so it's been a while again. its amazing how time passes by. I still feel like it's May. Seattle got slammed with snow leading up to Christmas and it would be difficult to confuse December with May now, but for some reason I never moved past May.

The months slip by and I can't really see anything that would upset this process, time that is. I had always thought of the phrase "Time is on my side" as simply an artful way of saying you've got loads of free time, but I understand it in a new light when i feel as though Time is so adversarial and not in a battle to accomplish errands, but Time as a personal attack. An oppression of monotony and immovable force. Even something as "momentous" as the holidays, rolled over and past me with little effect.

Across my street a team of 3 utitlity workers with the aid of a large truck are putting up a new ?telephone? (i suppose there are multiple technologies beside telephone these days) pole. It makes me think of society at large, but that's nothing new. Sometimes I think Henry Ford and Industry are some of the worst things in the world. I just don't like how specialized everything's become. Ohp, there's 4, one was operating the truck. i think you can pull off cities without industry.

i have nothing more. i'm not in the mood.

No no no!

I don't want to be done. I just suck at discipline right now.

A good friend of mine made a comment the other day that stuck with me as another one of those "ah ha" moments of struggling with new found adulthood. I had been doing what I often do: ranting and complaining about things I just never really do anything about. The realization was that many of the issues of the past year that we've been struggling with, things we've felt to be personal crises are really just things that normally occur all the time. Which is perhaps relieving? but also really scary. How unprepared are we? I know that's all very vague but I didn't want to get to into it.

What I did want to write about was this scene that recently struck me. I had the opportunity to spend an extended weekend in Laguna Beach. And so I did.



The late winter sun threw long rays against the sky and the hills even though it remained high and proud in the sky. and I sat in my chair. The young eucalyptus outside the window tossed it's thin locks of leaves from one side to the other like a young woman behaving with planned carelessness. and I rocked in my chair. The edges of the window, trees, sky and my face blushed with a light pink. The sun slowly sank, inching it's way behind the house in front of me. The wind continued to blow it's cool breath on the warm hills. The air was dry. Winter in the south. I hugged my knees tighter. My face creased into a smile as the young eucalyptus with a flippant toss of it's highest branches began to shudder and shake with indignation. The Sun was slowly leaving her and the scene was turning dark. I sat in my chair. I caressed the tree with my water tinged eyes, I loved the tree. But calm didn't come to those beautiful branches. The light pink that had once graced our group now turned to a darker angrier red. i couldn't help but laugh at the poor eucalyptus' futility. The tantrum slowly ceased and became rhythmic dancing sobs. The thin long leaves brushing across large swaths of reddish purple sky. And before I knew it, my beautiful tree became nothing but a silent beautiful silhouette. And when I heard my name called, my attention broke and I got out of my chair.

i enjoy harvest moons.

i also enjoy campari.

yes. i'm still here. barely. but i've been feeling more motivated lately. so perhaps one of these days I'll actually post something.

i'm amazed. living alone, at the amount of mess a single person can make. but at the same time. making pancakes at 3 in the afternoon on a Thursday is precisely the reason i live alone. Not that one couldn't do that with roommates. but it makes more sense alone.

but then there're the nights when i sit and stare at the wall, the ice cubes slowly melting in my jar, and i wish it would just talk to me. that'd be nice. i suppose that's why they invented TV.

autumn. it's a good time. too short, as a customer pointed out the other day. yes, i said, winter always comes too quickly and lingers too long.

a random couplet i wrote

yes. exactly indeed it's true
just distractedly misconstrue

The coffee isn't even bitter...

So i said the drought was over and then another week goes by. Heeh heeh. A thought just occurred to me and interrupted me. I'm thinking about it because my wireless speakers are cutting in and out from the music i'm listening to over my laptop. It's annoying the hell out of me. Well so I'm getting to the point of wanting to plug the speakers directly into my laptop, so as to eradicate the skipping. But then, I realized that the speakers would be right in front of me. and what I enjoy, what I think sets the mood about listening to the music over the louder speakers is precisely that they are not by my laptop. They're in the other room. And music coming from another room sounds fantastic and great and I love that. And then I thought, why do we obsess over entertainment systems/houses that put speakers in every room? No. Put speakers in a few places but then let the music flow through the place and listen to it from another room. It's great.

Anyway, so it's been awhile and i'm guilty. But to be slightly fair to myself I came down with a viral infection (good sign) that knocked me out for the better part of a week (thursday to tuesday). Why is a viral infection a good sign might you ask? Well, I always get sick when I've let go in a vague general personal life sense. I'm sure other people are like this too, you get sick on holiday or right after school lets out or whatnot, it's the i'm stressed i'm stressed i'm stressed ok it's all over and now i'm sick. Well it was one of those things I think. And now finally, I'm getting over being sick. So hopefully this battered caterpillar is on his way to being on kick ass moth (do moths metamorphosize?) to use a heart warming and long cherished metaphor.

I think it's fun that this blog is over a year old. Because, it's fun to remember back, and read what I was posting today a year ago. So many changes in a year...so many. And even in the past 7 days a fair amounnt of change has occurred. Well maybe not visibly so. But I think it has.

So here, on this cold, blustery grey wet rainy summer day in Seattle, I've committed a year of my life. (i'm already close to six months in, but another 12 at least). I signed a lease to a wonderful studio apartment. It's something I'm unbelievably excited about. Hence the above photo. I'm sitting here staring out at the grey in a half-moved out apartment (doesn't living in a half moved out place suck? a friend of mine asked me yesterday). I hope that this marks a departure from my life of the past six months. Head in the sand would be an apt description of this past half year.

So I've received some virulent messages about my slacking on the blog and I appreciate it so much. because sometimes i need external motivation.

My new place is equidistant a stone's throw from a park and a liquor store. I don't think it could be more perfect. And hopefully I'll begin to write more. So I guess this post is more of an update post and not so much a whatever else i write here. But it's good to have some fresh air in one's life.

I read this new fantastic book recommended to me by a very well trusted source. So, I'm not surprised it was fanastic. It was the English translation of Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities. It's a series of short descriptions of various fictitious cities. it's one of those books where you got, "Oh! Damn!" because it's this brilliant book, that's written brilliantly, with brilliant ideas, but is also sort of ingenious where you go "Oh! Shit! I could've written this" well that's how I felt about Cities. It's fantastic check it out. Thanks Meg!

I wrote this on an altogether different summer day. And with full intention of continuing it, but perhaps I"ll post it here now. and write more on it later.

------------------------------------------------------------------

The music moves slowly. With the fan. And the air. Languidly on a summer night that stretched out lazily across the city. But I see none of it now. In a small room. With no windows and only one door. A small fan hums consistently, while I hum softly along in short bars to the crooning low female voice. The sweat slowly gluing my bare thighs to the down. Too heavy for this heat. The laptop adding its heat. But at this temperature, knowing the futility of hoping for coolness, I am careless about everything. I am looking through the silhouette of my toes at the candle across the room. It’s soft glow illuminating my make shift bookshelf (the floor) and spine after spine of countless (54) texts to be read another countless times. The soft scent from the candle reawakening it’s fallen brethren in my sheets, the clothes, the books and the walls.

The music pauses in between songs and the droning of the fan continues solo. My cellphone sits silently at my side. An odd Friday night to say the least. I haven’t had one like this in the longest time, which is a phrase people utter when they’re too lazy to search their memory. And on a night like this, I am certainly too lazy to search for a memory that probably doesn’t exist. I don’t have any food in the pantry to eat raw, and the thought of turning on a stove in this heat is enough to keep me put and my tummy lightly complaining. Funny though, how some memories come to you without any searching at all. I think I read that somewhere. (another phrase people use when they’re too lazy to recall). Watching the tiny flashes from the city’s spire across a surrealist Northwest sky at dusk, I couldn’t help but think of Murakami and his memory. Or at least his protagonist’s memories. He captures it so well, but then again, plane’s have always been great places to get a good view. The memory of leaving comes to me again. By leaving, of course, I mean a year ago almost to the date. When, as a 22 year old I left my mother for the first real time. I wrote about it, but as things tend to do in this digital age, it was lost to some misplaced article of dust or broken chip. Perhaps I should try to recount it. A lot has happened since then. Almost too much to tell. Never did I think, so much could fit into one tiny year, especially with the rate they go by these days.

Anyway, stories from another place for another time I suppose. But remind me to tell you about leaving my mother and her mother.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Happy Hump Day.

It's been more than a year

Isn't it funny, when one goes to get one's hair cut that we sit in front of a mirror? I was in a funk, along with the weather, on monday. It was my second day off in a row and after walking around Capitol Hill in a daze looking for the miracle apartment to fall into my lap, I decided I needed to get a haircut. Walking into an uber hip salon recommended to me, I had stylist who was also stuck in slow motion. Seated in the vinyl chair, staring at myself in the mirror and the yellowish orangish headed short woman slowly and meticulously moving from one side of my head to the other and back again, I thought I might be falling asleep. My expression looked blank. And my reflection stared at me, rudely, I might add. I couldn't do anything but stare back, locked in a dazed gaze trying to focus on anything. The stylist slowly drew another two fingers full of hair up to it's perfect snipping height and slowly clipped from fingertip to hand.

Ziggy Stardust played over the stereo.

I haven't blogged in a long long time. Like seriously blogged and that's a problem. But. Perhaps the end of my long drought is over. I have been unbelievably stressed out. Like more than ever. But now, it's raining and the darkness in my apartment now matches the darkness outside the windows. And perhaps now, things are more congruous. Nina is on the stereo and the peppermint tea is lukewarm. My favorite temperature for tea.

I spent a fantastic evening a few days ago, leaning halfway out my apartment windows at 4 in the morning watching lightning reverberate through the clouds. Reverberate. That's impossible. Lightning doesn't reverberate. It does something else. Gimme a second. Stutters. Stutters and Shutters. across the sky. silence. too. no thunder, just the shuddering shuttering faint light through thick clouds at the quietest time of the day. On my elbows (the sill is low) and kneeling on the floor, conversation floats out to the city. And with a smile stretching my tired cheeks, I remembered how much I liked and how much I missed, talking, writing and reading. Reading, talking and writing, writing reading and talking. I missed it.

i had sunday off and I went to the lake. standing at the edge of the high dive off the shore on the dock, I swayed with the dock up and down, side to side over wave and through trough. Standing precariously up above the water, I swayed. giggling somewhere silently inside, I felt life swaying, slowly, shaking me to pieces. Swaying on the precipice. I kicked the lolling board, made my body rigid and sliced the incoming crest. And it's about time too.

I'll write again tomorrow. But right now, my tea is gone and I'm still in my work clothes. Plus, the rain is demanding my attention.

i just finished another book. i need to write about it. but i have a soccer game to play. it's rainy and cold in seattle, in july, because why would I deserve a summer all year round?


i feel something coming. who knows what the next few months will bring.

Wow, Remember when I blacked out?!

Sorry for such a long hiatus. Things, have been well. I'm trying to recorral my creative life. Here was an exercise in "making mistakes" by which I mean, becoming comfortable with creating things regardless of whether they are "up to my standards" simply to get things moving. I watched a great video about creativity and schools. If you don't want to watch the video, my take away from it as it pertained to my personal life was the important message that fear of mistakes kills creativity. And, looking at myself, I knew this to be true. One of my main blocks in trying to write a lot of what I think would make great writing is a fear and doubt in my ability to accurately render great writing or great ideas. I'm so damn afraid of writing shit, and most of what I write I already think is shit, that I can never get my foot out the door. So, this charcoal sketch was the beginning step in creating something that I might not be happy with and letting that be okay. And gosh darn, it's working, I don't feel bad about this sketch at all. And I made it without fear. I also then wrote a six page personal essay that hopefully, will get printed in a literary journal operating out of Portland. I'll let them do the publishing, not me.

here's the sketch:

Pond Frogs.

Ruuhhh, ruuhhhh. the bullfrogs are still here. on the cape, across the pond. I can hear them clearly because we keep the windows open. It's very humid here out on the cape and after living in the desert, well, never mind, i've always reacted poorly to humidity. Tossing and turning barely letting the cloth sheet drape over one shin as token sleep cover. the humidity weighing more heavily on me than anything on my mind.

ruuhhh, ruuuhhh. I stifle a laugh because my cousin is sleeping across the room. i'm thinking about humans making that noise to attract one another. the sleezy guy leaning on the bar groaning, ruuhhhh, ruuuhhh at a elegant lady. stupid i know, but funny enough, combined with the thought that I thought about that at all. enough to stifle a laugh.

i feel like i've let a lot slip lately. it's been an interesting time these past few weeks. letting some things go, trying to pick up others. a sort of general reshuffling of affairs, values stances. interesting time indeed. spring cleaning, cliche. but still, i'm a sucker for cliches because every so often i'm struck (almost physically) by the genuineness of cliches. they do, at the outset, capture something profound. sometimes it's easy to forget all their baggage. sometimes i'm struck by cliches. and the past few weeks, or hell, maybe months, have felt like rummaging through boxes of old stuff. But oddly enough, none of it has had anything to do with the past. well, i suppose that's not entirely accurate. nothing to do with the past? what an absurd notion. anyway, that's another path. but this spring cleaning has such freshness to it. It's all new. it's just me that feels old. what's up with that?

Before hopping the bus up to the Cape (i had previously thought (being from the West Coast as I am) that boston, cape cod and the state that houses them were between New York and DC) I had been waltzing my way around New York by the lead of a friend from brooklyn. new york. i like it. large, dirty. a real city. and yet, so livable. i felt so alive amongst all those people. even though i felt as though i was a temporary sojourner floating by. lead around by a local i still was stray, not there, but there. feeling the people, the closeness. not relating, just feeling. and encapsulating and conceiving in cliches. i'm just feeling it man. yeah. groovy.

the frogs are still at it. endlessly ruuhhh, ruuuhhhing out into the darkness. hoping for someone to respond, someone to keep them company. there, in the pond. i have a tennis match in the morning with the family. a tennis match, on the cape. sucker for cliches. sometimes you live a story and sometimes you fill your blog with cliches.

but ah what the hey. i'll polish some of this someday. and who knows if it'll be any good. if I need any motivation, I only have to read more Dave Eggers. His novels read like my blog I feel like. It's like a Vonnegut style without much of the well thought out creativity.

well, tomorrow is here.

Some Like it Hot

Somehow I got nominated as spokesperson. it wasn't the best choice. good thing I had some help.

Summer Evening in Seattle

Dusk and Dawn are the best times for thinking.

the lights of the city slowly blinking on like the thoughts in my mind. here, there in no way connected save for the impending darkness.

the hill and sky blur with only the words "Olive Tower" remaining clear in their white and mustard yellow.

piano and violin unwind the contortion of the day.
3 lonely tea candles, clustering for light. profile me against the white wall.

The last sounds of thunder rolling quietly out to sea.

Twenty-Two and Directionless

I'm back. and I've got some things to say.

The past few months have been extremely difficult (cue whiny personal blogging bitches) for me. I am not a person well-suited to the position I find myself in currently. While I think it's fairly normal and fairly common to be 22, jobless with a humanities degree, directionless and craving anything to boost self confidence, it doesn't mean it's easy. I'm getting a little (beyond?) tired of not knowing what I want. Try something. Apparently, I'm not even that good at trying things. Economic recession, blah blah blah. I know I love and am good at school, but it's never any fun being a walking stereotype. Marge Simpson, "Don't make fun of grad students, Bart, they're just people who made a terrible life decision." And you'll recall my rancor at the Maxim article I posted about.

So, yes, I want to go back to school. I also want to be respected for that decision not seen as a cop-out, a default, an acknowledgment of defeat by the 'real world' or a terrible life choice. I'm sure when I start respecting the decision others will follow suit, at least to my face.

In addition to the social pressure angle taken by Maxim, a friend has showed my a blog by Penelope Trunk that takes up another angle. There are two articles on her blog I'd like to address in this post. The first one is about graduate school naturally.

Trunk lists 7 reasons why graduate school is outdated. She is a careerist (by self definition) and so her take on the purpose of graduate school is already deviating from mine. Plus, her critiques aren't really looking at graduate school as professional development for the professional choice of being a professor. So with those caveats, she makes the following assumptions:

1) Smart people no longer go to graduate school (starting off on a great foot)
--Ok first of all. Since the corporate ladder has become obsolete, because we don't stick in one career path for 30 years anymore, because the principles, morals and values of the professional world have broadened, people like Penelope Trunk are forced to redefine 'success' and 'succeeding'. They do so dubiously and with ambiguous language. Definitions of success get whittled down to such generality as to become useless. I would characterize this new perspective's definition of success along these lines:
1) Financial security with room for financial growth
2) Adequate balance of work-personal life
Success is the ability to live your life. How tautological but at the same time, duh. Trunk claims that the workplace is different. New rules to play the game and new definitions of 'winning'. This is the assumption her advice is working within. Graduate school is no longer a "smart" way to achieve financial security with room for growth and an adequate personal life in the workplace.

Why does she think so?

a) Financial reasons. Graduate school is expensive and it "shuts doors". Two of her seven reasons are directly money related. She is right that it is a large investment (sometimes!). She is also right that most people will have to pay back money borrowed to attend graduate school. Graduate school is a 'stupid' move because of its difficult return on investment. Especially when success is simply financial security and time to enjoy that security. One can achieve 'success' without spending a large sum of money on graduate school. This neglects the fact that some graduate institutions view YOU as an investment in those artsy-fartsy terms like "common good" or "civilization" but also in the 'market' of education (they are institutions afterall). The other assumption is owing money in student loans undermines financial security. Yet, buying a house, renting an apt, leasing a car, buying a car or any other financial activity that either requires loans or is "throwing money away" doesn't fall into this 'undermined financial security' category. In fact, many jobs require a car and many people don't want/can't live at home with their parents. Having student loans "shuts doors" because it undermines your financial ability to take jobs that you want as opposed to jobs that allow you to pay back student loans. However, living at home without a car in order to be financially secure from loans or poor investments certainly shuts doors on jobs as well.

b) Professional Development. Reasons #2 and #5. A graduate degree is no longer a requirement to achieve "success". We have sort of already covered this. Why would anyone pursue graduate school if it wasn't required for success? We don't need graduate degrees anymore so the school is outdated. I think this is just a bit silly. I understand why the previous requirement of an MBA provided enough motivation to get one, but what about the other benefits of an MBA? Really? It's only a ticket? And also, I believe medical school is still a "ticket to play" for a large portion of medicine and law school for a large part of law. And it also seems to be a large ticket to play in the arts & sciences, humanities, academia. So, really, it's no longer a ticket to play in business. But, we never really learned anything in business school anyway..."If you don't use your graduate degree, you look unemployable". This reason doesn't even make sense. How many people are using their undergraduate degree? Certainly the expectations are different between a B.A. or B.S. and a graduate degree, but as "expectations for higher education are increased" (in one of her linked articles) wouldn't the requirement to directly use your graduate degree become laxer? Think of all the myriad professions one can have with an M.S. in Psychology, or my mother for example an M.S. in Information Science. And again, my father, with an M.D. having to spend larger amounts of his professional time in Hospital Administration, Business and Social Work. A degree no longer means you can only do this and anything else is "second choice". We do lots of different things with our degrees.

c) Personal Incompetency. This one upsets me the most. First, she claims that graduate school requires us to know what we want before we start. I have heard from plenty of people who have gone through graduate school that you should wait until you know you really want to go to school. Certainly, it's an investment of time, money and energy. Of course I'd want to be sure I want to do it. Like any other important decision? Trunk utilizes and links us to an explanation of the term "emerging adulthood" as a new development phase that basically I'm in the middle of. In this time, we 20 somethings are to find out what we really want and what will make us happy through trial and error in the workplace. We are directionless and lost and we should be, because if we skip this time period we'll have a quarter life crisis. Her final reason definitely hit home and made me pause to reconsider her points. Mainly because it plucked the directionless lost strings that dominate my heart at the moment. But, like I said, I'm beyond tired of this extended state of limbo that seems to be so important for my development as an adult. Partially, what's pointed out is observed and true and part of it is defining us in a way that I don't think is appropriate. The underlying message is "you are incapable of making important life decisions at this time". This WHOLE thing is hypocritical.

Extension of childhood. (trying to remain calm). Elementary and High School education in America is a grooming for the workplace. We get a bit more freedom in undergraduate programs and room to explore. We find out what we like and then we pursue it in graduate education. This is the traditionally understood notion of educational progression. Graduate school is where one knows what one wants and tries to make an impact or add something new (their two cents) to the world. Graduate school is where you create your own assignments. You choose what to study, you choose what to write, and you write a dissertation. From the observed workplace, you have a boss and you do what you're told. The creation of your own assignments comes from trying not to go insane. The structure of school was put in place so that we'd be good at "jobs" in the workplace. But, she says Benton says many people go back to school "more out of comfort" than because of passion. I don't know about lack of passion, but yes, school is definitely more comfortable for me than an office. On one hand she's telling me I'm incapable of making an important life decision and on the other hand, telling me my choice is an extension of childhood.

Maybe graduate school will be a stupid poor choice. Maybe it's a bigger Error and not much Trial. Maybe the point of all of this to make sure I don't have grand delusions about more schooling. I can see that. I can also see from that the remarkable similarity between graduate school and the workplace. The main message, from others not just Trunk, is that graduate school isn't all fun and games, you have to work, you might not succeed and people may tell you what to do. Well, duh, that's what the real world is. So basically, I'm left with one final response to Penelope Trunk on the subject of graduate school: Hindsight's twenty-twenty.

Other things that bother me: Everyone she quotes in her reasons have higher degrees. Yes they are from a different generation, but it doesn't change the fact that our important theories, observations and guides come from people who spend time thinking about these things, some people think about them so much, it's a career.

THIS IS REALLY LONG I'M SORRY. (it also occurred to me that Trunk is simply the lightning rod of a lot of frustration and "advice" i'm receiving about school)

I'm switching gears on Penelope Trunk and bringing in another article I found through a great blog. Penelope's article is about social media and the Atlantic's article is about online reading behavior.

Trunk blogs about how the different social media that make up the online environment should be able to express different aspects of our personality. However, she finds that many people are flattening their personality so that they appear consistent across multiple media. She is sensitive to the dispositions of the varying structured media, like Twitter, blog, Facebook, etc.
I find personality and social media fascinating. I wrote a comment on her article that sums up my initial reaction:

"I’m glad someone is talking about this. I’m not sure how successful maintaining multi-faceted personalities online will be. The analogy to “real world” relationships obviously is spot on, but the important difference is control over audience. I more than agree that the plethora of social media in which to express ourselves not only works well with our complex personalities, but also is designed differently in which certain behaviors make more sense. However, recall the awkwardness of those “real world” slips, when your boss catches you saying a lewd comment to a coworker, or a social friend accidentally being the outlet for some personal issue that would’ve been better suited for an intimate friend.

Typically we have control over our audience thanks to the whole spatio-temporal network of the “real world”. Sally is in another city or Jimmy walked in a couple seconds too late. But when it comes to all our online media we lose much of that control over audience. Not only is it nice to be able to interact with the same person in different ways, professionally and socially, it's also nice to be able to keep people separate. Which I suppose, over a slew of different privacy settings for each medium one might achieve a similar degree of control, but I think for the average user you are open and out there for any of your networked contacts. And thus, I see a motive for trying to be consistent or flat in character. How do we gauge the level of intimate progression with acquaintances to close friends to family in a potentially undifferentiated space such as the Google search results page?"

The Atlantic article I also find fascinating because Nathan Carr connects our emerging online behavior with the same economic structures that I'm already critiquing. Of course I'm sympathetic to his stance. I lament the loss of silence in my brain, sustained reading, etc etc within the general population as well. However, I'm not that worried about myself. I recently thoroughly enjoyed reading Anna Karenina which as some of you may know, is quite lengthy. And spend a decent amount of time reflecting and letting ideas echo through the hollows of my head. Then again, I'm unemployed. Since I'm a bit fatigued from my already WAY too lengthy post, I'll pick one point to comment on and then hopefully await some fantastic comments from my readers. wink.

Carr quotes Clive Thompson from Wired magazine as describing the phenomenon of online recorded history as "the perfect recall of silicon memory". Hah. First of all. Fantastic description. And the article by Carr is quite a pleasant read.

This description prompted this thought: Recall and Remember are two very different words. Let's be technical and pull out the definition. Among others that don't quite highlight the difference, there is a Oxford-English Dictionary definition of recall that states, "to cause one to remember". There is a subtle difference and much of the two definitions overlap. But we can tease out an intuition in the word remember. It resonates with another point made in the article that played prominently in my education. Reading behavior on the Internet is both structured and structuring. We organize and lay out the content of the Internet, but at the same time, the Internet organizes and lays out information in us. Carr argues that it spills over even into all other types of media. The structure of the Internet is found in television and newspapers now. He cites studies that find reduced ability to concentrate or absorb large amounts of information or reflect.

While I am nervous about this structuring, as I always am, I feel there is a stronger battle occurring. Carr points out how reading is not as natural as speaking. It's a much more learned behavior than instinctual behavior. And therefore, he indirectly concludes, it is more malleable and easily structured by the Internet's processes. The reason I delineate between recall and remember is because remembering is a process that is just as natural as speaking, if not more so. And it's this process that the Internet will have a more difficult time structuring. Silicon may recall for us, but it cannot remember. Remembering is a human activity, completely loaded. Remembering is inextricably interwoven with interpretation. We still have to interpret the information the Internet recalls. And how we choose to do that, is still very much under our control. We may not be able to fudge facts and the information we're allowed to see may be structured (aka biased) discreetly by the Internet's algorithms etc. but persuasion, interpretation, and a critical intellectual eye are still as indispensable now than ever.

sometimes the faucet drips

Oy. I'm amped on coffee.

Conversations with a six year old:

"Were you in a war?"
-No
"Are you sure?"
-Pretty sure.
"Well, that's your sword isn't it?" (referencing the decorative sword I purchased in Toledo, Spain and has been kept in the basement office since moving here).
-Ah, well, yes it is
"Did you kill someone?"
-No, that sword is for decoration only.
"Are you ever gonna kill someone?"
-I don't know, I don't plan on it.


"Don't you like their singing?" (referencing the Cheetah Girls on the television).
-I don't think they are actually singing.
"Yes they are, can't you hear them?"
-No, I think they are just dancing to music that is playing.
"No, they're singing, look." (points emphatically at the TV)
-Have you ever tried to dance like that and sing at the same time? *pause* What happens when you dance around like that?
"Well I get tired." (bends over and pretends to breath heavily)
-Exactly, it'd be tough to sing like that while dancing. I think someone else is doing the singing.
(She turns up the volume on the TV) "Can't you hear them singing? Duh."
Mom interjects siding with Lilly, "I wouldn't bother, Lil."

"You'll always be older than Kyle, right?"
-Yup.
"So when he's 21 you'll be 23?"
-Uh, yeah pretty much. We get older at the same pace.
"And he'll always be older than me?"
-Yeah, see, we both go to bed at night and wake up the next day, and that day we're both one day older.
"What?! No, it's not like one day I'm 6 and the next day 7 and then 8 and 9."
-No, no, you don't get a year older every day, just a day older. You're 6 and let's say 100 days old, but tomorrow you'll be 6 and 101 days old, and I'll be 22 and 101 days old.
"Ohhhhh, I get it, we get a day older."
-Yeah, because we all get older at the same speed. We go to sleep and wake up together.
"Kyle too?"
-Everyone on the planet. Time is universal. Well, at least it sort of is...it's at least the dominant paradigm.


I recently finished In the Skin of a Lion and it was fantastic. I also spent last night, before falling asleep, thinking of some really amazing images and started to write in my head. I hate it when that happens because I always feel like I need to capture it, but I know getting up and getting out something to write with will force the train of thought into the shadows. Anyway, I'm too caffeinated at the moment to write anything creative. or recall the previous nights images. They were some good ones, beginning with snapshots from my time abroad. It was a great reaffirmation, making me appreciate having done what I did. Helps to relieve some of the stress I'm currently experiencing due to my situation.

I really like sleeping next to a window.
the heart's a lonely hunter.

Completely Uninformed Political Ranting

So, I don't know jack squat about the E.U. or U.S. Politics. But, it's my flippin blog, so I'll say what I want.

I read a recent NY Times article about Ireland's recent rejection of the Lisbon Treaty. Now I have no idea what the Lisbon Treaty was attempting to address, or how it affected any of the European Nations. However, my increasing opinion that either the United States needs to split into at least four large regional "countries" or swing way more political power back into State and Local governments seems to color my reactions to the limited exposure to E.U. politics.

As a side note, this article (yes, by golly gee whiz! never noticed it before!) is probably one of the most slanted or unapologetically biased articles I've read by the Times. Sccccarrry.

This is my worry. (recall my rants about the future of medicine and Google, woOooOOoOo)

Ok so here we go. The United States government, large, alienating, not really a democracy, etc etc. (as another interesting side note check out this video of Noam Chomsky.) Has nevertheless provided a very nurturing environment for corporations to grow large large and become the boo nasty hiss TNCs (trans-national corporations). Also, a very successful environment for an elite ruling class to rule under almost impervious ruse of democracy, election, support of the ruled. When, in fact, the ruled often don't support the ruling. Let's see what was I reading recently. Ah, yes, Slaughterhouse Five by Vonnegut. The 100 American prisoners of war arrive at a camp in....can't remember where there are also British and Russian POWs. The Brits are appalled at the lack of refinery and general animalistic behavior American POWs. Then Vonnegut does a delightful explanation of the American phenomenon of the poor to despise themselves and blame themselves for their lot, when in fact, responsibility most solely lies upon the ruling class, the rich, the elite. But somehow, in America, we've turned that around with our National Myth of pulling oneself up by one's bootstraps and so, for arguably the first time in History, the ruling class in America, is not responsible for those it rules. Interesting. So accepting this, we then look at the development of the E.U.

Centralize centralize centralize. How the hell are we still moving in this direction!? Why are we continuing incessantly in this direction, toward centrality? We are so OVERLY centralized that nothing makes sense and nothing works. De-centralize, de-centralize. I take it all back. Centralization simply needs to occur in different areas, not the ones it's currently existent or being worked upon. Centralization needs to happen 1) geographically, people need to live where they work. this suburb structure is ridiculous. food needs to be grown where it's eaten, who isn't sick of semi's clogging up highways? POWER on the other hand, needs to be decentralized. because by decentralizing food, housing, electricy, goods, peoples, those in power are CENTRALIZING, let's use another term, consolidating, their power. by centralizing the other side, where food is grown, where we live, blah blah blah, we then decentralize the power. and make it more pertinent. ok rant.

So, while the Times article paints the Irish voters as a) dumb as bricks and not aware of all the miraculous benefits ratifying the Lisbon Treaty was eagerly awaiting to bestow upon them or b) spoiled brats who received European handouts to modernize the country (this is not necessarily a positive moral connotation) and is now refusing it to new E.U. countries

Certainly, Ireland had voters who voted against the Treaty who fit both of the above categories. But, I'm guessing, there's also Irish voters who know what the E.U. is, what the Treaty was doing, and just plain thought it was a bad idea, regardless of any xenophobia. So first off, kudos to Ireland having a law that requires these type measures be put to referendum instead of resting in the hands of the executive and legislative bodies like many other E.U. countries. However, the Californian water development and issues (or the American political system in general when it comes to "elections" rather) makes it plainly obvious that even public referendums are largely controlled by those with the budgets to campaign. it's at least a step in the right direction and perhaps Ireland doesn't have the same weaknesses as the American public does.

The second thing is that Ireland (from what I understand) voted no in the referendum because of fears that power would be shifted from Ireland to the E.U. (more power) now this may be misunderstood, or it may be not the "true" case of the Treaty, however, i resonate with those fears, real or imagined. I see the E.U. growing more and more similar to the environment we have here in the States. And since many of the boo nasty hiss TNCs are no longer so "American" in origin but "European" rather (even though TNC as term moves beyond nationality) insofar as "the West" is the 'first' world and everybody else is playing catch up.

So, wtf? No, give more power back to our State and local governments here in the U.S. and no! keep power in the individual countries of the E.U. I mean, I feel as though, if anything, the E.U. should be looking at the disastrous mess over here and saying, uhm, no we are not moving in that direction. But I suppose form the viewpoint of the ruling elite, America is a damn good model. Un-encumbered opportunity to make limitless wealth without any liability for resulting consequences. the American dream. and currently, a dream come true for a small portion of the world.


Perhaps my beloved anonymous could spare an opinion or two on the matter.

oregon

i met a woman on the train who only ate oranges before she cut her fingernails. I don't like the rind's orange tint in my nails, so when I'm ready to clip my nails I allow myself the luxury of peeling, deeply the fortified orange and its formidable peel. Leaving there, under the white crescents a telltale orangish tint.

i swiveled my head to gaze lazily out the window again. since when did we move so swiftly....?

In Honor of the Olympic Trials

No single individual is capable of being good at life solely on their own merit. It takes a tight knit network of support to allow and encourage an individual to put normal people to shame.

Well, it's no secret that Will Leer has been part of that tight knit supportive network that has allowed me to explore all the possibilities of being really really ridiculously awesome at life. And I'd like to think the favor has been returned.

Well, in honor of both the Prefontaine Classic and the Olympic Trials, I thought I might stroll down memory lane for a wee bit to set the mood for an amazing weekend.

The Prefontaine Classic will be aired on NBC and/or ESPN from 1pm-3pm PST this Sunday.

Will is running in both meets. The Classic this weekend and the Trials over July 4th weekend. This video below was put together by an outstanding colleague and teammate of ours Alec Lentz. It's quite enjoyable.

I'm Lucky I Got Out Alive

Reporters Expose Airport Security Lapses By Blowing Up Plane

Prada is Sexy.

so I did miss my connection on my flight. but luckily the airline put me up in a hotel for free. !! right? So, I ended up leaving on Wednesday afternoon and getting to my destination Thursday night. Fantastic. But since then the Midwest has welcomed me back with open arms. I promptly jumped in the car early Friday morning to drive 5.5 hours to Osh Kosh Wisconsin for the NCAA Division III Track Championships where my loveliest high school teammate was participating in my beloved steeplechase. She got fourth, booyah. Then, back in the car on Saturday for 5.5 hours before jumping in my brother's car and driving my tired caffeinated self 3.5 hours to my father's little lakeside trailer to spend Memorial Day weekend with the family. Welp, on Sunday evening an F5 Tornado hit a mile or two away from our trailer, with the cell all around us and pretty much scaring the bejeezes out of me. I've been in the state for less than 72 hours and it's already trying to kill me: the feeling's mutual. But I did not die. I lived. And here I am. Today, I woke up late, ate cake for breakfast, played Guitar Hero and got depressed and angry about my job search. I was going to rant about that here, but I accidentally let it spill on some friends and my younger brother, so it's kind of been cleared. But who knows, I'm certainly not emotionally settled about it, so we may see another outburst on here at a latter date.


But to be fair, I went for a short run today. I'm fat and out of shape. well not so fat, but feel fat when I run. and I was huffing and puffing. The lungs were not pleased. What the hell. But its ok. I still haven't hit one year yet for my year "off" so, who knows, perhaps by mid-June i"ll have somewhere to live and a schedule with a job etc. By golly, why I might even join a gym like the rest of the soul-less country. My B.


I made some summer drinks out of suggestions from a magazine. God, that sounds horrible. but let's be honest. i did. and they are delicious. My new favorite summer drink. Improvised of course, tailor made for Shan. Perhaps we'll call it the Shan, or to throw props to the original, the Shan Americano. Its two shots sweet vermouth one shot Campari. And, if you're looking for a less bitter drink, splash some Sprite or soda in there. So good. I like Campari, and not just because of Steve Zissou...



but other than that. The midwest is quiet...a little too quiet. But i did mention that I dug through my old library? Yes. Fantastic. I put up the new reading list with all the stuff I want to read/reread so yippee. That is if I can tear myself away from Guitar Hero (wtf?)



For Old Times' Sake:






Dearest Matchmaker.

How grateful I am for your comment! I received your comment around the same time i was doing some digging through my library in the basement and I had come upon two books that I thought I had lent to a friend and never got back. But what now, I find them amongst my boxes and physically jumped, sharp intake of air and clutched the books to my chest. And then, your comment sent me to cloud nine and right then and there it became quite clear to me that grad school here I come. It only makes sense.

SO YES. Many many good things.

First (not that this should belie any sort of structure to my response):

Dualities, hierarchies and other naughty folk. I felt that toward the end of my four years of education (which you are QUITE right, was aimed at moving beyond dualities) that I came more and more into my own as opposed to defaulting to professor opinion. I had the beginnings of discussion about these nasty beasts with Zayn, perhaps the most explicit advocate of plurality and moving beyond dualism in the department. However, we never got too far. Matchmaker, I'm just not convinced by the move. In fact, I think either a) it's impossible or b) impractical. I know whence this opinion stems. It would be the work of Catherine Bell specifically in her book Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. In summary, she describes the phenomenon/social practice of ritualization as a universal practice at least to some extent. Yes yes, anthropologists and sociologists watch thy tongues, but she does a damn good job of it. And really, the way she presents it the ritualization orders, structures, reinforces and embodies those dualities, hierarchies and other nasty bits that we have create, discover (pick one, haha ( or two or all). So yes. that's the first bit. (i would like to explore what a ritual would look like, or ritualization, or our structure system of "pluralities" if they are to come replace our dualities). So the first bit, I'll concede there may be room for Catherine Bell's work with stickier situations like pluralities. She acknowledges that things are dynamic, fluid, structured and structuring (one of Zayn's favorite isms). Which. I think, the fluidity of hierarchies, power dynamics, and "the rules of the game" i.e. phenomena such as ritualization being essentially open to all parties is enough to safeguard having those nasty bits around. Now, I realize that's a big hope. We'd have to take on the whole concept of the ritual expert Bell speaks about, which is like the scholar, the priest, the brahmin, etc etc etc.

However, the second bit with which I take issue is the plurality concept itself. Yes, its amorphous and sticky messy ewwww where are my categories?! But still, I'd like to believe I dislike the concept for more than the reactionary squirmishness. First of all, we should perhaps get our ideas of plurality straight. How I see the plurality is the attempt to take the fluidity of duality and categorize it into a unified one, or single graspable concept. Similar to what you were discussing with two becoming the new one. this is how i've reacted to plurality. Especially with the stereotypical slippery slope of some of the post-modern or post-post modern thinking. I ran into this problem senior year when I read the article "On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme" by Dave Davidson. And while I like Darryl's explanation (and visual representations) of conceptual schemes in motion, I think you can't escape the totalization, or systematization of any sort of plurality. because any way we try to discuss the practicality of it, aspects of a plurality interact in certain ways etc etc. I agree with the danger of the popular but incorrect "scientific" perspective. We should always keep in mind that our "truths" "axioms" et al. are observationally and empirically based. (or so would be my theoretical framework). So, while we may agree that the way particular aspects within a plurality interact in certain ways by no means does this provide us with any sort of statistical information on how any other aspect could relate (as if it could be so quantified). So right, we're either stuck with the plurality that's a case by case deal (from which we then approximate i.e. categorize in order to DO something with it, i.e. exert power, i.e. influence, i.e. our existence) I know this is a tricky train and could be subverted, but, not without great effort i think. because if you take on board the plurality idea, it's not alone. It comes with the foundational shift that one implicitly makes with it. So yes, we can agree that much ickiness has resulted from categorization, polarization, and duality enforcement, but an infinite amount seems right out.

Uprooting the duality structure uproots along with it our notions of power and in my opinion empirical or existential or what have you, on how we find ourselves to be "here" exactly, wherever that may be. Do you think it trickles this far? Or am I bonkers?

The binary nature of nature. Hmm yeah. I guess I wouldn't want to jump in that camp either too eagerly, but it's where Bell digs at my scientific heart. The basis for much of theory of ritualization requires the ritualization of the body. And since the dynamic/phenomenon is structured and structuring, we find that our bodies are not only structured to a certain extent WITHOUT our abstract ideas thoughts systems, person-person interactions etc, but then also in turn STRUCTURES all those ideas, thoughts, concepts, social systems, etc. So yeah, its a rough argument to break with the commonsensical notion of right hand left hand. and basic orientation opposites in how we seem to "naturally" orient ourselves within our environment. We find numerous subversive natural inclinations as well though. So it would seem to me that it's the fluidity not the structure that's important. but perhaps we're saying the same thing.

yes, interesting about the androgyny. I haven't been privy to much scholarship on alternative identities and theory etc. which, too bad. I did want to try to minor in something like that stuff. but from a "lay" persons perspective, i would say that androgyny (despite the etymology) comes off (in the observed phenomenon, not the concept) as being much more obviously C as opposed to hermaphroditism which seems to me plainly mix equal parts A and B to get AB. Androgyny I think displays more of the signification that Darryl speaks about, the repetition with a difference that is a new thought in dialogue. Whereas hermaphroditism seems more like summary. Perhaps that's so off base.

Anyway, to wrap this up. I looked a while for a good photo but alas, I'll post yet another video. Which I know I've posted David Bowie before, so it's a bit out of control now and it'll have to be the last time. But, its a bit fuller than a photo in that respect because Bowie moves, and sings and etc and it ALL feeds into this androgynous image or C. Something new is being created, not blended. Interesting.

Fly Over Country.

Wednesday May 21, 2008

So I’m an airplane. Flying, like, I do, inevitably to the Midwest. This is the longest time I’ve been away from the Midwest since my family first moved there in 1993. This is also, the longest time I’ve gone without seeing my father. It’s been almost a year. And while I’m excited to see my family and my father. I am in no way excited to be returning to the Midwest. It starts off with having to book a plane ticket there. Nobody lives in the Midwest. So, the bankrupt airlines that originally had their hub and spoke infrastructure set up to serve the whole country over, now charge an arm and leg to fly anywhere in their old network that isn’t on major thoroughfares. In addition, since they are probably continuing to lose money off these flights they are offering fewer than ever. That leaves the consumer/customer/citizen paying upwards of $500 dollars for a rountrip ticket with itineraries that include overnight layover in Chicago or Denver, or schedules that leave early in the morning and arrive late in the evening with minimal time in the air. This disgusts me. And so, there is an intensely bitter taste in my mouth before I’ve even made the first step toward visiting.

I know everyone bitches about airlines. But, I’m stuck on an airplane. So I’m going to bitch about it again. There is a good chance because of (I swear to God it’s not weather related) delays in Seattle, that I will miss my connection in Denver and of course, not be compensated for the fact that the airline (slash business I contracted with) didn’t deliver on its service. There is something fundamentally non-business like about this and why do we let them get away with it when it comes to air travel? Where else in the business world do we allow such leniency? I’m sorry, I’m a burgeoning broke corporation that can’t actually serve what we say we can. I mean. I realize I’m stuck, they are the only ones that fly where I need to go.

It just sometimes is too much. For example, I recall the time I flew United Airlines attempting to get from Seattle to Los Angeles on a budget. Surprisingly United had the cheapest flight. However, this flight flew me to Los Angeles from Seattle via Chicago. Now, I’m not sure if you all are that familiar with US geography, but Chicago is in Illinois, in the middle of the country, if anything, on the Eastern half of the country. Los Angeles is directly south of Seattle by some 1200 miles. They are both on the Western Seaboard. Out of control. Ridiculous.

I haven’t written in a while. I’m not sure why. Sometimes I feel like writing and other times I don’t. I didn’t really feel like writing now, but I’m bored and on the airplane. My iPod doesn’t have much battery and the book I brought (Aldous Huxley’s Perennial Philosophy) is aggravating. I’ve never reacted well to much Eastern Philosophy. I read Siddhartha (by Herman Hesse a German, writing on Indian religion) and enjoyed it thoroughly but as I’ve grown older the less and less I’ve been able to tolerate religious language. It’s a scary thing, witnessing yourself become less tolerant. I’m not sure what to think about it. Because certainly, I’ve bcome more tolerant in many other areas of my life. I think, perhaps, there’s too much of a fundamental difference between Eastern thought and my Western entrenchedness. There is a plethora of Western yuppies picking up Eastern philosophy as a smorgasboard of liberating ideas. But I reject that. I don’t like it. I know it’s not the original meaning intent or context of the ideas. Not that you could say our original Christian ideas are still in the same context, but there’s a continuity of cultural expression and thought throughout the West as Christian. So, since I haven’t spent any time in the East, I don’t know Pali, Sanskirt, Mandarin, Cantonese or even Arabic I am pretty much completely ill-disposed to tackle any of the Eastern ideas with any sincerity. And so, I don’t enjoy reading them. I can’t shake the language/cultural barrier. It’s ever present and I never feel like I’m accessing the ideas. It just all sounds silly to me. I think those that genuinely attempt to cross over, those who live in one and become fluent in the other still fail to successfully bridge the East with the West. It brings a new depth to foreign.

So I couldn’t read the book. It’s driving me nuts. So here I am, writing and complaining about Eastern Philosophy and airlines.

But, I’m trying to make an effort to sound positive. The thing is I simply don’t know how to discuss things I like or feel good about. I know I’ve written this before, this sort of enjoyment of the good stuff and a writing of the bad stuff. It is one-sided. I do love to fly though. I do. I secretly love all the crap that goes alone with it but I also love being in the air. I love touring a world made of a cloud floor and endless domes of blue. The clouds forming such a flat even floor as if I really could walk along them admiring the sunset like on the edge of land and ocean. Yeah. I like being in places like that. In the shadow tradition I believe one of my professors spoke about in his class Art of Living these places would be called crossroads. A twilight. And I do enjoy dwelling there. On the end of land and sea, on the edge of earth and sky, up here with the clouds. To drive the point home, dawn and dusk are the best times to be at those places. A favorite Pomona-ism that normally deals with racial identity applies here to and because I’m a fan of buzzwords, I’ll use it. Betwixt and between. One is betwixt and between at the crossroads. But the other aspect of crossroads that I enjoy is that they are often extremely dangerous places. They are the seat of the unknown. Highway robbers used to hide at crossroads, the edge of land and sea can be dangerous, certainly flying in this tin can so many thousands of feet above anything remotely solid is dangerous. One never knows what one might encounter at a crossroads. It as at the crossroads where we encounter new different and foreign things, none of them promising safety. It’s where trading is down, the intermingling of cultures, at the edge of one thing and the precipice of another. Betwist and between in a crossroads of twilight between day and night. In fact, Huxley was talking about this in a way. A crossroads naturally involves at least two paths, two roads, that cross. Huxley was pointing out the linguistic origins of the word two. Two has a negative connotation. It’s something dangerous and distracting and undesirable. No wonder this concept of the crossroads etc etc could be classified as a shadow tradition (I love it when these large motifs that I learn about separately turn out to be interrelated.) Two is subversive.

I like this. I like subversion. One, universal, united are these all the words that describe the Perennial Philosophy? What Huxley is tracing, through all the religious traditions. The Godhead, the Tao, the Buddha-womb. Unity, universality, a singlurality essence. Two, two, is negative, two is daemon, two is the devil, two is subversion. And there, lo and behold, you have a shadow tradition of the crossroads, but there you also have the basis of ethics for some of the Continental Philosophers. TWO. The basic structure of Otherness for Levinas. If I’m off on that stuff, I expect to be corrected by my knowledgable readers. But what subversion then! What devil worshippers, to give value and prominence to the two, the multiple. I like it. I think it grooves. It what I thought was so mindblowing about Catherine Keller’s work in Face of the Deep her incessant push toward reasserting a dualistic nature to the Christian Godhead, relentlessly reworking the texts and images and motifs of Christianity to remind, reveal, reinvent the duality of God, Elohim and Tehom. The two aspects of God. I can’t say I’m knowledge enough about the Eastern Philosophies, but I suppose I should look more into how the concepts of yin and yang work into the greater metaphysical worlds. Certainly yin is characteristically male and yang characteristically female. But its those two motifs, of the different genders that fundamentally reflect OUR duality. Why would our gods be One? But, if two is bad, and we have both male and female, well then one must be bad? Right? Women? Right? They are devilish right? In fact, let’s get rid of them completely from our Godhead, godhead is One and is Male.

This clashes with my post earlier about androgyny and fashion. That would be more the unification, the indffirence of gender. But perhaps its in the appeal. Because hermaphroditity doesn’t appeal to me either. But perhaps because I feel like it is self defeating to me as an intellectual concept. Because the whole point is that it’s a duality. But the hermaphrodite seems to even subvert the duality in a way that it combines the duality into one. The hermaphrodite is also something found at a crossroads. I think the yin and yang probably is a better model. Like I said, I’ll have to look into that further.

Well so there you go. That was a vomit.

Gosh, my brain is so out of shape. I would like to go back to school. Soon preferably. Thankfully, I’m flying to Iowa and will have nothing to do and half or is it all, of my library is in storage there. So I’ll have plenty of good reading. Gosh, it’s been so depressing being separated from my library. It’s just sometimes, moving a ton of books all around can be a headache. I can’t wait to get an apartment of my own. To move in. To get bookshelves galore. And, I’ve tried to lay claim to an old carpet rug rolled up in our basement that was my great-grandmother’s. I detest this modern furniture style etc. Gimme Victorian/Edwardian etc. There were these two old antique chairs in the house of one of my good friends. Her mother loved the chairs but rarely sat in them. The rest of the family was either indifferent or disapproved of the chairs present in the living room. Nobody ever sat in them and they all swore they were the most uncomfortable chairs in the world. I loved the chairs and every time I went over I would try to advocate on their behalf for their status as prominent living room pieces. I ALWAYS sat in them. Because, contrary to the popular opinion they were sooo comfortable. Perfect with the wide welcoming bowing arms and cushion slanted forward with a corona around the head rest that radiated with importance the one who could delicately seat themselves there. It was a chair with dignity. Not these abused, neglected, tortured and stripped refugees of furniture that you see standing on hardwood floors on dainty spindling legs and broad sweeping lines that are reminiscent of a distended belly or scoliosis. These malformations of modern furniture.

Ah! And it’ll be summery in Iowa now. Yes, I see this turning around. In the house of my father I can live well. I can splurges on wines and cheese, artisanal bread and all sorts of decadence. The sun room with some olive oil and my books. Perhaps it won’t be so bad after all…

Wow, sorry. That was ridiculous. P.S. I still love Yelle. Hasn’t gotten old yet. Maybe I’ll post a picture of those chairs, seeing as I’m going back to Iowa. Where they are. I also can’t wait to scope out my old coffeehouse haunt. I’m not sure I’ve spoken about it on here before. But it’s fantastic. Deep dark walls, deep dark furniture (at least it used to be) and often sweet classical music. Large ceramic bowls. Lawyer desk/library lamps. I like it. Hmm. Perhaps I could get excited about going back to the Midwest. If only for 10 days.

Well, we’re beginning our descent. Descent into the Mile High city. Descending indeed.

Happy Schmappy

It has come to my attention that I'm utterly depressing. (but certainly its refreshing in this time of spring time giddyness?)

ah well. I'll try to cheer it up for once.

Today it rained. (hahaha).

But Sunday. I did something peculiar. Why yes, I was invited by a friend to join him in watching a Monks' Choir perform at one of (the?) Seattle's Cathedrals (I'm thinking only one right?) Anyway. large grandiose catholic architecture (i do like the vanity of the Catholic Church). I chose the first pew in the front (just like all through childhood). I noticed, I was the only one in the young crowd in the cathedral to genuflect before entering the pew. My friend laughed self-consciously. waiting for the monks to start I explored the cathedral with my eyes, but only that which was in my field of vision. Not wanting to cast unintended glances at those behind me or to the side of me or anywhere else that would be deemed improper I faced the empty altar. with two unlit candles (one of the few select items allowed on sacred altar). a large floor to ceiling (like 40 ft ceiling or higher?) series of windows reached up into the rafters and began to circle around a large central 'eye' in the middle of the window cross. No traditional crucifix. Just a gigantic cross of small windows with a giant Eye in the center. Thank you Peter Jackson for creating visual imagery to easily accessible religious-eye motifs.

(it has just occurred to me that some readers may find the phrase 'visual imagery' redundant. But it's not. Imagery arguably could be traced through image and then back out to imagination. So imagery, one could argue, in it's default sense could refer to mental imagery, imagination, the process of creating in our minds. So visual imagery specifies not the mind's creation but the eye's perception.)

It was weird looking at that eye. And it was weird being in a cathedral again. with solemn purpose. I knew I liked religion. The paganism really. the connection to magic. I find that technology has become for me simply a mysterious black box that holds no magic over me. Technology is a mental mind-job not a world of magic. (no wonder so many are captivated by ms. rowling). MAGIC. Where do we find it anymore? well. I like to look to the catholic church and specifically it's more esoteric rituals. I know I've posted before on Eucharistic Adoration. which I think would've been perfect to complement the Monks' Choir. Regardless, I've been sidetracked.

I sat in the front pew. Watching, as people came into my field of vision and to my silent, vague, childhood horror, lay themselves sprawling along the steps and plateaus leading up to the altar. There were ripped jeans, bare feet, tevas, american apparel pants, UW sweatshirts, glasses, black, olive and maroon rainjackets, there were headbands, head scarves, piercings and tattoos, there were denim jackets, why there was even one "Jedi Academy" tshirt. There were books and jars of water, there were couples and friends, there were the inescapable, undefinable and horribly mainstream androgynous young Seattlites. Not so many, in a nice dress shirt and slacks and so with my vestment and genuflection I was the minority here in God's house. With heads staring at the ceiling, fingers turning pages, lips sipping water and legs crossing and uncrossing, fondling bare feet, the monks processed in.

It was late on Sunday. And it seemed rather like a college coffee shop or student center than the dwelling place of the Almighty. Come as thou art, I thought. and gently reminded myself that i was an "ex-Catholic" and no longer could lay claim to that soft indignity that was currently forcing me to shift my weight from left to right and back again.

And the monks began to sing. And i stared straight ahead. And back near the doors of the Cathedral the monks began singing. My eyes on the altar. Filling the voluminous arches and grand foyer the mens' voices rang softly. The monks sang. I sat perfectly still. My crisscrossed hands fallen numb but not asleep. As ghosts they only sat in my lap if I looked at them. but I didn't. I looked at the lonely forlorn altar, with its silly humanity spilled at its feet. The dramatic interior lighting lit up the tall columns on either side of the glass cross. You could see the 2X4 frame marks on the cement pours. Foolishly I mumbled out loud, "that must have taken forever". thinking in terms of my irish adventure. the thought of taking one board and pouring and drying and setting and pouring and drying and setting, innumerable rows of cement and boards just seemed gargantuan. my friend kindly pointed out, that they didn't do it one at a time. Quite right. I thought, quite right.

Then the whole building stood. The jeans stood, the skin tight pants stood, the bracelets jangled to attention. the books were thumbed. The glasses repositioned and the "Jedi Academy" turned its back on me. Everyone in the building stood and faced the glass cross. "how did everybody know?" i thought as I shuffled to a stand. After looking around (a few degrees to the left, a few to the right) I began to catch the echoing words of the monks song. It was the profession of faith, the Nicene Creed. I enjoyed listening to it and noticing that not a single person was reciting it with the monks. i felt so....secular.

...sorry. I had to put the pretzel sticks away. They were clashing awfully with this glass of Pinot Grigio.

speaking of food. i cooked dinner tonight. So the world can know. I cooked baked acorn squash filled with diced onion/apple/jicama/celery and served with lemon spinach couscous and salad. This was followed up by a wonderful dessert recipe I learned from a friend: poached pear slices with a reduced white wine syrup poured over lemon sorbet. it was. well it was just like it sounded.

After speaking with a good friend this evening, I've come to the conclusion that it's very difficult to remain intelligent in the 'real world'. Whilst in academia you feel as though you are oriented toward the greater wider world, but you still simply interact with a set of people that are in your same position. Now perhaps this is how the 'real world' operates as well (I can't say I have extensive or any experience) but it would appear to me that it's very difficult to remain intelligent out here. but I know of people who have. We all know one at least, who you think of as really intelligent. And its like, they aren't that intelligent, they've just figured out how to somehow remain competent in the real world and so they stick out like a sore thumb, something with pizzazz. (pizzazz is not a word apparently)

Anyway, that's going nowhere. but i've been sidetracked again and can't remember what else I was going to write about. All I can remember is that I made a promise to be upbeat.

I finally made arrangements to go *home* (LA is the only place that ever really feels like home). I hate flying into the Midwest because nobody lives there and it costs a lot of money. Whether I'm footing the bill or not, it irks me to no end that it costs that much to fly to the midwest. And in addition, they have shitty schedules like, 12 hour layovers in Chicago or whatnot. Uh, excuse me, I'm not going to pay $500 to then shell out more cash for somewhere to crash in Chicago during a LAYOVER. I must say though, its more convenient than renting a car and driving there myself, because lo and behold, nobody wants to one-way rent to the midwest because, ah thats right, NO ONE lives there. Thats not true. 3 VERY important people to me live there and that justifies it all. But otherwise. WTF. Should non-cities ever exist? EVERYONE MUST LIVE IN A CITY. by imperial declaration. obv. i'm excited. also obv.

Well, ok, I was going to mention a ridiculous trend I came across but after searching for my trail I can't find it anywhere, so you're all out of luck. Apparently it's not that big of a fashion if I can't find it anywhere. But anyway, the trend of long long shirts for men that are worn almost like the current dress over jeans look for women. Often worn under a blazer and with the almost now ubiquitous (at least in the NW) fashion of skinny jeans. it raises a greater look at the cycle of androgyny in fashion, which i think is fascinating. (can we all see the link with david bowie?)

it makes sense that some fashion would tend toward androgyny because if done well, it would attract the maximum of consumers. If you can attract both men and women regardless of a sexual orientation to a particular style, all the better, no? not so sure about the shirt-dress as it's becoming popular for men. anyway, we need a little frivolity in the blog yeah?

Lilly asked me an interesting question the other day. The only reason I found it particularly interesting is because it was one of the basic human questions that I suppose we all come upon by our own reasoning? and eventually ask. We were discussing at dinner a particular activity of my mother's (i don't recall it now) in high school. Lilly was astute enough to point out that it was before she was born. Then she looked at me and said it was before YOU were born. And feeling on a roll she continued with, before either of us were EVEN in her tummy! Then, the next logical step presented itself before her fledgling mind: Where were we before Mom's tummy?

Had she been a bit older I may have responded with, "I know, right?!" But seeing that this was a sincere question (potentially the first time asked) I figured she deserved the best answer I could summon. So I thought to myself. Where were we before our mother's tummy? I immediately discounted any type of religious narrative of being in communion with God. Well the best thing I could come up with "We didn't exist."

Clear!

the trees began misting. and i rolled my eyes at them. and gave them a brooding skeptical look. seriously? For some reason they seemed to be at fault. responsible for this rainy mist that just picked up. Unnecessary I thought. I was driving. Here, alone, again. In the dark, but this time home.

My heart on a downbeat. That awkward, subtle sort of off feeling. A downbeat. Nothing's really wrong but nothing's really right either. And so, I was driving home before 11 in the mist. I was a prolific dreamer last night. But of course, in the way that dreams are they looked back at me this morning, with that face, that "what the hell are you talking about?" face. But I can at least tell you, there were some big ticket players present. Some major leitmotifs making themselves known, iterating themselves in yet another set of indefinite patterns and manifestations. What was to come next. prescient dreaming.

I arose this morning and decided to invest the energy to make this morning special for my sister. She was awakening to a parent-less house. A house ruled by her older brother and I decided as a lazy Saturday morning sometimes requires. that we make pancakes. I asked her, would you like me to make pancakes for you for breakfast Lil?

The only response I received was a curt, "A Waffle."

Gone was the motivation for making pancakes in order to make the day special for HER. I was now going to make pancakes simply for my own feeling of duty fulfillment. (I AM a good brother and I DO do fun things for her). Besides, we don't even own a waffle iron. So I simply told her that I was making pancakes for her. She watched the television and I made pancakes. Huge ones. And she seemed totally unmoved by the whole prospect. I even let her pour in the ingredients and crack the eggs. This was all to be expected I suppose. And, after fulfilling my duty I turned to tackle the drip coffee machine. I must confess, I haven't a clue as how to work one. I only know how to make coffee with a French Press, which arguably doesn't even require a brain. My Stepfather had told me that the machine was simple. Put in the filter. Pour the ground coffee in, pour the water in, flip the switch or push the button or whatever (i don't exactly recall the last bit). Well, the machine wouldn't do anything until I had placed the pot under the spout and when I did that. The damn thing just let the water run out (not drip) into the pot having only gathered a slight brown tinge from having run through the grounds for a partial second.

WhereTF is the french press I thought? And so I drank a cup of extremely weak and extremely watery coffee and I STILL do not know how to work a coffee machine. bugger it all.

I have firmly resolved to go for a run tomorrow. I have become oh so talented at skirting my own goals, finding some more convenient AND entertaining way to spend my time. Or to accomplish whatever Task I invariably try to intertwine with going for a run. Something I have to do by going for run, like say, for instance, the logistics of returning my aunt's car to her and then getting myself back home. Why, Sean, you sly old dog. Planning to drive it over to her house and run back is brilliant! But not wittier than you ARE! For, inviting your aunt out for coffee and then having her drop you off back home was SO SO clever ever rever. And so, another day passed sans exercise. I don't think I've ever moaned about something so incessantly and continued to do nothing about it. Especially when there is no WAY on earth anyone else could possibly do this for me.

Cmon, Life. I need those two cold silvery goo covered paddles to sock it to me in the chest. Let's go. Where is my job, my apt, my fitness and my unbelievably enviable social life? I'm waiting....(rather comatose).

Faces on the Highway

I was driving south. on 99. it's one of my least favorite roads. uncooperative stop lights every other block, ugly strip mall, giant corporate stores set a half mile from the road with a large sea of parking lot concrete between us. Utter hell.

it was way too early. i wasn't meeting my friend for over an hour. but i had left so as to have the nicer car. If my mom got home before I left, I'd be stuck with the kid ruined camry.

I had been driving hurriedly earlier today, driving late to pick up my sister, driving urgently to get home to do nothing important: check my email for the millionth time. Waiting, waiting, waiting. I've been waiting so hard. But for nothing. Hurrying to wait.

But now. Now. I had time to kill. Now. I had time to think, besides worrying and fretting and asking out loud where that email could be? Now. Damn it, now I needed to stop grinding my teeth. An old habit back for a visit. I put my whole row of teeth on my tongue. Which, makes me nervous, I just know I'll hit a bump and bite it. But it's the only way to stop them from grinding.

Luckily, there isn't much traffic at 9pm on a Wednesday. So i coast. Aggravated by the insidious drivers earlier on (once you've driven in Europe or LA everywhere else becomes torture) I know languished and joined their ranks. Plodding along at 5 under, dazed outta my mind. The reddish orange dash lights on the Mazda lulling me into some sort of non-computer screen reverie. My thoughts, returned to me. My mind returned to me. My left wrist draped over the leather wheel. The radio, turned down low (normally I'm a full throttle loud music here we go-er) but Now. Now, the radio is barely audible over the engine and the incessant mindless chatter filling the airwaves in between "low rider" and "winding road" floats in and out of the front of my vision. Is that? nevermind. The silhouetted drivers beside me have ghoulish faces partially lit by reds, whites, greens and blues of dashboard fairies. Excited they're not. Sullen, drone faces gloomily staring off into the darkness ahead of them. With their northwestern mustaches and dangling earrings reflecting the treasure in front of their wrists.

9:15. Long ways to go. thank god I'm not in front of that damn computer. Thank god I don't feel like I have to check my empty, perpetually empty inbox. God I'm going mad. Driving aimlessly has given me more inspiration than I've had in days. i don't mind the Yellow light. Stop.

What was I saying? Wasteland, just look at this stuff, auto shops, erotica stores, a Sam's Club. I drive past a drive thru Krispy Kreme. Nah, you've eaten enough today without working out. Damn. I wish I had been working out. in the bowels south of the city, by the water, by the docks, by the industrial vomit that a metro area is required to have, I pull a U-ey on an empty highway. There in the beam of my headlights illuminated out from a block of corrugated iron by shitty florescent lights. An adult indoor soccer match. I wonder, how large of a circle it draws. Here, this group of men, in the colon of Seattle, getting together late, on a Wednesday evening to kick a small ball around an oval patch of Astroturf. i'd like to do that I thought. God, I'm old came next.

dont stand so close to me. as if I could feel crowded here. but the radio wasn't loud enough to protest. feebly telling me to give it space. it'd be nice to have someone I thought, and the rest of the evening just sort of floated away...

Addicting Moods

so today was a bit of an intense day. I finished Lolita and watched both There Will Be Blood and Atonement.

I hated Lolita until the final third of the book. And then it got brilliant. Perhaps, dragging the reader through the first two thirds set the final third up to be fantastic. I have a sneaking suspicion it had something to do with it. There will be blood was lifeless for me. An uninteresting story, with a lukewarm ending about a topic with infinitely more powerful stories (based on as much truth) at least I would think so. I was unmoved. And Atonement did move me. It moved me the whole way through. While stylistically I disagreed with the ending, the statements made by the elderly Briony are so controversial, I liked it simply for the fact that not only was I moved all the way to the end, it finished up in a way that pushed it further along as well. Which, I suppose with a topic like Atonement it'd be pretty damn hard to mess up.

The soundtrack however, reinforced my all too aware lack of knowledge in classical music. I loved the music, I love forlorn piano, I love whining violin and yet, I'm utterly blind stumbling through the literally massive tradition of classical music. A stumbling fool. My things-to-know list grows so damn quickly that I don't know how I'll ever make a dent.

I'll have to do a more settled in response to both Nabokov and McEwan when I have thought about it more, have more energy and aren't snagged in melancholy.

I'm sitting here on the sofa, in a silent house, with the soundtrack playing softly from my very dimly lit computer screen. Two things, would complete this scene, in completely different ways. I need either a sleeping lover/companion next to me on the sofa or, a cup of tea gone cold, a cup mind you, with the tea bag sitting soggy at the bottom, without enough tea left to immerse it and the dregs strong. Cold tea and classical piano.

i haven't heard any more news regarding jobs and I haven't seen my father for 9 months. I have commitments I'm only halfheartedly committed to. and I can't stop thinking about the smell of eucalyptus.

A Regular Day in May

I'm really tired, so everyone shut up.

It finally decided to be May here in Seattle and was almost to the point where you could say it's "warm" and the sun was out consistently. Not constantly attempting to evade Satan's minions (aka clouds). And what did I do today? Pretty much stayed inside all day. WTF?

My two twin Italian cousins who are ... 4? Came over today to play with my sister. Wasn't this a double-edged sword. Little kid mayhem, but, distracted little kid mayhem. So it was a sado-masochist bliss. Pleasure and pain all wrapped up into a whirlwind of princess dresses, bathing suits, buckets of worms (these girls ain't shy) and general other goings-on in the 4-6 year old realm. It was delightful to see...from afar.

Two of my aunts came over as well. How nice it is to be surrounded by people! And specifically people you like! Amazing what can cure an unemployed boredom. Anyway, it was a pleasant day. I also did a bit of active job searching work as opposed to passive internet research which is always uplifting because it keeps that dream alive that one day, some day, I may gain employment.

Otherwise, I pissed away some time on the couch dragging myself through Nabokov's Lolita. I borrowed the volume from a friend, and so, feel the pressure to return it in a timely manner. While, I enjoyed Laughter in the Dark the first novel I read by Nabokov, this second and arguably more famous work is much tougher for me to get through. Apparently, it was written in English (not Nabokov's mother tongue) and thus explains away the somewhat awkward tone and rhythm of the book, but in addition, it's topically about a pedophile. Which, I can't figure out worth a darn, why this is tripping me up. What do I care? I don't think of myself as a indignant moralist who can't at least read a book about something I don't particularly understand or care for. Perhaps, it isn't the pedophilia that is off putting about the book. Perhaps, the odd cadence and strange diction is enough. Who knows, I just can't wait to be done.

Plus, it's getting to be the time where I start actually dedicating active energy to sorting out what I might want to study in graduate school and piecing together a program of study. Which means, reading the work of people in the area. So much in the world, to learn and do. My my my.

My aunt asked me today (because Lo! and behold! I have a degree in Religious Studies!) a question concerning religion. Her children (the twin Italians) had begun asking her about who the first man (I hope they had said person) was and who built the world and who poured the first cement. (I like how that last one was added in there on the same level as the world, sigh. and they don't even live in LA).

So, my aunt was asking me to somewhat clarify the creation myths of the Christian religion and at the same time ask me why the particularity on Jesus in Christianity (are you less religious if you pray to God instead of Jesus? When did God become not enough?) Which are two ENTIRELY separate questions (not unrelated, but separate). And while answering her, I was thinking about how exciting that would be! How exciting to be at the stage where your children are asking YOU to tell them a Creation Myth. Here you go, here, you get to tell them, you get to create a Creation Myth (one of the biggest ?trope?s of them all) Creation Creation Creation. Think of the myriad possibilities that one could have with an innocent child asking you how it all came about. I would have a heyday.

That's about it on that thought because like I said I'm tired. I'm sitting here at the dining room table, the wall clock, clicking languidly stretching the seconds out as long as it can and the dim overhead light probing cautiously into the darkness of the living room. The busiest sound coming from the muted clicking and clacking of my keyboard. I can feel the distant rumbling of a fatigue headache rallying the troops for the onslaught against my forehead and temples. The freshly picked flowers on the center of the table aren't aggressively aromatic and I wish they were. Impotent, in their monosense appeal. I never feel like brushing my teeth.

Way too Long

Well,

it's been too long. I've been feeling oh so uninspired for almost the past month or so. and it's been awful and stressful. but i stumbled across faint acquaintances' blogs and so, somehow, have been shamed? into writing again. But before that. I will draw inspiration from a song that I'm physically addicted to at the moment. And, so I'm going to go try to learn how to post it here.



I hope that works. I'm computer illiterate.

So, its sort of obvious that I'm still on my David Bowie obsession. But whatever.

I have been homebasing in Seattle and thoroughly surprised at my ability to handle the shitty weather (it's been the worst April I can recall) but I took a trip down to San Francisco (the city I hope to eventually move to with a job). First impressions are always funny to recount. Or maybe not. I embraced sunshine (oh yeah! this is what I love so much and get depressed when I'm missing!) Some powerful spell had been caste in Seattle to keep me distracted from my seasonal affective disorder, (which is a fancy name that people unfortunate enough to not live in decent places give to those who realize living sucks when the weather is awful) Or it's a "disorder" for when a human responds emotionally to the weather. Sounds quite disorderly to me.

So sunshine. I love it. San Francisco has been beautiful and definitely warmer than Seattle but not warm warm. Which is actually kind of nice, because I can still wear most of my clothing. Although in general, i'm opposed to wearing lots of clothes. the other thing I found funny. Walking around and navigating San Francisco once again, another familiar but forgotten impression came forth from the depths. AH! yes, ! this is what a city is! There are tons of different people, lots of weird people, I don't hear only english (or spanish and/or chinese/vietnamese/japanese etc) I hear italian, french, german, spanish, english, russian, chinese, vietnamese, japanese. Crazy languages! And crazy people. And different looking people. AND. a city is supposed to be big. Seattle, (never have I had quite this impression before) is TINY. It's so small. It's not a city, its a large town. Not that I'm opposed to that, it's just, returning to San Francisco was like returning to a city. And I like the city.

So sunshine and diversity (and this is only San Francisco!). Two things I had been missing in Seattle. The day I arrived I walked to Union Square and popped a squat. There were two (i'm going to assume.) art students sitting out in the square. A taller hairy man with a hat on and shorter fairer woman. They were both dressed in 19th century women's slips. Or whatever the white gown underwear thing would be called, a slip no? They had spread before them a large blanket and possessed two cans of whipped cream. Each had a lovely parasol and it looked to me that they were perfectly enjoying a sunny afternoon picnic. Watching all the wildlife stroll by with cameras and cellphones and the odd finger point. They even at stages, felt so immersed in nature they began to swing and dance all across the square. I was embodied in the word bemused. and by embodied i mean i was completely possessed by that word. Do you know what I'm getting at? The word possessed me. Moving on.

Later that evening I was traveling with two beautiful companions from the Union Square area to Potrero Hill area. I'll admit it. We took a cab. Which was fantastic. I recalled as we gave directions to our destination the opening skit (to which show I'm unsure) by one of my favorite stand-up comedians Eddie Izzard. When in San Francisco, Mr. Izzard had remarked that there are approximately 5 taxi cabs in San Francisco and that none of them have any idea where they're going. (it's funnier when he says it)(perhaps because he's in drag). Well, our taxi driver said he "would give it his best" (i would sure hope so) To find where we wanted to go. Sigh. Whatever. I can't say that bothered me at all. In fact I chuckled under my breath thinking about Eddie Izzard. So we found our address fairly painlessly. yet, when he stopped halfway up the San Franciscanesque hill to let us out at not quite the right address and cars began to pile up behind him. He jerked the wheel and drove the car into a gap in the parked cars. "Whoa, he said, the vibe just got really weird (we hadn't said ANYthing), to our bewildered faces he continued, "i'm just gonna sit here and decompress". "You do that" and "You need it" simultaneously escaped Crosby and my mouth. Pressing bills into his rough hand we stepped out onto the hill doorways away from our destination. lauren and I giggling at the decompressing taxi driver.

Oh. I had been struggling to remember where I had left this blog. At the Yelle, concert, that's right. Oh dear.

Outrageous. Yelle. Is. In. A. Word. Fantastic. including the current connotation of really good but also in the somewhat obscure connotation derived from its root Fantasy. It was, both, simultaneously (or one because of the other)(both ways). Garish, loud, out there colors and shapes out of some post 2000 80s reverie. And I think i mentioned before. A club full of sunglasses. (reviewing the few pictures I have I see it was less than I thought (and perhaps only me and few friends) but that directly contradicts with my memory. I definitely remember a platinum blonde by the stairway near the toilets who had some ridiculous bug glasses on and at whom I scoffed before finding, later in the night, myself in some ridiculous pair of purple tinted chrome rimmed bug glasses myself.

Had I remembered the wise old adage of "beer before liquor, never been sicker" I may have either chosen not to begin with Alaska Summer Ale. Or to continue to drink beer at the club. Well I chose neither. Although, to be fair, at the end of the night, I did remember to drink beer instead of more liquor (as opposed to several nights before drinking tequila at around 3am). However, I think at this point the Stella (the only draught label I could read, heh.) was warm and flat and absolutely disgusting. But that was after several whiskeys and maybe some perfectly innocent iced tea. So after thoroughly thrashing and crashing and yelling "Je t'aime" at the top of my anglophone lungs. After thoroughly soaking my thin white tshirt. After thoroughly avoiding sloppy makeout seshs with strangers (which cannot be said of some of my companions). After allowing the event photographer (group photographer, whatever) ample time to photograph this youthful indiscretion in his white/pink/black Vespa Firenze Italia shirt and purple tinted chrome glasses. i decided to exit the club (without closing out or picking up credit card) and seat my soaking wet freezing cold self in a door stoop across the street (to apparently await my friends?) which, by lucky coincidence I looked up from the step between my legs and caught a glimpse of my friends turning the corner toward home. Bounding up I jogged over to join them.

Surprisingly, I was only hungover and not sick. the next morning. Which was fine, because I only had a job interview. (don't worry, I nailed it) Although, when Jenny asked me, in a very cunning way "what I would like to improve on" as opposed to "What are your weaknesses?" ho ho, I caught you Jenny, I know what you're asking. I may look hungover and out of it, but I know a hidden question when I hear one, sometimes.

Memory, I blurted out.

I felt pretty invincible after thinking I had made a huge blunder and watching Jenny break into what I thought sounded like a pretty natural laugh. Or, it could be that she could read my face like a children's pop-up book. Either way, I don't think it did any harm. I have an all day interview when I return to the big gray cloud.

But like I said, I'm in San Francisco now. And am eating cold leftover egg rolls for breakfast. Somehow, I had nothing to eat yesterday. Who knows, I have this awful habit of forgetting to eat. So I ordered some Chinese food take out. Ate, mmm, maybe 5 bites and then went to bed (it was pretty late) so I woke up this morning pretty hungry and thank goodness. I still had two egg rolls left. microwave them you might say? Well, ladies and gentlemen and those who don't identify with heteronormative definitions of gender, when inspiration hits, you just don't have tyme to microwave egg rolls. (well gee, really firefox, you think i misspelled heteronormative?) bwahah

so, not really any fancy descriptions here, but most of the time that takes a couple drinks and then the desire to blog within about 12-16 hours afterward, otherwise, toss that memory to the wind. but hopefully i can blog a bit more regularly and consistently now that i think i'm not quite so stressed. dun dun dun da da dun dun UNDER PRESSURE. right?

oh and for all of you who are unfamiliar with my new role model, let's see if I can get this to post also...



let me know you're still here. yeah?