August 2006 Archives

Don't you hate it when people, in all dead seriousness, blame their lives on that without any factual backing? Like me calling my lack of updating "commitment issues" or some bullshit. I just haven't updated. Life is busy. I didn't make the time. Let's call a spade a spade, people. Really.

There's some re-evaluating going on in my day-to-day front, specifically which meetings will support the best state of mental health (and which won't), and what should be done about it, and now that raf and I are living together I have to like, cook dinner a few nights a week, and realizing how differently I'm handling this relationship than any other one i've handled (ever), and adjusting, and changing, and so on. You all must know how well I embrace change by now! I'm actually okay at it sometimes, on the surface at least, but there's all these bizarre reactions going on somewhere in the recesses of my head and heart that make me act a little strange. Fearful. Defensive.

On a total side note, there is a gigantic spider right outside the office window that has built an eighteen inch (across) web and is just sitting there, waiting. It's so weird to see something like that so up close - and I'm remembering now, last time that happened, it was outside this apartment building I lived in in Hamden, and every night the web would be there, huge, blocking the side door... and every morning it would be gone. And then nobody saw the spider for a few days - until it showed up in my kitchen (about four apartments down from where it was living). That fucking sucked. The hair is standing up on the back of my neck just thinking about it.

So, apparently, I digress.

There's been many discussions of the flourishes of our New Haven youth, and where we've been, and where we're going... and if I go to see the Wrens, Glen Hansard, Tom Brosseau, and Rocky Votolato, that that will suffice. And it's not all going to be new all the time. And it's not all going to have the carelessness of youth all the time. And my passions have to be worked on and uncovered and dusted off, and everything is usually right in front of me and I don't know it.

I've never stopped writing.

I've never stopped paying attention.

And there was one single solitary flyer left for Open Studios in October. So I suppose some jumping would be in order.

Do what you love, and the rest will follow. You find yourself and create yourself by doing, not the other way around. My plate is full and good and most of the time, I am genuinely happy and grateful for everything I am and everything I'm not. And when I stay out of my own way, the part of me that does need to do the work of the polishing and uncovering just becomes apparent and I do it. Then I have to make sure I don't blow my head off when I hear about the guy on NPR who moved to New Orleans six months after Hurricane Katrina because he felt so passionately about the rebirth of the city that he needed to be a part of it. Or, in his words, "If I didn't go, I knew it would have killed me." Yow.

I'm thinking about copying all my tickets and setlists in black and white on the office copier, covering a whole wall with them, and then blowing up prints from a bunch of live shows. Like recreating the teenage bedroom of my youth. And then maybe a standard gallery on the other side. Sounds neat, doesn't it?

Pay attention. It's really all I need to do sometimes.

...

Because I'm getting older, and I get tired, and I should be in bed by now.

I'm learning about spiritual growth via restraint of tongue. It sucks. I'm being promised that there are unshakably fantastic payoffs though, and while I believe it, I still want to let a few choice things fly.

Pauline has five years tomorrow. I can remember sitting the back patio, verbally assaulting her with the Big Book. How funny. We're going to go out to dinner and then to a meeting... I don't think anyone I ever sponsored, even for just the beginning, or any short chunk of time, has stayed sober this long. Not that I have anything to do with that - but merely to just have been a part of such an amazing process is staggering.

I guess my biggest problem is if they'll have anything on the menu under thirty bucks. Free bread, anyone?

Why do cigarettes have to be so horrible? There are moments when I just love them so.

I'm sure my graceful handling of the first situation up there tomorrow, or lack thereof, will warrant a more thorough entry. I should probably take a cue from Kristin and do this shit in the morning. Sleep is just like cigarettes sometimes.

V.

...

and sleep pound my brain, plate is full but somehow the sentences are empty. so I'm here because I'm supposed to be. adjusting to my new roommate... mmm. finding ways around the little things, and ways to love them still. it's good, it's really, really good, in a real way, not a wishy washy early on in the game kind of way. I can't wait to make coffee for the morning shift on friday. funny, these little things, like an oasis...

I'm not the best at anything, really, and somehow I have to get past that and just keep doing what I dig, for no other reason than the fact that I want to or need to. I wax and wane. I do things alot or not at all.

I've never stopped writing, even if it's the first ten pages of two dozen notebooks in a box in my closet, or furiously scrawled-on legal pads with full pages on both sides of the whole thing. and things that were funny then in sharpie on the back.

life is so wonderful, I've never had it so good - it's shifting more towards creating who I am, instead of trying to figure out what I'm supposed to be, even though those sound the same, but they're not.

love and heavy eyelids time,

v.

...

Recovering, tiptoe-ing, taking it easy... but I'm back. This weekend demanded a lot of physical and emotional rest, and what I did have left to give came in the form of espresso making and grocery procuring.

Now, I have to go take care of everything I didn't for the last few days. I'm still worn pretty thin, but well on the way back to "fine". Heh.

kisses,

V.

...

... you're all full of shit. All of you, all you women who told me what I had to go through today would feel "crampy" or "pinchy" or "really not so bad at all". I will rephrase. I'm so glad for you that you had such a wonderful experience with your biopsy, or your doctor, or maybe you were wasted, or maybe I'm just sensitive. But come on, ladies! It felt like exactly what it was - a doctor with a pair of forceps ripping out a chunck of flesh.

Now, just like mammograms go, "It doesn't hurt like cancer would". They particularly like to use that phrase when your breast is mashed between two pieces of hard plastic in an inhumane state. So I get it. And I have perspective, and I understand, and everyone is different, and all that stuff. But today was just horrible. Invasive and painful. I've never felt violated at the gyno before, but I do now. Again, not because of the doctors, because I love all of them - they're some of the most wonderful women I know.

And for the aftermath? No, I don't feel "crampy" and I've already taken four ibuprofen, thanks. I feel like someone would feel after three chunks of their insides got ripped out with a pair of fucking scissors. I'm sore and uncomfortable and right at this moment, it feels like I won't have sex for a month at least. They said ten days.

I would post the pictures of it if it didn't look so disgusting. You can go Google for pictures of "cervical biopsy" if you want, but don't say I didn't warn you.

So like I said, I'm going to go with me just being a little more sensitive than you guys. And yes, I have several piercings and tattoos - but I only sat through the tattoos because I had to (once they were started). And the piercings - well, ears and cartilege are an entirely different ballgame. I hate all of you though, still... well, not really. I think I'm going to go take a nap now.

...

Um, chicken. Ha.

Yeah, so, I'm worn really thin, and my body wants to do some avoidance sleeping (that's the don't move until 9am kind of stuff), and I'm doing the best I can. I can't believe I'm sticking with updating so much. And that I sold my storage boxes. Turns out the cloth ones I bought suck a little bit, but they're good enough, and lightweight, and easy to toss in the back of the attic / cubby / poor excuse for a closet thing I've got going on here. Nice.

Two and a half weeks (just under that) until cohabitation starts. I should start a blog just about that. Adventures in Premarital Sex? That implies marriage. Um... Adventures in Sober Cohabitating? The Real Real World? Two people, living in one room, who blog their lives for the amusement of others? Something like that. I think it would be pretty good, actually... to document something from the beginning like that. Any suggestions, webmaster?

So, yeah. Broke, worn thin, tired, but overall good. Trying to figure out better storage solutions. Going in for my "outpatient procedure" tomorrow, which everyone assures me is going to be extremely manageable. Reading the list for headliners at CMJ and not peeing my pants about who's playing... Cold War Kids, Silversun Pickups, and a bunch of other decent goodies, but my socks are still on. Metaphorically speaking, at least, because I don't put socks on until it snows and I'm always the first one to bust out the flip flops.

Feck. I've got to speak Saturday night, totally forgot. Off to the races then - more to follow.

...

...and has quite the sense of humor.

check this out (I'm sure the actual story / audio will pop up eventually).

it's like this massive, enveloping, affirming push into a net with a whole bunch of other people. like I'm being screamed at, "YOU ARE NOT ALONE! YOU ARE SANER THAN YOU THINK!"

or at least that's what it feels like.

...

Yes, that is a "Milkshake" reference. I know. Open fire whenever you feel like it.

I have got to just put it out there that - it seems like - it feels like - I stop doing things when I realize there are people around me that are better at it than I am. Most noticeably, keeping up with new bands. It's a fucking full time job. And I hibernate, and check out for a bit, and I come back and there's all this... stuff. All these bands, all these plans - and I have tickets to see the Wrens in September, and that's about it. I've kept my running lists of Songs I Like but I'm just not into it like I was last fall. I make shitty mix tapes - really. So I scoured today - Toad's, Iron Horse, Mercury Lounge, Wrens, Oh My Rockness, everything I could get my hands on - and as far as I can tell, I'm not missing too much. Anything that's been good enough to get through my... walls? Not walls. Through the little padded cell I've put myself in? No. Um... through my sleep-state - that's it - anything that's managed to make it through that (like Tapes 'n Tapes) aren't touring this second. And I really want to go see "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" at Southern, but the tickets are thirty bucks each. And there's this great singer / songwriter / writer-writer benefit thing going on next week that John Roderick will be at, and those tickets are forty bucks each. Jeez! And there's been a bazillion good show listings for the pool in Brooklyn, but to be honest, I don't want to fight with a bunch of kids that are too cool for school to catch The Shins playing the same stuff they played last time, or to stand elbow close to people who are coming to see Sufjan Stevens because they think they're supposed to. And then there I was, all ready to truck down to see The Frames, and I would have literally keeled over from heat stroke, so I couldn't go.

For feck's sake.

It's frustrating. It used to be all I did. It faded out. Should I be doing it more? Is it not important enough? What am I missing? What do I need to see? What do I need to do? The bottom line is if a show is good enough, I'll go, but what happened to the fire? Is it the Wellbutrin? It can't be. It's this bizarre fading-out self-esteem dilemma, where, although I can't really afford to go to CMJ, if I do go, I'll totally not know what all the bands are that they're booking because I just haven't kept up on it. And I'm totally fine with that, that's how it was the first time. But it seems like something's missing... because I don't want to go see Okkervil River or the Mountain Goats, again. I don't want to see The Decemberists play an all-ages gig at 6:30 on a school night. And dammit, why the fuck do The Long Winters have to be playing the Bowery? Why can't it be a regular sized gig? Am I getting old? Does anyone have any experience with this? Because I feel like I'm trying to get somewhere without a map.

Help, please. Emails and comments would be greatly appreciated.

...

Even though I am so completely shot right now, it is far outweighed by knowing I got started on my day - out the door, showered, etc. - before 8 am. I got up with Raf at 6:30 to take care of the dog before we both left for work, and while we wound up having to rush out, it's just so, so much better than sleeping until 8. Remind me of that when I'm exhausted tomorrow morning, will you? Thanks.

I. Am. Tired. My mom's dog is still pretty young - less than two years old - and she's a handful. We curl up to sleep, and she wants to play. On the couch, off the couch. On the couch, off the couch. On the couch, off the couch. I start to drift off. On the couch. Off the couch. Nose in my face. On the couch. Squeaky toy time. Hard bone-toy chewing time. On the couch, off the couch. On the couch.

I finally had to put her in her crate around 3 am, and didn't have time to play with her this morning, and so this afternoon we'll do several rounds of "Where's the Baby?", until one of us gets tired of it. ("Baby" being the ratty, nasty, puffy, person-shaped thing she throws up and down the hallway.) So that's on my agenda. And then hopefully a quick nap, and then dinner and picking up mom at the hospital tonight around 8. This is normal now. This is my day.

I would kill for a pedicure and a massage. The pedicure I can handle. Maybe Raf is willing to help out with the rest.

I hope I can at least afford part of the NYC week with KEXP for CMJ. Seeing as I'm ready to sell my car to not have a payment and insurance - which probably won't happen - you can guess that the budget remains tight. That, and the second job are definitely going to come into play. They'll have a ton of people there for it, so I will most likely go for the second half of the week, and make two good solid days out of it. (Insert melancholy sigh here while I think back to the good old days where having money and doing what I wanted overlapped for a few months...)

So, that's my Tuesday. I love NPR, and triple 1% lattes, and my new toering, and my wonderful boyfriend. Just in case you were wondering.

...

interviews are a lot to go through for a maybe. all dolled up in sunday's best, hoping to provide the most accurate version of yourself that you can, which might even be as perfect and true as it can bein that moment - and it still may not be what they want. I'm sitting in the laundromat preparing for this, all calmed by the soft whites and blues they're in the middle of re-renovating it to.

as much as I would love this, there's a degree of nervousness removed from not needing to do it. if they say no, I'll be alright. but who doesn't love the yes...

polaroid pepsi-shot daydream linoleum,
spin cycle work shirts
red metal folding chairs
make me want to go paint the whole world.

seven minutes last touches
faded signs in the beating sun
you took a picture for me in the grass
sit up straight, stop fidgeting
all of a sudden everything's wrong -
or just right.

...

I saw this documentary a long time ago about the chaos theory, and fractals, and fractal geometry, and I've written about it before. Long story short: there's patterns in the chaos. Seemingly random unfurlings and happenings are actually quite planned, following strange little patterns, and slowly becoming obvious.

Unfurling. When you watch fractals develop, it seems like the perfect word for it. Because that's exactly what they're doing.

So I'm in the sleep much be cranky girl time, which leads to frustrated rushed mornings and too-late schoolnights. And like Kristin and I emailed about this morning - what seems so random, and so shapeless, turns out to be quite... well, quite not like any of that at all. Things are changing. I'm in the middle of The Week. I'm sure these were the same "random" happenings as they were about this time last month... and on top of that, there are plenty of things that have become a Normal Part Of My Day that really aren't normal at all. Things in today's schedule include stopping by the hospital to see my mom, which feels like just another part of the process of a Monday, but really, it's not regular at all. The everyday things I go through would floor other people. Life is hard. I deal with it. And I wonder why I have to shut down every once in a while to regroup - and then I am pushed to write consistently, and then more puzzle pieces fall right into place.

So here we sit.

I used to spew my guts all over a yellow legal pad most of my waking hours. I also used to chase a perpetual blackout with complete disregard for every single interpersonal relationship in my life. I used to be skinny. I was also sixteen then, and unhealthy. I bought tank tops in Goodwill this weekend so I'd have stuff to wear to work when I'm covered in bleach... currently still on the lookout for a pair of army colored boy's cargo shorts though. I fumble. I leave love notes for my boyfriend. I'm still pretty judgemental and uncompromising when people are completely full of shit and calling it something else. Things are so transparent - which means I must be too...

...

I'm trying to type around ChaCha right now, which is proving awkward. Letting her "do laundry" is important. The dash is important. I just learned about that today. Donna forwarded out one of those feel-good emails that make you want to change your whole life, like the one about the woman who was finally wearing the dress she kept saving and saving to wear to something special - and in the end, it's her funeral and someone is dressing her in it. This one was about a eulogy, about how the dates in the beginning and the end really weren't of much consequence, other than the obvious. What really mattered was the dash, the in-between, the life that made up the space from date to date. And the rest was all about living well and respecting yourself and others and what you were doing with your dash - so in honor of that, instead of pushing the litte love away to write (type), I'll just have to go around her.

When she does laundry this fervently, it gets pretty funny. She starts going in slow motion after a while, very methodically, and sometimes she starts to drool. Not big nasty drool, but when she leaves, there's a tiny little wet spot where her mouth was mashed into me. I love her.

I was talking on the phone with Erin this morning about body image and I brought up the scene with the woman drawing flowers on herself in the bathtub in "What the bleep do we know?" and how before that, things were getting to this distorted carnival-mirror image everywhere she looked. Erin moved away and has no point of reference, it's just her looking at herself, letting in the new people she meets as much or as little as she wants. Subsequently, without those familiar daily references, she's slid a little towards carnival mirror instead of a little more bathtub. I say this after catching a glimpse of myself last night and noticing that my stomach was actually kind of flat, and most of what makes up my jeans size is the fact that I have hips - not because I'm obese. And Erin, who's about 5'1", is like, "Well, my boss, who's heavy, I mean, heavier than me-" at which point I cut her off sharply. She's got some muscle to her, don't get me wrong, but "heavy" is not the word I'd even consider. "Barely able to be called thick in a small girl not fat but a little muscular in a really good way" is more accurate. She's healthy and in shape. She runs. She watches what she eats. And she gets carnival mirror just like I do.

That, a good iced latte, and clean sheets about sums up my morning. I'm leaving to walk to work in about ten or fifteen minutes. I slept late again today - which is where part of that conversation came from, about how when we're really, really on top of accurately paying attention to things, that we can put the pieces together like I did yesterday. Otherwise it's like, "Maybe I'm tired?" and our sponsors and therapists go, "Um, well, sometimes, but right now you're hiding / self destructing / avoiding" etc., whatever the issue du jour is. I mean, don't get me wrong. Sometimes it's just about taking a nap. But sometimes it's about checking out - and usually it's pretty clear which is which. Generally I'll sleep in either case and just ride it out, but the way things are now - I'm capable of getting up, and I should be. Gee, maybe all this stuff, and my mom going in for chemo again Monday, and moving in with Raf, and all these changes - maybe they're affecting me! Wow! What an epiphany! But all kidding aside, the fact that all of that gets tied together in days and not months is amazing. Really. I guess regular people just kind of get that, but it's had to be beaten into me.

I'm thick in more ways than one, I suppose. But it's the good kind.

So, off for my last training session, and one or two more next week - and my first full real shift is next Saturday morning. Delish.

The last thing I have to add is that I'm starting to feel like I don't have a lot to write about - which means the space is clearing out. I can't mix that up with having nothing to say, because it's just not the same.

V.

...

Is this thing on?

I'm still here, I swear. the last two days have been back to the "old" ways (which aren't so "old" because if I'm still behaving in a certain way, it's not "old" behavior now, is it?) which for me means sleeping until 8:30 and napping in the afternoon - and I'm here to report it doesn't work. Interestingly enough, it's happening on the heels of some very trying days - two in a row - where I got all kinds of jammed up. There's some medical issues afoot, that are apparently quite manageable, and some personal... altercations with people that are, basically, actively drinking - or about eight days into not actively drinking. Now, were I not writing regularly (at least mostly regularly) I would not be putting two and two together like that - angst leads to elevated sleep leads to not writing leads to - hey, wait a minute! I have patterns!

I'd like to formally thank Kristin for pushing me to update.

Now, off to a health benefits meeting, and then a little work, Petco, and koffee? training at 2. Be well, willya?

...

so the shot went fine, but now it feels like someone repeatedly punched me in the crook of my right arm. the blood draw itself was tolerable. remind me next time, will you?

I'm out in a few to head to a meeting, I really have an inconsistency with capitalizing from entry to entry - sorry. so I'm leaving soon, and I didn't need to come here, but here I am anyways. it was interesting to chat with kristin today about varying degrees of my raging alcoholism, from car wrecks to relationshipwrecks (!) to jails to the ghetto in hartford, and back. it's funny how my mind will discard every single one of those experiences for the one time I had fun, and looked fabulous doing it.

there's a ton of stuff I want to say right now that goes under the saftey net of Who Might Be Reading, so I'll have to digress for now. and that's all the time we have for today -

v.

...

(although that song is about a date, but still...)

it's 7:15 a.m. and I have to go get bloodwork done. I actually purposefully shut of my alarm, laid back down, and was going to tell the world I shut my alarm off. which would have been the truth. except as I started to drift back off to sleep, one eye opened up and surveyed the familiar view, and my brain reminded me that people go through much, much worse without even hitting snooze.

wish me luck. I hate needles. except for the one in seattle, of course.

...

Okay, I'll admit it (Ted, just admit it) immediately that this is an update for the sake of updating. Because I said I would. Because I got up on six hours of sleep, when I needed a lot more, ran a bunch of errands, drove to Carmel or somewhere in New York, spent all day with a chunk of Raf's family, drove back, wandered around New Haven for an hour, caught the end of the Dave Brubeck Quartet on the green, determined that I love New Haven, bought an eight dollar toe ring, and now I'm shot. But I didn't want the day to go unmarked.

Raf and I are going to try and see if we can deal with living together - which isn't inherently a whole lot different than how things are going now, only we're going to go from him sharing mine to ours. This is the first time I have let a relationship progress along a natural course, we've been dating for nine months, friends for a few months longer, and we're in love. So, it's sort of the next logical thing - but it's nice to say all that out loud, because I've never done it like this before.

Hi. I'm growing up.

xxxooo

...

My snapshots of koffee? are fond and specific: Jon playing with Awry on the tiny "stage" for a dozen people, the first time I heard Anne Heaton, the windowsills, the painted brick, the song about the crackpipe that one of my friends made up, the muffin crumbs on the floor... the payphone, the leather couches, the empty hollow sound the stairs made when I went down them. The coffee wasn't good, but the coffeeshop was. Peanut butter bliss bars and Christmas lights in the windows. It's where I found the flyer for the first Open Studios I entered. The steps on the back and the alley on the side housed many pacing conversations and phone calls. Scarlet tea. Saturday mornings last winter. Attempts at morning pages, red formica topped tables, coveted window seats, hiding in the corner behind a book while the coffee went cold and the world melted away.

Today it was so strange, so foreign, to see that little world I'd created in my mind from the other side of the counter. The blissful beverages for all those pent up writers and students and artists and old guys wandering around quoting things no longer steamed hopefully on the table in front of me - they ruled three hours of my life. Espresso shots pulling too long or too short. Learning how hard it is to get enough foam for a cappucinno. Where did coffee come from? Do you have t-shirts? How come I can't connect to the wireless internet? Do you have a pen? Who did the paintings on the walls? What the fuck is a mokafrappe cooler, and why are these fucking espresso shots so inconsistent? Have I made a mistake, is this inconcsistency really about my insides, I can't do this, I'm going to cry, I'm never going to learn, I'm never going to know...

Sandra quickly stepped in to save my life. She's a musician. She's got great tattoos. Today she was working in a bikini top and camoflage shorts that were shredded to bits. She didn't wear makeup and was wise about everything. The men ogled her. She comforted me. She's the one that asked me why the hell I wanted to work in a coffee shop the day I met Troy to do my paperwork, and she saw me starting to disintegrate there about an hour and a half into training. I wasn't good at it. It was my first day. It was hot and I was getting overwhelmed. They just kept like, doing stuff, and not saying what they were doing. I was like, am I supposed to do this? What about this? What do I do about this? Who does this? How do I make that? What does that mean? What? I don't understand. And as I got more frustrated, she got very... maternal. Soft. She started saying everything she was doing as she did it. I'm going to the bagels, see, no seeds, I'm getting a wax paper, it's to go, I'm getting a bag, I'm toasting... I'm steaming chai... this is how you make foam... here, I'll make the grind a little finer for you... the cups are right there...

It's just that barista-ing, or, the art of being a barista, is something that's very feel-based. It's not a list, well, there are lists of tasks you have to do throughout the shift, but it's like, everyone says the same thing: you'll know. You have to get a feel for it. And you don't have that on the first day. And as tears welled up in the corners of my eyes, Sandra started to talk to me - reassure me - kind of holding my world together in that moment. She reminded me that I was in the middle of changing everything. And about how she has a college degree and works there most of the time and how frustrating it is to fill the shoes of a musician. And how her sister doesn't understand and how her parents don't understand and how everyone thinks it's going to be this big relief to just "be yourself", but it's actually the hardest thing that we can set out to do. And it all shifted, and I'm like, right, it's easier to put on a suit and pretend to be someone else, and she's like, exactly. And you don't want to do that anymore, do you? That's what this job is going to demand that you do, that you work hard and that you be yourself.

I've never been simultaneously more relieved and more totally in uncharted territory all at once in my entire life. She went on to say that people thought we're all hippie feelgood coffee shop heads, but that people wind up there for much different of a reason than that. And then her and Joe started to talk about how there was something nuts like 650 applications between in-person and internet. That floored me, for the second time in about ten minutes. They kept reassuring me, they told me that Troy wouldn't have hired me if he didn't think I was going to cut it. It was just so caring and encouraging and so not about sales stats and bigger better faster more, and I put more quarters in the meter and stayed an hour past my training time to make shots. Over and over and over. That one was perfect. That one wasn't packed enough. That one was tight, but there wasn't enough for three shots. By the time five o'clock came, it was so much more manageable. And they were like, don't worry, you'll have a list. You'll come in and it will say, over the course of your day, do this, this, this and that, and don't leave until you did this, this, and that. So you'll be fine. But I'm already projecting into three weeks from now when I'm the only barista on and I want to blow my head off because I can't remember how to make a viennesse or however you spell it - I think, and I may be wrong, that a breve is... fuck... I can't remember. But a viennesse has whipped cream, kind of like a cappucinno, and I don't remember what else.

It's my first fucking day. I shouldn't know that yet. But they gave me a big coffee-stained photocopied book to absorb in the meantime.

I have to go tend to my scalded arm spot, and make some dinner before the meeting.

Things are happening. And I love it.

...

For the first time in about a week, it wasn't still 90 degrees in the middle of the night last night - and I slept. Beautiful, unsweaty sleep. I got up around 10 (!!!) after not sleeping past 7:30 for the last two weeks. And while the familiar feeling of wasting time crept in, it was quickly replaced by a sense of restedness (is that a word)? Raf got back yesterday, so waking up curled next to him was a treat too.

I have a great life.

So it's 10:50 and I'm eating raw cashews. Today I'm going to shower, run out to my mom's real quick to pick up some shorts I left there, hopefully get to the recycling center before they close, train at koffee? from 2 - 4, and then the regular friday night gig. Maybe something thrilling in there like grocery shopping too - and then it's family time with Raf all weekend. There's a reunion Saturday and a birthday party Sunday, and the weather looks great.

I went back to the therapist yesterday, I hadn't been to see her in about two months. And there I was, sitting across from a licensed professional, listening to her telling me about disorders and adjustments and varying aspects of mental health. One, to better understand a few members of my family, and two, to get me to stop using the word "crazy" about myself. There are people in my life who are crazy - like, crazy crazy. Sociopaths, borderline personality disorders, and so forth. Me, on the other hand (as far as we can tell), apparently I'm just going through some kind of situational adjustment disorder. Sounds manageable, doesn't it? Basically I'm apparently chock full of solid values and structured beliefs, and I've just had a bunch of stuff go on that's caused me to short-circuit a little bit. I can't even explain what a relief this is to know - in February, I was in my car, on the phone with Kristin, sobbing. Thinking I was losing it - like, really. Like, the crazy was getting inbetween who I was and who I was becoming - and it was terrifying. I thought it would never end - now fast forward to yesterday morning and hearing all this. And that I'm doing a good job, and that we've untangled a bunch of knots, and that therapy - pending any upcoming crisis - is like a once monthly thing to deal with present issues. Which is what everyone else is doing too - the major hurdles of my childhood did this and my parents did that and this is why you're like this when this happens - they're not all set or anything, but there's a basic roadmap. And now, we'll deal with how I behave with men (mostly my current one) and being scared and why I do what I do at work and procrastinating or whatever.

I'll say it again: I'm not crazy. My hard wiring, while a little frayed, is inherently good.

And I guess I have no one to apologize to but myself (and Kristin) for slacking on the updates, but I think I'm running at a halfway decent percentage here. I'm going to fight the temptation to go back and date entries for the days I missed and write about what I was thinking that day, just to see all the little boxes checked off.

=^..^=

Paw, paw.

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There should be an update-waiver for days that exceed a "feels like" temperature that's over 100 degrees, with more than 50% humidity. I swear, it would still be hot, but the humidity is totally wiping me out. It was even hot in the grocery store yesterday, it must have been pushing eighty. Everyone is tired and drawn. If I could have brought Cha Cha over to my mom's, I would have been camping out there since last week. At least the sweat is making me shed a little water weight. Nice.

So, last night, it's after twelve, and I'm like, fuck, I haven't updated. So as I finish recategorizing my pictures and wrapping up the night, I go to log in and say, hey, it's still Wednesday to me, here's the update, now I'm going to go pass out. Except instead of doing that, I just skipped right to the passing out. And so much is going on, and here I am just updating about updating, but now I've got to get out of here because the day's running late and I didn't sleep last night, at all practically.

More to follow (about more than just updating!), I promise.

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So I'm listening to NPR on the way into work this morning - I've given up television, first for budget constraints and then for overall mental health - and they're talking about MTV. It was strange to hear the crap that's pumped out on the stations here coming through on NPR, Justin Timberlake and Christina Aguilera and the like. So there was the obligatory "Video Killed The Radio Star" sample, a discussion of the ever-evolving times, how MTV was pitched back then and deemed stupid and useless - and now, how there's like, eight MTVs and how they own a bunch of stations in a bunch of countries and streaming onto your cellphone and what not. Fine.

And then, as we love NPR for doing, the story showed both sides. A former executive from BET, who has since resigned and formed an industry think-tank, talked about how it's easy to dominate the market when you own everythign. Infinity Broadcasting, Viacom, MTV (all of them), VH1, BET, and Nickelodeon - they're all the same company. His biggest complaint, other than an unfair share of exposure, was MTV's total disregard for "indie" bands. How when the labels, and the video stations, and what's being exposed to the littler kids are all the same company, that these littler unknown bands never stand a chance and have to be ten times as good and ten times as rich as the average no-name band to even stand a sliver of a chance of getting noticed.

The president of MTV, a woman who was just talking about teenage girls in a Brooklyn Dunkin' Donuts streaming music on their cellphones, responded with the mother of all examples: Fall Out Boy. And she was dead serious. She was all, Fall Out Boy was an unknown, and we premiered them on MTVU, and they played our spring break shows and a bunch of features and look at them now. All, we SO pay attention to indie bands! I repeat: she was serious. It would not surprise me at all to find out that Fall Out Boy was a planned exposure thing so that MTV would have justification of this sort when they are posed this kind of questioning.

Here's the snippet from NPR.org:

MTV's expansion is not without its critics, who say the network is an example of a trend toward consolidation in the entertainment industry, resulting in less variety and fewer opportunities for artists. Paul Porter, a former program director at BET, points out that MTV's parent company, Viacom, also owns Infinity Radio, VH1 and BET.

MTV's Norman counters that its reach allows the network to break independent artists in new ways, crediting MTVU's Spring Break as key venue for indie band Fall Out Boy last year.

Right.

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