April 24, 2000

I was out for a walk tonight, in starlight.

I was at my elementary school, a place I haven't been since I was a kid. I stopped to take a piss near the swings along the back fence.

Suddenly I got the distinct impression that there was a child on the swings, laughing silently. The mental image was strong and sudden.

I zipped up and turned around, to see an empty swingset and a shooting star that appeared at that exact moment, one of those long, slow fireballs that creates a golden trail of light. It lasted for a good two seconds.

I stood there, with my mouth open, for a long time.

Welcome to Earth, whoever you are. :)

1. That's a pisspoor way to welcome the man who just liberated quebec!
2. At the hospital: everything felt ginger and squeamy, in the room with the newborn and the mom and the girlfriend and the husband. The newborn baby, not yet 24 hours out of the womb, already had fingernails. She was so tiny! But bigger than I would want to give birth to.
3. The breath machine that NewMom was to use: a little inhaler contraption that measured the force of her inhalation and the volume. I thot, wow. If I designed that, it would have a little racecourse for the plastic bit to get around, it would be a toy as well as therapy. Hmmm. I want to do that.
4. Crying on the way home from the hospital the day before the birth. Something in the combination of impending birth, impending doom (from an overdue software project), and the hot burning mouth from the Cajun burrito. Physical pain releases mental pain. Strange. Been seeing this a lot lately. Every time I do yoga, I get depressed for a few days. Stored pain from the accident.
   
   This all seems like a dream report, but it's a reality dream.

Rejoice! for today is National Pigs-in-a-Blanket Day

today i was blessed by waking in a fit of coughing. Then, while reaching for my clock radio, I knocked over and broke a wine glass, and then was in the shower and realized my shampoo was still packed from my recent trip to NJ. This day looks like an awfully wonderfully starting one.

No martial arts practice today. Still too sick with bronchitis. Work was dull until i got called to an on-site meeting which went well. i finished the on-site early and ran some errands (finding vacuum cleaner bags and belts for the hoover windtunnel upright and buying toilet paper). the first place i went didn't have bags or belts. the second place only had the bags. the third place had what i thought was the right belts. i got home, opened the vaccuum cleaner and saw that the belts i got were too small, and round instead of flat. i managed to stretch that fucker on there. i think it's rubbing somewhere because there is an odd burning smell coming from it. oh well. it seems i really needed to vaccuum. my old bag was really super full (and previously my laziness had prompted me to attempt to empty the bag instead of trying to find a new one, so the bag was super gross). The fullness of the bag had pretty much screwed the suction. i may as well have not vacuumed for the past two months. there is a "clean" light on the vacuum cleaner that indicated when there is no more stuff getting sucked up. it took SO long for that light to turn green. at least i know the carpet is clean now.

i still need to steam clean, but all in good time. then i'll finish my new painting (a nude self-portrait of the left side of my body).

i have this horrible sense of foreboding right now regarding my employment. i think i need a change of pace. a big one. i'm so tired of IT. i need a big life change.

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Breaking news: 6 children (ages 12 - 16) have been shot at an African American celebration at the National Zoo in Washington, DC. Two others have been transported to local hospitals for non-gun related injuries (one epileptic seizure and one pregnancy problem) induced by the excitement.

Currently (7:15pm EST) the police are canvassing the area looking for the suspects. Witnesses report that two large groups of teenagers were arguing back and forth, throwing bottles when someone pulled out a gun and started firing. it is not known whether those injured were the intended targets or innocent bystanders.

okay, the national media has the story now. my job is done.

like everyone else, apparently, I was sick today. I was particularly unhappy about it because it's the day I have class until 6:00 pm--but more so because it's the first anniversary of me and my SO dating. (Well, if you want to call it dating, but anyway.) Nonetheless, it was a beautiful day, and we cried near the end of it. It's been a long, strange, wonderful, tough year. I couldn't have predicted any of it. Life is like that sometimes. Surprised by joy? Yeah... Yeah.

1) Day at work, nothing special there. The usual stupid customers that think they can make a badass website with FrontPage, but always have the crappiest things I have ever seen.

2) Met Gwen at the Safehouse, she was playing cards with some friends. Read a magazine for a while, then we decided to rent a movie. We got Enemy of the State, since she has never seen it. Ben called while we were watching it - he's bringing people over to go swimming in the jacuzzi. The DVD decides to start skipping and replaying the same 5 minutes over and over. We decide to go swimming with the rest of the loud people in my house. It's about 1 a.m. - I'll exchange the movie for a working copy tomorrow.

3) In the pool (small apartment complex) making lots of noise, drinking beer. One of the neighbors decides to yell "SHUT THE FUCK UP! SOME OF US HAVE TO WORK TOMORROW!". She sounded like the bus driver from SouthPark. We toned it down a bit, and went back inside and went to sleep after one last beer.

The end.

This is for all you voyeurs out there, who love to read a life. if that's not you, ignore this.
I really screwed up. Oh, and i was so together, too. I was trying to be so together.

I pulled this meeting together, it's a new committee, i'm supposed to lead it. But i'm so easily distracted. Today the issue of ArtByte came in and of course i had to read it, stem to stern, to try to imagine how i could fit in - and then i had to compose my response to Beth, and send it, hoping that she'll still want me to write for the magazine, even though i'm not really all that cool. And then, to clear my mind, i go for a walk. Maybe on my way home I'll pick up some beer. Tonight could be nice.

I'm all the way over on Smith campus, walking and singing, when i remember the meeting which started 10 minutes before. I try calling home but I bet Dan's online. I know the office where we're meeting is somewhere on Gothic Street, which is between here and home, so i run up and down looking for clues. Even though i'm not prepared for the meeting. I try calling home again. I run home & boot Dan off the computer (it's mine, i can do that).

By this time, it's quarter to nine. But they're still there when Deb answers, and puts me on speakerphone to try to come up with a plan of action. I hate speakerphone, by the way, so if i call you, don't do this to me. But this time, i deserve it, and go along. Everybody, as is status quo, is going in several different directions.. i have to try to make it cohere.

So, ok, at least now i'll go get that beer. Pop's (feeling down? come to Pop's) is just down the street.

On my way back, there's someone coming the other way. It.. IS.. that guy. that one who i've seen, let's see:

1. at Stop & Shop, that once. He and his friend were buying cheese. i wondered if he lived around here, or was just passing through. but how many just-visitors buy a block of cheese?
2. walking down the street with a video in his hand, snapping the other. he didn't see me that time. but he goes to the same video store! and he lives not too far away.
3. on tax day at the post office. he's in line, six or seven people away from me. i want to jump on him and say, do you realize what you're doing to me when you look at me? you're giving me chills! who gave you that right?
4. fifteen minutes later, he and his friend are walking down market street behind me. i resist the urge to stop, and when i turn around they're gone.

So when i reach him, we say hello, but i start walking backwards. I do not have the guts to say what i have beeen thinking i would say if i spoke to him, which is Who do you think you are? To do this to me? Who do you think you ARE!? I am walking backwards, facing him, and all i can say is, i've seen you before. He has the grace to agree. I am ready to follow him home, but he stops, (after names have been exchanged and hands shaken) and asks for my number. He says he has a good memory for numbers, but no paper, and he lives just "over there". I'm sure this is a ploy to get me off his tail.

He looks like a cross betwen John Lennon and Gary Oldman, only younger (oh, and alive, and American). He's got this fantastic mouth.