Earthquake! There's an Earthquake! We got an Earthquake!

Go to 2:15 and enjoy.

The Faithful and Mad

Despite your sometimesliness, MM, these will always make me think of you.

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touching you i say (it being Spring
and night) "let us go a very little beyond
the last road - there's something to be found"

and smiling you answer "everything
turns into something else, and slips away . . . .
(these leaves are Thingish with moondrool
and i'm ever so very little afraid")

i say
"along this particular road the moon if you'll
notice follows us like a big yellow dog. You
don't believe? look back. (Along the sand
behind us, a big yellow dog that's . . . . now it's red
a big red dog that may be owned by who
knows)

only turn a little your. so. And
there's the moon, there is something faithful and mad"

-- e.e. cummings

feet of cheese
coffeepot soul
hands that hate poolsticks
eyes like paperclips
I prefer red wine
I am bored on airliners
I am docile during earthquakes
I am sleepy at funerals
I puke at parades
and am sacrificial at chess
and cunt and caring
I smell urine in churches
I can no longer read
I can no longer sleep

eyes like paperclips
my green eyes
I prefer white wine

my box of rubbers is getting
stale
I take them out
Trojan-Enz
lubricated
for greater sensitivity
I take them out
and put three of them on

the walls of my bedroom are blue

Linda where did you go?
Katherine where did you go?
(and Nina went to England)

I have toenail clippers
and Windex glass cleaner
green eyes
blue bedroom
bright machinegun sun

this whole thing is like a seal
caught on oily rocks
and circled by the Long Beach Marching Band
at 3:36pm

there is a ticking behind me
but no clock
I feel something crawling along
the left side of my nose:
memories of airliners

my mother had false teeth
my father had false teeth
and every Saturday of their lives
they took up all the rugs in their house
waxed the hardwood floors
and covered them with rugs again

and Nina is in England
and Irene is on ATD
and I take my green eyes
and lay down in my blue bedroom.

Vicodin, Demerol and Halcyon - Oh My!

Though I'm not generally afraid of the dentist - I've already had several procedures in life - I was certainly feeling trepidatious about having four wisdom teeth removed yesterday. I had been told, somewhat erroneously, by another dentist that two of the teeth had their roots in my sinuses. Yikes! I already have serious sinus and allergy troubles as is, so the mention of a "perforated sinus" was NOT reassuring.

So, by the time I was sitting in the dentist's waiting room, I was a nervous wreck. Irritable, defensive and on the verge of tears - cue the Halcyon, followed by a very reassuring chat with a be-yarmulked dentist in the office. Much better! The last thing I clearly remember is chatting with Alison and someone in the background mentioning Demerol - then poof! The sedation was allegedly "conscious" sedation, though there are only two moments I remember: one tooth, on the bottom left, coming out easily & thinking it was strange to feel one's tooth being slipped out of the gum as though it were a snug shoe removed at the end of the day; and my dentist having me in a headlock. My bottom right tooth had deep and splayed roots, thus making it more difficult to remove - hence the headlock. In both instances, I quickly drifted off again and felt no pain.

Apparently, I said goodbye to the Dentist and staff, though I all I remember is being told to lie down a little while. There was a bit of excitement in the hallway necessitating my sitting down before actually fainting...rather than walk down to the car, I was wheeled down and somehow shoved into Alison's car.

The rest of the night was pretty miserable and bloody, though I'm in much better shape today. I didn't go to work, which I must say is awesome. Y, though often a pain in the ass, was thankfully understanding.

I've kept my teeth, but don't know what to do with them now. Gild them? Gild them and make them into earrings? Morbid and cool. Perhaps.

Horoscopes

Generally, malarky, yes.

I only take one horoscope seriously: http://www.freewillastrology.com/horoscopes/leo.html

And I read all the signs - the guy who writes them, Rob Breszny, speaks my language and his weekly horoscopes always say just what I need to hear. Not always what I want to hear, mind you, but what I need to hear to get my own butt in gear.

This week's:
"A British study revealed that the average man spends a full six months of his life staring at women in a slack-jawed trance of frustrated desire," reported The Week magazine. That's the bad news. The good news? The omens suggest you have an extraordinary capacity right now to break any slack-jawed trance of frustrated desire you've been oppressed by. That's true whether you're a hetero man or any other kind of Leo. So identify the sad, unrequited longing that evokes your most poignant disappointment, and rise up to overthrow it. You've got the power to declare your independence. "

Lately I've been flirting with my old familiar "slack-jawed trance." No, no, no, NO.

To love me in theory but not in practice is not enough.

Today

I've (mostly) enjoyed my day - though work is RIDICULOUS at the moment, I'm at least not working on Fridays. My pocketbook is hurting, but the extra day off is absolutely worth it. I staggered out of bed at around 8:30, watched a DVR'd episode of the X-Files, had a leisurely breakfast of coffee and the Greek yogurt from Trader Joe's and then went to the Doctor's at 11:30.

My Doctora is new & I like her (she was wearing amazing boots today that I covet - delicious knee-high chocolate brown leather. Oh my God.) I've had a lingering problem that my old Doc couldn't resolve - Doctora made a suggestion today that in retrospect seems quite obvious and I'm now annoyed afresh at the old Doc for his seeming ineptitude.

I also decided that I'm buying all my drugs online from Canada - had I bought everything prescribed to me from the pharmacy, it would have cost $270, $120 of which would be for an allergy drug I should refill MONTHLY. This same drug is available both OTC AND in generic in Canada for $20. Grrr.

Post-doctora, I went to the grocery store and Trader Joes's. I like grocery shopping by myself in the middle of a weekday. I'm free to space out, obsess over what type of salad dressing or wine to buy in the relative desolation of the aisles.

Once home, I cuddled with my cats and played online. (un)Exciting though it may sound, it was actually a very pleasant and peaceful day - pharmaceutical rage notwithstanding. Boyfriend got home around 5:30, whereupon we watched oodles of basketball (sadly, the Suns lost - but the Pistons won), ate a delicious dinner of salmon & salad and then polished off a bottle of champagne. Excellent.

There Ain't Cure for Love. And That's Okay.

"There ain't no cure for love."
-- Leonard Cohen

The lament is gone.

My love isn't. I'm still smitten when we're together and, at least at the moment of separation, heartbroken down to my bones when we part - if anything, the love of you that fills my throat is richer and more complex.

But nonetheless, the lament is gone. The keen and the protest are done. In short, I give up. You are not mine. I don't know that you love me. I do know that you certainly love someone else. It doesn't change my feelings and they still don't matter. I should love who I'm with. Accept it all or go mad.

At long last, I have.

I'm the Woman Over There in the Corner, Pinned Under a 15lb Dumbbell.

I am not a gym bunny. I'm more of a "library bunny" or a "cocktail bunny." Nonetheless, I get uneasy once my hips start pinballing off of door frames and furniture edges that they used to glide past. I don't need to wear a size 4, but I do need to not, well, ooze.

I had to get back to the gym - but not my old gym, the inexpensive but overcrowded Bally's, no, no. My NEW gym, the self-proclaimed "mecca of bodybuilding," Gold's Gym in Venice.

Wait, what? Me? Gold's? That woman over there on the left works out at Golds. I, Library Cocktail Bunny, do not. Except that my gym bunny boyfriend Aurelio trains there & we've decided to start working out together. Aurelio is an unfailingly consistent, conscientious person - sometimes to my dismay, though usually to my benefit - and short of hospitalization, he trains three times a week. Mondays are leg day, Thursdays, back, shoulders & biceps, while Sundays are chest and triceps. And don't forget the thirty minutes of cardio each time.

I have to tell you, I was not thrilled to be doing this initially. I didn't want to spend twice as much on a weight-lifting gym membership (to Hell with strong, give me skinny!) nor did I relish working out in the company of big burly types as they strutted in singlets and grunted over stacks of weight plates. I was also certain that decidedly squishy me would be terribly out of place there, amidst the oiled muscles and fake breasts. And to some extent I am, though I'm not alone. Sure, there's a high quotient of thick-necked "supplement" fiends (male AND female), not to mention the more mortally proportioned exhibitionists who prance & pose in workout garb that's coordinated right down to their shoelaces - but therein lies the fun! Forget the muted televisions, there's a parade of Venice Beach characters who give the Average Joes something to watch while laboring under our modest dumbbells. Juice or no juice? Pre- or post-op? Gigolo or trustafarian? The people watching is top notch.

A month into things, I've come around to weight lifting (though my triceps are taking some cajoling) and I kind of like the gym bunnies. They're generally either oblivious or actually friendly - my favorite person is a tiny lady in her sixties who lifts 90lbs with EACH leg on the incline leg press. The occasional celebrity wanders in (including a barefoot and dazed Luke Wilson about a week before his suicide attempt) and you can't beat the ocean breeze through the big roll up doors out back. Now if only they had a post-workout cocktail bar and a library...