oh! happy bday bunkadoo!

i arrived back in champaign about an hour ago...and there were three soaking wet boxes on my porch. three boxes...sitting in the rain, snow, and floods that apparently happened here while i was in dc. not to be confused with the rain, snow, and floods that happened in dc while i was in dc. who the hell would send me boxes while i was out of town you say??? who else...the dreaded ex. impressive that almost all of it is completely ruined because it was sitting in water outside for at least a week. at least i can ring out the old year fully and completely.

oh...and my younger brother is now engaged.

yesterday's book selection was...microserfs by douglas coupland. especially if you work at or have ever worked at microsoft. you will undoubtedly feel warm and fuzzy when he describes all that is the eastside. particularly funny (to me) are the mentions of the pro club.

60 minutes II has on a piece called sex, lies & videogames, which shows b-b-b-b-b-b-ill in mill-d playing the reporter in the only fun game that's in fuzion frenzy, sumo. anyway it was largely a fluff piece on videogames aimed at *older* *mature* audiences (from the sims online to bmx xxx) but when they showed the microsoft parts i was hoping that i'd see someone that i knew walking around outside the building. no such luck.

whoa...i made it! i'm actually the newest member of that experimental social theatre group now. AND i'm going to get to perform my piece "15-to-life" in april. and that's not all!!!! i also won a full tuition and fee waiver for spring...thank god! so despite the monsoon we are having outside (and, yes, i have yet another leak in my roof)...today's a pretty sunny day!

harlan pointed out via email today that i do have fans of my blog, even if no one else except bunkadoo ever leaves me comments...i dunno...sniff...it seems that only bunkadoo really cares...sniff...

[was that pathetic enough for everyone? ;) ]

so here's the situation: the university has this special course that you can take if you are a grad student nearing completion which makes you look like a full time student only you don't have to pay tuition. the benefit to taking this course is that your student loans don't kick in because it looks like you are still registered. ah...so you are waiting for the catch 22? you cannot be receiving any funding, including student loans while you take this oh-so-special course. so once again the graduate school rushes in to help out those who are in a situation where apparently they don't need any money because they are being supported by their spouse or whatnot. terrific! outstanding!

btw, have you seen that visa ad where this salesgirl freaks out when she sees that british girl from frasier and it turns out that she's only freaking out because she's using a visa card? anyway, christina from high school is the freaking out salesgirl.

i'm going to reach out and choke insight communications. for two months now my internet access has been absolute shit and they have already been out here twice and i'm sooooooo glad that they took over for excite@home when they went belly up. right.

anyway, i'm up working on my dissertation if you can believe that and i have to say...i'm getting a LOT bit sick of adding, deleting, re-adding, re-deleting my human subjects forms as appendices everytime someone changes their mind as to whether or not it should be in the document. i'm thinking about turning in old drafts as new drafts every now and again just to see what happens. but you know...at this point i'm just at the "fine...you want me to say that i love pickled herring in chapter four? fine..." stage of writing.

it's true. they've beaten me down.

starting at midnight, my favorite coffee shop in urbana (as opposed to champaign) will be open 24 hours a day. unfortunately it's only for exam week. why the fuck aren't there any 24/7 coffee shops in this town? and for that matter...24/7 bookstores. for that matter...why isn't everything open 24/7? who needs sleep, right??

so yesterday i had a dream about greg sending me back my stuff (hahaha) and today on jenny jones...or some show just like it..."give me back my stuff!" wow. did i will that show or what? greg has my blogger mug, a $200 rain jacket, TWO (2) pairs of my running shoes, a super cool blue sony cd walkman WITH external speakers...plus ALL MY SUMMER CLOTHES which at this point who cares...but what a fucking slacker.

gwyneth paltrow is playing the part of sylvia plath in an upcoming bbc movie? yeah. i can see it. right.

so no matter how many times that i tell art boy that i think he really needs to get some professional help...he won't do it. and i know that i can't make him and his other friends can't make him but i'm sorry...winding up in the er the other night because you drank almost a whole bottle of vodka when (1) you haven't had a drink in years and (2) you were alone...need i say more? and what exactly was the crack staff at the er thinking that night to not bother to even take his blood alcohol level?

uh...why exactly am i obsessed with making glass xmas ornaments in bizarre and non-xmas color combinations right now? oh well. keeps me off the streets. not really though. every now and again i run out of paint and have to go down the street to get more.

btw, the plan for dc, part two is december 20 - 30. maybe this time i'll not miss the fucking plane and will actually have time to call and see people while i'm there.

i'm completely covered with paint. well, no, not really COMPLETELY covered. i was in "project mode" today and you know that usually means that i'm up to no good. at least i didn't destroy the apartment...this time. anyway, it was a pretty ok weekend in general and isn't it funny how my depression seems to be lifting now that it is 4000 degrees below zero? i have some kind of fucked up reverse SAD or something.

watched in the gloaming again on hbo this afternoon and thought of marvin. and i thought about what it means to go home to die...when do you decide it's time? i miss how funny you were marvin...i miss how completely, completely outrageous you were and how you sometimes told me WAY too much information. perhaps you meant to shock me. perhaps it was because you really needed me or someone or anyone to listen. i'll never really know and it doesn't really matter which it was or what else it could have been now but i hope that i heard...completely heard...all you wanted to tell me.

so who wants to go to SXSW with me in march??? come on people! let's go! i'm dying to go to the film sessions.

it's world aids day and i miss marvin.

ok, ok...so i fucked up the whole tgiving holiday by oversleeping and missing my 6am flight outta here last friday, which completely screwed up my entire flight pattern and the only flight left was one that had me getting in sunday evening and leaving...well, this morning at the crack o' dawn. but i survived but unfortunately i wasn't at my parent's house long enough to call anyway because of aimee's wedding. whew. but i'm back now and trying to figure out my plan for xmas...do i even bother staying through new years because, shit, like there's ever anything to do in dc on new years. fucking republicans. ok, ok...there's NEVER anything to do in dc on new years whether or not the republicans are in the white house...but, hey, i'm sure that the republicans have something to do with the suckiness of the city, right? so let's blame them!

last new years, i was in seattle as you know dressed as the comic book character death from the sandman series for that lame heaven and hell ball...the one that we walked back from and my feet were bleeding by the time we got back from those crappy shoes that i'd bought that day? anyway, despite that...it would be nice to have something to do this year...i just don't know if i feel up for anything. any fun suggestions anyone? i have a frequent flier ticket to burn (continental us only though...).

my grandparents are coming for xmas. time to ask the doctor for something for anxiety...like, say, heroin.

so laugh with me...i am! art boy is now dating...my next door neighbor???? say it isn't so! he IMed me and told me. now that is too, too funny.

ok so i'm not looking at that post-doc position anymore. i'm just concentrating on my writing, my photography...and oh yeah...my dissertation and all those hundreds of thousands of fucking videotapes. i had to buy a new battery for my digital camera...$60!!! ugh...it did last 5 years but still. i really wish that i could afford a new camera though...the resolution on mine is pretty good actually but the zoom completely sucks. it's just starting to get a bit annoying to not be able to really focus in on things like this cool window on the front of the GSLIS building and that garbage (really) in front of C.O. daniels at the end of the ohio state game weekend. you know what i mean?

i must be clearly insane, right? i'm actually considering applying for a post-doc for next year? and the application has to be postmarked by thursday? lord...i never ever thought that i would be looking at a post-doc position. but it actually kind of sounds cool.

ok, since you asked...i'm mainly not looking forward to the holidays because i don't want to deal with being asked a hundred thousand times why i am not finishing this fall. yeah, yeah...i'm such a disappointment. blah, blah, blah. seriously, though...i am getting a bit sick of it. so many people seem to have opinions about it...but give me a break...i'm doing the best that i can.

you know... i just finished my third 300 page journal in less than six months...whoa...that's 900 pages of future novel material and that's pretty damn cool i think.

i slept for way too long today and my back is killing me probably from wearing those platform boots for too many hours last night at the party. but the party was fun and my bjork was a big hit and i still have glitter in my hair and all over this place and my cats look like they were at a rave last night because the glitter has even stuck to their fur.

but i'm a little...a lot...sad today realizing that it has now been 6 months since the breakup and i feel completely robbed and i wonder if you can sue someone over work and time lost due to heartbreak but probably not. i keep thinking that he's going to send MY stuff back but he doesn't seem to be in any kind of hurry about it. the holidays are pretty much going to suck this year i think.

btw, i'll be in dc in about a week and a half for all you dc people. i'll be getting in on friday the 22nd and leaving on dec 2. i'll be at aimee's wedding from the 25th through the 27th though. just so you know.

believe it or not i went to happy hour tonight. it was ok but i did feel pretty detached. let's face it...i really just don't like hanging out at bars chatting with people that i kind of know but not really. and speaking of former happy hour crowds...some of art boy's crowd was at 02 tonight. they got there right before we were leaving so i doubt any of them saw me, which is just as well. not sure i wanted to reunite.

so there's a "be your inner celebrity" cocktail party on saturday night and who am i going as? yep. bjork.

i'm going through this bizarre electronic organization bug right now where i have to have all my dissertation videos catalogued just so, all my mp3s properly labeled, etc. psychosis, clearly.

the problem with doing research that involves looking at large volumes of video data is that after a while you really really really begin to hate your research participants. i mean not them so much. it's more like having to watch the same stupid awful tv show over and over and over again that was cancelled after only three episodes because the plot sucked, the actors sucked, and it really just wasn't all that interesting to begin with. so you start seething with RAGE everytime you have to watch them saying the same pointless things...over and over and over again. rage. seething with rage.

so i voted today and i forgot that my polling station, which is at some church down the street, is ultra ultra conservative so perhaps i was a little too, uh, bizarrely dressed for the seniors volunteering from the retirement home next door. but anyhoooo...that "i voted" sticker can look like a cool little logo for your t-shirt if you wear it dead center of your shirt versus off to the side. went super well with my red patent leather doc martins and that insanely insane purple necklace that i picked up at zen on broadway when i was in seattle last week.

cha cha chaaaaaaaa...

ok, ok...i'm going to bed. but first...let me remind you about andrea's superhero designs since many have asked me what on earth is this wild scarf that i'm now wearing around my neck. well, you can get one of your own at andrea's site.

according to googlism...

michelle hinn is offered in several formats (ed note: that should clear things up a LOT for my therapist)

michelle hinn is a ph (ed note: what? just a ph? without the d...guess you get that when you turn in the dissertation. lol)

michelle hinn is a doctoral student in educational psychology at the university of illinois and a research assistant at the national center for supercomputing applications (ed note: yes...for a very long time now)

you are truely crazy jerome but i'll write the novel with you next november just as long as you keep the other night a total secret...you know...when i met you and that other person at the place near the place we were at last time when that thing happened and all the sudden that guy yelled "what the fuck does that have to do with leftover tacos?" and then the police showed up but by then we were laughing next door behind that gate with the sign that told us that we couldn't go on the ride unless we were this tall and those girls who were wearing those outfits burst out laughing over that one band that sang that song about that one restaurant with the name that reminded us all of something from a night not long ago and yet still it seems that so much time has passed since the blind guy told us the secret behind the meaning of that thing that we saw the day that everything changed.

so what time am i meeting you guys this weekend?

marvin...you were a friend of mine...

aids sucks.

ok...why i am sitting, typing this on my laptop on the friggin' floor while my cats are on the bed all stretched out? anyway, it's become very cold and windy here all of the sudden and most of the trees have already lost all their leaves. i wonder why i find this time of year to be the most beautiful...i guess that even though everything is dying all around, there's hope in knowing that at least some things will be back again when spring rolls around.

tomorrow marks the ten year anniversary of amy's death and i was just re-reading the diaries from that summer and finding it hard to believe that we were ever that young, that any of that actually happened, that she was still alive.

just got back from the airport, via chicago's chinatown where we had dinner before hitting the road. am pretty damn tired right now but i survived. i didn't get to see everyone i wanted to see while i was in seattle but i did get a chance to meet bunkdoo for dinner at snappy dragon and it was good to see him again. and he brought me some fun new games!

so i have about 4000 new emails from when i was gone so i'll have to look at them tomorrow and try to catch up. because i'm pretty damn tired right now.

seattle again. this time i'm staying in wallingford and so far no trip to capitol hill. so i did the exchange of "the stuff." sort of. he who shall not be named is mailing my stuff. but i gave all his stuff back to a mutual friend.

but anyway...i walked from the u district back to paul's house in wallingford and on the walk i passed by some of the places...you know...the places that you aren't sure if your heart will lurch if you see them again? but i was ok. i guess the fact that the u district looks like campustown did over the summer made it seem different thank god.

just a few hours until we leave for midway and i have a meeting with my thesis chair somewhere in between now and then. i'm really too tired to be going on this trip but i need to make the journey now and face everything...or at least some things. like the city...like some of the old haunts...old friends.

yeah, it's pretty late again and lately i haven't been able to fall asleep before 3 or 4am. i'm not sure what exactly i did all day but it doesn't seem to have been all that much. i did finish another journal today and it dawned on me that maybe i should go get a new one tomorrow for my trip, one that doesn't have metal covers with sharpish edges like the others i have in reserve. i'm not sure that airport security would exactly dig that. i could use my leopard print journal but i'd already promised myself that i'd use that as my next research journal instead...because nothing says *legit academic* like leopard print, you know?

haha. ever flip through the channels at this time of night and survey the infomercials that are on? there's this "flavor express deluxe injector and decorator kit" on now that basically lets you add cream filling to cake-like substances. and, yes, while it *is* quite a super bargain at only $12.67, i'm thinking that you could, oh say, BUY SOME FUCKING TWINKIES and save yourself some trouble.

so the people in the human subjects research office told me today that they'd come to a consensus, that they liked my hair better when it was red. and you know what that means...black hair all winter long! YAY!

oh...apparently i was one of the three big winners of the psych happy hour "plagiarize a song contest" (ok, there were only three entries so everyone "won") with my version of king of pain. wildly funny if you are doing research in psych. anyone else would probably say that it's time to up the meds again. but speaking of meds or psychosis/neurosis/thesis...beads. beads. beads. what the FUCK was going on this afternoon at the coffee shop at krannart art? oh right...THAT'S a good idea. go move to fucking new mexico and make beaded necklaces with a PhD. where's commencement this year? at the psych ward at carle?

ok sorry. i'll try to be more "E for everyone" next time.

just got off the phone with sleepless and everything's all set for my return to seattle next week for icls. you know who will be out of the country so i think at least mentally that will make it easier on me. and speaking of that...we finally talked about the "return of the stuff" the other day. you know, that conversation where you have to discuss the logistics of getting your stuff back from the other person. what was so interesting about the conversation was how it was really just about "the stuff" and nothing else. and that always amazes me...how you can be so close to someone, how you can be at a place in your life where you think "wow, this is it, this is the one" and then all that's left to say, or at least all that can be said, is cold and businesslike...as if you never knew the person at all. and i guess that there's a lot of truth to that. i'm not quite certain that i ever knew him at all.

something that we were withholding made us weak until we found it was ourselves. [robert frost]

that which we do not bring to consciousness appears in our lives as fate. [carl jung]

i'm going to finally get some dinner now but you'll notice that all my old blog postings from the fairy tale blog are all back now.

ok ok ok dammit i will i will i will update this.

maybe.

it's very late and it's now september and where exactly did the summer go? cece's right, really. we say this every year. but i just feel like i have really good excuses this time.

the middle of night is always a strange place to be and i find myself here quite often these days. i'm trying to get off this cycle but it's not as easy as you might think. i found this quote earlier that i think sums up what we can learn from depression if we are able to:

in the depths of winter i finally learned there was in me an invincible summer...camus.

and i've found the invincible summer before...but this winter is not quite over yet.

school is starting again and i'm still here and i just got through dying my hair black for the second time this summer. i was getting sick of the two toned red and black checkerboard style hair. black seems to suit me well right now. i'm such a pollyanna these days as you know.

i have a new cell phone number now -- email me if you would like it. i decided to finally get another one since no one can seem to find me ever these days. i just hope that i don't become one of those cell phone people who have conversations about some fight that they are having with some backstabber and how they are "late" all in the middle of the grocery store.

nothing happened this month either apparently

jesse sends this link to origami boulder. is this for real or what??

so what should i do to make this a better blog? i have to admit that this new blog of mine is definitely not very exciting and i'm pretty bad at updating it.

well...until i figure out what to do, here's a music recommendation for you: the breeder's new album. check out track three, off you. "i am the makeup on your eye."

are you tired?

my father collapsed at a dinner last night. he's ok now but we are still waiting to hear what might have caused it. kind of makes the whole breakup thing seem like a bad hair day in comparison, eh?

so i'm not sure where exactly you'll be able to get a copy of this cd but if you happen upon sadstyle, grab it. i'm not too sure about this all music site though...irene cara's what a feeling is a related cd??? uh, yeah. compare and contrast some sample lyrics:

what a feeling
by irene cara

what a feeling
bein's believin'
i can have it all, now i'm dancing for my life
take your passion
and make it happen
pictures come alive, now i'm dancing through my life
what a feeling

pathetic
by s

hope you feel
like you've lost this game
i hope you feel
like you're missing something
i hope you cry
when you get home
are you missing me?

yeah...pretty damn close.

fuck...i hate when i lose a post that i was working on...

jesse and i saw the new star wars at this great little 1920's art deco theatre in the middle of nowhere (yeah, more middle of nowhere than here) with the best sound system in this state outside of chicago. we both really liked the movie, with the exception of the supposed *love* story. the guy who was managing the theatre told jesse and i this great story about how his wedding reception was at that theatre and about how they showed slides of their courtship (yeah, he used that word) on the screen during the reception. and it was quite a touching story, actually. you kind of had to be there. and on the way we passed a little town called hope (i'm serious). and maybe there is still that in spite of everything. it would be nice to believe in that.

it's raining like crazy out there. my car is in the shop. i missed a meeting this morning. good.

so my hair is now black. comic book black, complete with that blue-ish sheen to it! and i feel a bit different now. as jesse says, it gives me a new view of things from the edge. boy this is going to surprise a lot of people when they see it, especially those that missed it the first few times around!

...and above all, remember to keep your head up.
otherwise, no one will see you've been crying.

i am numb and it brings me comfort for a time. i want to feel nothing right now as to feel anything more would shatter me. i have felt enough of grief for now and i have had enough.

i want so badly to know. jesse tells me that all it would be would be a story, some kind of list of possible reasons that are useless. like trying to describe why exactly you hate a song...trying to get to the essence of the thing would prove quite fruitless. why does love die? there are simply no easy answers and probably no real truth to be had.

these things inside me are silent like glass.

so i've decided to dye my hair tomorrow. black again. remember black? when was that exactly? at least twice...once in undergrad and once in my second year of grad school?

what exactly am i supposed to end? greg once said that i shouldn't read so much in dreams. but i believe that dreams are the things that help us try and make sense of the world. because god knows it sure doesn't make a damn bit of sense as is.

so you'll figure it out soon enough i suppose. i've been crying all day and i'm sure that i'm far from through. now i know for sure that the wind isn't the coldest thing in the city this time.

do you believe in true love? my faith in it is waning. so why the hell do we do this? got any answers out there?

so it seems that the dream does not yet have resolution and i don't know what to make of that yet. it's getting very late now and my eyes are so puffy that i can hardly see right now. i wish that i had some valium. but apparently i do not. so if i want the fairy tale, i have to end it. did dating greg end it? that is, end the cycle that i was in? or am i still in it?

"...but if i thought this was starting over i should have known i'd be the same i should remember this is all i am this is all i'll ever be..." (sarge)

song two

end of july

by sarge
------------------

drove the nine hours home at the end of july to find your face gone sheets gone bare walls white

and i guess that i understand this that you had to leave but this is nothing like what you promised me

see i don't wanna know what you did the months i was away can't see another sunrise drunk in milwaukee or have any more ash on my arms to explain

took off all of my clothes and wondered the rooms tried to remember every crack in the paint instead of remembering you

i took a shower and found your soap scrubbed you off for hours then gave up hope

but at the end of july all my plans changed 'cause baby i thought a few months apart might keep us together

but at the end of july all my plans changed and i've never been good at distant

but i'm getting better.

song one

the color that your eyes changed
with the color of your hair

by carissa's wierd [sic]
--------------------------------------------------

seal this
envelope with
a heart that's true
beaten black
beaten blue
beaten all over again
don't leave out a single thing
send it off with wings
the anecdote to ease
the pain that you feel
every time that you smile at the mirror.

i won't need any more memories for the next fifty years i could still write you love songs and
i won't need any more photographs to remember the color of the clothes you wore that night.

hopefully this won't sound as bad
as i am sure that it is
all results will be lifeless and lead to an excuse
to never try again
to never try at all
staring up at the ground
'cause oh how we tried
and oh how you lied
but how could that be true?

i won't need any more memories for the next fifty years i could still write you love songs and
i won't need any more photographs to remember the color that your eyes changed with the color of your hair.

my heart is gone
my heart is gray

oh my god...literally. apparently piecora's in seattle has become a chuch/restaurant. how can that be? yeah...great idea...capitol hill church restaurant.

hmm...apparently with blogger pro i can bring back my old blog entries if i so choose. we'll see.

i've been thinking a lot about this time last year lately. there's always something about the spring and i'm just starting to figure out what that might be. the pattern is not wholly what i thought it was. i've changed one thing. and it has led me to something wonderful. but i think that it is now time to finally go back and acknowledge what actually happened years and years ago. it's time.

i'm a little disappointed that i'm not going to get to go to the wedding in ann arbor. i mean i know that the plan was more than a bit impractical...but i still kind of wanted to go and get some context for all those stories. you know how i like context and all.

yeah, yeah. it's may already. no entries for april. sue me.

nothing much to say apparently.

this dissertation is brought to you by mastercard ("master the possibilities" (tm)) and by the letters f, u, c, k, e, and d.

seriously, it's going well now...but damn i'm super broke. i'm no longer answering the phone if the call says "out of area" because i'm now avoiding the bill collectors like mad. thank you illinois state budget cuts. i'm going to start selling my blood on ebay for cash. can you do that? wasn't there something about someone selling a kidney on there? oh yeah...here it is. damn.

so we got this letter a few weeks ago from the u and apparently the last 15 or 17 students out of 19 to kill themselves here were all grad students. so they've put us all on "suicide watch" for one another. no, paying us more and giving us decent advisors wouldn't help. no, those things aren't to blame. WE, the grad students, are to blame for the suicides of our fellow students. fucking university...

so they found that girl with the eerie eyes after all these years. very interesting. is it just me? or does she look pissed?

am watching the parade of nations for the olympics now. just woke up from a nap where i dreamed that they had to do surgery on me and then they found cancer everywhere and i had to tell everyone goodbye. god...that's pathetic sounding. but my dreams are running away from me right now. i guess most of you know that i'm in the waiting game now for the biopsy on march 11th. will someone tell me why doctors in three cities just blew off all the symptoms all summer and fall??? FUCK!

hehe...i finally found the waiting for star wars link for those guys, well, waiting for the next episode of star wars outside the cinerama in seattle (sponsored by the seattle star wars society). ok...these guys have to be microsoft millionaires or something right?

ever go to century 21 in nyc? the one at the old wtc site? remember the insanity there? how stress-relieving it was to push and shove your ways through the crowds to get the best bargains...kind of like kick boxing. anyway, today's salon has an article that explains what happened to all that merchandise after september 11. there are a lot of extremely well dressed people in maine right about now.

oh yeah...i yanked the amazon box down because they changed it to some generic amazon ad versus an xbox ad. fuck that!

so, so much to do...i need to stop letting stupid little projects get me so sidetracked. i just hate how all this assistantship stuff is such a timesuck...how how i let it be! yeah, it's winter and it sucks to be here...what else is new? this *is* my last winter here, right???

cece and i made a pact to get on each other's case to get the hell out of here. btw, she reports that the outlet has gone total suckville (just made that term up...i think). i guess that it was only a matter of time.

ok, i'm back in chambana now...and believe it or not? i'm working on the diss. whoa. i know. you need to sit the hell down for that, right?

anyway...today's rant is against american airlines for losing my luggage! ok, they FINALLY found it...but do i have it yet? no! why not? it's in paperwork hell. figures. fuckers. i will say, though, at least they have been nice while fucking around with my luggage...like a...no...i'm not even gonna go there.

today's graphic novel recommendation is daddy's girl by debbie drechsler. breathtaking...shocking...totally emotional. you can find more at drawn and quarterly's web site (the publisher).

went to the spa today on pine street. greg got me a spa package as an anniversary present and it was pure bliss...i can't even tell you. someday when i have a real job, i'm gonna do this type of thing much more often...someday, right?