March 2002 Archives

my god that was fun. it started in the parking lot, as all good nights should, drinking margaritas out of a big water bottle, so that the underage/underfunded could have a buzz too. and when i say underfunded? that would be all of us. the bands may have been a bargain but the beer was not. �that'll be eight dollars� -- �i only wanted one� -- �oh.�.

it was a benefit for Bill Locey, a local freelance music journalist and all around free spirit, who is having hip replacement surgery next month. Bill has great love for the local music scene, and the music scene loves him back.

now, i was there mainly to see the Jonathan Raffetto Band, and hope that they didn't see me because i'm still lagging on their website. yes, i'm going to get to it. soon. i swear.

but the band that delighted me most was raging arb and the redheads. can you say party band? i knew that you could. they are a local institution, and now understand why. this picture was taken before the stage got really busy. there were about a half dozen sofas on the stage, and as the performance went on, it got more and more crowded, with people constantly weaving through the band to get to the kegger, which was sitting in front of the lead singer. that bright light on the stage? your common house lamp, which it was some guys job to turn off and on (my guess would be that would be their version of a lighting technician when they're having their garage parties).

i was absolutely delighted by raging arb and the redheads. i have nothing but admiration for a band that throws an actual keg party on the stage.

it was a great night. i'll leave you with this picture. you decide what it is.

that i have possibly the coolest license plates in california? yes? well, these things need to be mentioned frequently, so, deal with it, k?

you'll laugh -- you'll cry -- you'll evacuate your bowels -- bogger, push-button flushing for the people.

well, sort of. i'm prepared, but am i really entirely ready? is anyone?

i'm getting out tonight. seven bands for seven bucks, at the ventura theatre. i don't get out much, so when i do, it's all about making it count. and this is going to be incredible. great local music.

show starts in ten minutes, i'm going to be late, it's ok, it's part of the plan. i also have to get easter supplies on my way downtown. nothing like a little hectic last minute panic to get the old heart going, eh?

can you tell i'm nervous?

music moves me...

The sun has gone down and the moon has come up,
And long ago somebody left with the cup.
But he's driving and striving and hugging the turns.
And thinking of someone for whom he still burns.

He's going the distance...

ever go read your own blog? cruise through the archives, the lovely comments, the joy and the fundamental interconnectedness of all things? the words?

i just did that. i did just that. selfish as it may seem (selfishness is far underrated, no doubt about that).

all i can say is, who cares if i'm fat, i rock. i've been putting my heart and soul in this thing, and it's all there. and it's not all good, but it is amazing. no, yes, it is all good. fuck me gently with a chainsaw, i love this blogging.

it was late. i had projects, and a wicked case of heartburn. caustic fire all the way up to my neck. and it was late, and i was out of tums. what to do? there is fancy pepcid in the bedroom, expensive stuff for the career ulcer sufferer in the house. me, i'm just a casual indigestion kinda gal. tums is all i need, and waking up sleeping people makes them mad. what to do?

this house used to be chris's moms, and she's one of those depression-era folks who never, ever throws anything away. the contents of her medicine cabinet are still pretty much intact. you know where i'm going with this, right?

turns out mylanta gelcaps that expired nearly eight years ago work just fine, thanks.

and there is nothing quite like pain relief. from stopping beating yourself over the head with a hammer, to taking two elderly gelcaps and having the burn turn cool and soothed, it's almost a high. ironically, that will keep you awake, too.

i'm sure i was asleep by three. hey, that's a decent hour, right?

oh, remember yesterday i mentioned OgGogBeGog? well, that <- there is a new link, guess where? yeah, i was doing that last night too. i was a busy webproject person last night.

melly is a tall, skinny girl. i am the opposite of the melly, a short, fat girl. i am seven inches shorter than melly, and i outweigh her by forty pounds? fifty? i do not know. i own no scale. when i went to the emergency room last week, i may have been at death's door with almost no oxygen in my system, but i managed to steadfastly avert my gaze from the scale, and from my chart, where the number would have been written. usually i am all over reading the chart as they write in it, but not this time.

the weight is a symptom of the life i've led this past year. a sedentary existence, or rather a sedimentary one. i have settled. i am complacent, and preoccupied, and might be hiding behind the fat as some sort of avoidance mechanism. whatever the reasons, i'm a big girl now. and i've gotten that way within the last year. and i obsess.

now, melly was talking about the catty remarks (do you eat? are you anorexic?). yes, it's a big issue nowadays, with the ongoing media fascination with thinness, and it's also so completely inappropriate and rude to confront a thin, beautiful woman because of her thinness and beauty, but i guess women can be bitches. who knew?

i do not obsess over thin women. i do not resent them. i used to. i don't now. i think i might be halfway to an uneasy acceptance of what i look like. who i am. if this is, indeed, me -- i'm not sure yet. my obsession comes in the form of looking at every woman i see, every age shape and size, and what-iffing to myself, do i want to be like that? or that? or that? and this makes no sense, because this is me we're talking about, and i need to decide what that is, for myself. and i'm not sure.

i know it's unhealty to be this big, and i know my overall sense of well being suffers. i also know that there is some comfort in not worrying about every bite i take, and there is some solace in laziness, not doing anything about it, except obsessing which can be done sitting on my fat ass. i hope to finish up with the ass-sitting part of this obsession and get on with it -- either get up and do something about it, or make peace with my self.

i'm tired of the indecision, more than anything else.

definitely floaty. the strangeness is nothing unusual, of course.

thought, maybe it's blood sugar. so, large cream of broccoli soup in a bread bowl. whoever thought of this bread bowl thing is a genius, not only is it sensationally tasty, but a wonderful overall food experience. ripping the soup-soaked bread, carefully around the edges, devouring it with wolflike appetite and making an animal mess of myself.

oh, there is no doubt some sort of reserved, polite way to eat this sort of thing, but i would never bother with it -- i like to dig in with my hands.

still a little floaty around the edges, but the soup and bread have formed a warm center of gravity inside me, such a happy thing. i love food.

for some time now, i've been sitting on information, interesting information, about a site which has been in the brainstorming stages. this evening, i have just finished registering the domain, arranging the hosting, and installing a fresh, new copy of MT. do you know i just love doing that sort of thing? nothing like it, really.

it's out of my hands now, there are capable designers and writers at the ready; the one thing i can tell you, is that it is going to rock. but that is all i can tell you.

now, i must return to pristine's new templates, which still need work. she hasn't posted yet as of this writing, so it's really not done yet, i just felt obligated to give you some sort of insider information into some of my nefarious plans. the other thing? you'll just have to wait.

the coffee is ready, the amazing smell of it fills the kitchen. i am going to finish this before i get coffee. why? you're asking me questions before my coffee? you should know better.

three things:

(one) bad samaritan is redesigned, mg is an information architect studbunny of epic proportions. (two) Melly also has been redesigned, go look, she's gorgeous -- oh, so is the site. (three) there is no third thing. no wait. there is.

(three) this is new: OgGogBeGog, the commenter known as Peanut Gallery, has finally left an URL. i've read a little, i'm going to go and read some more, here's a quote to get you going on over there too:

�Lurking all over the internet. Reading other peoples lives. They seem like friends and I follow their days sympathetically. It's very weird and it seems sort of sneaky. Trying to flesh out this site enough so that I can leave an address when I make my smart little comments at other peoples homes. It's hard to make something reflect who you really are when you are in the process of figuring that out yourself.�

(four) there are four things (one) Bad Sam (two) Melly (three) Peanut Gallery (four) coffee. my mouth is quite literally watering. i shall go have pavlov's cup of steamy caffeiney goodness now.

�tossing a cigarette i think there's one in my raincoat
we smoked the last one an hour ago
so i looked at the scenery
she read her magazine
and the moon rose over an open field�*

how the fuck did they manage to be so calm? they were out of cigarettes!

it is the love a parent has for a wayward child. imagine mr. and mrs. bundy saying, we love our ted, we just hate what he's done. separating the child from the deed.

this is how it is with me and the cigarettes. i love them, i just hate what they do. why must they be so violent? so unrepentant? i still love them. the taste, the satisfying feeling, the pacifier for lips and soul both -- not to mention addiction. and, goddess knows i'm an addict in so many ways. if you have doubts, look around you now (blogging? things of that nature?) there. see?

so i'm still keeping the kids 'round the house. still upset with them for what they do, but not ready to let go and say, fry 'em, they have no redeeming value.

even though i know they cannot ever find this redemption. they must go. danger to society, all that.

but when they are gone, i will be left bereft. no doubt about it.

*simon and garfunkel, �america�

this one's for you, Toxiclabrat (with special thanks to Nick for pointing out that there is indeed a carousel in ventura.)

on the way over, we discovered that they are building a big... thing. took that through a chainlink fence, so i was fairly limited on how i could point the camera. the thing is in the middle of the fancy new bus depot they're building at the mall, i wonder if public transit funds are being used? could they be put to better use than that... thing?

the carousel at the ventura harbor village is in this building. it's a combination arcade, snack bar, gift shop, and of course, carousel. the horses were mostly small, this one was fairly interesting, but the ones that really got my attention were not horses.

there was a big bunny, a big dog, a reindeer, and here's a horse and a pig. my favorite? this big chicken. i rode a regular old horse, but in retrospect i wish i'd ridden the chicken.

it was a beachy evening. first, i was drawn by the sunset but a little late, however, i made do with the moon.

later, i returned, intent upon capturing the changing lights on the steps at the promenade; sadly, they no longer run those lights at night.

i did find the light art further down still illuminated. there are three of them:
sense, knows, scents, nose
eyes that could listen, tongues with thought, hands with taste, ears that have seen
touch up, touch on, in touch, touch off

it was just lovely down there. i could have stayed, but i had things to template. look to surreally in a bit for the announcement of the new subdomain, now running. lots of newness in the world, and much to stimulate the senses.

cindy crawford and neil gaiman were prominently featured in a murder plot in my dream. (i would dreamlog these things but i'm actually trying not to remember too many details).

· · ·

i remember being told that daily affirmations were supposed to be positive statements -- but what if an important part of my day is wanting not to do things? what if the not doing is important to me? i have to sit here and figure out ways of twisting the phrases so they don't contain negatives? how about double negatives, don't those cancel one another out? ahh, hell, i'm tossing rules to the winds. here are some affirmations:

i will not twist Faith's words today (see? if i'd twisted that one i'd be off to a bad start). i will be productive at work (again, i'm on a roll here). i will not panic (no matter how prudent that course of action may seem). i will not hurt, maim, or kill anyone, in spite of the raging lack of nicotine in my body. i may yell at a few people though. that's reasonable. i will be reasonable today! or, i will try not to be unreasonable, at least. and i will not become despondent if lowering my expectations becomes inevitable. i will probably be a sarcastic ass in several situations today. i am ok with that.

the road to good intentions is paved with... ahh, hell.

Jon Sullivan ceased to exist. except for over at that mirror site, remember that? http://www.y6y6y6.com/index.php3. there may be an error or two on the page, but looks like it basically works.

of course, he'll probably yank that if we go play with it. [sigh] happy birthday, you cranky old bastard.

first, i have to decide if i really care. of course i care, what am i saying? i have to decide how much feeling selfrighteous and goodygoody i can take. bad girl, remember? bad. rebellious. eschewer of advice, ever defensive of my right to habitual acts of fun/sins of omission with the cumulative effect of selfdestruction.

so i have to decide. and i haven't yet, so don't quote me on any of this, or harass me if i decide against deciding just yet.

but so far, a few weird things have happened, almost effortlessly. (one) water. say, 3 liters a day. (two) posture. i've been sitting up straight, both feet on the floor. this has everything to do with (three) breathing, and i'm doing a whole lot more of that now than i have in recent memory. hell, i'm thisclose to getting up early enough to go walk in the mornings -- last two mornings i was off the sofa by 7:30, no later, which is... inexplicable.

i don't quite know what's happening, if i'm making it happen, or if it's out of my hands. pretty happy about it, if that helps. but what about the beer and cigarettes? is what i wanna know.

· · ·

and in the hard to keep track of department, we have some movers and changers:

virtual movers - Linkmeister - Kare - Pete

and, Eric is going to move into a new (actual) house!

if i had to pick a word, vulnerable.

damn dream hangovers. very realistic (except for the not being able to find my shoes and my socks being a totally different green than my outfit, which was really nice and if i was going to only have socks, damn things should at least match and... ) and then there was the one where i got fired. laid off, really, but -- jobless. i got unemployed. you wake up shaky after something like that.

anyway, this comes from the fact that, at work, i've been doing mostly in-house work which has far less time constraints, and i've been much less focused, and i know i have been damned unproductive. i've also been sick, and stressed, and these are not excuses.

and, i don't feel up to this, this morning. oh yeah, that work from home i was going to do? didn't do anything. and i have nothing to wear. (matching socks, i have, but i have to wear more than that).

vulnerable.

interviewer: are you now or have you ever been a commie?
me: no! no! i am not a commie! i want to kill all the commies! i want to kill! kill! i want to eat burnt dead bodies! i...
interviewer: you're quoting alice's restaurant
me: always wanted to do that, sorry
interviewer: [raps me lightly across the knuckles with a stick]
interviewer: who won the world series?
me: the A's
interviewer: wrong!
me: in 1972, 73, and 74 they did. you didn't say which year.
interviewer: don't get smart with me
me: you want i should get dumb then?
interviewer: [smacks me upside the head]
interviewer: what do you think of the our beloved president, who is revered by over 80% of loyal citizens?
me: i think he's a dangerous idiot, but at least he's not a complete whack job like ashcroft
interviewer: no shit, man, i ... [composes self, kicks me in the shins]
interviewer: YOU'RE A COMMIE. ADMIT IT.
me: i'm not even sure what one is. i think i was really stoned in civics or comparative cultures or whatever class they would've taught me that in
interviewer: IGNORANCE IS NO EXCUSE
me: ok.
interviewer: so you confess?
me: no.
[everything went kinda fuzzy after that, and i woke up in the parking lot of a deserted KMart]

too windy, really, and i'm not into getting sandblasted. however, getting two newspapers on weekends is lovely, so it was another sunday on the sofa. a good day.

you know, when people �resign� from blogging, i generally figure out they'll be back. i myself couldn't quit, i love this too much, so much that sometimes i think i should take a break just because of that -- and then i say, naah.

... so, it is with great pleasure that i announce the cheek is back.

i'm seeing a theme this weekend: randomness and pok�mon and benadryl and sunsets and donuts and eggs and nakedness and chrome teapots and old white men doing urban clich�s. somehow, it seemed a good time for an out of context:

"You're still going to have to do some things like painting and stuff to get the house ready to sell," she said, no longer just content on raining on my parade but hellbent on creating a flash flood to sweep all the floats and Shriners away. - uncle bob

I went outside wearing my pajamas and my scarf and my winter hat with nothing on my feet, carrying my stuffed penguin. we played hide and seek in the bushes until my toes were too numb to move anymore, and then I came inside and washed them off, all tinglywarm in the bathtub with the penguin still in my lap. - wockerjabby

We are handing out a free cannoli with the purchas of any specialty coffee drink at work, and I swear, the way people take to the pastry makes me feel like a drug dealer. "First one's always free, kid. See you again... very soon, I'm sure." [Extreme close-up shot: evil, knowing smug grin, fade to black] - lillywonka

Twenty minutes later, I was lying supine on the floor, sweating. The lights came back on, the floor started to hum, and the elevator edged upward. - maggeh

she would stand stock still, feeling for tiny movements under her feet. and then quite suddently, she'd pounce and come up with a little gray mouse, its tail hanging out of her mouth as she struggled to gobble it up in one big gulp. - portiastar

out of context, an original batgrl idea

and, say-say requested a picture of the cup, so here it is.

there's a very real possiblility i'll have to go to the beach today; there will very likely be pictures if i do.

now both the image and the tagline are random. i made some additional images myself, but i'm not completely happy with them -- my ability to place a small picture in another graphic is adequate, but my �eye� for catchy images, i doubt.

right now there are three. two i like, and one of those is chris's original pic. i'm going to keep working on it, i have a huge bunch of photos to go through, looking for the right look.

kd: a blog = always looking to improve itself, in the interest of your (hopeful) enjoyment.

enjoy. enjoy dammit! i mean that.

to begin with, the night before was probably two hours sleep if lucky. the entire day, only a � hour nap. took a benadryl at ten and one more around midnight 'cause i was still too awake. my son was camping on the living room floor still (sans tent this time) (and yes he stays up too late too) and there was a pok�mon movie on to lull him to sleep. and i discovered if you are drifting off to diphenhydramine (especially after the day i had), your mind will take the audio portion of the cartoon and make its own, completely unrelated and annoyingly nonsensical movie out of it. not even a cartoon. a movie with people. and animals. none of whom i recognized, thankfully. because i didn't like any of them. matter of fact, i loathed them.

fortunately, the second time that loathing roused me from my stupor, the kid had passed out. i had a beastly hard time figuring out the remote control -- by the time i got the thing turned off it was closed captioned and in spanish, i believe, and something odd was going on in the picture-in-picture.

woke up several times during the night, extremely hungry. remember eating: cookies, chunk of monterey jack cheese, and cereal, possibly twice. woke up for the final time when the friggin' gardeners came with their power tools to bang them against the side of the house. (think i'm exaggerating? one of these days i'll get a microphone for this puter and i'll prove it to you.) there is no way to sleep through the coming of the gardeners.

so here i am. happy to be annoyed and alive. good morning!

sunsets frustrate me. they are, each one of them, an unique arrangement of molecules and photons that will never be repeated. and i want to capture them all, except... well, it's not practical, and it would get old, i'm sure. doesn't stop the wanting.

and because of this wanting, sunsets tend to interrupt me. i'll be driving along and think, look! i must get closer to the sky! but the time it would take to get to the beach (which is not really closer, but is at least free of obstructions), the sunset would change or just vanish.

heh -- makes those folks that drive along talking on their cell phones look like pikers, doesn't it? incidentally, that sunset was way more awesome than you can really discern through the dirty windshield of a buick doing 65 in traffic.

and i liked the view through my back side window, which was covered in happyface stickers, which seemed somehow fitting. (and no, the car was not moving when i took that picture, i am not completely insane)

i also wanted to share my favourite breakfast with you. it's utterly simple and perfect: two eggs, over easy, yellow still runny, with a little melty cheese on top, over a piece of toast. salt, pepper, done. perfect.

so, had what they call an �exacerbation� last night -- asthma, that is. gave up on trying to be asleep around fiveish, tried various ways of dealing with it, finally around sixthirtyish, i woke chris up and said, gotta go.

good thing about asthma is you never, ever have to wait in the waiting room.

i go to the county hospital because the people there are nicer, and it's right up the street, and it's a UCLA teaching hospital. just like it there. anyway i get there and they're talking chest x-rays, IVs, blah, blah, blood work, admit, blah, and then he glances at the chart and says, you have Medi-Cal? and i say no, i have sucky HMO. and suddenly he's talking other options -- well, you can go the conservative route, ... and i realize, oh my god, he's talking about money. i had MediCal for ages, you keep coverage until you're earning a living wage, and you get used to that, whatever health care your doctor sees fit, within reason. you forget about the money. the copayments and deductibles and shit like that. suddenly i'm looking at each health care person as they come into my little area, watching to see what supplies they might be using that are going to show up on my bill. that tissue -- how much for that? they sure change gloves a lot, do i have to pay for each glove, i wonder? i watch for the little stickers - everything that has a little sticker, is money.

well, good news is, i have about four times the airspace in my lungs now than i did when i went in. the bad news is, i'm so wired it hurts. in other news, i'm thinking i should just go to work, because, well, i spent a bunch of money this morning. however, i haven't had real asthma medicine in a long time, i'd forgotten how much better i feel.

and i'm too wired to really think about this in any depth right now, but the difference between Medi-Cal care (maximum everything, almost wasteful) and HMO care (minimal, stingy) is huge. if i'd been on Medi-Cal they'd have prescribed one inhaler like a carrot on a stick and told me to see my doctor for more. on the HMO they prescribe like a year's worth, right out of the ER, because they know you don't want to be going to the doctor if you don't have to.

so, i feel great, and i've changed my mind about work, i'm going to see if i can finagle some working from home. yeah. even if i end up doing it over the weekend or something. i think i've just given myself the day off.

.... with pop culture:
this is disturbing me. i went to KFC to get dinner for the boys, and a big soda pop for myself. so i'm sitting here and out of the corner of my eye, something about the cup is bugging me. so i take a good look at it.

yeah. it's the colonel, who in life portrayed himself as a dignified southern gentleman, doing that �go colonel go colonel� dance move. i twist the cup around, watching in horrified fascination, at the cartoonish depiction of an old, fat, whitehaired man shaking his thang. this is wrong, people. sick, and wrong. i am regretting buying this man's chicken, even though it's not his fault, he's dead, and so has no way firing his marketing department for being on crack.

or is it maybe just the medicine making me irritable?

... oh, and this:
public service announcement from watchersweb. if you're gonna take pictures of a chrome teapot to sell on ebay, might wanna put some clothes on, k?

the worst has passed, but this is nasty medicine, and i did have quite a lot of it this morning. it's both foul and vile. only feel-good part is the air you get to breathe. i guess that part could be addictive as hell.

more details, for those of you who don't mind (more) whining:

the new look is courtesy of chris, who made the graphics, layout changes, and colours -- changes which were tremendously easy for me to implement, because movable type's template system is so exquisite, with all that stylesheety goodness.

i'm quite happy with it -- notice also the new MT has allowed me to list the most recently commented on entries in the sidebar. i love that. just love it.

it's done, it's wonderful, and there are more surprises in store! stay tuned..

and a bright and sunny thursday morning to you. where did you wake up? i was on the couch in this room. what's that you say? it's a fort, of course! or a tent, as the case may be. it contained a sleeping child, who did not want to wake up. and what's the decorating style in this room? you might ask. why, it's early-american it-came-with-the-house-we-don't-complain, i'd reply. no, nothing matches. it's �eclectic�, thank you very much.

the couch is usually my refuge, my quiet place i can sleep noisily if i so desire. not last night. it was campout night, it was watch spy kids till 11 then argue about wanting another movie night, it was, good thing i'm feeling alot better or else i'd be in a world of hurt this morning night. it was a good night.

the first thing out of sleeping child's mouth when i woke him up this morning was �i like to camp�. so, my living room may look like this for awhile.

good thing i like chaos.

i can't get mt 2.0 to work. it installs, and hangs on rebuild. i posted about this more specifically at surreally and put something up at the movable type support forum.

i want and need the upgrade, i do!

this is depressing.

sitting at my desk, meditating unproductively on the work at hand, i realize i am whimpering softly. if you could hear the voice i am using to write these words, it would be about eight years old, tiny and soft: my usual little girl voice, even littler and more girly. but if i spoke aloud, you would hear a deep smoky whisky ragged edge, and i like that part about being sick. i sound more grown up.

when you blow your nose, or hock up a loogie, do you look in the tissue and evaluate the snot? i do. is that weird?

i don't have a fever. i'm just like this. my fingers are puffy. there is a cushion of air pressure between my skin and the world, which is just out of reach through the daze.

i rather like this. did i say that? advil and coffee propping me upright. other than that, tilt. tilt is alright by me.

SNAP!
Hide in your shell, let the world go to hell
It's like Russian roulette to you
SNAP!
Sweat running cold, you can't face growing old
It's a personal threat to you
SNAP!
The world is a cage for your impotent rage
But don't let it get to you
SNAP!
(i am not sure what the rush lyrics have to do with anything but there they are)

i'm here, still a bit of a mess, but chances are i am going to get better. a nice person named portia told me that germies can make your brain puffy, and that explains almost everything, including the fact i spent the greater part of yesterday afternoon glancing angrily at a thermostat and bursting into tears. oh, and possibly the lyrics. yeah, that would do it.

so i'm going to work. and i'm not mad at them for not giving me paid sick leave. i just hope this is ebola and that i give it to them and we all die.

no, not really. i'm going to be ok. eventually.

maybe.

after finding out that undertoad loves cmdr taco's poem generator as much as i do, i asked if she'd like to contribute, and she said yes! so, from now on poemgen will have even more cool stuff.

oh, and the asian bastard's new new linklist is among the coolest i've ever seen.

i'm going to go curl up on the sofa now.

my brains have been replaced with soggy cotton balls. the symptoms themselves are not that bad yet, but i feel the little buggers attacking every cell in my body. i have the fear that i'll look back on feeling this way in a day or two and wish i still did.

i have to go to work, no choice in that matter. if they didn't want me bringing germies to work, why, they'd pay me sick leave, would they not? they would. but they don't.

but i'm going to get a big bottle of zinc-enriched orange juice on the way in and fight this thing. maybe i won't get that sick. i don't have time to be sick.

the air temperature in the office is seventy eight degrees - wait, that's misleading. there is no air in here. at least no oxygen. so whatever lifeless, inert gas this is i'm trying to breathe, it's not sustaining me. i'd go mess with the thermostat but i'm too bitchy to just go solve what's pissing me off. i'd rather feel freakishly violently angry than get up and push a stupid, little, annoying button.

it is possible that the only thing that is keeping me awake is this vague, unfocused rage. wanting desperately to go home, curl up on the couch, and generally not be here at work, sitting up, stressing, not resting, not healing. i'm angry because it's a matter of money. it costs me the equivalent two utility bills, or an average trip to the grocery store, just to take my germies home and spend time recovering. i'm angry because i'm fighting myself over posting this because i generally hide the worst parts, and this is one of them. i'm angry that there are judgemental assholes in the world, and i can't go any further than that without breaking my own rules of weblogging.

right now i am mad at pretty much the entire world, with very few exceptions, and i can sum it up with this: right now, i'm pretty sure i've decided against going to blogcon. i just don't fucking care. and it's not that i don't want to meet bloggers, i like bloggers, i just am sick of everything. and i'm not making sense. and in spite of four aspirin my head hurts really bad and i want to go home and i can't. and crying at my damn desk is so girly and stupid and i hate myself for doing it and i'm almost sure i'll delete this in a little while.

whatever.

i have one of those weird dream apartments with the strange extra spaces - small, misshapen spaces not meant for living, but can be made into cozy littld cubbyholes. and i can't find it. i can either go through the hotel to the apartments or go down the street, i'm riding a blue scooter like my son's, but this one is mine. twice, i can't find the apartment, despite spending 26 hours each time, getting lost, and then there's the accident. both arms, both legs broken. i am in the hospital, i am not taking pain meds, but i have beer. i have surgery and they put pins in the broken bones, i have no casts, i can see the surgical scars and the bruising and swelling, and it hurts. i am not supposed to be walking around but i manage, a little, there are crimes that need covering up. i know i have to set a fire to burn the evidence, but i don't want to add arson to the list of things i've done. so, you know, the guy who has that gavel that spits fire, and he just loves to bang it? he's the building manager, i think. well, i put the evidence on his desk, coated with an accelerant, so when he bangs it, kaboom! evidence destroyed. but it hurts so much to walk. and i know i'll get caught anyway, i'll have the stuff on my hands, it got all over my hands. god it hurts to walk. but in a way i'm enjoying the broken bones.

i am considering the very real possibility that without coffee, my natural state of being is asleep. all those naps yesterday, followed by a surprisingly good night's sleep (and some really weird-ass dreams), more sleep than i've ever had without feeling really tired going in. i wasn't that tired, i just wasn't awake.

[sigh] coffee is wonderful. i'm feeling better already.

so, it's monday. it's morning. here's something to cheer you up (it's only a little bit deviant, but not for the kiddies, k?) and here it is.

a project calling itself the real rack project has a blog.

and here is the actual project, here:
.

any resemblance to other rack projects is totally coincedental, of that i am sure.

who needs three martinis? here's the recipe: take one buick with v6 and nice radio, add cheesy popsongs and a short sweet drive in the breezy sunshine; yields two tacos, several stuffed jalape�os (my latest addiction, so much so i have the � thingy memorized on the keyboard). digressing...

now, the popsongs. first, living on a prayer (bon jovi) sing along with me oh, we're halfway there, ohoh, living on a prayer. yeah, admit it, you know the words. then, lemme see, oh yeah, celine dion. won't admit i liked it. can't explain how i know most of the words, you know she'd be ok if she had a decent lyricist. as it is, it had a nice beat i could car-dance to it. so i order my greasy-spicys and i'm waiting for my food and that song "riding on the metro" by -- who was it? blonde chick with a band... i'll think of it. anyway, had to wait in the parking lot, rockin out, singing real loud and bouncing just a bit, when the food-bringer got to my window, and he looked at me kinda funny. i neither cared nor missed a beat. oh yeah! berlin! ok now. my food smells good, the music is loud, and the first person with the opportunity to do so lets me in traffic! euphoria, to the extent i'm a little misty eyed as i step on the gas and mmmm, power. i arrive back at work just as another song is starting up, something by the romantics, i forget -- remember, i've got a we bit of a buzz happenin'. i was tempted to sit in the car and listen some more, but i came in just to blog this for you. and now my keyboard is all greasy, and i'm still silly happy.

[sigh] now back to work. lunch did rock, though!

sometime after three a.m., i went to bed. slept solid, got up eight thirty, took to the couch with two sunday papers, and proceeded to nap on and off most of the day. this meant i was off the computer most of the day, and had i been on it, i would have felt guilty for not attending to some overdue tasks at hand, namely the sheaf of complicated paperwork that sat, untouched, on the coffee table not one foot from my head all day. napping was a different matter - you can need sleep, but needing to surf forty-leven blogs is far less reason to put things off. i had no coffee at all, didn't even want it (maybe i didn't want to be so awake i'd have to choose between the internet and the paperwork). however, i seriously doubt i needed that many naps. and now i'm finally mostly awake, seven something p.m.

so i've just now given myself one more day for this project. and, sadly, the web projects i've been putting off are now slated for next weekend. and, amazingly, i still have a few beers left in the twelvepack i bought some three days ago, weekend or no weekend, i've been kinda ... quiet.

and i need to catch up on all my blogreading now. a whole day!

in the beginning, the greats wrote there own blog software. and my research tells me there were rarely, if ever comments. i personally wasn't around then, but available evidence is... available.

and then there was dotcomments for the well-servered folk, who had PHP. and there were remotely hosted comments, too many to list here, which have so far proven to be a finite resource, but they gave blogs comments. and once a blog had comments, the blogmaster would seek out other comments systems, when the server demands overwhelmed the last free comments system. and as this happened, greymatter blossomed, with its inline comments. and weblogs grew, and prospered. bloggers could interact without feeling their views merited a whole email or guestbook signature. along the way, movable type came with a different take on all matters CGI, and comments became integral to the majority of blogs.

blogs that were monologues for years, got comments. rarely were they overused, unless the blogger had spent considerable time cavorting around in a jumpsuit on the enterprise 1701e. but i digress.

commenting has changed blogging immensely in the past year. i rather think it made the whole deal more time-intensive; surfing, and having things to say and having to take the time to phrase them. but the interactivity... worth the time.

i love comments. don't you? and that's a rhetorical question, i'm not fishing for comments, it's just -- something i was thinking about.

so, i have random taglines. and no, reloading may up my pageviews but not the unique visits, so it's not a desperate cry for stats.

i have some help in the cause of finding me some quotes, though i would probably like to have original weirdisms instead of just the quotes. but for now i can't think of anything and i have that new toy. so, quotes it is. and toys are good, as is beer, and life in general.

(and mr. loki seems to be feeling better now, thank badness)

somtimes, there is nothing you can say and nothing you can do right, and then something like this makes you look back and say, damn, doing nothing was wrong and saying something meant to be comforting was... not right? not enough.

i am sorry.

ennui: great word. i've seen it written quite a lot, but i've never, ever heard it used in spoken conversation. still, it accurately describes many facets of my consciousness right now.

entropy: another great word, which people use to describe any number of things in life inevitably turning to shit, as if physics is the reason. yet we know that �thermodynamic entropy ONLY applies to chemicals and matter, atoms and molecules � not to economics or information or pollution or human problems, unless they are directly connected to atomic and molecular behavior, right?�

eloquent: what i'm not, as i try to explain ... whatever it is i'm saying here.

so, lunchtime. i take a surf break.

i go to bad sam, and for some reason the �five touches� column catches my eye, and i click. at the bottom of the page, the comments lead me to the bad sam message board, which leads me to unspeakablystupid.com, where i click, rather randomly, on a story called throwing up in portland, which started out �Hardly anyone remembers Camel anymore. They were a British band whose popularity peaked in about 1977...�

well, i remember them. a whole headrush of memories, i loved their moonmadness album. just loved it. at one point in the very late seventies, i stored all my albums along with my stereo in a friend's garage, and he sold them all because another friend of mine owed him money. you wouldn't believe how many times stuff like this happened to me back then -- which may be why i am so reclusive now, but i digress.

for years, i believed this album, this music, was lost to me. it was one item on my list of lost music that never turned up in a used record store, and after awhile i gave up hope. i clicked over to amazon.com with scant hope, afterall, this is 70's vinyl we're talking about, if it exists it's probably not in great condition, and even so, i don't even know anyone with an actual turntable.

behold, the wonders of the internet: digitally remastered CDs were released in '83, and i found three of them, in two clicks. and, i hesitated, because it wouldn't be the first time i rediscovered 70's music and thought, �what was i thinking� -- but i decided to take the chance, because after all these years, i still have snippets of their songs running through my mind.

and now, the CD is on its way. i love the internet.

every home heating system i have ever known operates in one of two states: on, and off. ones and zeroes, real simple. now, why is it that people who want to get a house warm real quick-like, turn the heater up past the normal setting, as if that's going to speed up the process? news flash: it doesn't work that way. and sure as hell, your sorry, clueless ass is going to forget you've cranked the heater up too high until the whole damn house is suffocating hot.

now, i'm not denying there may be fancy, state of the art houses out there with super deluxe, variable settings heat -- i'm not talking about that. i'm talking about your standard, garden-variety, thermostat-controlled heater. it is on, until it reaches the temperature you've set, then off, when it reaches it. setting it higher is just going to make it run longer, not better, and not faster. the heater does not think, oh! i must reach a higher number, i'll get hotter! it does not think. it is on, or off.

if you want to get warm fast, put on a damned sweater. get under the blankets. but keep your lousy paws off the heater control. got it?

"I am a drinker with writing problems."
- Brendan Behan

"Not all chemicals are bad. Without chemicals such as hydrogen and oxygen, for example, there would be no way to make water, a vital ingredient in beer."
- Dave Barry

fun with beer

got any favourite beer quotes/links? share 'em in the comments! i'm off to get donuts and beer, ahh, friday...
· · ·
i have some pictures for you:
donuts · breakfast · kid in a hat

so i took these herbal energy ginseng concoction big green horsepills a little while ago and i'm not doing too well. no ephedra, nothing like that, just a host of wake up druggies, and the last ingredient being kava-kava to add a little ball to the speed? i can only theorize as i sit here wide awake but not like, being very not-asleep would feel like, but buzzy, like, not paying attention. i feel like i should lay down, not sleep, but just vegetate with flying thoughts. i have a little bit of a potential headache in my right temple. oh, and my hair is on fire. other than that, i'm fine. i also had about four cups of coffee, do you suppose that was a bad idea?

in retrospect i am forced to admit that it was.

i still feel like a bowlfull of steaming crap. probably because i'm completely insane and poured two ounces of salsa on a large bean rice and cheese burrito.

then (get this) i ate it. yeah. i know.

however i did get up off my couch long enough to begin the long-needed additions to the linklist. there are at least three times as many i mean to add, these are just the ones out of the recent referrer logs. i have bookmarks. somewhere. around here.

actually, now that i'm up, i don't feel half bad. more like three quarters, but, well, hell, may as well go for a little surf.

Jon got back from SXSW, where he was stranded without internet access to speak of (how horrifying). this tells me that we are so on the right track for BlogCon, with the high speed internet access in the rooms -- i still can't wrap my mind around the concept of being in a strange city, unable to post and to surf my favourite blogs. the withdrawal pains would be too, well, painful.

i don't know how to feel about this, but just the thought of being without internet access for any length of time, especially a bloggable event like SXSW (or BlogCon) sends bad chills up my spine. bad ones.

and just think, in a few years when they've perfected 3G high speed wireless access and wearable computers, we'll be able to blog from anywhere... anywhere at all... muahahahah!!

erm, not that i'd want to get all cyborged out like that. no sir.

so it was a bad thing i took the walk, but damn the air was exquisite. i took the cd player and incubus, with drive on repeat. the rhythm of my steps lengthened in response to the music, and i was breathing, breathing deep in rhythm. and the streets were empty, their parked cars with windows misted with dew, and quiet, quiet the world. oh, and it felt like heaven, darkened ventura boulevards, heading for the lighted oasis that is the gas station on the corner, and one more beer. just one, really, it was the walk i was after when i set out on the journey.

and it was sweet. incubus, and cool moist air, and deep, deep breaths. i fell madly in love with the world, just then, and i can't begin describing this in a way that would bring you in it with me, or else i would. oh, trust me, i would.

best parts? watching, in middle distance, the signal at thompson and main, green, then yellow and red, and red for awhile, then suddenly green again, all seen through the mist and/or my old scratched glasses. in any case, the night was a haze of light and wonder. and it was a perfect walk.

and it is too late, and time for bed, after i finish the one beer i said i was after when i begun walking, even though it was the walk i was after all along.

...poemgen does not suck? well, at least, in my opinion it doesn't. what is it? well, it's a daily (or thereabouts) randomization of kd: a blog, using cmdr taco's poem generator cgi.

just thought i'd mention that.

i saw this a long time ago and forgot where i put it, it's definitely worth re-linking. it's called lost in translation, and it takes a phrase and translates it back and forth between five languages.

for instance: �dance like it hurts, love like you need the money, work when people are watching�
becomes, inexplicably: �tanz likes d the ferrito, exactly of it it necessity the money, work,
if the peoples to observe�

imagine this: your phone, which resembles a boxy wristwatch, vibrates to tell you there is an incoming call. no one around you will hear this, but they will see you react, a subtle change in facial expression as you raise your hand, tapping two fingers rhythmically together to answer the call, and then ... i am not making this up ... you stick your finger in your ear and begin talking.

you carry on an animated conversation, with your finger stuck in your ear. people around you back away slowly, convinced you're either (a) insane, (b) communicating with the mother ship, or (c) both.

and besides, didn't your mother tell you not to stick anything in your ear? except your elbow, of course.

let's preface this with the fact that i rarely watch movies. i only go to a theatre if there is a kids' flick that my son must see, and to be honest that's a level of filmmaking i am comfortable with. i love animation, and potty humour (jimmy neutron was great).

as far as grownup movies, well, i resist most of them. i don't want to be moved, touched, or edified. i don't want to be serious. i want to laugh at bizarre stuff till i hurt. i want my ribs to ache.

zoolander was brilliant. ben stiller is a genius. i only checked my email twice during the movie, which is saying a lot for its ability to hold my scattery attention. and the last scene, where dereck jr. makes his first �look�, well, i nearly peed myself. hahaha, weewee is funny (there goes my sense of humour again).

my webhosts promise me 99.95% uptime. which means there is .05% downtime. doesn't sound like much? it's 4.38 hours a year. some of which happened this morning. which means not only my site but all the surreally hostees experienced the absence of their blogs this morning. from the time i got up till the time everything was back online was some 20-25 minutes, it could have been longer, i don't know. all i know is that it was incredibly traumatic.

(breathe) (breathe) that was hairy. hairy like a plumber's buttcrack, and probably all sweaty like that too. *shudder*

i wish for once i could catch all my thougts and get them written, but it happens when my mind's wandering and i have no idea they're going to make sense till well after i've forgotten where they started.

in the writing of that sentence, a whole thought-train derailed and left me here ...

struggling for words. i know i'll feel better in the morning, i'm going to take the day off. had i planned in advance and submitted a form, i'd be here without a time i had to be up and out of the house, good thing. must go to work and submit form at a decent hour, which means i can't languish till noon, procrastinating even more. i have things to do. after these things are done, (hint: this involves a trip to the bankruptcy court in santa barbara) i will be much more relaxed and find it easier to handle the stress that is my web presence at this moment.

it's a bit much, yes?

ok, i like it this way, but i'm in need of some firm solid life-base from which to operate at this level. i've been failing, actually -- have projects that have languished a month (sorry, mig) which are fully formed in the idea stage but awaiting my implementation. i have lagged on this, among other things, spending my time surfing and commenting, reaching out in my way, finding excellent friendships that in fact sustain me.

(thank you for being here reading this)

it will be ok. it will be ok. it will be ok.

it will. really.

well, oddly enough, the day i picked to head up to santa barbara is clear, sunny, and will be between 70 and 80 degrees, so i'm going to have to take a cruise up the coast in my newly tuned up car, in this weather. huh.

so while i'm gone (lo, these several hours), i'll leave you with this: last night, i surfed my own early archives, i believe all of these were �palm blogs� (they were whole entries, each of them), snippets that i etched in graffiti when there was an avant-go palm channel (before i lost my palm and didn't care, some gadget junkie, eh?). so, here they are:
· · ·
sickness -- ridiculous & compelling, & in the end i believe it will have been a necessity. i have devoted an irretrievable measure of my life & identlty to this & it would seem wasteful to abandon it at ths late date.
· · ·
(blink blink) mmm...daylight? can i go back to bed now?
· · ·
been exercising my demons this weekend; at the moment, i am procrastinting as the impending evening deepens & makes it harder & harder to find excuses...oh shit, i gotta go.
· · ·
moments of fleeting peace are exquisite. & they are fleeting! one just passed.

today we will review an apparent fashion trend that seems to have slipped in under the radar: i had no idea it was spandex season! but it is, at least at von's.

girl 1: wearing skintight and very thin, bronze spandex pants with a slight flare at the ankle. the slightly shimmery fabric clung to her bethonged butt, showing off the wonders of a good workout program and a serendipitous gift of just the right padding. �excellent�, i thought, watching the gently graceful undulations as she walked down the soup aisle, �except, not a good choice if you don't want strangely hypnotized people following you around the store.� conclusion: thumbs up.

girl 2: oh, honey. you have a cute figure, you do, don't change a thing -- except the low-rise stretch pants and the crop top. that, you should change. just a little more fabric, with a little less cling, and that little extra you would be oh, so hot, instead of just being, well, kinda clumpy in places. a pair of comfy hiphugger jeans and a wispy little shirt would still let you show off the cute navel ring, but please, dear, lose the lycra. conclusion: thumbs down.

this has been a public service announcement to make sure people understand that spandex, while comfy, has consequences. serious ones. be careful out there. you could put somebody's eye out.

�experimental in nature & futile in the most boring way possible, i guess. but it's a start.�

that's what i posted on 10 sep 2000, 18 months ago today, my very first blogger entry. kind of a �testing 1-2-3� with what was supposed to be a clever twist.

i then went on to ramble about templates and netscape and trying to find a purpose.

i still don't have one. i'm ok with that.

you know, i tend to think of europe as being a place where the general population is more chic and fashion-conscious than they are in the states. so after observing some european tourists in downtown ventura this afternoon, i feel i should re-evaluate that impression, based on the preponderance of strange shorts worn with loafers and black dress socks. are there people, right now, wandering all over europe dressed like that? or do they just do it when they're on holiday, like taking a vacation from the pressures of being stylish and well-dressed?

in any case, it's all part of the regular weekend beachgoing. even though we go to the same place and do essentially the same thing, it's always a new experience. it started with this beach bunny, and then there were some bikini girls playing instruments, i don't think they were all that musical, but i also don't think that really mattered, in the grand scheme of the beach. there were a lot of people crawling around on the rocks, intently doing... something, and doing it for hours on end. and of course, some things never change, like how much fun it is to dig in sand.

it's just some lyrics i wish to share. they follow: