lampoooooon

it seems that for every generation, there is a specific cultural benchmark that lets you know that you have arrived in the pantheon of legendary international superstardom. starting in the 70's, it was getting lampooned on SNL. in the 80's (if you were in britain), it was getting your very own puppet on spitting image; additionally, it was if you were asked to guest on sesame street. beginning in the 90's, it was unquestionably being asked to provide a guest voice on the simpsons.
and it makes you wonder...what's going to be next? what's the next step in legend benchmarking?

falling downtown

conveniently, we christened today the official opening of autumn this morning, because what lies outside my window is a perfect, gorgeous textbook example of what autumn is supposed to be. crisp and bright and cool and slightly breezy, but with the kind of sunlight that will not only warm you up, but will scorch your skin if you're not careful. gorgeous. it is so nice outside, in fact, that for once in my life i am actually happy about the fact that my company has an unbelievable culture of secrecy. why? well, because this morning, after packing up the last vestiges of our personal effects in preparation for today's heinous office move, the marketing staff decided that since nobody who knew anything about the move (i.e., our newly de-sprogged and on maternity leave bosslady and evil regional manager) had ever come close to telling us anything like whether we all had to wait for the packers, we were just going to bugger off and leave the still-packing sales staff to deal with the whole horrible endeavor. so, perhaps not the kindest of moves, but really. 'twas indeed their decision to not start packing until the day of the move.

thank you, leslie segretti

"we know you order your lattes skinny. we know about the shopping. we know you like hookers and whiskey."

the rundown (minus stifler and the rock)

and now in the milky light of monday morning, i've pulled the cotton wool out of my head long enough to finally reveal the truth of the deb ball to the assembled company. first: as far as i'm concern, the party was the stuff of legend. or perhaps not, but certainly it was charming enough to warrant its consideration as an annual event. the punch drained quickly and the company mingled properly (for the most part), and most everyone looked absolutely fabulous. we had a pair of gentlemen in dueling fedoras, as well as a pair in chain mail and mesh. the ladies swooped around in acres of pink and white and silk and glitter and stockings. one of our number made his requisite scene, taking a swing at the roos in the presence of his new boyfriend (needless to say, as a result of that, we have not made a terribly favorable impression upon the new beau; that is my lone regret of the shindig) and then passing out on the couch; somewhere in the middle of that he attempted to stick his tongue down my throat while standing about four feet away from the boy. apparently, i'm not the only one he tried this with. ah well. at least we know he has consistently good taste. the party coasted to a halt somewhere in the three o'clock hour, by which time i'd mixed my poisons so thoroughly that the world was spinning and i had to remove my contact lenses. by the time i crawled into bed, i was more or less unaware of myself. apparently, i whuffled gibberish into the ear of the boy before passing out, pleased as punch with a job well done.

saucy minx!

it's nearly autumn. actually, according to my calendar, it may well already be autumn (dates were never my strong suit). but that is neither here nor there. the point is that fall is coming in for a landing and that means: long walks, long scarves, pumpkin risotto, thanksgiving, halloween, skewer's choice, bonfire smell, mulled wine and spiced cider, corduroy, caps, combat boots, leather jackets and copper lipstick, kill bill, new alias, early darkfall and dinner parties, cold cheeks and cold hands, warm feet, hiding under someone else's jacket, wool sweaters and flannel sheets and wishing winter would hold off just one more day.

yeah. definitely looking forward to autumn.

almost there...

the pictures are hung by the sofa with care (and some truly terrifying whacks against the not-so-adhesive tape), the fairy lights have been hung, the dust kittens slain, the vodka is chilling and the apartment is flawless. we're hours away from the social event of the season. the owl and i have been cleaning since three, the bathroom is spotless, and buffy is on deck to usher us calmly into the home stretch.
so bust out your petticoats, find your pinkest lipstick and your naughtiest lingerie, and join us in spirit at the debauched debutante ball.

the beagle has landed!

so the bosslady dropped her sprog last night. at long last.

i suspect that my quality of life-at-the-office is about to skyrocket.

justify my

i am an asshole. i admit it.

between job stress (office move, pregnant boss giving birth three days before office move and leaving us all bewildered and confused, thinking i might not actually HAVE a job come the end of the year, getting reamed by the executive board), health stress (lumps in my neck that still haven't gone away, elevated blood pressure, disease scare), home stress (finding a new roommate and getting her sorted out), boy things and friend things, i've had my head so far up my ass that everything that didn't touch me on a regular basis got screened out. i got detached from my family, from some of my friends, from everything that keeps me sane. even my music.

so yeah. i pulled the family trick of not communicating. i failed to respond to emails. i failed to return a phone call. i, for all intents and purposes, dropped off the face of the earth.

i can see how you'd take that personally.
and i can't excuse the behavior.
but in my defense, if you'd taken time to investigate a little and find out that i've been OUT OF MY GOURD for the last six weeks and incapable of doing anything, really, you might not have felt the need to send me an email that made me cry. you might have given me the benefit of the doubt, just a little. or figured out that it's nothing to do with you, the pathetic nature of me in the last month or so. you had the resources. you had the person to ask who could have said "oh, yes, she's cracking up right now. please hold."

but whatever. clearly my poor course of action biased you against that path of thought. and that's fair.

but if you wanted me to feel bad, you've succeeded. i feel awful. and i'm sorry.

and i hope you'll take that. and accept that. and offer up a little compassion in this direction, at least enough to understand why i did what i did. even if you can't bring yourself to forgive me.

but that's your call. because whatever you've decided, i'm sure you've made up your mind.

that's all.

thematic!

riddle me this: what's the story with this week's theme days? we've had boys don't call night, randomly bump into someone from your past,day, and today, dumping by email day.*

p.s. i wasn't dumped by boy. i was dumped by a friend, which sucks even more.

caption me

things which make me inexplicably happy

• the reappearance in town of much-missed friends
  
• good, raucous, fun shows
  
• audience participation
  
• giving people good news about their upcoming vacations (particularly when the news comes courtesy of another friend)
  
• finding out that all of my fretting over a certain song was for nought, because the subject found it not intrusive, but mad sexy (!)
  
• toast and avocado at 2am
  
• vacation days. even if they're spent at the DMV.
  
• planning the party of the season
  
• the little owl's plan for total world domination.
  
• autumn. which means boots, corduroy, leather and tweed
  
• not being the one who has to bolt out of the house at hell-o-clock in the morning, but instead being the one who gets to make the coffee and lounge in pajamas and kiss someone goodbye. it's not quite for everyday wear, but it's really pleasing once in a while.
  
• pizza and wine (which is apparently a very me combination) with the girls
  
• not being at work.
  
• finding out that someone is going to give their child my name, because they think it's so darn pretty. that just rocks my face, despite my pathological fear of infants.

what makes you inexplicably happy?

drive like jehu!

guess who finally got around to trading in her california license for an official new york state driver's license?




just 2 and a half years too late!

pop top

i have spent years of my life lamenting the fact that my name, my curious irish name, has never appeared in a pop song. i always felt this was terribly unjust. "why could you not have named me sarah," i would wail at my mother. "or beth. or martha?" invariably, when i got started on this tangent, my mother would look at me curiously, wondering why on earth i was suddenly so hell bent on the name martha. but all my protestations were for nought; all the wails in the world would not give me a radio-friendly name.

so imagine my delight and joy upon discovering that my name HAS, in fact, been featured in a nick cave song! lamentably, i have no idea what it's called, but it was introduced to me in a terribly charming manner, courtesy of the armoured bear:

" "...their daughter Siobhan/who pulled beer from dusk till dawn/ amongst the townsfolk she was a bit of a joke/ but she pulled the best beer in town!" Tragically, though perhaps predictably, the aforementioned Siobhan meets a rather bad end soon after being mentioned in the song, O'Malley's Bar - which was owned by her parents (who were killed just before poor Siobhan). Admittedly, none of this has any direct relevance to the Siobhan in question here, who is not fated to meet her end at the hands of a fictional Nick Cave penned psychopath (and i should know), and is much nicer and more stable than most people mentioned in Nick Cave's music. By a long shot. "

and lo. my discovery that my name has been placed by the king of literate goth rock into the musical lexicon, albeit murderously. and with intimations that "Siobhan" is a bit of a simpleton... but nonetheless an altogether fine way to start my day.

all quiet.

To: The Infamous They
Re: Last Night's International Kibosh on all Telephonic Communications.

Blow me.

love,
shivvy

mysterious happenings

i confess that the jury is currently out on what kind of a day today is going to be. on one hand, i have a terrifying amount of work to do because i was largely useless yesterday; the subway car that carried me to work had no lights; i have more rehearsal to do tonight than i know what to do with, made doubly important by the fact that i completely blanked on the lyrics to one of my old standbys; my office smells like burnt hair and i think i have to go to the DMV on thursday.

on the other hand, a mysterious benefactor left a nearly full pack of cigarettes -- my preferred brand -- on my desk in the night.

so you can see my quandary, i'm sure.

amendment: i have figured out the tone of today. go here , read the entry on "how to answer loaded questions," laugh uproariously and understand my pain (or lack thereof)

quandarius

i've finally hit that artistic wall that i have been sidestepping so neatly for the last five years. namely, the inevitable smackdown between my public and private life. you see, i've spent years writing songs about the ones who done me wrong; it's common knowledge, it's therapeutic, and it's never been a problem because by the time people get songs about them they're usually long gone and exiled from my life. i never had to worry about them being hurt by my music, by my reactions to them and the truths i realized in their company. by the time i aired that dirty laundry, the subjects no longer cared what i thought about them.


so what do i do now that i've written songs about someone who's still an important part of my life?


the quandary is not whether i was wrong or insensitive in writing the songs themselves--i stand by my rights to my feelings. and there have been moments where i, like everyone who has ever been in a relationship, have been hurt. and in those moments, i have done what i always do when i'm wounded. i have written about them, snapshots of those moments where i had no other way to salve the injury. but that's all they are--snapshots. by crystallizing them in song form, i have been able to freeze the feelings in fiberglass, cool them down enough to file them away. the problem is, while i grow desensitized to the things i say in my songs and start to look at them as pure craft, the people around me don't see that. for the people who don't live with my songs every day, the messages remain poignant and volatile.


and that's the problem.


by writing about these instances between us, i am able to heal. my concern is that the party concerned will not feel the same way. that perhaps he will interpret them as a sign of an ongoing grudge or resentment. and as such, i don't want to play them in public. because the point of these songs is not vengeance; the very last thing i want is to use my therapy to exacerbate the problem or cause another. the thing is, they're good songs. i'm really proud of them, and i want to show them off. but they point like long fingers as harshly as i've ever done.

scandalous!

this weekend, i did nothing that could get me arrested.

but i came close.

music revue

i am throwing a party this weekend. said party is gorgeously themed (the debauched debutante ball) and gloriously co-hosted. as such, i must make the proper effort. now, the dress is taken care of. the decor planned. the invitations sent out. the punch...more or less planned. what remains?

why, nothing but the MOST IMPORTANT PART of a good party. i refer, of course, to the music. I think that four mixes will be sufficient for the evening (three upbeat/mixed, one mellower for the end of the night); i am currently working on compiling the first.

on the roster thus far:
1. theme to cowboy bebop (extended mix)
2. oliver's army-elvis costello
3. i hear noises-tegan and sara
4. red alert-basement jaxx
5. sexual revolution-macy gray
6. deceptacon-le tigre
7. hear me out-frou frou
8. seed-the roots
9. I-76-g. love and the special sauce
10. apple of my eye-ed harcourt
11. shakedown!-the start
12. young-ryan adams
13. the crystal frontier-calexico
14. murder on the dancefloor-sophie ellis bextor
15. pressure drop-the specials
16. cherry lips-garbage
17. i'm your boogie man-KC and the sunshine band
18. singular girl-the old 97s
19. top of the world-shonen knife

i think that's a good way to start things off. what are your thoughts? what essential party songs ('staying alive,' by the way, is verboten when answering this question) am i missing here?

i love making mixes. tra la!

paging amanda lepore

given that fashion is ostensibly a very female, feminine vice, i find myself increasingly disturbed by this season's high-fashion advertising campaigns. though the presentation of fashion has always been a rather masculine discipline (models, with their smooth, featureless bodies echoing nothing so much as a prepubescent boy) it is a very different form of masculinity infusing these campaigns; while still adolescent in tone, there seems to be emphasis on large, strong hands and square jaws. absent eyelashes and brows. instead of the boy scout, they seem to want the second-string quarterback.


that's right. the drag queens have landed in the fashion world.


the greatest perpetrator of this new phenomenon is fashion house valentino, whose insert i just stumbled across in elle magazine. the images feature this platinum blonde amazon creature who, if it isn't a man, is one of the most terrifying images of nu-femininity as according to the fashionistas that i've ever seen.

shiver yer timbers

avast, ye scurvy dogs!

for those of you who have not been keeping up with the really important news, today is international talk like a pirate day. that's right, me hearties, today be the day when you can 'yarr' and 'matey' to yer heart's content, the day to call yer cap'n a scurvy dog and find yerself a lusty lass (or jack) to be givin' a jolly roger (note: that would be a pirate flag. get your mind out of davy jones' locker, you naughty things).

if ye be unversed in the art of speakin' like a gentleman o' fortune, me hearty lads and lasses, here be a brief guide to be helpin' yeh.

in the meantime, join me in chorus, ye salty dogs! sound your barbaric YARRRR!

cures all ills.

Who knows how to make love stay?
1. Tell love you are going to Junior's Deli on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn to pick up a cheesecake, and if love stays, it can have half. It will stay.
--tom robbins, still life with woodpecker.

the fact that there is half a junior's cheesecake in my office up for grabs right now leaves me mildly unconcerned with how to make love stay.

once upon a more enlightened time...

okay. clearly nobody has ever accused the new york post of being a fair and balanced paper, particularly in its editorial section. This is why i frequently consider it to be a good barometer of how dogged and stubborn i am in my views. if an editorial concerning a subject on which i have an opinion fails to raise my ire, it's either an issue in which i am not interested or one in which i recognize that there are a myriad of valid opinions and i accept them all as valid and correct.

however.

there are also those editorial pieces that get me frothing so verily that it's all i can do to keep from picking up the phone, tracking down the author and giving them a piece of my stubborn, passionate, liberal-arts-educated mind.

i LOVE those pieces.

i stumbled across one today concerning the new revolution in 3-d ultrasounds and how they were causing strife and fear within the ranks of the "pro-abortion" (it's pro-choice, CHOICE! not life, as i erroneously put here earlier in a moment of fog. i am proudly and adamantly PRO-CHOICE. thank you) activists. and it was so unbelievably simplistic, so condescending and so smug, so quick to dismiss all women who choose to have abortions as cruel and murderous, so adamant in its refusal to accept that there are reasons women choose to do it, as there are reasons they choose to do anything. it was rapturously narrow minded, and it got my blood a-boilin'. oh, how the blood boiled.

it was, quite frankly, glorious. because it reminded me that there are things in this world that i care about outside of my immediate sphere, that there are things besides my job and my boy and my music and my friends and family that i mean something significant to me. and sometimes, particularly recently, i've been forgetting that. i've been so wrapped up in my personal dramas that i've forgotten what the flush of righteous anger feels like. i wanted to pick up the phone and call the post, track down that columnist and just tear her a new one for being so narrow-minded.

and then thank her, just a little bit, for dragging me one step closer back to myself

mercury rising

it has come to my attention that for the last month or so, mercury has been in retrograde, making a royal hash of everyone's attempts to either communicate or affect change in their lives. the final result has been widespread utter misery, stress and confusion all across the board.

it has also come to my attention that starting tomorrow, mercury comes out of retrograde. the channels will be unblocked and we'll all feel quite a bit better about the world at large. or at least the complaint department will again be processing our efforts.

so does this mean i'm going to feel better about the impending departure of a dear friend, or simply that i'm going to be more open and sharing with my keening wails?

goodbye, iowa

hey kids?

we're moving.

i've had a lot of fun here in the dland, but it's time to move on. i hope you'll come visit me in the new digs.

http://shivery.blogdrive.com

scots

it's really too bad that the only scotsman i know personally is really a rather vile human being. so i don't want to talk to him particularly. which is really unfortunate on so many levels.

fortunately, i also know someone who does really a rather reasonable facsimile of the scottish accent. and i really do rather enjoy speaking with him.

a girl's got to indulge a fetish somehow.

dear isabel, i hope you're well

they say that in the moments before the storm, animals become agitated. the prevailing theory has to do with the fact that before the heavens really open up, there is a great deal of ozone released into the atmosphere. it is the ozone that causes the animals to pace wildly and appear so nervous.
i don't know about the ozone, but one good look at the people on wall street today leaves me with no doubt that miss isabel's little temper tantrum is leaving the people of this fair city out on the farm with the stamping hooves of the goats.

let's get this party started.

hm. *kicking floorboard*. not so bad *tapping walls*. needs a coat of paint. some throw pillows *checking the ceiling for leaks*.
i think i'm going to like it here.

told

sometimes, being told what you already know makes you feel like trying defenestration as a lifestyle choice.

sometimes, being told what you already know makes you feel like you could fly.

muumuus

i just saw our new office.

and it is, in fact, an abject hellhole.

well, that's not entirely true. the building is nice and looks as though it has potential. even though we're over looking a sweatshop. it does, however, flank port authority. and is about the sketchiest neighborhood i've ever seen in manhattan.

my initial instinct stands: muumuus and mace. because i think that's what it's going to take to not get assaulted when leaving the office after dark.

wheeeeeeeeee

i have this tendency to eat with my hands. i don't know if it's because i have atrocious table manners or just because i find myself more dextrous with the food that way. as the chinaman in "the cricket in times square" once said, chopsticks are really nothing more than "two velllllly long fingers." perhaps that's it. or maybe i just like the tactile connection with my food.

really i just don't trust these "forks" and "knives."

why, yes, the meeting did suck my brain out through my nostrils. why do you ask?

brass

dressed for battle in my finest black armor, i am printing my weapons and steeling myself for war.

today the brass comes in to visit. today i am the star attraction. today i get to spend three hours being told why everything i've done in the last two years is heinous and wrong.

here is where slc training comes in handy: they are not going to be prepared for my whimsical ability to jack up an argument on the fly and bullshit with the best of them.

but wish me luck anyway.

rosy

i am frequently uncertain exactly how much stock i put in astrology--i like to believe it when it's good and ignore it when it's not--but right now i'm enjoying the notion that the stars are actually responsible for the fact that many things in my life have been utterly SUCKTASTIC for the last bit of time.

and that all i have to do is live through the month and things will suddenly look a lot more rosy.

onceinteresting

i started writing an entry and then realized that it, like so many others, was simply going to be an extended rant about how very much i loathe this job.

*sigh*

i remember when i was interesting.

teeth

i had that dream again last night, about losing my teeth. in this particular installment, they once again fell out in a single chunk, like a bridge. this time, instead of my left top molars, it was my front teeth. my four front teeth, collapsing inwards. i was at some sort of strange swanky hotel...i don't know if i was working there, catering the party that was going on in the ballroom or attending. all that remains clear is the black-gilded bathroom with its palm fronds and dark mirror, and my abject frustration that it had happened again.

if anyone could possibly explain to me what is going on with this dream, and why i can't stop having it, please let me know.

nonalpha

test

hiss

so...glad...weekend....

the hiss above is the sound of my brain deflating after a most curious week. and while the specter of the meeting of infinite hell (next tuesday) still looms on the horizon, i am feeling a bit more zen about it. or perhaps i'm in denial. difficult to tell. but i'm both flummoxed and strangely bolstered with an encounter i had with my boss this morning...after coming to my desk about six times to remind me to do certain things for next week, she came by a seventh time, and when she called my name i gave a very weak little response, both engrossed in another task and alarmed by what was wrong now. she comes into my cubicle, grabs a seat and says "after all these things i've been throwing at you, i wanted to tell you something nice. and that's that i have been noticing that since your review, you've really been making an effort to work on some of those things we talked about, and it's really noticeable. and i just wanted you to know that i can see it, and that it's really showing up in the quality of your work. just thought you'd like to know that."

mystifying! that never happens around here.

needless to say, for the first time this week, i was positively speechless.

get me out of here

why, yes. of course i have all morning free to stitch together fifteen jpegs out of your meaningless excel spreadsheet. never mind that each one takes about fifteen minutes to compile. i am here exclusively to make YOUR LIFE EASIER.

really.

just a little crazy

well, according to shiny new doctor, the mysterious lumps in my neck were no more than some particularly angry lymphnodes. but that i might want to get a little outside assistance with these anxiety issues of mine.

that's right. i have anxiety problems (shock! horror! i can feel you all recoiling in stupefaction right now).

so i now have irrefutable proof that i'm not a total headcase.

just a little bit crazy.

the best part? my parents' take on it:

mom: well, yes. i've thought that for some time.

stepmom: oh,now. you can't possibly be as stressed as you think you are.

right.

as a parting shot, i am looking to add a comments section to this little diary of mine, seeing as how y'all seem to be afraid of the guestbook and occasionally, i'd really like your feedback. so, suggestions?

hey!

Dear Shivery:

"just give up, and admit you're an asshole. i think you'd find you're in good company. and i think you'll find your friends will forgive you. or maybe i'm just speaking for me."

Love,

the part of your brain that's really tired of you beating yourself up over every goddamn thing you do.

home-lost-keys-numbskull

you know your apartment has truly become your home when you leave your keys at the office, 40 minutes away, and you go charging back to get them, because all you want out of the evening is a glass of wine, some quality time with your guitar and your boy, and your couch. all you want is to be inside your castle, where you are queen.

i am home now.

geeeee-tarrrrrrr!

i used to laugh at those people, the random rock stars with rooms full of guitars. i used to wonder "what the hell do they need all those guitars for?" well. it seems that now i'm learning, with three of my own (the gift, the beater and the show pony) and a fourth to come (the blue electric, once i get to cali)...i am becoming one of those "room-of-guitar" people.

scary.

excess, man. excess. but considering that a guitar is my second favorite bedfellow in the world? it's probably not such a bad thing.

anyway. as long as it's not cats, quoth the biscuit.

~stressed~

so my hair is once again an atomic cherry red. at loose ends last night, i figured it was time to subject myself to that chemical cocktail while i noodled about on my shiny new guitar and tried not to think about my upcoming appointment with my shiny new doctor.

the last few days in this cubicle purgatory have been marked by a rather astonishing amount of...not co-worker bonding, but comiseration, to be sure. largely at the expense of our boss and this company. vaguely therapeutic. there's something about knowing that everyone you're working with hates it as much as you do.

that, and the dead mouse that made an appearance below triniwoman's desk a few minutes ago. yeah, that didn't go over so well in a roomful of women.

head case!

isn't it just typical of me that the more i have to say, the quieter i get?

all over the place

i've finally done it. i have a new primary care physician. no more putting off going to the doctor when i'm clearly dying! no more making up excuses! after two years of bitching about the man in dark slope, i have a new doctor, brought to me on highest recommendation by the one co-worker i still respect. thursday afternoon i go see her, and she will be checking out the mysterious lumps i found in my neck on friday.

oh, you didn't know about those?

yeah. i have strange lumps in my neck. which are either very angry lymph nodes or cancer (or neither, but you know of my penchant for melodrama. come now.) i vascillate between mildly concerned and rife with all out panic. even though i'm fairly certain that my shiny new doctor is going to tell me it's largely stress-related.

'cause, you know. i've been a little stressed out lately. for myriad reasons. you know how it is.

in other news...last week, my producer told me that he absolutely had to see me. immediately. he had something very important to show me ("as long as it's not his cock," quoth the boy)...after postponing the meeting twice, i caught up with the man last night. and what did he have to show me? a shiny new guitar. MY shiny new guitar. he brought me a shiny new guitar. to which i said "meh?" and proceeded to giggle like a maniac for about ten minutes. plus, it seems we have access to studio time. real, honest to god studio time. that's right, children, we're going full throttle back to work on the CD. woooot!

what a strange, strange world it is in which we live.

and, a parting shot. next week, chairman of the board (you know, the one who sent me an email telling me he hates the work i've done on the website) and scary VP man are coming into the office. and guess what they want to talk about? that's right, liebchens, the website. me. to be perfectly honest, i'm so distressed by the fact of this meeting that i really don't know what to do with myself. at all.

so, to alleviate the pressure i think i'm going to stagger through the day, take thursday off (because, really. going to the doctor to get a lump in one's neck examined is quite enough agony for one day), and possibly go to soho and buy myself something pretty. finish off my roll of film (and possibly deposit it for processing). then go home. call my mother. call the biscuit. play with the shiny new gee-tar. and go to sleep.

thrilling, eh?

sundays are exhausting

i was going to write an amusing little anecdote about the mute boot fetishist i encountered yesterday, but instead i'm going to leave it at this: i just wrote a brand new song in about ten minutes (well, almost. some lyrics need to be reworked). and i am exhausted. so i gots to rumble. perhaps i'll tell you about the boot fetishist later.

working and dreaming

my dreams

of late

have all

had guest appearances

from

my

coworkers.

and ever morning

i have woken up

with

a sore jaw

from clenching

my

teeth.

you tell me why i'm having trouble sleeping.

in other news, i spoke to the guy from that company that wanted to interview me. for a position that would have required me to take a 6,000 dollar pay cut. and thus, with much pain, i had to say thanks, but no thanks. but, you know. at least it's nice to know that after two years in the work force, i am qualified, finally, for entry-level work.

yarr.

these smoke eaters want to get splifficated

and how!

if tom waits doesn't make me cry, i know i'm going to be okay.

the music of tom waits is rainy day music. that is why i am listening to it now.

the music of tom waits is also the music you listen to when you're thisclose to simply disintegrating and doing your best not to fall into a pile of racking sobs. this is not why i'm listening to it now.

no, i'm actually feeling almost sane for the first time in two weeks.

stress cadet

ever since the ill-fated review, i have been exceptionally....tense. i have been tied up in knots and unbelievably rife with stress. it's been making my heart flutter in terrible ways, in the way you get when someone startles you, the way it happens when you have a shot of adrenaline running through your system. if i were more paranoid than i already am, i would think im' developing a heart murmur. i know it's more along the lines that i've spent three weeks having a constant panic attack, and thus my cardiovascular system is in overdrive.

but i also note that in those moments when i am calm, when i am not thinking about work or moving or any of a host of other crises, the heart just tap tap taps away happily. the head stops hurting. the ears stop ringing. that said, i think i need to start making a conscious effort to calm the fuck down. i need to go somewhere. i need to sit in a nice quiet room by candlelight and daydream. i need to spend a quiet weekend alone. i need to hang things, paint my room, lacquer my kitchen table. make wire jewelry. i just need to start...i need to start paying attention to the fact that my life is not exclusively about stress.

i need:

1. newroommate to move in.

2. to settle up last bills and whatnot with currentroommate.

3. to nail this job interview and get a new job.

4. the ex to leave town so i can stop thinking about it.

5. a vacation. for real.

any three of these things will probably make the whitecaps in my blood go away.

and cutting down on the caffeine probably wouldn't hurt, either.

om.

YAAAAAAAA!

JOB

INTERVIEW.

i have a job interview.

pros: a job that is not here. a job that is something new. a job that might well broaden my horizons and actually make me think. a job that does not kill my soul.

cons: it smacks of entry level. with which there is nothing wrong. unless they try to pay me less money than i'm making now. which is really not the point of this little adventure.

but..job interview! wheee! my concentration is now, officially, completely shot. and it will continue to be until the HR guy calls me back so that we can schedule.

i saw something nasty in the woodshed!

i had a compounded anxiety dream last night, combining the greatest hits of those things which frighten me about school and work, featuring my boss as a professor whose conference i slept through--while just outside her office. which was just off my bare, demolished, hovel-like apartment (dream apartment, not my apartment).

distressing.

in other work-related news, i find myself sympathizing with miss sally sue...her boyfriend of TWO YEARS (with whom, i might add, she's been shacked up for eight months or so) forgot her birthday. clean forgot. and whatever else i may feel about her, that's really not okay.

and in FURTHER work-related news, i think i have to actually bite the bullet and write the world's most boring article today. lotus applications and e-learning. oy. wish me luck. feel free to bombard me with wit to take the edge off.

and finally, my gay boyfriends are better than your gay boyfriends.

that is all. time to re-verse myself with meaningless rhetoric and empty jargon.

goodbye, englishman

my ex is coming to town this week and i've decided not to see him.

because, quite frankly, there's enough going on in my head that i don't need to compound it with that particular piece of baggage.

plus, i was speaking to herr producer last night, and he reminded me of two things:

1. you should never see someone from the past out of some sense of obligation. particularly when you know full well that you don't want to see them in the first place.

2. were i to see him, i'd be demonstrating particular insensitivity to someone who is much more important to me than an ex.

today is the day where i must throw down and decide between the past and the present. and i say the time has come for me to live in the moment.

and thus do we actually close a chapter.

when you get the distinct feeling that this is going to be one of the longest days of your life, can you really be expected to amuse a small child?

my boss has brought her four-year old daughter into the office for today. and tomorrow. and the next day. and i know i'm supposed to be personable, but i'm having the kind of day where i can't speak lest the floodgates get opened.

i'm a bit agitated. not really in a plays-well-with-others state of mind.

so i have no idea how i'm going to entertain a toddler. which i know i will be asked to do at some point. given that she's the one-girl focus group for something i'm working on.

because every girl should be able to fix her own closet

i do, however, have the mad skills with the power drill.

mixed blessings and headaches

he reached for me as i walked away from the immediate trackside. this man, this creature in the blue and green aloha shirt and the molesterstache reached for my arm as i passed him. i'd seen him watching me as i stalked the platform, trying to burn off the stormclouds that had been gathering above my head all night.

he reached for me just minutes before the train came. i felt the brush of his fingertips on my wrist as i crossed his line of vision and twisted wildly to avoid the contact. i twisted too far and came close to swan diving onto the tracks. i righted myself and charged to the end of the platform, taking refuge behind a garbage can and stomping my combat boots to remind myself that i was still there, that i'd not fallen onto the third rail, that i'd not allowed a stranger the undeserved luxury of entering my personal space.

but i could still feel his fingertips, clammy and wanting, on the sleeve of my jacket.

five minutes later, the four shots of tequila and two margaritas kicked in and i was suffused with a pleasant numbness as i fumbled with the pod for some sounds to drown out what remained of what i felt. i slid down the wall to rest on my heels, dropping my head and closing my eyes. waiting for my chariot to come for me. waiting for my head to clear.

i've sobered up quite a little since.

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