Covert update from work. Last night, I saw the Gossip play Ladyfest. They were awesome. So were Tallboys. I got the Gossip's setlist. It is hanging on my wall over a Pearlstein poster. That is contrast. I love leaving a show sweaty, stepping out into the chill and not putting your sweater back on because it feels so good, the fresh air on your sweat soaked body.

I am getting paid fourteen dollars an hour right now to wait for them to give me work to do. My internet at my house is not going to be fixed until Tuesday. I am not very happy about this. Sunday is Halloween, Le Tigre, Gravy Train, and Breaker Breaker. I still have no clue what I am going to be. I am now going to plan my halloween outfit, and get paid fourteen dollars an hour do so. God, if only this job was my all the time job.

The moon is full, or at least seems so. Last night was a lunar eclipse and it was beautiful. Today felt good despite the headache. Worked at Princeton Review, got out early, watched Cassevettes' Opening Night, and that is probably what this day will be remembered for. I could say so much about this movie but I also can't because there is so much to say. I am imagining how many college papers must have been written on this. The metaness, the feminism, the harmful effects of fiction on reality, and the neccesity of hope. Cassevettes' character playing Rowlands' character's wife in the play. Ahh, too much! So fucking good. And a ghost seventeen year old that seems so Lynch. This is the third movie I have seen of his and it has only excited me even more about him, his genius, art, and its potential.

Genius! Genius! Genius! That's my take.

more than this

yes, that is what music does to you, but a specific type of song has this very particular effect on me. Roxy Music's "More Than This" is one of those and I am listening to it right now feeling that particular effect, was listening to it a lot yesterday experiencing the same sensation. I bought their Greatest Hits album yesterday because socialcarwreck said to buy myself something, and I like any excuse to forget how broke I am and make unneccesary purchases.

And I am not sure if these are my memories being evoked in fits of nostalgia or if they are cinematic memories I am mistaking for my own, if they are memories from some John Hughes movie or Lost in Translation even. And if in fact, they are not my own experiences being evoked by these songs, but are memories of other character's experiences, does that diminish the feeling, make it a wobbly nostalgia supported by artificial memories? Let's add OMG's "If You Leave" to the tracklist at this point also.

Are not all memories, even those based on our own experiences to some extent artificial? As I sit here in New York, more than a little malcontent as of late, thinking back to past experiences, giving the past that glow that an unhappiness with the present will do, I think this is a very important question to ask, to ask constantly. A movie has just as much weight as my past experiences do. And saying that should not minimize the importance of either one of those, rather, it is meant to open up both to more forms of meaning, that the past has its role and I am not sure what that is, but do know the feeling I get when I hear these songs that conjure it. After I put the CD in the discman yesterday afternoon I sat in gray Union Square with the chill fall air blowing against me, lashing me with memories of high school where the weather always seemed to be like this, a constant gray fall. I must have worn shorts sometime during high school, other people must have, but all I can recall is us in shorts out on the blacktop during gym class, all cold and thinking of other places. And it all seems sad and great to me, that is this music.

I signed a new lease on Sunday at our old rent price and it didn't elate me, the thought of being here for one more year. I still dream of moving to somewhere else. How often are our dreams of the past? Do these ones outnumber the dreams of the future? There is a John Ashberry quote that says something about aging that Rupert read to me from the cap of his tea bottle that would be apt here. And if I can feel this, I don't care if they are not my own memories but the feeling I had during these movies, retriggered by hearing songs from the soundtrack. It's the feeling that matters, not the cause.

Can you make me more disgusted with our country?

Serpico at Peter's. I went to the video store eager for old timey scary New York movies: The Warriors and Escape from New York. Both were checked out. I stood there, frustrated, ready to call the night a night before it had begun, too overwhelmed with choosing a selection. I had come determined to rent one of these movies. This was the purpose of the evening. I wandered around, not finding anything even remotely similar, frustrated and make awkward by how small the store is and how crowded it was and how everything is shelved by director. I spotted Serpico, which I remembered LOB talking about in her diary, and so got it to prevent a nervous breakdown in Reel Life. It was really that bad a situation. I wanted to cry because they didn't have the movies I wanted. It was a boring movie, which was all right because it meant that I didn't feel guilty talking over it to Peter, chatting into the morning.

PS

Dara talked to Iris, our landlord's daughter yesterday, and told her that Josh only sleeps here on weekends, and apparently this is okay if we stick to this, and we will sign a lease for another year on Saturday, at the good old price of 1300. So this ends those dreams of Austin. For now, at least.

Here's what I do: I stand behind a computer and a massive Scatron grading machine in a room with about seven other people doing the same task. Most people sit behind tiny Scatron graders, they do not stand behind massive ones because they have done this before and know which machines to grab. It also does not help that I get there a few minutes late. The room we are in is a corner of the twelfth floor whose windows look out onto the Hudson River, the New Jersey skyline, and way downtown Manhattan. It is a gorgeous view. I watch an insanely large cruise ship, looking large even with skyscrapers foregrounding it, make its way down the river. I see the sun sort of set even though it is pretty gray. And I do this while I let the machine eat Scantrons until a message pops up on the computer saying that there is no birthday, or no ID number, or no test code. Then I look at the sheet and see that the kid is an idiot and bubbled in about five numbers in one column, or that they didn't put the year they were born. Do some kids not know this? Why was this was so frequent, bubbling in the month and date, but not the year? Then I look up their information in the database and complete the missing information, or fix the wrong information. Some of these tests make me giggle so much, the completely insane bubbling habits. Kids write their names out and then bubble letters that do not correspond at all to what they had wrote. And the thing that entertains me to no end is that their is a kid, a fifth grader, in Philadelphia whose real name is Somemore Love. Another kid's name is Eros. What the fuck is wrong with these parents? Were they high when they decided this? Somemore Love? Isn't that a joke from the Simpsons where Bart calls Moe and asks for last name Love, first name Somemore. Moe yells to the bar: "Uh, I'm looking for Somemore Love! Somemore Love!"

When I am leaving, I get my headphones out of my bag while I wait for the elevator, and this guy asks me what I am listening to. He is European, if that makes any difference, and I think it might. I hate small talk and meaningless questions, of talking about how glad you are to be out of work. I think it is really cool when people brush aside all of that or even introductions and ask you what they are curious about. So waiting for the elevator and riding down it, we talk about Le Tigre, about jumpy music vs. lounge music, and I leave really happy to have had a non-artifical encounter with a stranger. I resolve to make my own conversational habits more earnest, less plastic, even with strangers - especially with them.

Michiko, how do you do it? This fall is going to drown me. I never even finished all the books that came out this summer I wanted to read, haven't even started them. Anchor Book of New American Short Stories. Cloud Atlas. Undoing Gender. Aloft. The Dew Breaker. Oblivion. They are all sitting in my apartment eagerly awaiting their turn.

And now there is an insane amount of books coming out this fall to further get me backlogged. That Roth book. That Koestembaum book. And oh my god, How We Are Hungry comes out in a week. I have to get moving on this Thackery horse. I know I will read that Eggers book as soon as I get my hands on it and that every thing will be bumped back one in line. God, I sometimes think this is an addiciton, that I could not stop. It is compulsive, the need to read certain books. It is all I am ever doing.

I don't know if I talked about it here, but my love of Eggers has definitly dwindled since I first became obsessed with him. Now, I no longer still hold him in such high esteem, but I still really like him and like reading his stuff. When I notice his tendencies, I notice that I also do them. The breathless, speedy sentances - the obsession with motion. I wish I had better samples of my writing pre-Eggers to know if this is his influence. But I could also blame Whitman. Doesn't the cover look awesome, though?

Peter was mugged two nights ago right on 14th Street, kicked in the head, rescued by some passer-bys. New York, this should not surprise me. It does. This is daydreams of other places. This is daydreams of a sort of white flight.

Le Tigre says finally free. Tomorrow, I work at the Princeton Review. I got the Wayne Koestenbaum novel last night. I am so excited. But first, must finish Vanity Fair, then I have The Plot Against America, which I am also itching to read. I aquire books way faster than I read them. I am tempted to put VF on pause, but know that if I do, I will never finish it.

It's cloudy. I am going to work at the Strand. I am late. What's new?

Franzen! Franzen! That's who this essay is about. She kept on talking about her boyfriend's lauded book and I kept on wondering who it was. It was another far from perfect essay in the collection. The fact that it is about Franzen is probably why it made it in. Hell, I even want to go back and reread the essay now that I know it is about Franzen.

From some Amazon review:

"Envy" by Kathryn Chetkovich. In this autobiographical essay, Chetkovich, an obscure short story writer, chronicles her romance to Jonathan Franzen who with his novel The Corrections becomes a publishing phenon, making her consumed with guilt for experiencing, against her own will, envy. She combines narrative with a sharp analysis of the causes and effects of envy in her life and shows how the condition is a universal one.

travelling miles

I read an essay by Rick Moody about the word "cool" last night that was in the Best American Essays 2004. It was a terrible essay in every imaginable way and surely, the only way it gained inclusion is because it was by Rick Moody and it will help sell some copies of the otherwise unsexy anthology. Anyways, in it, he talks about Miles Davis a lot and it is probably for that reason that I am listening to him right now and that is a good thing, because really if I was listening to anything with rage right now, anything with teeth, anything of the rock variety, my blood pressure would rise too much, and there would be a rambling entry ahead of you, much like the one I composed last night. Instead, I am going to curl up in my bed, masturbate, and maybe read, but probably won't once I masturbate.

And I will just touch on this one topic before I head off to sleep because something is going on with it lately. I saw this boy at a stupid club on Saturday night. And man, I cannot get him out of my head. I am not sure if it was that or the stress of late since they both emerged around the same time, but God, I have been so easily turned on these past days and find myself masturbating to sleep, find myself half awake in the early hours mastubating to a dream I am just coming out of. I was so mad walking to work this morning just thinking about my landlord, and suddenly I get sidetracked by thoughts of masturbating. And it clicked that stress = horniness. That because of this tension, I look for release, and am masturbating all the time, or thinking about it all the time. It's a method of escape. I used to take masturbation breaks when I had to write papers. And that is the only reason I can be happy about this stress in my life, that it is giving me a sex drive. I was sitting in Union Square smoking a cigarrette this afternoon. My jeans stretched across my legs just so when I shifted my leg and I sighed with pleasure, wishing I was home.

I read a short story by Gary Lutz in the Anchor Book of New American Short Stories last night that was really good, was different, intelligent, and the sort of stuff I am planning on reaching for, that I want to see from fiction. I need to get his book and find out if all his stuff is good.

Thursday evening at 11:15, we are meeting with our landlord and her granddaughter.

People asked me for advice tonight and I was surprised that people were mildly respectful and even complimenting. One of these persons told me I should be an actor. I laughed. The other I talked to about Miles Davis.

I was bitching very loudly about how little I made an hour to Jesse after I found out that he made nine an hour and I only make eight twenty-seven even though we started at the exact same time and both have about the same work ethic. Later, my manager who heard this talk asked me how much I made and I told him, and he said that he would talk to someone, that I worked hard and have been there a long time. Which is nice that he understood this was outrageous. I used to not care about getting paid more because I kept telling myself that I was going to get a new job soon so I should not pressure for a raise. I am not sure I will actually get a raise right now because our union is negotiating a new contract with those stingy fuckers who own the store, and the owners are trying to crush our morale. Remember, I was only going to talk about one thing, going to do one thing. Stress, this, equals that.

We still have yet to have a succesful meeting with our landlord. I hate her. Yesterday, the three of us went downstairs to meet her. It lasted about two minutes. We said that Jillian's boyfriend doesn't live here and that we shouldn't have to pay more rent. She did not know what the hell we were saying and said she would talk to her daugter who would then communicate with us. Today, her terrifyingly tough granddaughter called and left a message on my phone right before I had to go to work saying she wanted to set up a meeting where she would act as translator either today or tomorrow. I didn't have time to call her back before I went to work and passed the message along to Dara.

When I left work this evening, exhausted, already mildy annoyed, I checked my message and there was another message from the granddaughter, left only a few hours after the first message saying, "Hello, this is Iris calling AGAIN!!! I WOULD APPRECIATE IT if you would return my phone calls! You can CALL ME BACK SOON at blah blah blah." And this is one of those instances where language, where not even capital letters can convey tone of voice, the snottiness of this message. Apparently, I should return her messages as soon as I recieve them. Not like I might not have a job or anything.

Dara talked to her sometime after she left this hostile message on my phone, and granddaughter said she wanted to meet with both of us together. This is not going to be easy since Dara and I have opposite work schedules. And we could either meet at eight in the morning or at eleven at night. I cannot tell you how much this irritates me. I am at that point where you are so stressed, so annoyed that you cannot fully verbalize it, that all you can really do, all you want to do is roll your eyes, because it is all so fucking stupid and not even really worth wasting your breath. Today at work, I stole glances at this book of Whitman poetry and I should do this all the time, should spend some time at home with him and realize what is important in this world of ours, that this stuff is not, and certain things are, and that this stuff is distracting me from that, that there always seems to be some this stuff here in New York, that it is too busy, there is never space for contemplation, for being bored. Remember where your thoughts went when you were not bombarded with constant stimuli of one sort or another, those afternoons on your couch, looking out to your empty street with only the occasional car interrupting your thoughts? I remember those moments, and I want to find my way back there. I am really seriously wondering if I can do that here, that I should be able to do it anywhere if I were serious enough, but there are other things. I am constantly stressed about money. I like sun, heat and natural skylines.

And now there is this apartment stuff that is exacerbating the normally bearable obnoxiousness of daily life, making everything just one more reason I hate my life lately. Since I was mugged, I find myself hurrying home from the subway stop, afraid of that dark stretch of Keap Street that I have to walk down, checking over my shoulders occasionally, something I never ever did, making sure my front door is locked, something I have never in my life worried about.

I am listening to these eighties songs that Jillian recently downloaded to my computer, right now Level 42's "Something About You." If you want the soundtrack to this entry, download the fucking song and maybe if you are in the right mood, you can also daydream about past days when you would turn up these songs on the radio and unironically be moved them, because you were in a car moving and on your way to something, on your back from something, just moving you know, and to listen to these songs in a stationary position is something else entirelly, and I am seriously considering dropping it all. I am looking at the Craigslist ads for apartments in Austin, marvelling at how cheap they are and thinking to myself what I will do if it doesn't go well with the landlord. I am conjuring the most lovely runaway fantatsies right now. New Orleans is also in the running, as is Memphis. I will get eight hundred dollars when I move out of this apartment and if I work everyday for the next two months, I can hopefully save enough to start again, to roll those die, blowing on them first, wishing, and seeing if I can get snake eyes this time around.

what i have found out

Our building is (99% sure) not rent-stabilized, which actually means that yes, our landlord can very well raise our rate 15%. However, thirty days notice must be given, not fifteen. However, they can evict us with a short thirty days notice also. And 1,500 is still probably way under the fair market price for a three bedroom in Williamsburg, so we couldn't disupte it that way.

Our lease was up at the end of August and they have been saying that they would sign a new lease with us soon, but that does nothing for us in this current situtation which makes us month-to-month tenants, meaning that they could kick us to the curb anytime they felt like it with just thirty days notice. If only, we had been more insistent about getting a new lease signed two months ago, we would not be in this boat right now.

Jillian's boyfriend, Josh, has been sleeping here every night for the past couple months. He has an apartment of his own, but appearantly our landlord thinks he lives here, because she has a camera set up at the door downstairs and appearantly watches it all the time. However, legally we can have an extra roommate according to Tenant.net, but that is not really going to help our case when we have no leverage to say we are not paying this much. I thought we had some more leverage before my research this morning, and thought we could make demands that would make them change their minds about charging so much: the installation of non-peeling floors, door handles (habitability laws require these), and mailboxes (which is required in an apartment with at least three units). But we really are not in a position to haggle with them when they can just say no, and give us a month's notice to move. There is a law against retalitory evictions, but I'm not sure if that will help us much since we are considered month to month tenants.

Did I mention that our landlord doesn't speak English, is partly deaf, and yells a lot? We are supposed to meet with her today and convince her not to raise our rent.

Looks like we will be talking to the legal aid people about suing our landlord too

Oct. 15, 2004

To: Tenants

The rent is being raised starting on Nov. 1, 2004. The rent will be raised to $1,500. The rent is to be paid on the 1st of every month NOT 15 days later. The latest 5 days later. The reason for this is because, there is one more person living in the apartment. And Because, of the lateness of rent every month.

PS: If you have anything to discuss with me about this come and talk to me. NOT my daughter because, she is no the landlord I Ada Acostsa is the landlord. You can come Saturday when my granddaughter will be here. Or just call me

718.486.0435
Ada Acosta

i dreamed a song called "up in the old tornado." megan's boyfriend was going to war.

I heard the expression dove gray lately, read it in some British novel I think, and the phrase was so perfect. I think of it today, looking outside at the dove gray sky, wanting to curl up in bed and read all day long, but knowing I can't, knowing that I have to go work in a short half hour, and also thinking how there will not be any of these lying in bed days for about a month. On my days off, I am going to be working at the Princeton Review for a few weeks, running tests through Scantron machines, doing this for fourteen dollars an hour, making money to help pay some bills. Tomorrow will probably be last day off until mid November.

I think it is supposed to be bleak weather tomorrow and that has me happy. My daytime will be spent doing nothing, maybe protesting, but probably not. Then some openings I am really excited about. Virgil Marti. Yayoi Kusama? (Or did that happen last night?) Then something to celebrate Niki's birthday, something that will probably not be the Faint since I think Christy is still in VA and the tix are in her name. I have to make tomorrow so special since it will be my last free day for a while, have to stand still and make it last.

Last night, I watched Gumnaam with Ethan at his place in Park Slope. Park Slope is beautiful. I think this everytime I am there, how nice it would be to live there. It reminds me of neighborhoods in DC, of even Alexandria a little. Tree lined streets, a dark night beyond the glow of streetlamps, no light haze from the city, from the BQE. I think someone shat/puked/pissed (all three) right by the entrance to my subway. It has smelled like an awful combination of all three right by the entrance to the Lorimer stop for the past few days. On the ride out to Park Slope on the Q, there was a homeless man passed out who smelled equally pugnent, so getting off at the subway stop, seeing trees, smelling them - God, I cannot tell you with what relief I inhaled the air there, thought about how much I do like clean air, respite. My mom bought me a plane ticket to come home for Thanksgiving and I am so happy, so excited, am basically holding my breath while I swim underwater to that side of the pool, will be so happy to come out and take in deep breaths.

test

Does this show up on Friendster?

I might have a new job in addition to the Strand for three weeks. Fingers crossed. Should know tomorrow.

1.
Last night, I bought #4 non-bleached expensive coffee filters after I got off work. I picked up a thing of milk also, excited about making coffee the next morning. I got on the subway, listening to Jesus and Mary Chain, so happy, rocking out. I heard a man behind me on the crowded train saying "Excuse me," heard it muffled through my headphones. I stepped aside and turned to see who said it, and I know I let out a audible sigh of anguish as soon as I saw him. I was embarrased about this, but I don't think anyone else on the train noticed because everyone else looked equally horrified and glum. He was holding a laminated piece of newspaper, asking for money, the headline obviously concerning him: "Man Attacked with Acid." This man's disfigured face cannot leave my mind. I fell asleep to it. Jesus and Mary Chain suddenly seemed less rocking, the world seemed so much sadder. This man looked like something out of a horror movie. His ears had basically melted off. His eye sockets sagged like melted wax, charred eyeballs appearantly still able to see. I am so glad I did not have any money in my wallet because I felt so guilty and would have readily emptied my wallet in his hands. Everyone else on the train seemed to feel the same way. People were opening up their wallets like you've never seen them do before, all eagerly giving money - secretly hoping (I think) that the man would hurry and move past them, so the image could start to fade from their mind.

2.
This morning, excited to make coffee, I realized that I bought filters that don't even fit in my coffee maker, that I needed #2 filters. I cut and folded the filter, a junkie improvising, needing my fix. Now I will have to buy another expensive box on non-bleached filters.

3.
A while ago, I read Russell Banks' The Darling, and the main reason for doing so was that I had planned on writing a review of it. I had so much time to do so, but every time I sat down to try to write something, I failed miserably. I was real good at doodling on a piece of paper, sketching out various themes I wanted to address, but when I sat to write, I was always tripped up on the first sentence, never finding one that gave me enough momentum to carry onwards. And so this morning, I saw that there was a review in the NY Times, and I clicked on the link, saying to myself that if Michiko wrote this review I was going to scream. I didn't scream. But, she did write the review, and wrote it with a nice crisp opening sentence that made me say, yes, this is what I wanted to do. This is good. She is pretty amazing, not for her quality of writing, but for the volume of it. She reviews at least one book a week, sometimes two. And I think I am going to go look at the horrible draft I wrote and learn how to do it better, look at exactly what Kakutani did, at what she didn't.

Why didn't I think of this earlier? And, WTF? I am connected to him through Anna-Maria. Anna-Maria is friends with Hernan Bas! I am going to become his offical stalker.

Last night, I lay in bed feeling too drunk, that feeling where you feel like you will spew if you move too fast, or turn over on your side, where you are trying to stay as still as possible to prevent your belly from exploding vomit everywhere. But last night, I did not drink anything. No, I was drunk on cheese. I ate half a huge log of fresh mozarella for dinner with tomatos. And then as a pre-bed snack, I ate a half a tub of goat cheese. And man, let me tell you, I will not be doing that again anytime soon. I felt so ill. I also had had coffee way too late and so I almost had a panic attack when I forgot how old I was, when I said, "Wait, I am 23 right? Right? Wait, how old am I? Am I really 23? Yes! Ahhh, I am 23 years old. Oh my God, I am so old and at a point that I should be well beyond by 23! 23!" And then I was real sad and somehow managed to fall asleep, but did so thinking something had to be done.

love

I went there again today. I couldn't help it. I was in the city to get my paycheck and I had to see the paintings again. I hopped on the crosstown bus across 14th Street, rode it to the end, and walked up to Daniel Reich Gallery to see the Hernan Bas show again. It's weird when you revisit something that you loved so much on first viewing and just sort of expect there to be that same reaction. There wasn't that same sense immediately, but soon it came to me again, thoughts of high school, of restlessness, wonder, and violence. God, what these painting do to me! I read the artist statement and it was so cute, talked about love, and I want Hernan Bas to be my boyfriend. It was inspiring (not jealousy inducing, as it most times is) to see one of my peers, a homo my age making such lovely paintings that resonated with me, making art that represented a time, a feeling that I have been waiting to see done in writing form, but that I only find in the visual arts. And so fuck you Jerry Saltz for claiming that Bas is derivative of Elizabeth Peyton. Fuck Peyton and her cutesy, starstruck portraits. I hate Peyton. Their subject matter is totally different, and besides the fact that both look sort of like amateurish painting, they don't even have similar painting styles. Bas has explosions of strokes, uses glitter. They are nothing alike! Bas is awesome. I am going to write a love letter to him.

I then wondered around and looked at more galleries. At Kashya Hildebrand, there are disappointing, didactic oil filled sculptures by Andrei Molodkin, but there are mesmerizing photos by Arsen Savadov that totally rescue, and in fact are the show. They are photos of miners covered in soot, wearing tutus or nothing. And they are amazing.

I then went to David Zwirner where there is an amazing show of On Kawara's work that totally changed the course of my day, and hopefully I can remember the lessons learned, and have it change the course of my life. It is a beautiful show. I have only see two of his pieces side by side at MoMA, and that effect made me wonder about the difference between the two dates, about what the possible significance could be. Seeing all of these works grouped together provokes a totally different feeling, a better one. Each of these works painted with the date it was made, going back the last forty years, that this is dedication to art, that it should perhaps be something you make a habit of, rather than a hobby of. That each day you have to devote yourself to creating art, that it is a methodical process.

Between two of the paintings I was born. A large portion of them, I wasn't even alive yet. This show amazes me so much. When I signed the guestbook as I was leaving, I noticed that Kiki Smith was the person who had just signed it, that she was probably just in the gallery with me, and I did not notice it because I was so wowed by the work, so in love with its message, agreeing to myself I had to change, a pact for the future being made.

I am covertly updating at work while I man the information desk here at the Strand. The internet has been cut off at my house until we pay the 150 dollar bill from the past few months, and that brings up the item of money and my lack of it, which seems to occupy too much of my mental energy as of late. I made copies of my resume and tomorrow morning I am going to the temp agency. If I don't, you all have encouragement to beat the hell out of me. Dave, this is directed at you.

I have been listening to the Beatles all weekend because that is all Q104.3 has been playing in tribute of Scott Munie (sp?), one of their djs who just died. It has been making me so happy. I have been reading Vanity Fair, which has also been making me so happy.

I like being happy. Things that lead to this state: cute boys, Beatles, that sassy Becky Sharp, being sober, tea, Interpol, daydreaming about cute boys, imagining old men on the subway naked, my headphones, the weather that makes me appreciate my down blanket so much, the cold space between my body and my covers that is only overcome by snuggling, snuggling late at night and longing for boys of my past, thinking about what great fiction should be, thoughts of moving, loud music, soft fabrics, a clean sink, lonliness.

And these things should outweigh, should do so easily, stress about monetary matters, but I can admit, it is not always the case.

nothing is going my way

Fuck this shit. Today is not going so well. I just wrote a terribly long entry here at El Stupido Times Square Internet Shithole, and this stupid computer logged me the fuckoff with like a ten second warning. I tried hitting post as fast as I could but it was not fast enough. This always infuriates me, the feeling of wasted effort, and not wanting to take the time to retell things. So here in outline format is what I wrote about:

-How on my way here, the subway was stopped in the tunnel because of an investigation on the track. A women went into a crazy relgious spell, had happy eyes.

-Happy eyes of children on subways. A young boy this morning. That Wordsworth quote: "The son is the father of the man." How I still don't understand it, how on the Brian Wilson's Smile album, there is a song called "Child is the Father of Man." Wonder, children's eyes, unguarded stares, how to reach that state, what happens to change it.

-Public Transportation. Riding the Staten Island ferry yesterday. Gorgeous, cloudy weather over the water. Staten Island thrift shops. Outrageous new clothes. Seeing things Bonnie would wear. Nostalgia. Nostaliga for high school, buying clothes that the type of person you want to be would wear. Willing change through purchases. Layout of Staten Island. A drive-thru Taco Bell. Absence of drive-thrus in New York. More thoughts of high school.

-Watched Debate with Beast, cheese, crackers, duck sauce, and good friends. Laughed a lot. Hole afterwards with Peter. On the way home, harrassed twice! Called faggots. Both times running back and asking the asshole what they just said. First time, two big burly guys that could have kicked my ass blindfolded demurred and said that they didn't say anything. Second time, drunken floozy had to be restrained by her friends as we yelled insults at each other on Second Avenue. But yeah, no taking shit. Raising that Queer Fist and shutting you up.

-That's when the computer ate it. Now, Post.

God, I should not be updating at this place where it is eighteen cents a mintue, should not even be on this computer at all, should have gone to Times Square to satisfy my internet urges. I am right. I am off to Times Square, talk to you soon.