fun with basements

snow and a headache... and somehow, instead of being at home either a) sleeping said headache off, or b) making a ridiculous snowman - i am at work.

camel snot & fun with play-do

i went for pints with my friends, scott, david and nathan tonight. i've decided that i'm most definitely driving back out to chaco canyon this summer. and this time, i'm driving the jeep with the top down... i haven't seen the bleeding sun in five years and i deserve a freaking tan. pint night... why? why do they make me drink shitty beer, like mich ultra, at an obscenely inflated price in order to get a stinking glass? sigh. not. cool. not. cool. at. all.

i sprained my knee today... i'm apparently a klutz. i, apparently, can't walk now. at all. what joy is mine... i've hobbled myself. and for some very strange reason, i'm not upset about it - well, stairs are proving to be a bit more of a hassle than would typically be desired, but such is life. i'm somewhat glad of it, in fact, because i've had an excuse to not be insanely busy today... people seem to understand that when one is injured, one cannot move at a quick pace - what utter bliss is mine.

i'll lay down my vices, i'll lay down in houses... things come alive

i apparently lack the ability to work on my paintings without completely dousing myself in oil paint. health risk? yeah, i'm not so good about the whole keep-the-oil-paint-off-the-skin bit. no, not really at all. i've had this really bad habit - since i was about 15 - in that i put down my brush and decide that it's a great idea to start finger painting with oil paints... if i worked just a little harder at it, i could probably make myself look tye-died... given that i look like a henna session gone terribly awry after i've been painting. whatever... it's my therapy and whatnot.

i painted quite a bit today... it's a stationary activity [well, relatively stationary] and i can't really walk that well today... so it's convenient like that. my personal trainer allowed me to kick my own ass yesterday and currently, my legs are punishing me. c'est la vie... i've lost ten bleeding pounds in two weeks. yeah... that's right... i'm gettin' skinny again. what?

rambling, yet again... i'm having a 'dinner party' on saturday. though there will be food present [that my roommate and i will probably spend most of saturday cooking], i have a feeling it will be more 'party' than 'dinner.' nonetheless, i'm stoked. the last time i hosted anything close to a 'dinner party' [again - mostly wine (well, lots of wine, but that's neither here nor there) with sustenance available] was in my shoebox apartment in rome, cooking food enough for ten people on one burner, by candlelight because we kept shorting out the electricity. superb... so here's to hoping for someone's drunken stupor on saturday and here's to hoping even more that it's mine.

i need a drink...

a most unfortunate series of events...

last week - bitten by dog [see post from 02.04.2006]

this week - car accident [see below]

i was on my way to norfork this afternoon to bid my mother adieu before she is on her way to dubai tomorrow... and of course it starts snowing - rather profusely - on my way. i decide to continue on my merry way, undeterred by the fact that the last time i had an accident of any sort of magnitude [i.e. i was lucky to walk away from it], it was sleating and i was on my way from fayetteville to norfork... foreshadowing, anyone? i get to harrison [about 2/3 of the total journey] just fine, when i happen upon two rather horrid accidents [a) girl seemingly pinned under rolled-over turquoise coupe. b) young man unable to exit his truck after having spun out, run off the road and hitting a tree]. immediately after passing said accidents, i crossed an icy bridge. i slowed down to avoid some debris in the road and was 'tapped' from behind by the car behind me that was apparently unable to slow down in time. at this time, i began to spin, across both lanes of traffic, back into my lane, where i slammed into the curb and landed up on the sidewalk, facing the opposite direction. the impact broke two of my wheels and punctured my rear-left tire. what joy is mine... i was helped by a wonderfully kind stranger at the bp gas station, who had apparently recognized that i was much too shaken-up and still too shaky to operate my piece-of-shit jack by myself... thank you, whoever you are, from the bottom of my heart.

lessons learned from said accident:
1] stay home when it starts to sleat heavily or snow for any period of time... take actions such as: give car keys to someone else and/or hide them to insure that you don't drive in these conditions.
2] get a better jack
3] people are capable of demonstrating extreme kindness to strangers, for absolutely no reward other than ultimate gratitude. maybe some people are inherently good, after all...

hey man, how'd you get that shiner? get in a bar brawl? ... nah, dude. i fell out of a tree.

i have a busted lip and a bloody nose. yeah.

three cheers for friday night.

cheers. cheers. cheers.

i'd give my body to be back again... in the rest of the room.

brief recap of the last couple of weeks and some added nonsense to conclude:

i'm in a class that basically focuses on phallic imagery and a primarily sexual interpretation of the body in medieval space [yeah...]. i got a personal trainer and am going to get rid of my fat ass if it kills me. i graded quizzes for the first time this afternoon. i've been remodeling the cnc room in the basement of vol walker along with my friend melissa [and am almost done painting - will post pictures when it's all said and done]. i got stuck in an elevator on monday night... me and a computer cabinet, getting cozy and stuff while i waited for the cops to let me out [i was just so very glad at that moment that i am nowhere near claustrophobic...]. my transmission is slipping in my jeep and i am - as usual - broke as hell [that's a technical term, by the way].

i'm moving to dubai [in the u.a.e.] after i graduate in may and i can't wait to get the hell out of here. i have this tendency to get rather stir-crazy, and i have never been so desperate to get out of a place in my life - partly because everything i touch here seems to turn to shit and partly because i honestly believe that this place is killing me - just a little bit, each and every day. i seem to have completely lost myself. i've lost touch. with almost everything that matters to me... so i'm getting out as fast as i can...

it's endless. it's mapless. no compass. no north star.

i love coming home to my family's farm... it's the one place in the world where i feel like i can actually breathe. i've never been anywhere where i feel more at home than i do here... even when i was a kid and this was my grandparents' house, i always felt safe here.

i think one of my favorite things about coming here is that it always storms right after i arrive... [self-revealing factoid numero uno for the day: i positively adore thunderstorms] - there's just something so wonderfully exhilarating and yet so peaceful about hearing the rain on the metal roof... about being able to see lightning for miles without any street lights or buildings to obstruct the view - just the trees and the hilltops and the surrounding farms backlit in violent bursts of light.

on clear, temperate nights, you can lay a quilt down on the grass and stare up at the sky and it looks as if it's light outside for all of the stars; you can see the milky way so clearly it looks as if you could reach out and take a piece of it for yourself [were it not millions of lightyears away and all]... i have fallen asleep on the grass in front of the farmhouse many nights because i've stayed out looking at the stars for too long.

i've honestly never considered myself to have roots in any one place - i have roots with people, but not really to a town, city or building in particular. recently i've come to realize and be comforted by the fact that i do have roots - very deep ones - here... on the farm that always welcomes me with a symphony of rain.

silent cities...

i am so very tired of reading about dead people. i feel morbid and slightly freakish, considering that i'm doing my work at a coffee house, reading and writing about american cemeteries, at the communal table where i've gotten several strange that-chick-is-reading-about-what? looks today. what joy is mine. nevertheless, i'm over-caffeinated and under-motivated. we'll call it writer's block. yes. that'll do.

so, as i promised, i'll begin the nola stories... in pieces, mind you, as i still have editing and whatnot to do this evening.

went to new orleans for new years, to visit my darling friend, dara, and her beautiful daughter, anna... and as is becoming something of a ritual with me and going to nola for new years, dara took me to frenchman street... i was smart enough to go in non-heels this year, as last year, i ended up shoeless in the quarter due to the extreme pain/blistering of my feet. ha. started at molly's [i heart molly's], ended up spending the grand moment [midnight] at the hooka bar, oh yes, drinking a lot, and taking pictures with two beautifully-dressed men in drag, sigh. i love my life. i was [willingly and rather enthusiastically] kidnapped by my friend crysti and taken, at what must have been ninety miles per hour, down the interstate through the smothering fog, to a bar in metarie, called 'jiggers,' where i proceeded to top off my drunken stooper for the evening... or so i thought. we ended up drinking champagne at something like 4 am at [newly met] steve's house and didn't get home until 7. dear. holy. god. i had the hangover from hell. all i could do when i woke up on new year's day was emit something resembling a death rattle... much to crysti's amusement.

i took a little research excursion to st. louis cemetery no. 1, which was locked, so i took pictures over the wall [this is quite a feat, given that i'm a midget], and was informed that a police escort is recommended in order to visit the cemetery. i guess this sort of thing is supposed to deter visitors. this, of course, peaked my interest, so i'm going back and i'm going to get into the cemetery, damnit. i have to wait for the arch diocese in nola to regroup post-katrina, though, in order to get proper permission, etcetera, etcetera, ad nauseum - therefore, i'm going back to nola for mardi gras [killing two birds with one stone, as it were].

all of my nonsense aside, i was shocked, saddened and struck by the destruction katrina and the levee breaches left behind. though i am not from new orleans, i love the city... really and truly adore all of it - the good, the bad, all of it. seeing water lines on houses i'd admired and photographed a year previous, hundreds of cars abandoned with windows broken out and doors and trunks ajar under the interstate, driving through the ninth ward and seeing, first hand, a fate literally worse than death... i just sat, near speechless, almost in tears. i can't even describe... it just makes me hope that the city is as resilient as i think it is... and it makes me angry that the bastards who had the knowledge of what needed to be done before the hurricane season and the power to get it done didn't do anything, let hundreds of people die an indescribably horrid death, and nearly let a city be destroyed. kharma... that's all i have to say. one day, they'll get theirs. until then, there's hope for a new beginning for so many people. there's always hope.

too much left to taste that's bitter

back from nola... have to finish research before i can play on the internet. i shall post pictures and tell stories on the morrow. yeah, so hold your breath until then.

happy christmas, you eggnog sucking patsies...

i was attacked today. not by anyone but by something - something being the 7 1/2 foot christmas tree that i purchased and attempted to peacefully assemble this morning. 'easy assembly,' my ass. the thing weighed at least 100 pounds, was in a ginormous box that i somehow squeezed into my jeep and then had to get out by myself... ho ho freaking ho. i look like i have been in a fight with a very large cat... all clawed up and whatnot. not. cool. at. all.

the tree is also 'prelit' - meaning that yes, it has lights on it, but noooooo, you can't access the bleeding cord you're supposed to plug into the wall because it's three inches long and located half-way up the bloody 'spine' of the tree. argh. i loathe going to wal-mart and now i have to go back, yet again, fight my way through all of the last-minute christmas havoc and get a bloody extension cord. oh, and after i get the extension cord, i have to fight with the tree again to see if i can find the bleeding thing i'm supposed to plug it into. ah. bah humbug and stuff.

on the merrier side of the christmas season, got the mri and found out that my brain isn't going to explode. it's like the best present ever... and no one even had to wrap it.

happy holidays... may they be truly merry and bright.