play that funky music

good or bad: i can't seem to stop listening to 'take your mama out' by the scissor sisters.

and i mean seriously can't stop. its like some sick obsession. it's almost worse than the day of JT except it hasn't been on for eight hours yet. it might get there though....it might. depending on how long it takes me to write about one hundred more coherent words on petrarch's struggle between reason and passion- thematically, mind- in the canzoniere.

in the meantime, do it, take yer mama out all night.

would you hear me scream at the top of my lungs?

on saturday, i made three different kinds of chili.

last night, at about half seven, the two kates, morgen, robin and i sat around our paint stained round table with steaming bowls of food, pieces of buttered bread, glasses [both classy and klassy] filled with red wine and imitation sparkling beverage and ate and laughed and talked while candle light subtly lit our faces and rod stewart [don't even ask] sang about a woman named maggie.

moments like that- i'm not sure if what they make me feel can be put down in words. when i'm eighty ad the world is oving too fast i think this might be one of those memeories i slip back to. comprised of the best things in life- good food, good people and laughter- it's one of those moements that i never ever want to lose.

i think it might have saved me. and i think it might save me.

and so is love

you know what i like?

i like having friends that i can call up on a friday night. i like that even though a party's starting and plans have been made and set in motion that some friends will stop and drop everything and spend nearly an hour on the phone while you have a girly-type freak out about the most senseless shiete in the universe. i like having friends who will let you talk your way through whatever it is without interrupting [except when their roomate jumps on them and starts humping their torso....yes, that merits interruption] and offering good one lines exactly when you need them. i like having friends that send me emails that say 'i love you' and you know no matter what that's the way it's always going to be.

a little security in a world of uncertainty goes so far.

hey. you. i love you.

it's all we've got, isn't that enough?

i have just spent the past hour and a half looking at pictures of hawaii- kauai in particular- and have decided that all i really want right at this very moment is to be on a beach on the north shore with those massive waves raging in the background and the sun shining down and the smell of flowers and salt in the air. oh, and clean hair.

since the first part can't be accomlished without a bit of planning, maybe i'll work on the clean hair bit instead.

flavum nom de leesh

most of my favourite movies of life have john cusak in them. there's something in just how ordinary he is, how regular he seems on the outside that appeals to me. plus, he is majestic. awesomely majestic. anyways- before i go off on a rant about the appeal of mr. cusak- in high fidelity, based on the most excellent book by nick hornby, there's this scene where he and lisa bonet are talking about breaking up. they're talking about moving on in life. they're discussing the bad parts and the good parts.

i'm nto sure if it's lisa or john, but some one says a really poignant line about "stuff". something about how they hate the 'dividing up stuff' times in a relationship- about how it's the worst time.

i think this is applicable in any instance. dividing up stuff when someone is gone seems deplorable because it's so sad that someone's entire life seems to be stripped down to a few cardboard boxes, to old photos and scraps of paper that are thrown out anf small trinkets that have lost their meaning.

i know life is so much more than stuff, but the stuff part is just so sad. i'm inclined to agree with lisa and john on that one hundred percent.

god moving over the face of the waters

today is a monday.

i remember when i was little that sometimes, when my dad was watching baseball, i would crawl up on the couch next to him and watch the steady rise and fall of his chest. more often that not i would end up tucked under his left arm, validating my connection to my father by breathing in the same rhythm, echoing the rise and fall of his chest with my own, small one.

today is a monday. and today my father died.

'cos you, my love, i could never believe

i like to describe mornings like the one i had today as the 'i've-been-hit-with-a-board' type.

you know that feeling- you've been up most of the night because of various or nefarious reasons. your face is puffy and you look as if you've forgotten to take off your mascara or, alternately, that someone punched you twice in the face. you have sheet lines on the backs of your hands. your nightclothes are twisted and your mouth feels like it's turned to a deserted ghost town that even tumbleweeds avoid.

after shoving in your contacts you also notice that your eyes are bloodshot, your gimp-leg ankle is swollen and despite washing your hair in a midnight shower, you still look like you've been living in the bush for a few weeks. add stains of coffee to the sweater you pull on and really, you've got quite a coherent picture of what i looked like this morning.

then i found out that with the wind chill- it's negative thirty one degrees centigrade outside today. gorgeously sunny, of course, as all of the arctic air masses seem to be high pressure ones, but cold enough to make your tears freeze.

i think that staying home from class yet again might have actually been the best decision of the day thus far.

looking through her red box of memories

you know how sometimes you'll randomly pick up a book and without really planning on it get entirely sucked into it and spend the next three or four hours tucked up under blankets with scratchy eyes turning the page again and again until there's no more pages to turn and then realize that you've just spent four hours reading soemthing when you techincally should have been doing osmething else?

i totally just spent four hours reading bridget jones. all i can say, really, is 'fawaw, that mr. darcy!'

i know a place where no cars go

when kate comes in through the door, bringing ina gush of fresh air, i'm sitting on the couch with my good leg tucked underneath me, covered in mago juice and cackling wildly at the infomercial that has caught my attention.

ten minutes later, i'm still covered in mango juice, my right hand sticky and my wrists simply unmentionable and kate has joined me, both of her legs tucked up under her.

we decide on bridget jones.

i mean, she says she's fat and horrible and has no luck with men and wears huge knickers [which i actually quite admire being a fan of overly large underpants myself] but she ends up in said knickers macking with colin firth.

the only thing comparable to that kind of excitement in my life is revealing what exactly a mango stone looks like. believe me- not that exciting. it's kind of like a shrivelled up coconut.

someone told me there's a girl out there

essay writing seems to make everyone go batty.

in other news, i made myself a dinner tonight that made me go "mmmMmMmmMmmmmmMmmM" while i was eating it, much like a child of very few years. it was just boiled potato, scrambled beef and frozen mixed vegetables- no name vegetables at that- but it was exactly what i wanted.

in yet more random news, i can't seem to stop watching tom cruise kill oprah. it just continues to slay me each and every time.

god i am such a dork.

i can't wait to go back into japan

ever had one of those days that is good until you come home and then for some reason even though you have curry and bad pop music and some chocolate and are warm enough and not too stressed out it all goes to hell for some sort of inexplicable that more than likely should e written off as hormones or something like that?

yes, i think i am having one of those.

you have learn how to die

three pm on a sunday afternoon.

thus far today i have gotten dressed, eaten rice and chocolate covered nuts, watched a show on large animal surgery followed quickly by one about surgery on babies, called the dweller's sister about his personal belongings which ARE STILL IN MY HOME, edited three essays, had a visitor, listened to far far too much bad pop music, sent kate away to do my banking, and gone up and down the stairs no less than seven times.

HOO-yeah, master chief.

now here's the sun it's alright

four hundred and fifty six hours.

the total time left in my life until once again i will be a fully functioning non-gimp, capable to taking a step and waking up stairs. i'll be able to get my books and buy groceries. i'll be able to sweep the floor in under ten minutes. i'll be able to wear my left shoe again.

oh the joy.

too many things that i want to say

i like snow.

i'm not a skiier, or a snowboarder. i think that snowmobiling is a sin. i can't skate [despite years of trying] and snowshoes and i have issues because of the large mannish feet i have inherited from god knows where. despite this, i do enjoy the snow and winter- there's something about the way cold smells, about the squeak of snow under your boots and the way trees look when they are covered ina light dusting that strikes a chrod in me.

i do not, however, like the ice and freezing rain that comes with snow. like today, the first meaningful day of school. right now i should be in my intro to buddhism class with professor salmond. he'll probably show us pictures from kashmir just because he can. [even though that's more hinduism...but whatever]. regardless- i'm not there. i won't be in shakespeare and i'll miss yet another damned brit lit class because of all the damned ice and slush that has made venturing out on one foot and two sticks with rubber ends far too treacherous to risk.

i think i might be going crazy with this forced confinement. like, who the fuck stays home because it's a little bit slippery?

jesus on a donkey. four weeks and four days seem like a freakin' eternity.

you and i that's alright

morgen and mike cooked spicy thai food for kate and i this evening.

i think that if they hadn't fed me, my dinner would have consisted of celebration mix and water because i am too damned tired to do anything else. but i did put the vaccuum away.

the tired me [which is almost always crabby] would like to rant about the vaccuum and the other things i did which are directly related to cleaning again today, but i'll just come out sounding bitter and angry so instead i am playing u2 too loudly while kate talk on the phone.

or here in my room. as she's just arrived for our regular evening floor chat. sweet deal.

oh, you don't have to go

i have this suitcase that's light blue in colour. when you open it up there's a mirror on the inner part of the top of the case that's a square that sits on an angle. in a more coherent world- it's a diamond.

i've had this suitcase since i was little. i remember taking it on over night trips to my gramma's house. once a solid plastic toy balloon got tossed in that belonged to my cousin carolyn and i remember living in abject terror and fear for months whenever mom or dad looked sideways at the suitcase because, i was convinced, i'd be locked away forever for having carolyn's toy balloon. it was yellow and said "it's a boy" in blue writing on it. the pocket it was tucked into bulged out for years after the balloon was removed- its imprint a constant reminder of my theft.

the suitcase is a little more worn now. it would never do for an over night trip for me now because of my over-packing tendancy. instead, it's full of paper. i mean scads of paper. mail and pictures and stick on tattoos and newspaper clippings and small sketches and old essays and scraps of paper that meant something at some time. there's cd cases. thread and beads and random scraps of material and randomly scattered through the pile as well.

it smells good. it feels even better. i like to get lost in there.

i think that were someone to find it, they might have an inkling of who i am, the friends i kept [and continue to keep] and what was important to me during the past three years of my life. in fact, i sometimes fantasize about leaving it somewhere with a little sign that says 'open me' on it.

i imagine some person finding it- i can't decide if this person is elderly or young like me- and spending hours reading the letters and the postcards, examining the recipts and lists and residence and rental forms. the pictures would paint a story that ranged from concerts in the open to autograph signings with sir ian mckellan. the magzine clippings and printouts might reflect a certain affinty to a certain group of men from a certain movie trilogy. in the bottom, after much digging, they'd find glass beads, thread and a drawing that plans out an intricate mobile. i imagine them carefully putting everything back.

i can't decide if they would keep it or not. after all, it's just a bunch of paper.

but such a LOUD bunch of paper.