05-28-04

Once again, I feel like the tuffest library desk clerk on the block.

I have (another) black eye. This time it has swelled to golf-ballesque proportions. Well, a very small and somewhat flat golf ball, but that still makes it quite a lot bigger than it should be.

I spent a long time before work trying to decide if I wanted to cover up the blackness on the wounded eye with foundation and concealer or if I wanted to use eyeshadow to create a similar looking bruise around my normal eye. I eventually ran out of time and just decided against make-up entirely.

Sort of relatedly, I've spent most of the last week on the border between 'everyone can go to hell' and 'I need a hug.'


np: work

5:34 p.m.

05-27-04

Doctors know your mom and dad.

Fact #1: Today is my brother's birthday. He's 27.

Fact #2: On this date in 1999, I graduated from high school (it was a Thursday that year too).

Fact #3: If it weren't for Fact #1, I wouldn't be able to remember Fact #2. I'd probably be able to remember that I graduated in late May, but the date? No way.

I've been losing large portions of my evenings to naps. I'm not a big nap fan, usually, but the headaches are out of control. I've learned, however, that 2 painkillers+gel eye mask+1.5-2 hours of sleep=all better, but with a hefty chunk of my life gone. One of these days I hope to Rip Van Winkle my way into the future, when clothes will be shinier and my car will be an antique, not just old.


np: Ted Leo-Me and Mia

9:55 p.m.

05-26-04

Note to self: learn from your mistakes, already!

I think I'm going to start counting total incompetance in everything as one of my special skills. Being bad at one thing is unremarkable, but being bad at everything is actually kind of impressive.

One of my friends once described me as 'pretty resilient,' and I have to assume what she meant was, 'well, I've seen you do some stupid things, but you always pick yourself up and then do it again! Sometimes four or five times!'

I guess what's important is that I always pick myself up.

Also, this morning there was a fairly large part of a tree on my car. Close inspection showed that the end was not ragged, as though this tree branch had blown away to freedom, but neatly cut, as though someone was pruning the tree my car was parked under and just didn't see any reason to try to stop it from falling on my car.


np: the Streets-Fit But You Know It

3:04 p.m.

05-26-04

I can tell you have a lousy imagination.

Can anyone explain why our bathroom door keeps getting bigger? In January, our landlord shaved off some of it because we all of a sudden couldn't close it all of the way (well, we could, but it was being held shut by the wood part at the top of the door, not by the part that's actually supposed to hold it closed (my door-part-related vocabulary is severely lacking)). And now it's sort of doing it again. I figured that it has something to do with moisture, but it seems like it's happening more often/quickly than it should. It's like a freak show! Come see the incredible expanding door!


np: dEUS-Hotellounge (be the death of me)

1:41 a.m.

05-26-04

I skipped the part about love.

I watched this movie last night. It was weird, because Cary Grant was supposed to be French, but the only way you knew that was because he said something like, "Hi, I'm French," (not an actual quote) at the beginning. It was like the director told him, "You know what? Everyone knows you're not French anyway, so don't bother with a French accent or anything." And his name was Henri, but every single person in the movie Americanized it to "hen-ree," which I found kind of odd, because when I had a French housemate, we all just used his French name (probably butchering it in the process, but hey! we made an effort!). But then, his name was Thibaut, which I don't think has a very convenient English equivalent.

I liked it anyway. It had a motorcycle with a sidecar and a romantic scene inside a haystack. And that Cary Grant is suave and looks like he uses the phrase 'old sport' a lot. In my mind Cary Grant IS Jay Gatsby (I just had to look up Gatsby's first name. I thought and thought: "Frank Gatsby? Harold Gatsby?" Harold Gatsby is way better than Jay Gatsby. Did his parents just name him after a letter?)

I don't think that this is what I meant to write about, but as soon as I opened up the 'add an entry' page, my mind went entirely blank. Except for the part about that movie. There were about five seconds when I probably couldn't even have told you my name.


np: dEUS-Via

12:17 a.m.

05-23-04

I closed my eyes like Marvin Gaye.

I never quite finished unpacking (and in January I thought something like, "Well, I'll only be living here eight more months; there's no sense in unpacking now." And yes, my thoughts often include semi-colons.), so my closet is full of boxes. Sometimes I need things from those boxes, and since they aren't organized in any way*, that means that I just have to dig through them until I find what I'm looking for (or, more often, until I get tired of looking and give up).

So, while I very often don't find what I initially was looking for, sometimes I find other stuff that is just as good. Last night I found a cd. And while it was just a mix that I made one night when I couldn't sleep, it had some songs on it that I'd completely forgotten about (mostly things that I ill eagle lee downloaded on my old computer (which vanished without a trace last summer)), like Low's cover of "I Started a Joke" (it's less a cover than an absolute miracle). And Joel R. L. Phelps singing "The Guns of Brixton," accompanied by only a piano. It is amazing.

[Formerly this space held the opening paragraph to a linguistics crime noir story I started writing last summer (that I also found in my closet), but upon rereading it, I discovered that it was crushingly boring - I mean, it mentioned predicate logic - and I realized that I was only typing it in order to distract myself from the impending doom that is tomorrow morning. It is top secret doom that awaits me, though. Sorry.]





*actually, one of them is organized. it is my art supplies box, and it is an 'i can't believe it's not butter!' box that i took from the store, except i crossed out 'not butter' and wrote 'art supplies.' so every time my roommate wants to borrow crayons or something, i get the box out of the closet and exclaim, "ohmygosh, i can't believe it's art supplies!" it never gets less funny! (because, how could it possibly get any less funny?)


np: Low-In the Drugs

10:58 p.m.

05-21-04

And how you built a tower tumbling through the trees.

Honestly? I'm a little tired of all the thunderstorms.


(the purple arrow is where i am. right where it is the reddest.)

And while there's a lot to be said for daytime thunderstorms, and the way it suddenly gets dark and green outside, last night's thunderstorm had a tornado warning - with sirens and everything - so it wins.

Also, I am not too happy with today's thunderstorm because I was watching soap operas* (oh my, i AM lame), and they kept having interruptions every five minutes to say that the storm was five minutes closer to being here than it was before.

But at least I found some rechargeable batteries in a flashlight. Who puts rechargeable batteries in a flashlight? I must be dumb.

Now I have to call my parents to find out if they're still going to Detroit tonight, because they were going to stop and take me out for dinner on their way there. If this has screwed me out a free meal, I'll [insert empty threats and menacing fist-shaking at the sky].





*Marlena is alive! Never you mind that she has already been embalmed! Also, what is the deal with that new girl on Passions? All of a sudden Miguel said, "We should call our other sister," and everyone else was like, "Oh, yeah, we SHOULD." I love that nothing on these shows makes any sense whatsoever.


np: Neutral Milk Hotel-The King of Carrot Flowers, Part One

2:28 p.m.

05-19-04

And I remember talking about time.

I was trying on some sandals tonight, and my friend Beth walked out of the adjacent fitting room, threw a bunch of clothes on the 're-shelve me' rack, and said, "Ugh."

Not being particularly pleased with the sandal selection, I said something like, "I know!"

The casual observer might've thought that we'd come to the store together, or that we'd at least seen each other at some point during the last six months. But the casual observer would have been wrong.

And it feels pretty good to be able to start talking in sort of a mid-conversation way to someone I haven't seen in forever. It feels pretty right.


np: Super Furry Animals-The Matter of Time

1:19 a.m.

05-17-04

Girl, it's a hard, hard world.

You know what you just don't see enough of? Anthropomorphic tampons.


np: the Kinks-Animal Farm

8:43 p.m.

05-17-04

And a nice drive in the country, finds a nice cliff to drop off.

I go through these weird sleeping/waking stages. Last week I fell asleep by 11:30 every single night. Tonight? Nothing. I laid in bed with the lights off for a while, and you know how you kind of have that default mental screen saver when you're trying to clear your mind and relax? Right now mine is set on the apocalypse. It's partly the previews I've seen of this movie and partly the fact that I've been reading a lot of books of the "the whole world was just killed off by a nuclear war/plague and now the diminished population has separated into small, isolated communities and we must come together and rebuild" genre. I've tried to stagger them with poignant coming-of-age tales, but those don't seem to stick in my mind quite as vividly.

Two other things:

1. I have friends who live in far more interesting locations than I do, but they still don't seem to have anything better to do on Saturday nights than send me birthday greetings. I wish we could all be boring together.

2. Today I saw some lambs and calves and a foal. We also stopped at a house that had a 'free kittens' sign out front, but I'm not sure that our intentions were to actually take a kitten home with us (I can't have one until I move out of my current house in August). In any case, the kittens were too young to be taken away from their mom, but I held them all, because I have a 'no kitten left unheld' policy. It is an excellent policy.


np: Neutral Milk Hotel-Song Against Sex

2:15 a.m.

05-14-04

Stuck in the perpetual motion.

Today is the last day that I can listen to the Flaming Lips song "When Yer Twenty-Two" while I'm twenty-two.

I don't like the song very much, it's just the principle of the thing.

I always have to think through the principle vs. principal homophone problem with "The principal is your pal." Every single time.


np: the Flaming Lips-When Yer Twenty-Two

9:57 a.m.

05-13-04

But where is the basement?

A woman just asked me where the third floor was. Not how to get to the third floor, but where it was physically located. I said, "One floor above the second floor," which seemed as good an answer as any. Then she asked, "What floor is this? The second?" and I said, "No, this is the first floor." She didn't seem convinced.

Also, explaining to her where the elevator is was more of an ordeal than it should've been, since I can actually see the elevator from where I'm sitting right now.


np: work

2:44 p.m.

05-12-04

Not once.

Also, I meant to mention that we didn't get panhandled at all last night in Detroit, which is very unusual.


np: work

6:21 p.m.

05-12-04

An official afternoon in an official government office, officially..

I had some official governmental business to attend to today, so I went to an official governmental office. There apparently are two kinds of problems that this particular government office deals with: the kind that you take a number for and the kind that you write your name on a clipboard for. I had the clipboard-signing kind of problem, so I signed my name and sat down to wait. There was only one person before me, but while I was waiting about 15 more people wandered in. I thought, "Phew, just in time!" and checked over the form that I'd printed out from the internet to insure a quick transaction.

While there was indeed only one person before me, his problem seemed to go on and on ("This is your address?" "Yes." "Do you have any roommates?" "This is my address." "You live alone? Do you have your name on the mailbox?" "No, this [points to paper] is where I live!"), but eventually someone called my name, and at just that very minute another woman entered the office, didn't read the signs that explained the difference between a clipboard-signing and a number-taking problem, didn't appear to notice that there were 15 people waiting, approached the window of the woman who had just called my name, and started asking her all about what she should do now and blah blah blah. The government woman (henceforth, g-woman, as I'm tired of typing the whole thing) explained the difference between the two types of problems (if you ask me (which no one did) she definitely had the kind of problem that you need to take a number for), and the other woman started yelling about how she needed help RIGHT NOW. Again she was told that she had to wait until the people that had come in before her had been helped. "No," she said, "I have a situation. I need to know what to do NOW."

The g-woman said, "Well, I can't help you right now, because this young lady* has been waiting a while." She gestured towards me and the angry woman turned around and looked at me, and for a second I was 99.9% sure that she was going to punch me. I smiled nervously, wishing that I hadn't been brought into the whole thing. If the g-woman would've said, "Hey, you, go back to your book** while I help this woman who is so obviously more important than everyone else," I would've sat down and waited another half hour. I am willing to put up with a little inconvenience if it cuts down on the amount of ridiculous drama that I have to observe in my day-to-day life***.

But that is not what happened, and the woman went to another window, muttering, "I hate this fuckin' place. Everyone is so rude." And of course, they dragged someone out of the back of the office to help her (she began with, "First of all, that woman at the first window is very rude"), because everyone knows that you get better service if you throw a temper tantrum. People may say/write mean things about you later, but you'll get what you want right away, and that's all that really matters.





*hah. lady.
**With the books I've read and the movies I've seen, honestly, I'll be a little disappointed if I don't have to battle the undead at some point in my lifetime.
***Daytime tv talk shows used to bring me so much joy, but I can't watch them anymore because they just make me so mad. I always want to tell them all to grow up and work through their problems like adults and wear clothes that cover them up more extensively. The shows that really bother me are the ones that have themes like, "I was ugly in high school, but now I'm hot!" They always involve a woman shoving her newly augmented breasts in the face of that boy who wouldn't take her to the prom 25 years ago. Y'know, if you're still upset about something that happened that long ago, you probably need to take a long hard look at your life. [Just for the record, I do enjoy it when the boys who wouldn't take them to prom say things like, "Actually, I don't remember you at all. And no, I am not interested in dating you now, despite your ridiculously large breasts." But daytime talk shows being what they are, they hardly ever say that.]


np: work

6:12 p.m.

05-11-04

Let's drink to the future and forget the past.

I made some rice for dinner. I have a long history of unsuccessful rice-making (it always turns out too wet), which is incredibly pathetic and not something that I enjoy admitting. Tonight, though, it was perfect! Then I decided that it would be Spanish rice, and I added some tomatoes, onions, green peppers, corn and spices, stirred it all around and uncovered a GIGANTIC BUG.

It was huge. Huge! But it was still alive, so I tried to tell myself that it had probably just fallen in while I was chopping up onions and had my back to the stove. I finished it all up and put some on a plate. Then I looked at it and thought, "Eeew. There was a huge disgusting bug in this rice," and threw it all away and made a quesadilla. Nothing says good health quite like a dinner that consists almost entirely of cheese (and also onions and corn. these days i seem to put corn in everything).

Unrelated fact: Tonight I am going to see Clinic! It will probably be almost exactly like the two other times I saw Clinic, but just like those other times, I will set out tonight with the hope that they will play "Distortions" and that they will be on stage for longer than 40 minutes. This time I have added the hope that they will be wearing the suits that they seem to be photographed in so often instead of scrubs. I think year four is time for a new gimmick.


np: Super Furry Animals-Don't Be a Fool, Billy

7:36 p.m.

05-10-04

Make way for pedestrians.

This morning I saw some baby ducks in the arb. Baby ducks are the second most likely baby animal to make me say, "Awwwwwwwwwww! Look at the baby [insert animal name here]!" out loud, even though there is no one around to hear me.* I also saw some baby Canada geese, which were also very cute, but seemed unaware that it is inconsiderate to spread out over the whole path so that pedestrians that are unwilling to traipse right through the middle of a family of geese have to sit on a bench and wait for all of them to congregate on one side. And then, even though I tried to stay as far away as possible and kept reassuring the geese that I wasn't interested in harming them, or even touching them (even though I could think of nothing I wanted to do more than pet a baby goose), the adult geese still made threatening gestures in my direction. I later saw the goose make the same threatening gesture towards a car, so I think that it was just bluffing.**

It was actually a little upsetting, because before I left, I spent a long time debating over whether I wanted to take my cd player or my camera with me. I was opting for the camera, since it rained for about seven hours yesterday and everything would be lush and green and muddy, but then at the last minute I thought, "What's the point? I never see anything interesting in the arb," put on my headphones, and left.

I meant to get some much needed cleaning done this afternoon, but it was hot and I spent a lot of time laying around and watching Green Acres at a deafening volume (I had to be able to hear it over the fan). And the fact that I was rendered completely useless on an 83 degree day doesn't bode well for the rest of the summer. I guess I should move farther north.





*I've reread this sentence many times, and I'm really not sure if it makes any sense at all. And I don't care.
**And, just for the record, I do know that 'ducklings' and 'goslings' are the proper terminologies for these animals, but feel that they do not properly convey the cuteness of these widdle fwuffy critters.


np: Sufjan Stevens-Flint (For the Unemployed and Underpaid)

9:24 p.m.

05-08-04

I knew it wasn't just me.

This morning I was reading a book (The Orphan Game, by Ann Darby) at work, and I don't think I can even begin to describe how surprised I was when I turned the page and found this:

(My apologies for the fact that I was too lazy to stop at the computer lab on the way home and actually scan the page, and instead came straight home and took a picture of it instead, because I'm tired tired tired and about to take a nap nap nap.)


np: Belle and Sebastian-Piazza, New York Catcher

1:38 p.m.

05-07-04

I really have to stop checking my checking account balance at 1am.

Have you noticed how expensive things are? I mean, just normal, everyday things cost a lot more than really seems necessary. I bought some things the other day, not fun or interesting things (i think the most recreational item i bought was 2 minute deep conditioning treatment for my hair*), just vegetables and milk and cheese (and not fancy cheese! it was cheddar!), and it ended up being much more expensive than it should have been.

Do grocery stores think that I am made of money (and even if I was, would I really want to spend that money on asparagus and milk)? I did find two dollars the other day in a skirt I haven't worn since last year, but that probably won't happen again soon, and two dollars isn't going to last forever. I think I am going to have to start bartering. With beads. "I'll give you 14 red beads and three green ones for that loaf of bread." "You throw in a couple of those yellow ones and you've got a deal!"

Another thing I noticed at the store the other day (yesterday/monday/tuesday/whateverday), was that whenever I go to the store alone and during the day, I am bombarded by elderly people asking me things like, "Where is the deodorant?" and "Can you get that can of creamed corn down from the top shelf for me**?" I haven't made any conclusions based on this, except that (1) it is probably somehow related to the fact that I can't seem to go anywhere without someone stopping to ask me for directions; and (2) I look like I really know my way around a grocery store. So, actually, I have made two conclusions based on this.





*Although, after getting those crispy ends chopped off today, my hair doesn't seem like it's in as bad of shape as I thought it was. My new haircut rules! (not that you can really tell from that picture. hooray for blurriness!) I think that this is the first time I have not freaked out and had the haircutterperson (stylist?) cut off far too much. It is actually a little longer than I would've liked it to be, but a little too long is much, much better than way too short.

**And yes, I have wondered about the logic of asking someone who stands a whopping 63 inches tall to get something off of a tall shelf. I have decided that it is not because they are senile or just can't see very well, but because I look young and agile and able/willing to shimmy up the shelving unit if I need to. That MUST be it.


np: Clinic-Harmony

1:06 a.m.

05-06-04

Say it, I can say no more.

I had an adventure! Well, it wasn't really my adventure, but I joined in. I joined an adventure!

The long story is boring (as long stories usually are) so here is a bulleted list:

Moral: Diabetics are a menace to society! As I so tactfully said to my mom on the phone, "I'm glad that crap skips a generation." She answered, "Well, you keep hoping that," and I wonder if she knows something I don't.

[As it turns out, the bulleted-list version of the story is kind of boring too. Oh well.]


np: Yo La Tengo-Tom Courtenay

11:08 p.m.

05-05-04

Yes, I am talking to you, white SUV!

Dear people who drive haphazardly across parking lots:

After a great deal of thought, I've decided that I am no longer going to stop when I see you careening towards me while looking in the opposite direction. You seem to be living your life with the assumption that I care a lot about being alive and will, therefore, stay out of your way, leaving you free to talk on your phone and look for a parking spot that is closer to the store. You are wrong! I would find death a small price to pay in order to teach you a lesson in not driving like a jackass.

xoxo, kim.


np: the simpsons (the be sharps episode! yay!)

5:13 p.m.

05-04-04

Squirrels would rather eat houses than potato chips.

Today I was standing around minding my own business (which is how I spend every day), when I looked out the front window and saw a squirrel EATING OUR (my parents') HOUSE. He was actually doing some noticeable damage. I gazed at him through the glass, and he gazed into the house at me for a few minutes before he went back to gnawing on the wood. I decided that if he was desperate enough to eat a house, he must be pretty hungry, so I went to get him some pretzels.I couldn't find any pretzels, but I did find some potato chips. However, as I was taking them outside, I encountered a locked screen door. After several noisy attempts, I unlocked the door, but by then the squirrel had already started running away. I yelled, "Wait, I have chips!" but he continued sprinting away until he was out of sight.


np: Brenday Holloway-When I'm Gone

1:24 a.m.

05-03-04

We have two hundred couches where you can sleep tonight.

Yesterday, my mom and I went to some yard sales in a housing development where all the streets had names like "Rum Run" and "Booty Boulevard." At first I thought it might be fun, because pirates should have pretty great yard sales, but these were actually all just normal people with big, expensive-looking houses. The joke was on them, though, because their houses were all right next to the highway, and across the highway is (a golf course. but just after the golf course is) the airport. Suburban people in their late thirties/early forties have the most boring yard sales ever. They always are full of baby clothes and toys and intercom systems that don't work when there are airplanes flying above your house.

Today my head kind of hurts (which I'm not very surprised about), and I spent a long time looking for a Richard Scarry book that I'm sure I have somewhere called The Best Mistake Ever, because I wanted a picture of Lowly Worm in his little apple-shaped car for possible t-shirt transfer purposes. I couldn't find the book, and I couldn't find anything suitable on the internet, but I didn't look very long because I got frustrated with the slowness of the process and decided to try again when I go home (but I don't have a printer, so even if I do find a picture there, it doesn't do me any good).

My ears hurt from wearing headphones too much.


np: Interpol-PDA

1:06 a.m.

05-01-04

You think that I don't know your name.

At about 10:45 tonight I was driving 76 miles per hour down a flat, straight and mostly deserted highway in a slight, misty rain, and the cd player shuffled over to Clinic's "Distortions."

It was absolutely perfect.

I don't think I hope that I will never stop being completely amazed by hearing the perfect song at the perfect time.


np: Low-Soon

1:45 a.m.

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