This is the official blog of Northern Arizona slam poet Christopher Fox Graham. Begun in 2002, and transferred to blogspot in 2006, FoxTheBlog has recorded more than 670,000 hits since 2009. This blog cover's Graham's poetry, the Arizona poetry slam community and offers tips for slam poets from sources around the Internet. Read CFG's full biography here. Looking for just that one poem? You know the one ... click here to find it.

Tuesday, April 27, 2004

Birth, Disease and Grand Slams

Christopher Lane and Akasha had a baby at 8:17 on Friday night, Oren Jacob Lane (rolled or gutteral "R" on Oren; those wacky Jews). 7lbs, 9oz. Already has more hair than Lane, and his beard is coming in the same. Oddly enough, I hear he's already taller than Chris.... I am a surrogate uncle. But it means he was out of the slam.

I was in pain from the sore throat starting Sunday and by Tuesday, I was in so much constant pain that I just wanted death, sweet death. I slept for four straight days with breaks in between to cry in the shower, try to not throw up, and drink water, tea, and gargle with salt water. Took me till Wednesday to actually say "ah" and look at my throat. I'm the son of a Registered Nurse, yet, I am a medical idiot. Anyway, went to the Emergency Clinic for the pain. The doc said I tested negative for strep and mono, but that my throat was the worst (throat infection) he'd ever seen on a living person. The doc was 70+ so he has some clout. He said the strep test (a throat swab) may have given a false-positive, but the mono test (blood test) was almost totally negative. I wasn't sleeping because I was tired, I slept because it was either sleep or feel pain. He gave me some antibiotics (heavy dose of amoxicillin) and I was over-dosing to get the throat clear for Saturday. Instead of 2 every 12 hours, I was doing 2 ever 8 on top of double doses of 24-hour Sudafed and extra-strength Tylenol. When I get a disease, I blitzkrieg the mother-fucker. I never do things the easy way.

By the Slam, I was feeling OK, more or less. More on the Slam later. Suffice it to say, the venue rocked, the audience was fucking huge, the host Bill Campana, feature (one of my best friends and former touring partner) Josh Fleming, calibrators Rebekah Crisp, John R. Kofonow, Dan Seaman, and Suzy La Follette, and slammers Justin "Biscuit" Powell, Sharkey Marado, Cass Hodges, Aaron Johnson, (and my NORAZ Teammates:)Brent Heffron, Logan Phillips, and Eric Larson were amazing. I was honored to share that stage. Everyone I know, poetry-wise in Northern Arizona was there, in addition to my Mom and step-dad Bill, and my Phoenician best friends Michael "KuK" KuKuruga, Nikki Kaufmann, Kevin Crawford and his wife Erin Crawford.

Oh, and I won the slam. By more than 4 1/2 points while everyone else was fighting for the 1/10ths of points between them.
Whoopty-fucking-do.

Thursday, April 15, 2004

Slam finalists

Sedona Slam March 26th:
1st Christopher Fox Graham - 81.7
2nd Eric Larson - 78.7
3rd Sharky Marado - 78.4
4th Brent Hefron - 73.7
------------------------------------------------
5th Aaron Johnson - 72.6
6th Rhette Pepe - 67.4
7th Ryan Guide - 50.7

Flagstaff Slam April 14th:
1st Cass Hodges - 88.9
2nd Aaron Johnson - 88.6
3rd Christopher Lane - 88.0
4th Logan Phillips - 87.6
-------------------------------------------------
5th Justin Powell - 87.1
6th Rebekah Crisp - 86.4
7th John Kofonow - 86.0
8th Dom Flemons - 72.1

The top four from each slam face off at:

NORAZ Poetry Grand Slam Finals
Hosted by Bill Campana
Featuring Josh Fleming
Tickets are $10, students are $7.
Orpheum Theater.
NORAZ Poets
Flagstaff Poetry.