Wow

I've never met this guy, who is a college friend of my roommate, but holy macaroni, these are some incredible pictures of Antarctica.

DAR

I am kind of bummed that I didn't take the opportunity to see this artist perform this song, Strong Black Vine, at the DAR Hall. Hah. I had no interest in going back then, though. And it is weird, because after she came here, I went to Michigan and so did the artist. I wasn't thinking about that at the time. DAR Hall makes me think of this lawyer I worked with. She left to live by some big famous Chinese Theater in the LA area and came back for a visit. I had to run after her in the mall one night with her cell phone in my hand "Keep it!" she flung at me. She was extremely drunk and not wearing the most sensible outfit. When I started scrolling through her contacts list to call someone for help, she became more interested in her possession. After walking into a broom closet and peeing in it, she came up behind me and began making growling noises. I kept scrolling. My hand was shaking. Finally she leapt on my back and got her phone back and I gave up on trying to influence her and left. The next day, she called to apologize.
She was in DAR.

Blue! Grotto! Statues!

Blue Grotto Statues.
Sounds nifty to me.

Girl, Woman, Hollywood, Film

A clip and an article in which some express their disgust. I am disgusted. I recall a professor, who was otherwise quite likeable, treating it like a big joke when I was an undergraduate, saying it was all consensual and he was sort of duped because the girl didn't "look" that young.
Well, that was not the case.
Away from Hollywood, here's a discussion about crimes in the military.
Comment from one "Junkyarddawg" the chief problem here seems to have been a leadership which refused to acknowledge there was even a problem, for political or career reasons. That's the problem in a lot of cases. Perhaps there could be a subtitle to this: "Wars, Arts Industries, Universities, Clusters of People Who Could Be in the Government or in the Media..."
Another could be "Headaches." I have one right now.

Click, click

on text links and then pictures and then...
Aw, now what was I actually looking for (it was not this) when I came across this yucky sporting event clip?
A football fan who is a meditation teacher likes this clip about the randomness of life. Moving on.
East Meets West In Sun And Flowers.
Click.

Kitty cat kinds of things

Cat Ladies Documentary. A review of the documentary. Cat Congress Mired In Sunbeam. The hissing noises I probably should have made at the person who was backing out when I came back from Trader Joe's this evening and found a long white scrape on the side of my car.

un journal

KB/TA "Duet",
Women and Music,
God/Running Up That Hill,
Bouncing off Clouds/Cloudbusting,
Cloudbusting meaning

Ew

Is T.M. A "Hero?" Ew, ew, and more than ew.

Today

Attended more panels. At one, this lady from Georgia introduced herself as a girl from the south. And just because of that, when she passed out her papers to the room I stood up and walked over to the aisle to take mine and said "thank you." She said "thank you" back. And then "you're welcome." Southern manners!
She performed several of her poems, including Full Figure Potential.
Also I read this article about Sherman Alexie by Heather Purser.
And watched a new-to-me interpretation of Bells For Her.

Its not the donuts I regret...

i.e. apple cider donuts (although it would've been way cooler of me if I'd gotten them from an apple picking place instead of the Giant.) It's that I spent a portion of my life this evening thinking that acquaintances from grad school and part-time jobs resembled people in some of these pictures. And also that I noticed that someone at one of my jobs spent a lot of time rocking silently in a chair. I don't think he was autistic.
I have to go hang out with a different version of myself now.

In memory of youthful things

Oh my god, I lived in such a great house once! It had views like from a restaurant! The Seattle skyline and the Cascade Mountains! I crawled on the roof, on small stones, and basked in the sun! (Yes, the sun appears in the summer there.) And I was steeped in the books of Shirley MacLaine, and fairies, and various New Age-y topics. I was about 13.
And on a winter night I watched people dance in a ring in the snow.
Looked at this Green Children channel, because of looking at another's channel. Tonight was a good night for a short stroll in a garden. The ring in the snow memory makes me have to look at this again now, too.
The Mummer's Dance.
Although I didn't know that song back then. So, already tampering.

A bookfesting kind of day

It gave me great pleasure to see Stacey Ann Chin and Sherman Alexie read. Hers was in the afternoon, outside under a tent. His was in the evening, in an auditorium where he received an award. Hers brought forth laughter and tears. His was extremely funny and included impersonations of animals. Both talked about being less angry now that they're older. They also both talked about the clitoris and asked audience members to raise their hands if they masturbate. (Perhaps someone issued a memo?)

Things to say to oneself

I wonder why people I knew seem to become less idealistic and more into material things as we get older...all these people on facebook say they went to fashion week...is anyone ever going to appreciate size 14 models? "Lonely" is a feeling that is worse when you resist it...When you embrace it, it actually becomes cozy...If you ate one everyday it would not feel good, but once in a while, eating a cheeseburger is okay. Hiding is okay, but how sad it is that some will never know other people's secret rebellions or good deeds...Okay, who is this person...(Click on her website) So loud! Turn it down! (Couldn't do it. "Am I a feminist or a womanist...")(Immediately afterwards): strange now I seem to feel better.

To fest

I feel like that could/should be a verb.
I cannot see Immortal Cupboard: In Search of Lorine Niedecker for free on this upcoming birthday of mine. That is a pity.
But, my schedule this week may permit me to go to Fall For The Book on Tuesday and Thursday.
Oh Goody. Solitary thirty-something birthday plans!

Hee hee

Just read "Enough With The Sexy Face Already."

Opportunities to view Green

Green, green, green.
More of it to come, next season.

Sometimes an idea

is like a sugar cookie being nibbled at by a well-mannered but hungry and mature-for-her-age child...
(lahk a shu-ger cookee...)
I didn't yet know of an attempted assault on the campus when I walked into the bathroom behind someone else. (I thought.) The stalls were empty and the plexiglass square in the ceiling was ajar, revealing a big crawl space, which gave me a spooky whodunit feeling. Maybe the fact that in the evening I attended a meeting of the budget for the county's parks is a better thing to focus on. But it also got edged out by driving around and listening to Tori Amos. Looking for South of Broad in the bookstore, but fixating on Girls in Trucks. (Upon viewing the author's face on the book jacket--doesn't she look like that student I briefly knew in Seattle, and I was the closest thing to a fellow southerner, but I wasn't really, but we met at a coffee shop and she ate a meringue and I ate, well, nothing, because I had no money, and she was a nanny for a wealthy family, and told me that when she first came to Seattle she got rid of her southern accent right away because it marked her...oh well, nevermind, could not be, she was not Katie Crouch, is this some kind of "I think I cross paths with writers complex" going on?) Sometimes, it seems better if life is just about eating something orange out of a bowl in front of a TV set.
"Have a weird day."
(Al, from the A Girl Called Al books.)

Here 'tis

Given just minutes away from one of my jobs, where I got the opportunity to direct some proud and patriotic tea-party-ers towards their festivities this past Saturday evening.
The Communist Speech.

There was this artist called Remedios Varo

Stars of the Night Commute cover.

One reason to celebrate the 70s/80s

It's my day off and I don't think I'm going to this film festival thing I wanted to see in DC. Oh well. I got to ride a bike in beautiful weather today. Plus I have library books! Like Shelf Discovery, which is full of many book covers I can remember! I showed it to a friend, and we both agreed it's a shame we will miss Judy Blume at the book festival this upcoming weekend. I was looking at some of the versions of her books that are out now, compared to the ones I read. In the cover art on this older Yearling edition of Otherwise Known As Sheila The Great, those girls look like they actually have real personalities! I also found a teeny weeny version of the Yearling cover for It's Not The End Of The World on this site. That's the version of the book that I read. I loved her pose and used to stare at the cover, thinking I wouldn't have minded looking like her. I feel sorry for the kids nowadays, who have to get books with such incredibly boring cover art on them. Bleah. Maybe that will change. Hope so.

Tuesday evening in the park

Was the young man looking up at the great tree, who then knelt down and touched his head to the ground several times, an exuberant nature lover? Was he not the same as the one I'd just seen pacing around monkishly with a thick open book in his hands, its tasseled book-mark trailing out of it's center? Who reminded me of Vincent in Heaven Lake? And when he turned around and gave me a piercing look after I said "that's too bad" into my cell phone, what was he thinking? When I thought of his short hair, athletic build, and youth, I wondered if he came back from a war and began cultivating a passion to know more about Islam. Could be he will marry someone like one of the girls from Baghdad I knew, who became interpreters for the army. Or perhaps he hasn't been to war at all. Maybe he is a conscientiously pagan tree worshipper. (Tho somehow, I rather doubt it.) He pedalled away on a bicycle. In the car I listened to Datura. Spring Haze.

Glo friends

Maybe someday, I'll have a creative writing candlelit wine and cheese party with glo friends! I don't own any at the moment. My sister and I did have some once, including the turtle.

Labor Day this year

A gargantuan feature of my day off was watching shows on the MTV channel (I think) about pregnant 16 year olds and girls giving up their kids for adoption.

da da da da

I saw this girl today who reminded me of a certain girl who used to be the class artist who is now a writer. NOT how she looked in the grown up profile photo. More like a grown version of how I remembered her as a kid. Slightly Annie Lennox-ish. I found a very cute, charmingly misspelled letter (in cursive!) from her and the rest of my 3rd grade class in a brown manila envelope. Sometimes I wonder if these things aren't coincidences. Could be. Now, I can't be going to any upcoming book festivals on Saturdays. I requested off from one job. The other job stepped in to prevent me from going. Maybe I'll try to attend some of this film festival though. Before our yardsale, one of my friends lent me this book to read: I Was Told There'd Be Cake. Most in my mind is the story about being inveigled into being a bridesmaid. I knew a girl in grad school who always was one; she asked me how I escaped it. I don't know. I am the sort of person who is never asked to be a bridesmaid maybe? We had a conversation in a bookstore in upstate NY. I can't remember why. She asked me to touch her hand or sweater and tell me what I thought. I said "mother and love." She said "that's funny, because my mother gave me this sweater." Hmmm. Was that what it was? It's hard to recall. Tonight me and my new roommate ate cold crabs and drank wine in night time drizzle at some picnic tables. Thanks, early bird picnic neighbors. (For the crabs.) Yo quiero comer un cupcake.

eerie moments of the evening

The evening was a vast improvement over a severely and nauseatingly painful morning. Lonely Elevator Girl story. Wow, the 50s. Jack Kerouac. Much later on, in an art museum, the elevator girl stared and stared and recognized herself. I reminds me of the reaction I had when I stared and stared at a picture of Irene MacDonald by C.L. Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) in my high school photography book. "It Won't Come Smooth." This evening, I liked what I listened to on this radio show, "Voices With Vision," but alas, no playlist. I drove and listened and wanted to go to a diner, but I came home instead and then I was in the perfect state of mind to appreciate the elevator girl story. Before I sleep, I'm going to read The Magician's Book.

Finland

Land of superior health care. And maternity leave.
Conan Hates my Homeland.
Also they manufacture xylitol!
Which might be better for PCOSers than BREAD.
But not APPLES.

Hmmm

Is it good to reform health care? Is it imperative to reform health care? Is it American to care about poor people who can't afford health care? People who provide the more fortunate Americans with services...like waiting on them in restaurants, cleaning up after them when they get drunk at happy hour or on weekends, chopping up their salads in the kitchen...