Categotry Archives: General

standing on a street corner today in portland with jason in the rain, i waited for the blinky man to appear opposite, beckoning me to cross. my time in powell’s had already been well-spent, but my time on the street corner was just beginning.

here i am, looking around, in the rain, trying to blow out of the corner of my mouth at my hat falling down upon my eyes, failing, but unwilling to remove my hands from the deep pockets of the coat, the only warmth to be found for poor fingers. i wondered what i was doing here. in portland. on the corner. in the rain.

more water around than bridges. though my own body could form a bridge between one step and the next, if only the blinky man would appear, between the water falling from the sky and the water waiting on the ground. how many bridges did i cross today? did i ever leave the corner?

i’m still standing on the street looking around at this city i don’t know listening to my phone beep text messages at me and smiling because at least i don’t have strep throat.

i’m too sick to make captions.

so, as some of you know, in my desperate search for employment i sank so low as to offer my services to a paper writing company. so that slacker students could pay for my paper writing skills and cheat their own education.

i have yet to write a paper. my hotmail inbox is flooded with automatic messages telling me that a job posting has appeared on the website and i can go claim it. but everytime i get there they’re all gone. who are these people? how do they get there so fast? everytime i do manage to get there before the hordes have descended and pillaged all the beautiful maidens, the left over fuglies are too boring or too complicated for me to even approach. i hate this job.

also, i think i have poison oak. again. stupid cat.

drive, drive, drive, tire go bang, drive more slowly and have my balls handed to me on a platter by everyone passing me, feel small, arrive! hug, eat, drink, drink, drink, drink, lost count of the drinking, chris the bartender is the devil, stumble into wall, collapse on sean, argue with sean about exit strategy, chris the bartender gains two new admirers in kristen and i, got laughed at by taxi driver, arrive! collapse on floor, fall out of bed, crawl around after cat making friends, wake up sean, go to bed, sleeeeeeeeeeep, go to tire store, be entirely unimpressed with tire store, go to brunch, eat, eat, eat, go to bacaro, back to tire store, am very rowdy with sean at tire store, go to nuala’s work, go to bookstore, read really, really bad free ad book for a series, read really, really sexually explicit book, had seriously dirty thoughts, had to walk around for a while and rearrange books in alphabetical order and straighten displays, felt a little OCD, and a little sexually frustrated, went to dinner at molly’s second job, eat eat, eat, mashed garlic potatoes are SO GOOD! drive home, san argos is really scary, sean’s san argos resident voice impression is scarier, possibly san argos is actually scarier, as is the bathroom at the gas station next to keefer hotel in KING CITY! sing loudly, arrive HOME! home, home home! bed, bed, bed! cat, cat, cat!

pictures here

i just applied for a job at a library in oregon at an abbey. monks live there! i told my mom about it and she said that one of my uncles went there for a while because he thought he wanted to be a priest. life is weird. i wonder if i could be a priest. or at least a librarian.

if i was five and i discovered a speculum in the house i’d probably use it as a telephone.

me: hello?

speculum-phone: bonjour.

because speculums are dirty and totally french is a dirty language. some french carnies said nasty things to me once. their adamant refusal to believe “pussy” was another word for “cat” is an example of this.

me: dirty!

speculum-phone: oui, c’est vrais. je suis un putain.

me: salope! salope!

speculum-phone: oh, the shameaux.

me: shamu? ISHMAEL!!!

maybe if i knew the word for shame in french my brain wouldn’t have gone there.

speaking seriously now, what the hell has happened to the pap smear process? admittedly my last experience was before the turn of the century. but has hovercraft technology advanced that much? it was the fastest cervix swabbing i’ve ever experienced. and there seemed to be a lot less parts to it. color me surprised.

the beginning of the film festival (for me) went pretty well. not only did i manage to acquire FIVE friends to take along instead of three, but the director remembered my name from my comment on his webpage. it was an exciting moment when sean and nuala browbeat me into speaking to him outloud like a real person.

me: hey, i, um, commented on your webpage.

john hazlett: you’re michele, right?

me: (internally screaming) yeah.

(i don’t remember the middle of the conversation because i was too delighted that he knew my name)

john hazlett: so are you coming for a drink?

(there was an after party)

me: um, no, i have to go to bed.

yes, because i am completely inane. and my braveness (forced by others) extends only to a point and then i must run for it like a small, scared rodent. a fact for which sean and nuala publicly berated me on a street corner till i actually felt like a rodent.

next up is the pirate movie (sunday, 4:30, woman’s building). which will be good research for me as i write this pirate lesbian story i’m working on.