The Avery, where the bartender, who alleged she remembered me following a few rounds of drinks despite the fact I had no recollection of meeting her ever, yet I respected her depth of knowledge when it came to Mezcal— she gave me a particular brand she said contained animal fat, which intrigued me enough to break my vegan streak, figuring distilled animal fat perhaps didn't count, and after a few rounds she poured us both a shot of Malort which Farhad, being a Midwest resident, acutely refused to shoot down, I, however, having heard horror stories decided to indulge and considered the liquor endearing— it wasn't bad at all!

—02 (109:118 .924) Being outside sans smartphone, what a feeling! even if it's brick and you have a bad case of sciatica your wife may have passed onto you and the trash is filled with rats the size of small donkeys you could saddle and ride downtown like Lyfts for free on frigid days like these, when you carry three bags of shit you no longer need, yet I digress (William Williams denouncing usury was unexpected but I usually keep an open ear for Fed polemics) but back to the bar—

—03 (66:69 .957) One hundred fourteen bucks struck me like a lot as a tab until I considered the amount we both imbibed of allegedly top shelf liquor, it was possible, I supposed, that animal fat Mezcal was marked up more vociferously than the typical vegan options.

—04 (89:89 1.00) In any case since Tree was probably about done doing her makeup we wandered back to the flat to scoop her up plus discuss dinner options, of course filling up a couple coffee cups of Japanese whiskey as we considered all audibles, just like old times, almost twenty years ago or so when we'd get shitfaced with Mexican cooks after shift's end.

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Full text at Modal .TXTualities

—III-II: Shrooms at the Dominican Shisha Spot 1598:1889 .846

Reimi said the next night Nikke came by her flat to commiserate, that she was somehow, inanely, in better net spirits than her sister, the two taking a patch of fur off the dog, wondering aloud about the possibly haunted river flowing in the middle of the invisible triangle connecting the Children's Hospital, Dive Bar, and Dark Lady, with Nikke in particular speculating that perhaps as soon as they stepped past the interstate highway that barricaded the west end of the city from the river, that a certain dark force, a possible cloaked portal of sorts began interacting with both of them?

Yet even with that thought shot into her brain, it wouldn't stop Nikke, Reimi informed Buddy, from walking back downtown the subsequent Saturday— but only after popping into a mosque to make a donation to the unrecognized dead infants in Palestine, dropping off a fifty dollar bill to an African Imam with a mini water bottle of Mezcal surreptitiously slipped into her sweatshirt pocket.

Nikke walked swiftly downtown, purchased a pack of cigarettes, stopped to pop in the spot from the previous week, cracking a joke when an old fuck took what at first look seemed to be a decent tip then stuck the cash back in his pocket— then Buddy interrupted to note Nikke would meet up with him that evening, pouring them both an espresso, popping the last couple squares of a psilocybin candy bar, and then they both would go smoke hookah at a Dominican night club.

Paperless Fractal Novel available in a variety of electronic formats here

165:205 .805 After smoking hookah with Cormier last week and actually going through two of them which was that night and even now frankly shocking as Cormier was never a guy remotely intrigued by shisha yet at Braza he actually in fact goaded me of all people into doing two hookahs which I was of course accommodating to because the hookah at Braza is on balance sufficient to smoke more than one of for sure yet following the conclusion of the gathering I came across a notion back at my flat to compose a polemic addressing my newly found desire to light fire to every PDF I'd ever exported to excoriate myself as well as American Modernism for cowtowing to degrading so-called avant garde instincts for the greater part of a century

133:151 .881 The reality was as I saw it at least that poetry in particular had become radically convoluted with regard to its "authorial intent" yet needlessly simplified in terms of "metrical structure" but also at this juncture was there really much to be gained by desecrating American Letters which increasingly seems to be pilloried even by American poets themselves who tend to compose quote-unquote successful collections only to turn around and disavow Capital P Poetry and dedicate themselves to penning novels instead

101:127 .795 I for one remain basically unoffended by this trend as even the most monastic writer still on some level yearns to be perused by some version of consumer that's to be clear an individual not actively involved in the creating or editing of the art itself and that seems essentially impossible in America today so it makes perfect sense for poets themselves to disparage poetry and instead dedicate their skills to creating novels by contrast

(.766) Well I guess it’s been give or take seven years since I first experienced the sublime delight of smoking the hookah at Pasha on Allens Avenue and nearly three and half since I was introduced to the venerated ice hose so I suppose I’m now at the point in my life where an equidistant amount of time has elapsed since I experienced the regular hose as well as the ice hose both hoses that I’d of course recommend although our country’s rapid rate of inflation has impacted the price of each substantially while the rapid spread of the COVID-19 virus has turned smoking hookah into an increasingly frowned upon practice.

2026 Syllables in London

excerpt from the fractal novel "patriotism runs counter to ordinary human morality" html/pdf @ nickk.net

At the National Gallery in Westminster, after Tree told me we'd visit the Byron building, I became a little flummoxed— wandering around, wondering what exactly the author of Don Juan'd be doing among all these f****** painters— just to stumble upon original Pontormos, Parmigianinos, Bronzinos, my favorite Mannerist painters— art I'd gazed at as JPEGs on the internet forever, but now witnessed in their original forms, and I reflected back to spending twenty bucks to be granted admission into RISD's museum, whereas, now by contrast, I was seeing a half dozen original Bronzino's for free.

On a second go round of the Mannerist rooms an American tour guide posted up in front of Bronzino's Venus pontificating an impromptu talk regarding the Mannerist movement surrounded by a series of I'm sure well-intentioned senior citizens who were then prompted to relay personal and specific interpretations of the quote-unquote "theatrical" painting—

I enjoy believing what I hear they ID’d bin Laden by his ears my lobes are super distinctive too twenty thirteen I was in three hundred square feet double debt to income with none of it expungable

To be honest I wasn’t against being run into by a bus or two but RIPTA fucking drives too slow if I’m gonna go ideally I’d like to go

My hair clippers sounded like helicopters in the wet Rome lavatory Americanos the size of a micropenis agitated me

My zipper had a mind of its own on New York Avenue I didn’t tip on my second set of Fernets at the tavern oops!— too busy bonding over wanting to cease completely

html/pdf @ (nickk.net)

The blunt reality of my life at the time was that the pizza at Bettola was more appropriate to eat with a literal soup spoon as opposed to your opposable thumbs, that each slice was steeped in an ill-advised amount of oil and cheese, that the bread, for that matter, was already floppy, that even a robust crust could never withstand the weight of the toppings as currently constituted, which caused the entire pizza to avalanche down to the tips of your fingers whenever you attempted to pick it up, thereby forced to consume the slice in essentially one rushed bite, with all the ingredients concatenating onto each other, leaving you with a piece of wet bread in your palm that constituted the quote-unquote "rest of the slice".

It was technically Curt's idea to go, when we were still at the cigar bar so-called dinner, where the copious smoke was seeping into our skins by the minute, where the pasta was mush and the garlic was burnt, where Curt attempted to bum a single cigarette off the forty or so people in attendance, all to no avail, neither one of us smoking a cigar or cigarette, the new bartender made almost entirely of plastic, with a Picasso like vibe to her work— she actually gave me a great deal on the maybe eight Michelob Ultras I chugged!

But Bettola was alleged to sport the best pizza in the state— it was something apparently a group of consumers cast votes on at some time, somewhere, and subsequently the award was advertised right in front of their stoop, so I saw no real risk in stopping by, as I was still up for a bite, finding the pasta at the bar a bit subpar, plus it was a straight shot up Pontiac in any case.

Yet while I'm typically of the mind to silently disparage a restaurant's offering then just never return again, Curt, by contrast, tended to vocalize his discontent to wait staffs, and with a complaint I quietly addressed to him now buttressing his own disgust he called the bartender, Reign, over to voice his concerns with the notion both pizzas we ordered weren't "great", yet Reign, for her part, found Curt's complaint just as contemptible as we found the place's pizza—she was frankly a little shocked that a person could dislike this luscious pie.

This food in front of us was, to Reign, great pizza, yet she now stood faced with two patrons who seemed to disagree, judging not just the particular pies they got to be subpar, but the actual construction of the pizza itself— the underlying architecture of the restaurant's recipe— to be deeply flawed.

Oh no, it's fine, I said, entirely insincerely, telling Reign the food was okay, there was really no need for us to complain— maybe just get me one more Michelob if you have a chance?

So I believe Curt and I were both surprised when Reign came over some time later, after to-go boxes had been packed and night caps'd been sipped, with a fresh pie, saying Try this one on for size— yet, while I of course, had no inclination to complain, I didn't even object to the meat on the pizza, I'd rather have, at that point, breached my own veganism before I levied a complaint to Reign, yet Curt wasn't of the same mind as I.

Yeah, see, he said, this pizza has the same problem—proceeding to show Reign and now another waitress the essential incongruence between the thickness of the bread and the payload of the multiple toppings, how it made the pizza really hard to eat.

What Reign still failed to comprehend was it wasn't the components of Bettola's pizza that were objectionable, it was instead the core geometry of the pie that was basically unacceptable— in an entirely ill-fated attempt to save face Curt asked Reign to make us an espresso martini but with tequila, her idiosyncratic take on the cocktail.

excerpt -- html/pdf @ nickk.net

She definitely appreciated Yarvin’s oeuvre from that vantage point, as a sort of middle school level form of absurdist propaganda, because, from that angle, Yarvin was, to some extent, an enjoyable author— yet the fact he’d become influential in American politics wasn't even "mildly surprising".

Of course not, Buddy added amicably, expressing his humble opinion as a God-given right, which was why he nearly vomited prior that day while reading a Yelp review about a particular bar, the writer making the comment "how nice" congregating with newly found fellow ex-pats in Tokyo was.

Buddy repeated the phrase "Fellow Ex-Pats" mocking the notion— it seemed wholly grotesque and disgusting to "want to bump into" other objectionable Americans in a beautiful and ultimately untainted city like Tokyo.

html/pdf @ nickk.net

Reimi found it intriguing, discovering this fact and subsequently perusing Yarvin’s blog posts after hearing about his "so-called influence" in contemporary American politics, being, as it so happened, already entirely disaffected by both centrism and liberalism in America, only to conclude that Curtis was at best a fifth-rate thinker, a seventh-rate stylist, a ninth-rate human being?

No, his aesthetics were immeasurably worse than that, Buddy interjected— his analytical skills, she said, were clearly near-mentally challenged, Curtis Yarvin, Reimi said, was "very possibly mentally challenged"— and she made quite clear that she meant that with no actual ill-will whatsoever— yet the fact transformed his polemics regarding American IQ into something fundamentally comical to her, she actually found the one chapter she read deeply comical in that regard, with the writer’s absurd warnings to the reader, and his "bomb drop" regarding racial IQ as items that actually made her chuckle out loud.

excerpt from the fractal novel: html/pdf at: nickk.net

Not long after landing in Japan with Reimi it became rather clear to Buddy that the country was, at bottom, "a fundamentally animated culture", that the whole populace of Japan, with remarkable cohesion, had managed to imbue itself with "an animated form of existence", that everywhere you went in Tokyo, he thought, you’re ceaselessly "inundated with animations"— even the escape plan on an airplane is relayed via an animated, he didn't know, Pokemon avatar in Japan, yet that was still an improvement over the human-relayed iteration.

Because, Buddy said to Reimi, his Platonic travel companion who herself had a respectable knowledge of Japan, what exactly is the damn point of these so-called escape plans on airplanes?

Well, Reimi replied, there doesn’t seem to be any whatsoever!— because, Buddy interrupted, if we’re thirty thousand fucking feet in the atmosphere and spiraling back toward Earth's surface I’ll just jump out of the damn window to my horrific yet inevitable death!

watching every season of tiny homes w/ aplomb cuban got lucky w/ that bullshit dot com

bubble—it takes time for old wounds to heal or appear out of thin air like an executive spiel

i walked around west end for hours in utter despair in the frigid air until I figured I didn't really care

Lo and behold! you enjoy poetry to disseminate your woes boldly into 501(c) magazines battling for supremacy in the LES settlements filled with the faux blind trusts of rich fucks who pursue the betterment of mankind through art and index funds— but rhetoric factories and editor-in-chief salaries aren't the point of modern poems you know?—focus on what you know which isn't ETF flows and municipal bond market liquidity these aren't the things to be considering as you lock in next semester's loan rate for your MFA which I'm sure is going great!

i saw chris conklin in line at rite aid he looked

twenty years older and i thought eventually the two of us will be dead

Lights flicker numerically like CPA firms Neoplatonism was a corrective on the integrity of infinite numbers Sufism a corrective on the rationalism of the concept One I feel more in tune with God when I vehemently condemn photography at a bar where no one gives a shit every situation is set in a unique context in what we perceive as time A curiously significant shift seemed to occur in the repetition of the smile addicted to dying a thousand deaths with that said hold the red onion on the gyro I’m fresh out of gumballs Sent to remedial English simply because we questioned the nature of signifying pronouns but we never got offended at it sans repetition you can’t get back to sleep sometimes ‘If the whole ocean were ink for writing the words of’— sans repetition sometimes I can’t get back to sleep mirrors are now placed regularly in households and automobiles