"Some of the debate really centers around the fact that people don't believe Iraq can be free; that if you're Muslim, or perhaps brown-skinned, you can't be self-governing or free. I'd strongly disagree with that." -Our President, G.W. Bush, in his speech tonight.

In a gross attempt to evoke sympathy against racist sentiments when these sentiments don't really exist, or if so, not nearly as strongly as they do in the military actions the Bush administration is trying to evoke sympathy for, our president manages to conflate being Muslim with being brown-skinned. Who in this imagined debate argues that "brown-skinned" people "can't be self-governing"? It was at this point in the transcript that I stopped reading, slightly satisfied that Bush is getting put through the wringer finally, and more than a little disgusted that these are the times we live in. This is why I read the book reviews and art criticism in the paper. This is why I have retreated into my own world. Honestly, there is nothing wrong with it. I would in my earlier years get red with indignation whenever anyone uttered such things as I just uttered, lamenting how apathatic people were. But there are so many amazing things that this stuff distracts me from, and so I tune out. It has been rainy here the past couple days. For a while, this depressed me, but then I was comforted by it, knew that it was sign that green would soon be sprouting - that this water is necesary for my happiness, this constant dreariness will bring about a beautiful spring world in these next few weeks. There are little green buds forming on the ginkgo tree outside my window. I cannot wait, am honestly giddy about the days when those funky leaves will be outside my window, will be visible, part of this world again.

I called in sick to work today and spent the day playing around on Friendster, cleaning my kitchen, and reading Joan Didion's The White Album in one long sitting. It was really good, mildly depressing, and forced me to look up a couple words online. Some people groan when they come across words they don't know, exclaiming arrogance on the part of the writer or speaker, but I really get excited about it. Especially when they don't look garish in the context, when they seem like the best word choice, the only thing that could have possibly been used, and with Didion, those three words I looked up were so. Inchoate, somnolent, and analgesic. The essays are all elegies for sixties California life and are both beautiful and depressing. It was really nice to read this book also about California after finishing Fante, to read a writer who does not write short declarative sentance after short declarative sentance. Didion has a beautiful rhythm, and so I spent all day on the couch listening to her, soaking up her astute observations. I am reading another book about California now also: Rebecca Solnit's River of Shadows: Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West. I got about ten pages into it last night before falling asleep. So far, I am not that taken with it, and may give it up - but it is about Muybridge, whose motion photos I am in love with, so I may try to love it. These three books in sequence are allowing me to see all these various mythologies about California, and how they all have their roots in the mythology surrounding manifest destiny.

But if you want actual gossip, here goes: I called Chris (Kevin's friendster friend) and left a message on his phone saying we should hang out.

Kevin and Matt are looking for roommates and since Niki is looking for a room, I told her to write Kevin. She did, and in the e-mail she joked how if she lived with them, she wouldn't make out with any dogs. Thank you so much, Niki.

Min, the third roommate who has not slept here since Christmas time, has announced her intentions to move out and Jillian will be moving into our house at the beginning of June.

I still have not filed my taxes. I need a NYC form before I can finish my state tax form, and I was way stressed about this a short hour ago.

What's new with you?