time slam

the day is dreary. the day is moving painfully, pitifully slowly. my rumpled comforter and drafty bedroom are all i can think about. bonjour, winter!

the scene at my apartment tuesday afternoon if there were a surveillance camera mounted above the doorframe:

an elderly man with dentures and obviously dyed ginger-colored locks knocks at his upstairs tenant's door. after a brief pause, a girl comes to the door, her face hardly belying the fact that she is freaking out - did she do something wrong? before she can confess to anything, a cat bursts out of the apartment and starts to run down the nearby staircase. after the frazzled-looking tenent grabs the cat by its hind leg, there is an awkward exchange between the two characters in our little scene. why is the girl having such a hard time speaking? oh, perhaps it is because she is whitening her teeth, the little strips wadding up in her suddenly parched mouth. she gestures wildly, explaining that she always remembers to open the flue to her fireplace, that it couldn't have been her that caused the house to smell "smoked" yesterday. the cat scrambles out of her arms, back down the stairs. while the girl in our little vignette scrambled after the cat, we see the elderly gentleman (her landlord) peering into her messy apartment as a look of sheer perplexion crosses his face. our teeth-whitening, cat-wrangling, somehow always guilty-feeling heroine returns, and realizes her landlord is probably wondering why she has been watching television meant for babies at a very loud volume level (it's because it helps her de-stress). the two nod, awkwardly, something is said about christmas, but it's hard to tell because her teeth whitening strips seem to be hindering much of her ability to speak. she returns to her apartment, he walks downstairs, shaking his head.

fin.

i'm a broad

whoa whoa whoa, i'm going to dublin in march. holy crap i just booked a ticket i probably can't afford, but let's worry about that later, you know? the year should be pretty sweet - i love making travel plans.

next step: approving this with my boss.

that's kind of my m.o. - strike and then approve, like a snake.

by the way, my family received a christmas card in the mail from the xy presbyterian church, which we all used to attend before we stopped one sunday (it really was that simple!). the card featured a lovely snowy photograph of the xy presbyterian church, and under that, the striking words:

"It is truly the simple-minded who
understand that
the God who raged over nations
is now mild and is in us."

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

The XY Presbyterian Church staff"

i'm sorry. that's a strange poem to quote on a christmas card from a church, rainier maria rilke or not.

cherokee pornstar

Dear Boss,

Please stop walking by my desk while pointedly looking at my computer screen. I promise you, I am only browsing the internet, doing google searches for "d" list celebrities and old grammar school bullies about 45 percent of the time. The other 55 percent of the time I am likely in the bathroom or snackroom, perhaps checking my mail or bustling about, trying to look busy so you will stay away from me.

Love,
Industrious Old Me

here's an interesting excerpt from the book "a million little pieces" by james frey, which i purchased as a yuletide treat for my mother, but instead am trying to cram in whilst taking care not to bend the binding before i have to wrap 'er up and endow.

oh yeah it's a book about addiction. our hero, 23-year-old author james, is in a drug treatment and recovery center. he fell down a fire escape and his mouth and face serverely battered. he is undergoing oral surgery, including a double -root canal, with no type of narcotic assistance, because he's in this treatment center. none. just him and two massive straps to hold him still.

"the drill is back on and it is working through the fragment of my left front tooth. It is moving through a thinner, more fragile section of bone, so it works quickly. It shoots the grit, makes the hole, penetrates. At the point of penetration, a current shoots through my body that is not pain, or even close to pain, but something infinitely greater.

Everything goes white and I cannot breathe. I clench my eyes and I bite down on my existing teeth and I think my jaw might be breaking and I squeeze my hands and I dig my fingers through the hard rubber surface of the tennis balls and my fingernails crack and my fingernails break and my fingernails start to bleed and I curl my toes and they fucking hurt and I flex the muscles in my legs and they fucking hurt and my torso tightens and my stomach muscles feel as if they're going to collapse and my ribs feel as if they're caving in on themselves and it fucking hurts and my balls are shrinking and the shrinking fucking hurts and my dick is hard because my blood hurts and my blood wants to escape and is seeking exit through my dick and my dick fucking hurts and my arms are straining against the thick blue nylon straps and the thick blue nylon straps are cutting my flesh and it fucking hurts and my face is on fire and the veins in my neck want to explode and my brain is white and it is melting and it fucking hurts. There is a drill in my mouth. My brain is white and it feels as if it's fucking melting. I cannot breathe. Agony."

perhaps this is my reason to resolve a switch to PBR lite.

brave new woman

last night i was leaving work and i heard a dog barking very loudly, and it sounded very close. so, instantly, i feel each muscle of my body tense up and i'm scared, even though on principle i enjoy animals and the companionship they offer. just as i'm looking around, waiting to be attacked and eaten by a icelandic pony-sized doberman, i see my attacker: a wee little dog in a sweater for god's sakes barking at me from a nearby parking space, the little pom-poms on his sweater shaking with each bark (and for the record, the barking sounded much deeper than a tiny dog would warrant uh or i'm a total wimp). i laughed and took a step in mr. sweater's direction and to my horror, he started to run away and into the street. well i convinced him not to run into the street and i tried to tempt him over with some cheddar pretzel combos that my thoughtful friend adrianne bought for me this weekend, but to no avail. mr. sweater just wanted to bark and threaten to run into the street and not listen to my voice of reason. our standoff lasted roughly 10 minutes before i just flagged down a cop and let him try to get mr. sweater home. moral of the story? police can be your friend and help you rein in intolerable little beasts that, despite being barky and incorrigible, really don't deserve to be flattened by dutch traffic.

oh yes and let me tell you a secret, gentle reader:

http://postsecret.blogspot.com/

let's go find me a ham

just got back from a weekend with two great friends in illinois. we went to ikea and i almost ikea-d my pants, it was so overwhelming. here's the good news: i have a new, particle board and cheaply produced, assembled and purchased nightstand. i sheepishly looked away while driving through holland on my way to work monday and today: there are several woodworking shops that have closed/are closing, probably because of the trend in meijer's and target and ikea that allows buyers to purchase just about everything but the staircase in their home and assemble it, thus drastically reducing the cost to the consumer (along with using cheaper labor and crappier materials). i should have purchased something in holland, and i would tell a friend she or he should have purchased something locally. unfortunately, low cost won my inner battle. but i understand that there is a high cost to low price. next time i purchase something, it will be from a local merchant oh yes.

during our stay in the fair lincoln state, we visited the village of hinsdale, where soccer superstar mia hamm lives with her cubs husband. my friend jorie told a story about her mother and sister who were driving through hinsdale when sister jenna said, "let's go find mia hamm" and her mother said "why on earth do you need a ham?" i laughed for a while about that. i mean, really, how often can you actually say that when it really just works?? in other news, my friend peter berghoef is now a published poet - check him out at www.2river.org

winter of our disconnect

I was in the shower today and recalled a early 90s winter childhood memory from a strange time in my little family's existence. my mother was attending the university of michigan dearborn for a master's degree in art history. her wedding and engagement rings had been stolen a few years earlier by our outlaw cousin louis (who is now doing time in an upper peninsula prison for the 15th time for theft. but strangely, although he always gets sent to the great white north to do time, he has a harsh, loud deeply southern accent now). So my hometown is a small place - there's no one who doesn't at least know your name, who you are married to, related to, or what golf club swimming pool you can utilize. my point here is that there was no reason for my mother to expedite the replacement of her symbols of marriage.

Now, today in the shower i remembered my mom coming home from class, all flushed and giddy and happier than i had seen her in a long time. "I got asked on a date!" she said. We all stared. "A guy asked me out!" her face fell when she realized she was sharing this bit of news with her husband and two young children. I heard them really yell at each other that night.

My dad took my mom to the jeweler the next week.