Sunday, December 30, 2007

and let's not forget
-luscious jackson 'naked eyes'
-nick drake 'one of these things first'
-thrill kill kult 'daisy chain for satan'
-arcade fire 'black mirror'
-can 'laugh til you cry, live til you die'
-nektar 'desolation valley/roads'
-steve miller 'wild mountain honey'
or perhaps, let's.

Saturday, December 29, 2007

the soundtrack of 2007

i am not neccessarily proud of some of these, but they have given me great pleasure (mostly whilst driving) over the last year. ah, the memories.
i am only counting entire albums. in no particular order, as usual.
-traffic 'mr fantasy'
-love 'da capo'
-the white stripes 'icky thump'
-nuggets box set volume one (especially cds 1-3)
-the rolling stones 'black and blue'
-dr dog 'we all belong'
-phish 'story of the ghost'
-yo la tengo 'i can hear the heart beating as one'
-the beatles 'please please me'
-instrumental rock collection: soul
-os mutantes 'anything is possible!'
-secret machines '12 silver drops'
and some of the songs:
-ween 'captain fantasy'
-robyn hitchcock 'this could be the day'
-amy winehouse 'you know i'm no good' (and i'll fucking admit it. this is a great song and anyone who says otherwise is a fucking LIAR)
-neil young: 'don't let it bring you down'
-tom petty 'asshole'
-trey anastasio 'black'
-destroyer 'rubies'
-ram jam 'black betty'
-the beach boys 'tears in the morning'
...there will be others, i'm sure.
*
in my head right now: "you look so good... in my bed"

Thursday, December 27, 2007

please: a plea for ease

xmas went really, really well. i feel like a collossal fuck after my post of vitriole, so much so that i will not reread it at all. i never think first. this has gotten me into pretty much every stupid situation i can recall. and i fucking deserve it.
the train ride from seattle was gorgeous. the tracks hug the shores of puget sound, it was the first sunny day in a good while, and everything was tinted golden. my parents had the xmas tree up, adorned with ornaments from my youth; we bullshat and drank a lot and had a very good meal involving stir-fried scallops. the scallops were the size of hockey pucks, but thicker. they were like eating a stick of butter. i mean that in the best possible way.
it snowed on xmas, fat white flakes that melted upon contact. my parents offered to drive me home instead. the interstate was blocked off for 'police activity' in federal way. we eventually passed the scene: about 15 squad cars, lights flashing, and no evidence of an accident. my father called me when they returned to olympia; they'd gotten online to find the source of the ballyhoo. a guy had jumped out of a moving vehicle containing his girlfriend and her young son; he had taken off all his clothing on the freeway; he was swinging his belt at cars. the cops were called, they couldn't talk with him, they were unable to subdue him with a taser, and he was eventually shot to death on the middle of I-5 in front of a bus full of people. "that was not the story i expected to hear" i said inanely when he told me.
in today's paper they interviewed acquaintances of this mecurial young man. "that's not like him at all" was the prevailing opinion, seconded with "he's no drug user." toxicology shall see. anyhow, merry fucking xmas.
also on xmas in a small town about 20 miles east of seattle, a family of six was murdered in their own home. by their daughter and her boyfriend, presumably. again, real nice folk. couldn't imagine. they were a quiet bunch.
washington is the serial killer hub of north america, you know. the washington-BC region in general, tacoma in particular. i am inclined to blame the weather.
a term i learned today: episioplasty. it was bandied around as a surgical option for a female dog with chronic UTIs. it involves cutting back the vulvar folds to prohibit excessive gunge incubation. i love the english language: there really is a word for everything.

Sunday, December 23, 2007

fra ra ra

sigur ros is playing. the best music has a seamlessness of applicability: it can be appreciated whether driving, fucking, being giddy, being morose... and this does not fulfill every criteria. it is good, but it is not an across-the-board stalwart, unlike (at least for me, at this precise moment) traffic, or the raconteurs, or the goddamn beatles.
entropy was deuterized on friday. she came home three hours post-op, pupil dilated from opiates, and sucked down a bowl of food. she and i took a nap on the sofa in the twilight, her chin resting on my arm, purring when i touched her. by that evening she was trying to jump on tables and tearing at her e-collar and being even more of a shit than usual. i was at a seminar once where the speaker repeatedly intoned "cats are made of steel." it is true. it is very fucking difficult to make a dent in a cat. they are willful, tenacious motherfuckers. like philodendron. i appreciate that.
*
a preface to my newest Action:
-i have made it a paramount goal to keep my life as stress-free as possible, since i add enough turmoil and drama to things already, simply by being me
-my savings are my reward for the purgatory of yelm, and money is to be spent, and if i die, i would rather not have any monetary value
-i prefer comfort to coming across like a moist fogged-over illegal prick
-which sounds revolting!
-therefore:
i am buying a car on wednesday. a practical car. a car with 4 doors that open. a car with a heater, cup holders, fabulous gas mileage, functional windsheild wipers, a cd player, a sunroof, a new clutch, 4 newish tires, and seats that are unfortunately upholstered with a fabric reminiscent of a mid-80s trapper keeper.
i am buying a volkswagen golf.
for a pittance!
it is used. i am not contributing to further rape of the world, the unpaid toilers, the finite resources, the evil executives. this is a (14 yr old) car that came up from california with a fucked clutch, an unwanted orphan. i am retardedly excited about having a heated vehicle, i admit. this is a big fucking deal for me.
i am keeping sweet green. she's mine, after all, and i adore her; my neighborhood is not zoned, thank fuck, so i can continue to keep her tripod-like self parked in front of my building like the darling wastrel she is. i will fuck with her come spring, when it is light for more than four hours a day, when everything is not continuously cauled in wetness and rot.
in the meantime, i will be cavorting in a brilliant turquoise marvel of latter-day german engineering. the thing hauls ass. it will be fun.
*
tomorrow i make the amtrak-trek to my parent's lair for forced gaiety. i am dreading this. a stultified unpleasant chat with my father a few nights ago made me uneasy for hours afterwards. i will be trapped there, reliant on their transport from bumfuck to the only slightly-less-bumfuck train station, for nearly 24 hours. i am anticipating the following (and if i state it, perhaps it shall not happen?):
-father being a dickhead
-mother getting drunk
-unsolicited opinions on my life, my personality, my hair, my vocation, my diet, my sociability, my health- no opinions of which will be "atta girl"
-cream- and meat-based everything
-enduring mannheim steamroller's xmas swill on the hi-fi, in a house where the thermostat is perpetually set at 68 degrees
-mother falling asleep on the sofa at 9pm
-father hauling me into the office to stand there dumbly while he shows off his thousands of mp3s, and plays them
what will i be doing to contribute to the festivities?
-sulking inwardly
-getting defensive
-helping my mother get through the bottle of wine
-smoking in their driveway and wishing i was home
-feeling unbearably self-conscious and self-critical by proxy
-turning into a shrill teenager, minus the 78 volvo to get away in
*
i fucking hate xmas.
i hate holidays.
holidays are for the families you choose, not for the families you have.
there, i said it.

Thursday, December 20, 2007

found items

a stairwell on an abandoned section of the olympia brewery:

dancin' with the nazis: ("scarily cheerful marching-band music" according to the man selling this. he wanted $45. i did not, though i was rather interested on a purely sociological level.)

in the trash at the bus stop one block from my lair:

a lucky pile of pennies, abandoned in the loo at the library:

and the bottom of a 2-ton hanging lamp at the state capitol building, able to vibrate in place:

i found a wallet on the bus the other day. it belonged to a bedraggled-looking 44yr old woman. she had a downtown address, a reduced-fare bus pass, and a student ID to shoreline community college. i called information and got another woman with the same name, connected to her cell phone via a chirpy "dave and rebecca aren't home right now" message. i looked the woman up online. i found the other rebecca, the one whom i'd already called, and her address in a nice part of town. i finally made it to the other woman's address tonight... the YWCA. an unpleasant woman unsmilingly assisted me at the surveillance-monitored counter while rap played loudly. "she doesn't live here anymore" i was told. she wrote the wallet's finding in the spiral notebook behind the counter and gruffly told me goodbye. i passed through a group of smoking strangers as i left the building. and i thought about how polarized the fucking world really is. i had proof in my hands of a woman who was seemingly making every attempt to improve her life, and the residual sound of the other woman with the same name and the completely alternate reality, and i am still sadly wondering how the fuck that happens. i don't believe in luck; things either happen or they don't. but sometimes i think my beliefs are bullshit.
i left all those pennies for someone else.

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

coliform conniption

i am wired with sexual energy. i want to slam my body against a tall stranger. it must be the season.
the new job is going rather well. on my 3rd day there (yesterday) they were passing out envelopes. i got mine and immediately thought negative things; instead i found a "glad you're on board" xmas note and a crisp $50 bill. on my 3rd day. $50. did such things ever happen at tacoma? no, indeed, they did not.
no, tacoma is now denying me the "extended leave" clause that i am legally entitled to (as is every taxpaying employee of the united states), which i was relying on to retain my health insurance benefits until my new ones kicked in (april). i was planning on continuing to pay the exorbinant monthly fees, appreciating that they are still far less than the $500/month+ clusterfuckery of COBRA. yesterday i received an email from my former manager saying that "it was in the memo" and "we know that it's complicated to understand" blah blah BLAH, whereupon i responded that they can just let my coverage die at the end of the month. i stated it kindly. and when i left my new job, i had $50 in my wallet and my fingers crossed mightily that i will not have any serious shit befall me in the next 4 months.
or i will be fucked.
i hate american health care.
i am now commuting via public transport, which i dearly love, which is such a new and novel and joyous thing that i can excuse the presumed 'imconvenience' of it all. i am now able to TAKE A BUS TO WORK FROM MY HOME, like normal folk do! this is thrilling as fuck. the thrill was induced, in part, by my tire shredding on my car whilst on the interstate last weekend. i ruined the rim too. and then i continued to drive it home, because it was already fucked up. my car is now parked off-kilter in front of my lair with a rear tire that looks like it was decimated by a machete. i accomplished tire death. i shall post a picture soon.
i also hate the annoying burden of vehicles.
*
whilst walking here (at the w seattle library, post-dentist, ever the wily hedonist) i had that thought i hadn't had in at least a few days. changing jobs and consequently changing my life, worrying about whether this is a wise decision, worrying about potential health issues and the stupid drama with s, wishing it wasn't so fucking cold and grey and solitary here, has essentially defined the last week. i have been even more stressed than what i consider natural. and the thought was: i can handle this.
it can be considered the height of patheticism to have to perform my own cheerleading... as my current optimism inevitably abates, surely i will analyze this to my detriment.
*
on the mcdonald's electronic reader board near my lair:
nog nog!
who's there?
egg nog shakes!
that's who!
it makes me laugh every time.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

flux

it snowed like hell on saturday. one inch of sloppy slush paralyzes this place. i, for example, live atop a 40 degree incline in a town that does not utilize sanders, plows, or de-icers. understanding this makes me feel a bit less pussified.
from the front of my lair, looking down (sweet green is in the foreground. i learned this weekend that she leaks. formidably. there is an inch of standing water on the floor. i eagerly await mold.):

it was melted by that evening, turning into a nightmarish torrent that dumped nearly 7 inches of rain over 2 days. chehalis, an admittedly nondescript berg about 30 miles south of olympia, is completely submerged. I-5 is underwater. in seattle, storm drains were clogging and people were rowing out of their yards. there was a landslide a few blocks away from my place. i am tired of sogginess. everything is perpetually sodden and bleak here. usually it doesn't bother me too much... i love rain, hence my decision to live here... but FUCK. i am reminded of the horrible month of january 06 and the CEASELESS rain and my leaking ceiling... go back to the archives and read all about it for some bona fide knee-slappery.
later saturday night, downtown. the snow is still falling but not adhering.

i met s at our usual haunt. the furnace was broken. it was cold as fuck. we played with the candle. he sarcastically selected 'radio ga ga' on the jukebox after i, in some degree of earnestness, chose 'fat bottom girls.'

...blurry though this may be, i find this image rather sexy.
*
my last official day at the tacoma ER was monday. it was very fucking sad to leave. they bought me cake and a card. i got a lot of hugs. i cried. some of my coworkers cried too. i drove home that night feeling incredibly morose: what the fuck did i go and quit for? is that yet another decision i will learn to rue? no more commute. that's all it comes down to. better benefits. better pay. a new experience. life goes on.
i tend to not get too comfortable on purpose. anywhere.
i orientate (?) at the new place tomorrow and start my first shifts on friday. i am deeply dreading my new schedule. i have a week of swing-shift training, then the terrible day shifts begin. early day shifts. i am already getting despondent about this fucking weather. not seeing daylight for days at a time is a worrisome concept, to the point of preoccupying me.
*
went to the ranch 99 asian market today. i am always at least a head taller than everyone else there, including the men. so i didn't bust out the camera and add to my conspicuousness, though oh, how i wanted to. an entire roasted piglet, dangling. frosty bags of duck feet. artichoke tea. fascinating, terrible things. i bought a bag of soup mix for s's birthday, a freeze-dried amalgam including dainty starfish. he collects bizarre food products too- i didn't know anyone else did that (which is why i have in my cupboards tinned treacle and grass jelly, and why he will soon have, along with the starfish-stuff, broiled octopus and amyl nitrate flavoring).
i have always been drawn to images of the mundane, the unclean room, the packaging at the grocery store. so herein is a picture of my cool two-tiered stove.

Tuesday, December 04, 2007

go take a shower



or:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/news/2007/12/03/wface103.xml