ok...soon...burning man planning posts. i promise.

oh my god...how much time can we spend on the "was that a hussein body double" issue? and why does the u.s. media just call him "saddam?" what the fuck are we doing? i feel sick watching the coverage. "ever growing coalition of the willing." whatever bush.

fuck. apparently we are bombing iraq but it's too early to tell what the hell is going on exactly. FUCKKKKKKKKKK.

so i get this email this morning about some list of links that was on a website that i last was in charge of in 1997:"i recommend that you remove your dead site from the web. i'm sure it was wonderful in its day but it is royally dead now."hey thanks big brother! i'll get right on that.

ok so it was a date.

uh...so was it a date?

um...so i was on a date tonight? well, ok, so it didn't start out as a date...a coffee...but six hours later after dinner and drinks and a "i had a really great time, let's get together again soon" parting on, uh..."honorary reo speedwagon drive" (i'm not making this up...there is a fucking street called "honorary reo speedwagon drive" in downtown champaign)...apparently we had just been out on a date. and, no, this isn't some crazy scandal.

what a long day...i think i'm going to withdraw the play and forget it. this is just insane. yes, it's become even MORE insane since yesterday. i don't know what to say about it really other than this just fucking sucks. i don't know. i've talked to lucia, to christine, to yuri, and to jesse about it...they know how much this is bothering me. of course the question is out there -- why tell the story now? exactly. why now?

it's like clockwork, really...every spring. the anxiety builds and i feel like i'm about to re-live it again and again and again and i can’t stop it.

oh god...the play saga is a meta play in itself...i'm too emotionally exhausted from this week's script adaptation and stage blocking and the ENDLESS discussion about whether or not i should step out of it because it might be too *real* for me. i don't know. it just seems to be such a hassle right now...i mean...eh...forget it. i'm too tired to talk any more about it today.

so today (later today) is unofficial st patty's day on campus...the most hated day of the year for everyone who is not an undergrad. bars open at 8am on campus, which means you are very likely to find that your car has been vomited on while you were teaching a class that no one showed up for because they were out drinking green beer. and just in time for all the open houses that start tomorrow and the all prospies and their parents who will probably be molested in the street by some drunk frat boy on a dare.

ok my play is definitely on now -- it's being "adapted for stage" now. i know...uh...wasn't it already a play? the adaptation person in the theatre department looks over scripts like mine and makes sure that what is in the script can actually be performed on stage in a way that won't completely lose the audience. no words, though, have been cut. she's just putting in stage directions and such.

oh shit. i just realized that i still owe jerome some money -- eep! i'll get that to you asap!!

fuck i wish that i could afford to go to thailand for spring break. too damn much money. but steve is going to send me some fabrics from there soon for my "stash." so that looks like it's as close as i'm going to get to thailand for now.

anyway...looks like the play may be on again. i'll know for sure tomorrow. it's still *too controversial* but they are going to go for it anyway it seems. as of this moment at least.

christ. so the girl who comes to inspect my apartment? she only goes like 3 feet into my apartment and says "ok, that's fine." what the fuck? all that cleaning and all she does is come in 3 feet. whatever. i mean my living room could have been on fire and there could have been satanic messages (or any messages really) written in blood on my walls...and she wouldn't have known a thing.

cool! now i can finally start setting things on fire and writing satanic messages in blood on my walls!

oh weird...i'm about to hit the two year mark on this blog. kick ass.

two more shows of this production's run! it's been a good show and i'm glad that i stuck with it. i just hate that it really has caused some major, major problems in other parts of my life. it's funny...well, sad really...whenever i try and get to the things that are most important to me personally, it seems that something else must topple and suddenly i become a great disappointment to those that saw me as an automaton, a slavish workhorse. and i hate that i just fucking can't be everything to everyone...i just have to mean something to me right now.

whoa. the pioneer 10 finally fell silent. you know...and i know this is weird...but thinking about that lonely robot spacecraft out there in space for so long, sending us data for over three decades...i think this touches me more than the columbia. i mean i am not saying that the columbia wasn't tragic. it was. but i guess the fact that this spacecraft is out there, floating, with its message of goodwill and a map back home...i don't know. it makes me wonder if anyone will ever find it. it's like a space message in a bottle. ok, ok...i guess it touches the "geek" in me...but it also touches the artist in me. this expression of self, of science, of us...we sent this message out hoping someone/something might someday find it and understand. ah...who knows. i'm a sap.

ok, three shows down and three more to go for this production's run. lucia and cece were there last night and it was fun to see them in the audience. the show finally came together -- dicey because it's experimental stuff and therefore who knows if or when things will ever sync up. but it did. and it does feel great to be involved in the performing arts again...even if it isn't in music. and hey! i guess i can now officially say that i've been a stage actor!

up next? rehearsals for my play...that is if we can get it through the censors. unfortunately we are supported by university funds and there are a lot of conservatives holding the purse strings. but we'll figure something out. :)

oh...almost forgot. i got this weird error message today. i guess win xp doesn't have the league of nations option. you think it would but maybe it's part of the antitrust settlement.

wow...two days until the invited dress rehearsal and i'm just not getting my lines down for the last piece yet!! it'll get there...

reno. thoughts of burning man and talk today about upcoming conferences in that biggest little city that several of us called home for a while. skin burning, burning...so dry...a place to dry my tears, the tears that i'd cried for way too long. some days i think about escaping to reno again, hiding in that sad, sad heart...even just for a little while.

1937.09 miles from this place...years and years from this place. sitting on the grass on the lawn of the university overlooking the strip, talking about the children playing and the sadness that i felt when i remembered. and yet i felt safe, i remember safe...in the desert sun...holding me. and i was free.

oooh. so i forgot to tell you about the conclusion to the exciting customs story. i did finally get my shipment and all was well but i was getting all these questions like "are you sure this isn't for night vision?" and "so how exactly would you develop film for a 35mm camera?" of course i have part two of the shipment still headed my way so i'm sure i'll be going through this all over again in another day or so. i mean it's coming from friggin' AUSTRIA. i dunno. maybe the duct tape on the outside of the box caused alarm because they were wondering if it was a shipment of extra tape to sell on the black market. you know. to hold up your plastic sheeting or canned food? just duck and cover. that's all you need to know.

typical conversation with j***e on im [4:15pm, cst]:

[j***e] morn
[me] hey man
[me] want to go to burning man?
[j***e] just woke up
[me] not now
[me] in august
[me] http://www.burningman.com/
[j***e] yeah i've heard of that
[me] lets go!
[me] i have an in on a camp
[me] many others are also half interested/half scared
[j***e] i'm not going
[me] ok so i'll put you down as a maybe then
[j***e] lol
ok, so who ELSE is planning on burning man? so far there's three of us semi thinking about maybe committing to it.

i don't know what to say about the weekend really. it just kind of disappeared and now i'm facing monday again and i really can't wait to go to albuquerque for spring break and see barb, lee, dave...maybe we'll all have another adventure in santa fe. it will be so nice to see all of them again...after all, i don't think i've seen any of them since greg and i started dating...or since we broke up. hmm...something to think about...what exactly was it about our relationship that caused me to doubt everything about myself so much that i was ashamed to see anyone at all?

happy valentine's day!!!

oh! i'm collecting AOL/Earthlink/MSN/Other ISP CDs plus any CDs that you would normally be discarding (like CD burning mishaps) for a remediation art project that i'm working on. let me know if you can contribute to the cause! thanks!

oh my god. i'm in big crazy trouble right now. so i ordered this new camera and some lenses from austria, by way of russia. anyway, us customs is FREAKING OUT because at some ups dispatch center in louisville, kentucky they've decided that this is dangerous machinery and there's threats of imploding the package, etc. ugh...i just hope i don't have to pay a hefty fine because that would really suck. i have to call them in the morning to get this straightened out. terrorism paranoia i guess. all i know is that on the ups tracking website, it says that my package has been seized by customs and then i received a whole series of answering machine messages on my machine when i got home from rehearsal tonight.

you know...while i like doing photography, it's really making me crazy. i mean every friggin' time i go on an airplane guess who gets the super duper deluxe treatment? and, yes, i understand...but i'm just saying...it's just hard to stay all chipper and patient as people are smearing the lenses with all kinds of clothes to check for explosive materials all while ransacking my luggage for more stuff. the most hilarious part was the last time i was on a plane and they dumped out my entire suitcase (this is a regional airport...we don't have those ultra fancy xray super scanners like at those big city slickers airports). you know...people have made fun of me for my less-than-precise packing skills. but i felt pretty justified because in the end, everyone's ransacked luggage looked the same...just like mine has always looked. :)

haha. flashback memory to aect chicago from years ago when sherry packed about 90 pounds of books in a garment bag and the guy at the roanoke airport just about died when that came off the luggage rack. ok...only barb will remember that one.

what a long day. i'm finally, finally feeling better but there's still (always?) some chaos. yesterday my email was jammed for the second time this month due to someone sending me an enormously large file so if you sent me something and it bounced, that's why.

so i'm kind of freaked out. yesterday i got that dreaded "your dissertation is what you'll be doing for the rest of your life" speech. ok, ok...it's wasn't that dramatic. but panic inducing nonetheless. sure, i know a ton of people who have gone on to never do anything close to their dissertations again. i mean, there's the argument that you should do your dissertation that answers the questions that YOU are passionate or you'll never finish. then there's the argument that says who the hell cares because you'll hate whatever your dissertation is on forever and ever once you're done. i mean so the whole thing with yesterday is that i really trust this person and their instincts...a lot. so when he tells me that he feels like my dissertation, if tweaked, could be so much more meaningful, genre-breaking...a book, literally. well...it makes me feel like "wow...i could really do all that?" while at the same time making me feel like "shit...am i just tilting at windmills here?" so it makes my brain hurt, you know? i mean the funny thing is that we are always looking for someone to believe in us...and then when they do? we can't feel like they could possibly know what they are doing.

since we are on high terror alert now, i thought that i'd encourage everyone to go old school and immediately go out and purchase items that represent paranoia when paranoia was done RIGHT!

ex libris anonymous has FABULOUS journals made from old books from the 50s and 60s. being the heathen that i am, i picked up a journal that used to be an old gold gideon bible. but there are plenty more! give jasmine your support!

for your movie watching needs, consider getting some old 16mm educational films (converted onto vhs and dvd) from a/v geeks to learn about what terrors face us in the 1980s and how to be model citizens! i have the av geeks lunchboxed set dvds. classic!

for you link lovers out there, here's an oldie but a goodie: is dick cheney dead yet? i hope that he updates it this year...guess january was chaotic for a lot of us.

alright. who's in for burning man this year??

andrea has done it again. she always totally blows me away. in her latest newsletter she shared that instead of new years resolutions, her tradition is to create a personal theme for the year to live by. so in honor of that most kick ass idea...my theme this year is:

becoming. living the life of my true self without compromise.

and while we're at it, she shares this concept from her favorite writers, rob brezsny, that's sooooo much better than paranoia:

pronoia...the sneaking suspicion that the whole world is conspiring to shower you with blessings; the growing conviction that life is inherently designed to liberate you from suffering, fill you with joy, and make you really smart.

cool.

ugh...and it's not just a cold now. it's pneumonia. great. this has been a 100% frustrating day. i think i might just call it a night and try again tomorrow for better results.

sick...i'm unbelieveably sick right now...oy...where's cold detox when you need it?

sitting here at way-too-fucking-late-o'clock and wondering if this cold/flu will ever leave me and also wondering how come no one has come up with the rapid detox solution for the common cold. you know how they can put people into short comas while they go through the worst part of drug detox? i want something like that for the head colds. yeah, yeah...i know...there's nyquil. give me a fucking break. child's play. let's face it...it's just not that great. no, i'm thinking of something on a much grander scale. i mean wouldn't it be lovely to just be in a drug induced coma while the worst of the cold is there? i mean would that work? could that work? i mean we might as well be knocked out for a few days, right? it's not like we're super efficient workers while we are typing with one hand and blowing our noses with the other. not to mention we look like absolute hell and being in a short coma would keep you from feeling even worse because you wouldn't catch a glimpse of your pale green skin, red eyes, and...uh...ok. you get the point.

anyway...bunkadoo, a.k.a. jeromenome, has a great idea about v-day cards. he wants to bring back the days where we gave valentine's cards to our friends and it wasn't this national day of mourning for all the unattached. and marion will appreciate this flashback to emporium daze...all these years and still no one has marketed that damn ftd death bouquet (tm) idea i came up with while we were selling all those god damn roses back in the 'burg. i'm still telling you that it would work. when you hate enough to send the very worst.

so did i tell you that i HAVE a sewing machine now? and so now i'm sewing every day and it's totally crazy. and i was just telling my mom on the phone how i ran across this grad student at UVA'a (i think) web site and he was talking about how the only way he remained sane during his dissertation writing was by making stuffed animals. somehow he got it into his brain that he would learn to sew and sew he did, making tons and tons of stuffed animals. so maybe there is something to this quilting thing of mine.

the funny thing about it is that i was convinced that i didn't like quilts (and WHY exactly did i sign up for a quilting class?) but really i don't like those pastel kinds that look (and usually are) manufactured. you know the kind i mean...the kind when you hear the word "quilt" and you think (a.k.a., i think) "yuck...nononononono way is that going into my house." so, yeah, i still hate those quilts. but i've been seeing these quilt examples at the store that i go to, in the classes i've been taking, and on the web and there are these cool stories that are told through the quilt, only you just have to learn how to see it. and i guess that's true with anything really...the story is there. you just have to learn how to see it.

my latest movie obsession: bollywood! get your bollywood films at indofilms. works like net flix. i can't wait for my first four to arrive!

you know what's kind of funny? ok, it's a LOT funny. for some reason my cable modem company is blocking the microsoft site. but luckily the msn "sorry we can't find your site" search page pops up on my internet explorer and asks me if i was looking for microsoft (again, blocked) or mmicrosoft. now why the hell does it even offer me mmicrosoft as an option? i know, i know...it's a 'bot and not a static web page...but still. you think that bill would make sure that something like that wouldn't happen.

in other news, my play has been deemed *too controversial.* lord. it's not yet clear, however, if *too controversial* means "uh...we've got a problem..." but as the magic 8 ball suggests...all signs point to "yes." hehe. i've always wanted to be *too controversial.*

ugh...the flu. it's official. and that's fine, really...it's like -36 outside.

an old friend of mine is once again touched with fire it seems. and i recognized the voice right away on the phone. i mean i knew it was her...but i also knew which version of her it was. once you've heard the sound of madness descending, you cannot forget...and i just remembered that it's been ten years and my blood runs cold. a whole decade has passed in the blink of an eye and here we are again...the play goes on and on...a pattern. and i can't seem to shake the feeling that we've gone all this way only to arrive exactly where we started...only i'm not sure we know the place quite yet...only that we know that we've arrived...once again.

wanted: xbox stickers...to decorate my videogame journal! :)

i want my blogger mug back dammit!

anyway, i'm dying for some new games but i don't have any cash right now. job opportunity part two came my way earlier this week but i, once again, had to beg off due to timing. too much cancer last year to finish up...but it's all over now. and we're moving on.

so last night i did something TOTALLY uncharacteristic for me. any guesses? i took a *gasp* basic quilting class. there's this sewing place like 14 steps from my apartment (ok maybe it's a little farther than that but it's damn close...it would take me longer to get there if i drove rather than walked) and they rent out machines and they offer classes and such. so back in december, COMPLETELY on a whim...i walked over and asked them if they offered classes. and normally just getting information would be more than enough to end my manic wanderings. but no...i signed up to take a class. so when getting information somehow fails to curb my manic excitement, usually signing up and paying for whatever the object of my attention is then takes care of it...and then i don't do anything more from there. and then i bought the supplies for the class...and then last night...i showed up for the class. and you know...it was absolutely insane because I'VE NEVER SEWED ANYTHING IN MY LIFE. and so it was weird because i was using this super technical sewing machine that kind of felt like i was using a racing wheel for one of my racing games...had the pedal and everything. but the damn amazing thing is that now i have these little sewed together squares and i'm trying to figure out how the hell it was possible that i sewed something together at all! but apparently i did...go figure.

and you know...i don't really even like quilts. i mean the traditional kind. but i like the idea of making something that looks completely, completely absurd and modern, like with velvet in wild colors. so i felt like i was getting the knowledge that i needed to do something, well, absurd and modern. and this post is going nowhere really but i just had to share.

some sad news...lucia's father passed away on thursday and my heart is with her and her family. so everyone...send good thoughts her way...thoughts of strength, of healing, of courage.

i don't know why i forgot to mention this the other day but cece, rachel, mike, harlan, sarah, and i all went out to boltini's to check out the 16mm educational films set to a rock-n-roll soundtrack. it sounded amazingly wacky and they even had $1 schlitz cans...but the show wasn't all that. but the company was great and we all had lots-o-laughs anyway. AND i got to wear my wacky-ass coat that i bought at a local vintage shop. what better occasion, right?

sigh...why can't my apartment people fix the goddamn fuse in the bathroom? it seems to blow every three months. shower by candlelight i guess...again.

why is carrot top famous? can someone answer this for me? i just saw an ad on tv for the hollywood squares and he's apparently on it...WHY? why does this guy exist?????

i think that i eat like a drug addict. actually i don't know if that's the right title for my dining behavior but it feels right at the moment. i mean some days i only have candy to eat. all day. that's it. candy and orange juice. then there's the days that i might only eat steamed rice. today is a tv dinner day. i guess i'm on a health kick right now, huh? actually i think that i mostly eat like a grad student...i dine on whatever i can afford at the moment. which is kind of like being a drug addict...although i'm not sure that all this research gives you quite the same high.

so you probably haven't heard of this place unless you are me or bunkadoo but today's shopping recommendation is lush fresh handmade cosmetics based in canada. as bunkadoo and i can attest, they have THE best bath products ever. this is based on asynchronous remote research that we have both conducted in our own, uh, labs and is not based on synchronous co-located research with bunkadoo...who did tell a story recently about some kind of synchronous co-located research involving free-falling out of showers when showering in groups. but that's some new direction that he's leading his lab in and you'll have to ask him to brief you on that.

guess who's been working on their methods chapter again???

i hit a new low in dissertation procrastination today...i just spent the last three hours removing every single stain in my carpet and cleaning...and i mean COMPLETELY...cleaning my cat's litter boxes to perfection. nice...

well, i've been amazingly busy all day ever since i discovered lomography on the web and now i'm completely obsessed with it. ok i've also been doing other things but i really love the history behind lomography -- high quality art photography for the people. it's so very art as experience as chip might say. and christ...i just said it too. fuck.

anyway, according to this site...lomography is "...at first glance, a bit like good old photography, but it is actually something else, something completely different. it requires uncompromising and relentless snapshots of everyday insanity by lomographers using their lomos. these are taken from the hip, over their heads, through legs, from the floor, upside down, facing backwards, etc..."

kick ass.

holy shit! that book we did??? it just went into REPRINT. shit. who knew?

oh -- i now have a livejournal mainly serving as a passthrough to here so that i can take advantage of the LJ communities while still focusing on my blog.

in the "ok...i deserve this" category...

i either have (1) the flu, which i don't think that i really *deserve* but it just kind of figures because i was making such a big stink a few weeks ago about how i would rather have the flu 7000 times than get a flu shot.

or...i have (2) some god awful parasite from that whatever-tartare that i ate at that restaurant the night my brother announced his engagement when i stated something along the lines of "i can eat whatever the hell i want i don't care if it's dangerous or not and stop fucking telling me what to do i'm not three years old" blah blah blah.

here's hoping that it's just the flu. and here's hoping that i don't get it 7000 times if it is.

update on the boxes...not everything was ruined. the goretex raincoat survived (damn that stuff's amazing). most of the other clothes are kinda moldy, the cd player doesn't seem to be working, and all the shampoos/soaps/etc all kind of exploded into one big mess. probably the weirdest thing he sent back was the book on london that i got him for our six month anniversary when everything was still happy and hopeful. although looking back...ah...never mind. it doesn't really matter anymore, does it?

it's kind of funny, though...i had a dream about fiji the other night. no, not the country...that fraternity that john was in back in undergrad...remember him? anyway...yes...it was a fairy tale dream (tm). and as far as i can figure out, it was mostly about ghosts. not the supernatural kind...just those people who used to be your friends back when you were dating their friend but once the relationship is over...yeah, you know what happens. and i imagine that i had the dream because i've been thinking about the friends that i lost when greg and i broke up. god knows why i was dreaming of people and places from 12 years ago though...patterns...patterns...patterns...

oh yeah. many of you have asked me what this mystery play is all about. well, the main thing that i can tell you right now is that it's about the conversations that we all have when a new relationship begins to become something more significant. and it's about that dance we do, trying to find a way to convey the pain that we have felt, the experiences that we have had...simultaneously hoping that they will have the strength to stay...and hoping that if they don't that they'll leave now before you start to fall and even the king's men can't put you back together again.

happy new year everyone! harlan, christine, yore, and i all spent a low key new year's eve together cooking, eating, and watching happenstance and ringing in the new year to the sound of...uh...owls. christine has this bird clock that "chimes" a different bird sound every hour and i guess midnight is the owl hour. they say that midnight is the witching hour...and i guess witches sometimes have owls...so there you go. anyway, it was a really nice time. not a crazy new years...but just casual and happy and fun. and i guess that for the first time in a long, long time i realized that maybe i'm not so alone in the world. and i don't really know what specifically made me feel that way tonight and i guess it really doesn't matter. the important thing is that i feel like things are going to be ok. somehow. finally.

i realized on the drive home tonight that i've been a pretty crappy friend over the last 7-8 months. and i'm sorry about that everyone. that's the part of depression that really amazes me...that for some reason when you are falling into it, you have to push everyone away so far and create an even bigger...well...loneliness. and it's not until you come back out of it that you realize that the pushing not only hurt you...but other people as well.

may we all find peace this year.

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.