H to the R

i think i'll carry on with the daily post, but do it on my own blog. it's a little lonely around here posting all by myself, so i might as well do it HERE. hopefully i can keep up the impetus.

summer in the south

thunder and lightning and rain and a full moon in southern oregon! yeah!

vanitas

today i missed the train by two inches. i could have reached out and felt the cold steel on my fingertips as it pulled from the station. i ran two blocks in a tube top and flip-flops and kept my iPod the whole way. so sad.

then, because the steel bridge is closed, i walked under it to the broadway bridge, up the stairs, down onto lovejoy and finally to work. truly, i am not complaining because i got to walk a while in the beautiful day, listen to music and smile at cute boys.

aaaah, summer.

(p.s. this is post number 27 for me. I've invited "myself" to be a contributor so that I don't have to log out of MY gmail in order to post here... yay! except now it links to my Renjitsu blog, but whatevs. <3 me!)

throwback

solo dance party

mj's pyt is possibly one of the best pop songs ever. crap, i shouldn't even throw down on that list. it would be long. shit, just the mj list would be long.

that's all i have right now because i'm cooking rice and beseeching my paleolithic g3 to run photoshop, itunes, and firefox all at the same time...

here's my playlist for tonight's s.d.p.
(apparently, i'll be slow-dancing with myself a lot)

burning up - madonna
pyt - michael jackson
the metro - berlin
alone - heart
if i close my eyes forever - lita ford and ozzy osbourne
view to a kill - duran duran
hold me now - duran duran
what about love - heart
dick in a box - from SNL
bliss - muse
london bridges - fergie

Defenestration of argot

...or throw the slang out the window.

It appears that we have lost one of our contributors. And I'm losing steam. But.. I must... carry...on.

Lately I've become disturbed by the quality of my vocabulary and grammar. Perhaps the books I've been reading aren't challenging my brain to pick up new words or more refined ways of speaking (Harry Potter...?) I usually end up assimilating types of speech when reading certain books. Beware when I've delved into Dickens. I forswear re-reading Stephen King's Dark Tower series. My gods, the shit I picked up from those tomes. Maybe I need to get into some critical theory, but phlpckack! How dry....

Okay, back to work.

Film screening tonight! Joy!

[in]eloquently,
S

That's a wrap.

For our second wedding anniversary, Bill and I decided to help our friend Daniel with the 48 hour film project. Daniel and I attended the kickoff where we drew our genre and were assigned a prop and a line of dialogue. We got: Road Movie, Jumper Cables, and "Okay, I think I got it straight."

So. We made a movie. Bill and two of his friends did the music, I "produced" and a number of our friends were cast and crew. Whew.

It's awesome and I can't wait to see it on the big screen.

-S

what good is sitting alone in your room?

some may not believe this, but i have never (until just now) seen Cabaret. the film. liza minelli is fa-bu-lous. completely. i love a good musical, but this movie kicked me in the pants. hard.

plus, Fosse? come on. his shit is right up my artistic alley. yeah, that sounds dirty.

life IS a cabaret,
Serenity

this just in

My promotion is official. The new title? Library Access Services Manager; whatta mouthful. In a letter of congratulation, a faculty member suggested some alternate titles: "the most fabulously responsive and efficient person in the library" or Vice President of Sensible Solutions, With Wizardry. I think I love the latter.

VP of SS, W/W.
Nice.

A couple of years ago upon declaring my intention to take over the world, a former faculty member gave me the future title of Supreme Majestrix, which I also love.

Along with the promotion comes a small pay increase. Somehow I stepped up and negotiated and received more than was offered. I've never done a thing like that before. I am very proud of myself, especially since I'll actually be able to pay some bills, and maybe, just maybe SAVE SOME MONEY!

Hooray.

With Wizardry,
Serenity

not a square to spare

effing crazy weekweekend on the horizon:
date with tony
learn how to use professional photo lights in 2 hours
work
set up in-home photo "studio"
shoot promo with boa (feathered, not scaled...)
do some photoshopping
email a good shot (hopefully)
work
first thursday art openings
hang with jess(?)
sleep the eff in
begin 48-hour film project....
sunday, whew
back to work

workityworkworkwork + somefun = satisfaction(?)

busily,
s

anisoptera

(i forgot to post yesterday. dang.)

i love the part of the summer when the skies are abuzz with giant dragonflies. sometimes i think they're hummingbirds, but upon closer inspection, i realize that they are not birds!

s

mo money

ill give the first person
who figures out
the tie-in to the last two
posts one million
dollars-in monopoly money

butterfly decal review mirror hoggin the scene

everything in my life right now
is an rem lyric
which is sweet in a way because
i get to re-invent each song
until lifes rich pageant...

its hard to dodge after that...

" buy the sky
and sell the sky
and reach your arms up
to the sky
and ask the sky
and ask the sky
'don't fall on me!
don't fall on me!
don't fall on me!"

maybe these maps and legends
have been misunderstood...

-g

tech support

the radio works if you turn it on and then dial the right frequency.

s

weird things on the coast

north of seaside there's a shipwreck on the beach near the dunes. the skeletal prow is what you see and my first thought was that it was a smallish fishing boat. then i noticed the smokestack. further down the beach there were tall metal posts sticking out of the sand. it must've been a really big ship. it's kinda surreal to see a shipwreck surrounded by brightly clothed vacationers.

i also found a couple of pieces of red sand-dollar. i didn't know they came in that color. hopefully, that's not some nasty chemical adaptation.

also there's a place called "klootchy." haha.

-s

addendum: the ship is the wreck of the Peter Iredale that ran aground in 1906. All 25 crew and the 2 stowaways were saved. What I thought was a smokestack was actually one of the masts! (It was a 285-foot, four-masted barque.)

what's that floatin' in the water?

day twenty three
repairs are nearly completed
to the sails and the rigging

the radio seems hopeless at
this point... i find myself
settling into this drift...

dot dot dot
dash dash dash
dot dot dot

-g

rollerskate therapy

in march my husband and i got another dog. we already had a sharpei/lab mix named beefy and he's the most perfect dog in the world. we knew that it would be really difficult to find another dog as cool, but we were hoping to find one that was complementarily cool. (yes, that's a word. i just made it up.) i had a medium, lab/pit mix in mind or maybe a fuzzyfaced terrier type. instead we got mossberg. he's a 90-pound sharpei/st. bernard mix. yep.

mossberg is very sweet and he and beefy love each other. he loves the dog park and though he has severe hip dysplasia, mossberg can run like the wind.

his only problem? on-leash aggression. mossberg HATES rolling things: skateboards, scooters, the occasional bike. actually, i think he hates loud noises and fast-moving things. moss barks and lunges when these things come near and nothing you say gets through to him. he once even lost it when a woman was walking down the street with some pots and the handles were banging together. i am really uncomfortable with his behavior because i worry that some day he'll get away from me and hurt someone. he is 90 pounds. 40 less than me. that ain't a big difference when you're trying to restrain an animal that has a brain like a chicken.

i read up on aggression in dogs and one of the things that struck me was the theory that dogs on leashes feel out of control. and if coupled with noises that scare them, the loss of control can make a normally friendly dog go nuts. a suggestion was to sound happy and excited with them (be jolly) when there are things that scare them. if you're okay, they'll see it's okay and feel better... hm.

we live in a massive basement studio. yeah, that sounds contradictory, but it'd make sense if you saw it. i decided to try to desensitize mossberg to some of the things he doesn't like. i put on some good dance music, laced up my skates, and turned my apartment into a rink. i practiced my turns and backwards skating. mossberg and beefy chased me around the apartment and moss only bit at me a few times. it was more like mouthy playing, but i was a bit freaked. i was worried that he'd attack me or i'd fall down and bill would come home to find my face eaten off like that lady in britain.

after awhile, mossberg got bored and flopped down in the middle of my rink. i think i'll try to have some more sessions with him because he could get used to it and i got a bit of a workout.

i'm not sure if my "methods" of dog training are effective or healthy, but i'm fairly desperate and i'm willing to try just about anything. we're not ready to give up on old chicken-brain. it's time to eat some zingers and watch prime suspect 4 with the dogs. aaaah, junkfoodmovie therapy.

mossberg:



determined,
S

p.s. i'm now re-reading Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince. i guess i'm going backwards now.

tgif

only one thing stands between me
and the weekend and i got a feeling
its gonna coast...

two shows tonight!
one is in the park though
and may get rained out...
oh pdx....

but the other is at the joint
my friends hubby works at
and shall be three scoops of
fun

payday!

-g

what's a producer?

it's happening. soon. if you miss me august 8-10, that's what i'll be doing. yehaw.

nervously,
S

faithfully

missed several days worth of
posts.... been on a camping trip
but now im back- been trying to
deal with a breakup and not doing
too good at it... keep getting reeled
back in like the godfather...
"they keep pulling me back in"

dont know what to do about the
heart stuff- doesnt seem to
be any solution/relief in sight...

this is like yelling
"hello" into a big
empty container...

-g

oh yes, she did.

we just received a donation at work that included a playboy publishing book on creative nude photography, circa 1980. my boss showed me and a coworker a photo of a girl with weird, huge, 70s boobs wearing only a macrame plant holder as a necklace. or maybe it was a necklace. um, awkward.

while it was a very funny photo, it's one that i would have laughed at with my friends and a select couple of coworkers. not loudly in front of patrons, and certainly not with my boss.

anyhew, why am i so very timid when it comes to speaking up sometimes?

then....*shudder*... she showed it to a member of the faculty. luckily he's young and hip and he is a bit more advanced, but come on. ew.

cringing with awkwardness,
S

small town

sometimes i wonder what i would be like if i grew up in portland. well, any city with a large number of inhabitants. would i be more competent, confident, jaded, wealthy? i wonder too the ramifications of growing up where i did and when (pop. 16,000 or so, circa 1989 - 199something.) i guess when i say "grew up" i mean where i went to high school. before that it was an even smaller town off of highway 3, not interstate 5.

my dad used to tell me a story when i was little about the witch who lived in the orange groves. he lived on the edge of some orange groves in southern california during the late fifties and he and his sisters would terrify each other with stories of the witch.

i imagined a green expanse dotted with orange blobs. in the center, a rickety wooden windmill that leaned solicitously to the nearest trees. the witch lived in the tower and protected the groves from pests, poachers, and weather. she somehow used the windmill to control storms and the like. none of this is actually what my dad told me, i don't think, but when he described the place, this is what i imagined.

if i grew up in a big city i probably would never have seen a rodeo, tree frogs, or crazy lightning from a geodesic dome.

wistfully,
S

all good things...

finally read watchmen. after hearing about it for years and then seeing the preview for the upcoming movie, i decided to read it. damn.

today was a weird sort of ending-of-things type of day. i finished re-reading the 7th harry potter, watched the last episode ever of star trek the next generation (season 7, btw), and read watchmen. i haven't had a day like that in a while.

i should be going to bed, but after all these endings, i feel sort of cast loose. maybe i'll root around in my bookshelves for an old standby. gibson?

fanatically,
S

swan garden

we tried a new (to us) chinese food restaurant in our neighborhood. it shoulda been the best considering my rule-of-chinese-restaurant: the sketchier, the better. i'll try it again because i love good/bad chinese food.

here's my fortune:
you will be transforming a situation in your life now with a positive attitude.

work, maybe?

uncomfortably full,
S

half-assed

posting quickly before running out to karaoke.

yep.

that's my post for the day.

-s

my real friday post-by g

all day long in van with no air
conditioning(which is mostly ok
cuz i dont really like that
shit anyhow)

took five minutes to let
that shit cool down from
all the driving in the heat
and got to sit on a "cliff"
up by mt hood (oregon)

solo road trips are always interesting
because at some point
i reach a spot where im talking
to myself so loudly
that it makes my throat sore and then
things get really weird...

i am as lost today as i was
last night when i wrote about the gaping
maw but i managed to find a road
50 miles from portland that
has no road signs and further
managed to find the business on that
road that has no posted address
nor the name of the company on
the front side or back of the building...

over and out
g

gaping maw

-well this is going to post as fridays
entry even though technically
(where im from) its thursday night...
...no its not because of the time
difference- its because i haven't gone to
sleep yet...

because im busy fighting the future...
i want to believe but
the future is still a gaping maw
(see title) because im not saving
my marriage
and im not saving my academic
career and im not saving much
of anything right now...

at least this blog is saving
shit for me...

this blog is becoming a secret narrative
about the real reason im out here
in the first place... last year
when i past the fifteen year anniversary
mark of living in pdx i kept saying fifteen
years in capital letters... FIFTEEN YEARS!!!
i'd say and i'd be right... and i'd sound like
jeremy piven in grosse point blank when
he's yelling at john cusak for disappearing
without a goodbye or anything... except he
was yelling TEN YEARS!!! and smoking a joint...

i feel as stuck as ever and i still press forward...
i think i need to lean into the
wind a little more...

...or disappear more

-g

forget about your house of cards

stuff, things, junk, crap

the REAL post for today is about STUFF

i need to do some research into technology grants for artists. to spend $2000 on a new computer, a camera and necessary components would kick my ass, but to an organization who wants to further an artists career, it might be like spit in a bucket. (gawd, i love that metaphor.)

anyway. i have had the opportunities in the past to photograph my friends and i believe that i could do it really well if i had the right equipment. hmmm...

i gotta go eat breakfast. more thoughts later.

materialistically,
serenity

p.s. g, you always spread good. even when you're crabby. 3, me

the art of indistinct divination

yesterday's post was written during the all-staff retreat, but i didn't use a computer all day, so it never got posted. oops. also, there was a large amount of vodka involved with my afterallstaffretreat.

in light of the aasr (see above for acronym definition), my post for yesterday will seem a bit ironic. but what the hell. i never said i am actually a real grownup.

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

something weird happened to me last year. i can't really put my finger on the exact date or time, but there was a click. no, it was a crack. like a tree hit by lightning that splits down the center and is engulfed by flames.

i am no longer terrified of the future. it doesn't exist for me as a gloomy nebula into which i'm hurtling headlong. it exists, but instead of being a heavy tangible terror, it just is. the opacity is becoming more transparent.

when thinking about the future lately, i haven't gotten the searing pit of anxiety and dread in my stomach. it's actually quite exciting.

maybe it has been becoming 30, evolving in my job, or somehow maintaining my marriage. possibly these things are symptoms of what some would call being a "grownup."

the weirdest part of it all is that i just noticed one day that i felt different. nothing happened. there was no lightning. not really.

-----------------------
warily unfrightened,
serenity

negative creep

well now... i wasnt the most cheerful
fella yesterday i guess...
im trying to be a better person
and one of the main things about that
is not to be so harsh or critical...

what is the root of all this
bitterness and angst...?
its such a waste of energy anyhow...
i want to use that energy
to produce and i want to
bring good into the world...

so thats my mission

-g

gold star for robot boy

boring leading the bored

i am working a late shift tonight so
some people can sit around and talk
about some stuff and feel like their
lives are moving forward and have some
purpose and
then tomorrow i have to wake up
early to come in and sit thru a
day long meeting that promises
to be more of the above...

they didnt get to me when i was
a kid and ive been taking out
the trash and painting garbage cans
and mopping up for two decades....

they dont understand that
it ALL sounds like jargon...
even the most well intentioned
thoughtful people either
sound like wet blankets on the one
side or hawkish mongers on
the other (and im not talking about candidates)

i and i survive

-g

a slip of genius

my fortune from dinner last night at pho jasmine:
you will attract cultured and artistic people to your home.

awesome

wild night!

-made it to the top of my desk!
(the surface has been obscured
therefor crazy-making for
way too long now...!!! stress
level normalizing...)

-scheduling nightmare with band...
not really a nightmare but more like
sleeping in a chair and waking up with
a neck ache...

-i am a reactionary... there i said it!
(er... well i wrote it)

- i could teach a class on the hidden functionalities
of push pins
(among many other types of
office products...
office depot really
oughta have me on retainer
in R & D or something...)

-once this clutter in the office is
thwarted i shall never again
let admail thru the gates

-keep going deeper and deeper
into a land that exists only as
an improbability but never the less
stands as the measure of record...

-despite the roller coaster i am
going to have another glorious
day tomorrow

hope you do too!

-g

did the babylonians have day-glo?

tony prepares to make a wish on his ziggurat of neon brownies and beautiful rose cake. (candles not indicative of age.) ziggurat by "Gresham" (as Willie was calling her.. yes, to her face) and rose cake by Joaquin.

here's a better picture of the rose cake.

eff the effing eff

oh no, oh no, ohnoohononoono! i missed a post. upon breaking my slumber this morning i realized that i totally forgot to post yesterday. i am sorry. my only excuses involve lack of sleep and jean-luc picard, and those aren't very good. everyone (the aether and/or the 'royal' everyone) please forgive my horrible lapse.

i'm writing this without reading gregory's last post. i feel so behind. i am a behind. ha.

whew.

here's a list of my vows:
drink one amount of water equal to each amount of coffee imbibed
post EVERY day
get more sleep
learn how to say 'no' and graciously
stop being so hard on myself

m'kay, bye. i'm not sure if i should post twice today to make up for yesterday that way i have 365 posts at the end or if i should leave yesterday blank like a gaping tooth hole or for the prophet. hmmmm... methinks 365. will ask g.

you need a heart to live

anyone know where that quote is from?
10 bonus points!

anyhow a friend recently told
me to open up my heart
to people and im not so sure its
gonna work out
but i am going to follow thru
with a whole bunch of other
plans...

i feel like i wrote this boring
entry in
boring oregon

-g

(ps-you dont need a heart to live)

in which i fillet a fish. ew.

okay, so technically i am writing this on the next day, but as gregory had a post where he hadn't yet been to bed, i can do so too.

on thursday i found a moment to myself, so i went across the street to the asian market for some groceries. i decided to buy a whole fish and cook it. i've never done this before, so i didn't really know what i was doing. luckily the fish was already dressed, but i did have to fillet it. i thought that i had to cut the head off before filleting, so i did. it was disturbing. but also not.

all in all, i bought a $2.78 fish and got two fat fillets off of it. i steamed them in the bamboo steamers in a sauce of soy sauce, sesame oil, ginger and rice vinegar. it was delicious!

so that's my post for the day.

today was filled with a good friend from out of town, the dog park, and a friend's birthday party. amazing.

-s
post 4
(my promises that the next will be less boring.)
p.s. i now have a keyboard that isn't missing its left shift, control, and option keys so i might soon be using better writing skilz.

whats weird about that?

so a major league soccer team
subdues a naked man on a flight
from L.A.

the naked guy apparently wanted to
get off the plane while it was
in the air

one of the soccer players who subdued
him related that the man said
something really weird to him:
"I don't hear you, I don't see you"

im flyin back to new york
in august and
i really hope there aren't any
soccer players on the flight

the steel bridge

i just saw batman and i can't really talk about it right now, so for the time-being i'll post a picture. this is one of the reasons i fell in love with portland.



-s
post... uh, 3?

discipline:its not just for kids anymore

...or the title could be

 its whats for dinner!

but really its me trying to 

 stay with the once a day 

entry...

tonight the crew i work with 

 is converging to witness 

brother J's offering to the thunder

 gods

watching keefmatties place tonight

 

playing a wedding tomorrow

!

-g

sleep is for the weak

-so technically this post counts 

   as thursdays entry for me (g)

cuz i haven't been to sleep yet

  and we're kinda keepin this 

 as a diary type thingy... so if this 

  was on paper... well im rambling 

because apparently im weak 

 from lack of sleep...

why am i still up? because 

 the batman premiered tonight

at 1201am and i was there w/tanner

 and his crew... awesome marcus

 gave me a free ticket that some girl 

 in line let go of cuz her friends abandoned 

 her... 

riding home during a full moon cloudless 

 sky- my day was a cloud of frustration 

 and weird vibes but it was sprinkled with 

diamonds... free lunch/first swim of the 

 season in my

 pool(why did i wait

 so late to set it up?)/great session with 

 joey reviewing slides for the next 

thousandpointsoflight(one of my bands)

 show....  great rehearsal for ryan and annas'

 wedding... cap it off with a movie 

about a man...  who is a bat! 

(thanks for the line tanner)

well no movie spoilers but i will 

 say one thing: make sure yr there 

 early cuz the watchmen preview

is off the hook!!!! im getting it of 

 my shelf right now and 

drifting off to dream land

-g

AiPod?

my iPod just played a joke on me. first, it played "Bowie," by Flight of the Conchords.

Bowie's in space
Bowie's in space
Whatcha doin' out there man?
That's pretty freaky, Bowie.

and then it played "Fame," by David Bowie.
weird little shuffle.

bum rush the show (or Chuck D. for Prez.)

riding home tonight listening to P.E.

 "I refuse to blow a fuse"

...saved me in traffic cuz i was about to 

 pop

aitchophilia

i am now obsessed with the letter h. one can search flickr for a letter and find hundreds of them. it's amazing. i am also now totally obsessed with my flickr account.

h{eart},
S

(post 2)

La Ville-lumière

i was in paris (yes, france) for bastille day about 16 years ago. my sister and i woke up to the ground shaking. we ran out of our room and to the wraparound walkway. tanks were casually rolling through the streets.

we went to the champs élysées to watch the parade. so many men in uniform; firemen in shiny helmets, frogmen riding inflatables (as in scuba divers. i'm not being derogatory).

fireworks at the eiffel tower and funny double-cupola cones of multi-flavored sorbet ended our evening.

i love paris. i love it with all the romance and swollen heart of my 15-year old self. the scent of freesias and diesel fumes will always smack me with a kaleidoscope jumble of parisian memories. though i've devoted my life to art and the study thereof, my most pinchingly sweet memories are of the quotidian. baguettes, le dragon joyeux (best chinese food ever), flowers, beautiful women, cigarettes, pay toilets, coffee, sidewalk cafés... sigh. j'aime paris.

p.s. la marseillase is such a bloody national anthem: may their tainted blood soak our furrows? fuck yeah.

toujours,
serenity

(post one)

pd(xile)

as of 11:15 am i have lived in portland

for 5844 days(read 16yrs)...

-i lost my hearing in my right ear

on the flight out... it gradually

came back but that ear has been

fkkd up ever since...

-i didnt know i was moving here

that day (i kinda still dont)

-is it true that every cell in

yr body is replaced so that yr

a different person every five years?

have i really been 3 different people

since then?- i know i didnt eat salad

or chinese food b4 i came out here

-i love every single one of you

-g

(first post)