i got out of the shower. pixel rubbed around my calves enthusiastically, acting as a warm, furry towel. since she hadn't spilled my blood in the last 24 hours, i decided to reward her with a can of wet food. i yanked on the tin of mackerel & gravy. it wouldn't open. i pulled harder. it flew open, covering my naked body with extremely smelly, sticky brownish goo.

i screamed "GODDAMNIT PIXEL!".

this was obviously all her idea... if a cat made deodorant for humans, it would surely be mackerel-scented. i grabbed a kitchen towel and tried to scrub off the muck. i was already well on target to be late for work. the fluid came off, but the scent remained. i glanced around and saw that the window had been open, providing the neighbors and people passing by on the street with some entertainment. i grabbed some dior addict perfume and squirted it all over myself.

in an attempt to feign normalcy, i decided to wear a preppy blue peacoat. i haven't been to the grocery in days, so there's nothing suitable for breakfast. i headed to madison market. (no matter how late i am, skipping breakfast is not an option.) while i was waiting in line, i noticed the man to my left staring at me. i rubbed my nose to make sure nothing was hanging out of it. than i realized i smelled as though i'd been up all night drinking beer in a fish processing plant. pretty sexy.

i listened to a fresh air episode where ice cube talked about the first time he heard hiphop. his grandpa's car stereo didn't work, so his grandpa drove around with a boombox. "THAT'S JUST LIKE ME!" i yelled. except that i'm not 80, don't live in south central, and kexp is typically not sandwiching the commodores between the sugarhill gang. plus i sold my speakers so now i listen to music via headphone. i say headphone because i only do it with one ear. i'm afraid to listen with both headphones lest i get into an accident.

instead of getting sexy speakers designed for the ipod, nonstatic suggested that i buy some speakers which could double as studio monitors for my future attempts at producing music. so i went with these tascam speakers. they don't resemble a freaky pulsating jellyfish, but if they aid me in forming my own freaky pulsating sounds i'll consider that close enough.

our brunch party rocked. someday i'll learn how to cook something other than breakfast food so that i can graduate to a dinner party. special thanks to dieszy for expert mimosa madness.

( seattle brunch & other restaurant commentary )

this guy sits outside madison market regularly. "spare any change, miss?"

i decline, and he says "thank you so much" but in a snide, sarcastic way.

...


the only thing that annoys me more than people calling me "ma'am" is people calling me "miss".

it began innocently enough. the car stereo started picking up the sound of accelerating and decelerating. if the radio was tuned to a station that wasn't coming in, you could rock out to the amplified engine sounds. RRRRRRR! RAAAAAA!

but then it got louder. now even on normal stations with a strong signal, the car overlaid its own commentary. initially it discussed how its engine was feeling, but it moved on to adding loud crackling and static sounds. whenever i turned on the radio, it would announce its arrival with a high-pitched treble squeal-shriek. this prompted some of my more sensitive passengers to begin holding their hands over their ears upon entering my car.

today it decided to stop holding back how it really felt. i was listening to fresh air on the nano and terry gross's voice suddenly became a cacophany of static and scraping and squealing and frontal noise assault. i yanked out the tape adapter. kexp was then eclipsed by a sonic attack which i imagine could rival a merzbow concert.

RRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR! it screamed.

i'm sure it thought that it would get the better of me, but instead i turned the volume up and howled along. apparently the only thing that will be listened to in my car from now on is our combined shrieking. :/ maybe i can set up a transmitter and little-car and i can start a noise band.

i cried the first night i arrived. it feels weird being here without grandpa. even though i argued with him continuously, i appreciated his opinionated personality. he never talked, only shouted. he waved his hands around melodramatically and paced around the room when he spoke as though he was addressing an audience of hundreds. he was extremely republican & uberconservative, so we had lots of political arguments. he almost always won, not because i started to agree with him, but because i wasn't able to articulate why i didn't. then i'd start to cry, and my grandma would shout in the background "good god, jim, she's SEVEN! can't you wait until she's a little older?" and him saying "it's never too early for the child to learn about right and wrong" and me saying "but i already know you're wrong." he died because he refused to follow his doctors' advice and take the various medications they prescribed. my family felt that he'd essentially committed suicide. but i could understand why he'd consider following somebody else's orders to be more of suicidal than death.

i haven't seen my grandma in 11 years. when we go out, she stops to examine everything we pass... touching plants, shirts, electronic devices. sometimes she even smells them. she asks detailed questions about everything we say. occasionally when leaving a room, she does a little dance or curtsy or sings a little song. i find these eccentric behaviors charming. they seem to irritate my mother, though, who prefers to get straight to the point (whether it's a physical or a conversational destination.)

so far my brother and i have stolen wireless from the neighbors, had money forced upon us, and been stuffed with food and homemade cookies. we're both vegetarian and it stresses my grandma out, so we've been eating grilled cheese w/tomato (which is perfectly fine with me.) we went to the mall and she bought me fishnets and teal and magenta tights. my other relatives would've asked why i want to dress like a prostitute. she said "these have such pretty colors! they're like flowers." she doesn't give me shit about anything. not my tat or my typical hair/appearance decisions or my 'lifestyle choices' or any of the things that pretty much every other relative loves to lecture me about. those relatives give me little pats when they "hug" me... a light, awkward tap on the back with the tips of their fingers. this grandma hugs with a tight squeeze, so hard it almost hurts.

i didn't get along with my parents, and since i only saw my mother's relatives maybe once every ten years, i tended to forget what being around them was like. it almost makes me understand what it might feel like to have a family that you're close to. but when i think about that, i just feel worse, 'cause i know this'll probably be the last time i ever see her.

one of my missing-burningman pangs occured again today when i saw thetathrees' post about dance dance immolation. you play dance dance revolution, but if/when you fuck up, it blasts you with fire (as you wear a protective suit.)

i googled an explanatory article which begins "So, what’s better than video games? According to the good people at Interpretive Arson, video games with fire, of course.

i definitely needed a long, fun weekend and this one delivered. musically it consisted of going to bumbershoot and seeing digable planets, ted leo & the pharmacists, j boogie's dubtronic science, be good tanyas, & choklate (coincidentally, while eating crepes nearby). saw mike grant @ the baltic room and expressed extreme enthusiasm 'cause those same promoters are bringing glenn underground & 3 chairs & many other good people. went to atonal's bbq where i drank a bottle of wine and burned eddie's boca bratwurst. (if you hate veggie dogs like i do, you should try these ones... they're actually good.) went to burning sham and got surrounded by dozens of clowns and played the life-size game of operation. got dinner cooked for me. played gta continuously. watched the office special which unfortunately was not nearly as good as the series.

i work at a telcom, so the majority of my calls in the past few days have been either people from new orleans or people setting up numbers dedicated to helping people there. unfortunately, we don't have local service in that area, so all i can do is set up toll free numbers for them. i work in sales so it's all commission, but if anyone mentions new orleans i waive all the activation fees and give them the lowest possible rate i can find.

post 9/11, we had a website set up where people in NYC/DC could sign up for free service. i wrote an email to some of the execs today in an attempt to get them to do the same thing again. i tried to make it as heart-twinging as possible, 'cause even my normally cynical self shudders at articles like this interview with the mayor of new orleans.

so few people will sing to me.

today at the gym, the guy making my psuedo-lunch aka nutrition shake was loudly complaining. he was a personal trainer, and it was his first day. he was not enjoying his fill-in position as a temporary shakemaker.

i use soy instead of dairy and different protein than the default. he did not enjoy these deviations. he asked a coworker for help with each ingredient. she tried to point him to the shake recipe which was taped on the wall, but he continued to question her instead. to entertain myself, i decided to start adding all sorts of other ingredients to the shake (multivitamins! ginseng! what else can i get?) he glared at me.

after she left, when we were alone, i informed him that after he was done making the shake, it was part of bally's policy to sing a small morale song to the customer. i tried to make it sound as serious as possible. he stared at me. he appeared to be reaching for the phone to call the front desk.

i felt guilty, so i confessed that it was nothing personal, but that i just felt that not enough people have been singing to me lately.

for the first weekend in a long time, i plan to stay in town and relax. recently i finished the audiobooks of naked (funny) and a long way down (recommended!). this weekend i hope to finish reading snow crash. it was sitting by the free cascadia stage, so i picked it up and started reading. i ended up buying it online upon my return. i also want to finish listening to the curious incident of the dog in the night-time and among the missing. listening to among the missing is sometimes painful! i tend to prefer the melancholy, but these stories are depressing enough that it's sometimes too much. audible is having another referral contest, so if any of you have a deep desire for a free trial audiobook membership, let me know ;)

i might also go to the capitol hill block party. condor's band, now renamed chuck yay-grrr!, plays on saturday @ 12:45 @ the badjuju. the decibel electronic stage on saturday and sunday also has some good shit. and sunday, for the first week in a long time, i will be very happy to return to flammable.

a few people who've met me know this tale. i'm a so-called 'pear' body type.. even when i'm not in the greatest shape, my waist is on the smaller side but i have a large posterior.

one night i was heading through pioneer square to see some dj at the last supper club. a small guy in his 20s with saggin' pants was walking behind me. "hey shorty! shorty, wait up!" even though i knew he wasn't referring to my height, i still found it amusing to have a 5'2 guy address me as "shorty". i didn't follow his request to wait up, though.

he started jogging so that he could catch up with me and walk next to me. once we were side by side, he said: "girl, you got a ghetto bootay! you got a big ol' butt!"

i didn't really know what to say about that. it wasn't as if it was new information. i considered staring down at the area in shock and saying "whoa... you're right! when did that happen?". he clearly felt he was giving me a compliment, though... so i said "um, thanks."

he continued "only one problem - that butt is lookin' kinda hollow. bet i got something that could fill it out!"

at that point, i had to jog away... not out of fear, but because if i had stayed i would've collapsed on the street from laughing so hard.

a few minutes ago i was microwaving my lunch. i pressed the off button. when i opened the door and reached in to take it out.. it turned itself back on again and microwaved my arm!

i assumed i had just not pressed the off button strongly enough, so i closed the door, hit the off/reset button again, and opened the door again. again it turned itself back on and resumed microwaving.

that alarmed me, so i unplugged it. now i have to obsessively google what happens if you microwave your own arm for awhile ;)

i hate running. in middle school, we were required to run the mile. at first, i honestly tried.. but after only a short distance, my throat burned as though i had strep throat, i could barely breathe, and i had a terrible side cramp. i decided i loathed running, and from then on i would alternate between half-jogging and walking... clocking in at a 16-minute mile. needless to say, this resulted in everyone making fun of me incessantly. they couldn't stand the fact that they were making an effort and i clearly wasn't. i already didn't like how running felt physically, and now i decided i didn't like it psychologically either. so as soon as i was no longer forced to do it, i quit.

there are plenty of kinds of exercise that i actually like... skating, ballet, dance, yoga, swimming.. i even like cardio and weights. but instead of focusing on those, i have decided to start running again. i really don't know why... my hatred for it has definitely NOT declined with age. it hurts my thighs, knees, lungs, side... it is generally thoroughly unenjoyable. there's probably some sort of correct breathing method that i'm not using, or a way to align my feet. also, my 40gb ipod is really annoying to run with. i have an armband, but it still bounces up and down really hard and feels heavy and uncomfortable.

saturday i slept through kiki's birthday party due to ailment. brunch at lola's with iamdonte: good, but wasn't noteworthy enough to make it worth the price. then to rummage where we saw superjew.

she reminded me about diy academy which you all should check out.
all classes are cheap.. like $5-7.

'DIY ACADEMY is a series of low cost workshops that can enrich your life and local Seattle culture through the do-it-yourself movement. This series will run from June - August 2005. DIY is sustainable, affirming and really fun! Every person should have a chance to use the work of their hands and minds to empower themselves. Why fill your life with only what the corporate machine can sell you?'

things i have lost, had stolen, or broken/destroyed recently:

- new audiovox cellphone (cracked it right down the middle of the screen)
- puma gym bag i'd special ordered from chicago
- dior "addict" perfume (who steals perfume, anyway?)

i've also:
- slammed a 1920's era window on my hand really hard and it made a crunching sound
- skipped yoga to watch sideways (except it wasn't that good) and then class this morning
- cried at my own exhaustion during intimate moments, then mumbled apologies awkwardly
- eaten nothing but chocolate protein shakes for lunch for days because i seemingly can't
remember to bring my lunch to work, so i end up eating at the gym

my exam got rescheduled. i may stay in detroit another day. i'm debating how i feel about paying orbitz $130 to do that.

took me long enough. reply here if you want some questions to answer.

1) What do you covet most?

devoting my life to something(s) creative which has a positive effect to a significant number of people but still allows me to be financially self-sufficient. preferably something(s) nonprofit.

2) What do you fear most?

i regularly sink into depression/malaise which interferes with achieving #1 (and many other things). so i s'pose the answer is myself

3) What one object do you take everywhere?

keys. boring answer, but i gotta get back inside somehow. and frequently ipod

4) How long can you hold your breath?

not long. i have some undetermined problem where i'm regularly dizzy/lightheaded. i'm also a 10-year ex-smoker. ~1.5 minutes

5) What is your favorite texture?

the nape of the neck where it meets the hair

- no derrick carter.
- no jeremy caulfield/imonk/nordicsoul.
- big, nasty scene with me crying and throwing any nearby objects as weapons and being sad. i blame these ikea stainless steel kitchen shelves for being instigators. i slammed the toaster on one of them this morning as retaliation and listened to its hollow ringing sound. i will thwart them, though, despite their best efforts to bring me down.

+ getting cheered up by el guapo sandwich at honeyhole & iamdonte
+ i'm getting excellent grades despite my horrible school-work schedule. may even get a 4.0 this quarter
+ messing around with records
+ watched shaolin soccer and closer (the latter i enjoyed more for the script than for the film itself)
+ have i mentioned that i love wax on? i particularly love that they have a glass container of whiskey available for your pre-wax relaxation.
+ who was it that recommended the fortress of solitude? i'm listening to it as an audiobook and it is AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME. it's making me want to go back to nyc, though. i still haven't seen much beyond manhattan.

this weekend has been pretty awesome so far. friday night: very depressed, came home from work wanting to die. went out to dinner at crave and had the cheese/fruit sampler plate, wine, and the pasta w/shiitake mushrooms. so. good. unfortunately, i discovered the hard way that the large dose of rescue remedy i'd taken earlier does not mix well with wine. i went into the bathroom and laid my head on the toilet, listening to the pounding sounds of kris moon coming from the lower level. we headed downstairs for octave one. even though i was so messed up from the inadvertent drug combo, sitting down feeling my ass vibrate from the sound system that had been brought in for the occasion was still enjoyable. finally it abated and i danced.

today - walked downtown with nonstatic & enjoyed the sun. found an art gallery called olivodoce on 12th which apparently has been around for a long time. they had a show with painted speak-n-spells which i would've loved to have seen. the current show is called "100 artists 100 clocks" and it is absolutely worth checking out. one artist covered a digital alarm clock in menacing claws. while searching for web information about the gallery, i also found this blog which reviews some seattle galleries. went to gameworks and played lots of two-player arkanoid. even convinced him to play dance dance revolution with me. i'd forgotten how much i love it. now i'm making a mandarin orange-almond-crunchy salad and then heading to the l'usine & geoff white show.

apparently i've quit smoking again.

i'm still sick, and i haven't had a cigarette since.. i can't remember. i think thursday? friday? whatever.

anyway, since it's been this long, i figure i may as well stop.

dammit i have to figure out where to do my taxes online that won't charge much. i formerly could do that for free because i made so little money, but now i'm sure i'll have to pay. :/