Met my sister for the sibling car swap in Mid-Mich today. I have been driving around her little scooter for a couple weeks so that people will think I am a commoner. And apparently she has been parking my ride under a tree that drips tar and alien waste. Thanks, sis. I don’t even feel bad that you haven’t been able to donate plasma because you have iron poor blood.

Maybe I have iron poor blood – my eyes hurt from reading. I still read regular old books but I find some of my most favorite things to read are on the web. Not only in the brilliant word sprayings of Bethany or Kim, or in PDFs of Spin articles from BM (wait, I’m going to need a middle name that starts with an A or a U– those can’t be your initials) but also in the form of comment/feedback posts from anonymous people on giant websites. I especially identify with the minds that troll IMDB.com and Amazon.com.

I was researching a film and came across a post some tween girl had thrown up about how she wanted to meet and marry some actor, let’s say Clive Owen because that is the only sensible choice as far as actors to meet and marry because Mark Ruffalo is way to indieobvious. Well the rest of the IMDB let her have it with comments like “Just because your birthdays are in the same month, your parental situation is similar, and you both used to be fatties doesn't mean you're remotely meant for each other. At all.” Some guy called LiberalsSuck84 posted that. It was far more cruel in context and I couldn’t stop reading all the RE: Re:s! I felt so bad for her I wanted to go get Clive and get hitched just to show her dreams do come true.

Amazon reviews are the best. I know all about the cattiness and controversy about writers posting their own amazon reviews and then their jealous ‘friends’ from writing group snarking back – it makes for ok reading but who wants to hear smart people argue? Does anyone check the product reviews for things like door alarms and pizza stones? Well, because I am considering moving the south (lifelong dream: Yazoo City, porch swings, and sweet tea) I was researching hot rollers and I came across this: http://www.amazon.com/review/R1XJ6V2P76KQ6W/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm

I’m not even sure which part of the video is a legitimate review or if it is just a cry for help from a drugged and abused women living in the back of some guy’s 18 wheeler. I do love fake eyelashes.

Does any of this reek of procrastination? Yeah well, I’ve got way too much to do. My entire life is hanging on by a thin thread - can I finish this project? I need to go find some apples and ephedrine and then research Mark Ruffalo. Maybe he isn't so bad.

Ladies, I miss Oinkster - first OOB when I get to LA. (OOB = Order Of Business)

If I knew as much about money as I do about boxed wine I would be able to get my name to the top of the Chevy volt waiting list. DB calls boxed wine 'mom crack'. If I had a lot of lot of money I would name a bench after myself and my future dead husband, a civil engineer and known philanthropist, on huntington beach or maybe in DC near Ford's Theater, it would say "forever young" and maybe I would start up a county fair fuchsia ribbon award for sewing named after my 4H sewing teacher B Tanner. E says that the stupidest question someone can ask is, 'hey, what's that you're reading?' I was personally asked to leave the library tonight because they close so early and I didn't know, I ignored the announcement. I was listening to brazilian folk music. I love folk music and folk art and country folk and folk dancing. B thinks that Rob Bresney is on to her. J is in NYC, she should meet up with K. K makes me think of things I miss terribly. If I didn't miss things I wouldn't know what to do with myself. I suffer from sentimentality and a mild dog allergy. I can't decide what I miss the most - walks around the 'voir, the Olympics, or the curtains and photocubes I left behind. Dodger Stadium for sure. That place and Chichen Itza make me feel like cutting someones heart out and putting it in a decorative bowl on top of a very large hill or smallish mountain. If the leaves don't start turning colors here as promised I will feel duped.

That is the second time in a few weeks that I have mentioned cutting out or removing a heart. I'm going with it though. I had a dream the other night that I had two purple couches. Kierkegaard says the only people afraid to revisit things are robbers and gyspies.

It can't really fit in your hand.

P1100760
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

I'm full of shame once again. Emma and I just got back from the Michigan State Fair where we paid a dollar to get into an exhibit to see the worlds smallest woman. It really was a real live woman from Haiti. She was watching tv and wearing sandals sitting cross-legged in a white box next to a sign that said she was born in 1977 and only knows a little english. The sign outside said you could talk to her and I had an overwhelming urge to ask her my future. I didn't though because I already know the future of people that pay money to gawk at people. And it is very bright indeed.

My favorite fair exhibit was the chick hatchery. We saw a little baby turkey beak-busting out of an egg. It totally tops that god awful 'Miracle of Life' human baby video we were forced to watch in science class. Egg births are far more civilized.

It's storming like a wench without beer here. Like a dozen dragons breathing fire on their crying dragon babies. Like like like, well I don't know, this isn't my weather blog. I'm suffering from heatarexia and Renaissance Festival sunstroke on top of having to drive in midnight torrential downpour on these skinny Michigan two-lane highways with all those butthugging SUVs! Lay off people seriously. You can have your friend punch your time card for you if you're a little late to third shift. I only say that because I know from experience and I have read Rivethead.

I don't know if Renaissance Festivals would thrive as much if they took place in area where people live a more affluent and leisurely life like say, Laguna Beach. There is something about the world of warlocks that makes me believe its enthusiasts live quite oppressive off-ren-season lives. I know I do, but really - what kind of suffering does one have to endure during the week in order to find relief only by sticking a foxtail on his ass on a Saturday afternoon? And the girl has such a sensible purse?

There is so much I don't know about life and I realized it seventy times a million over and over again today thanks to the magical world of the Renaissance Festival.

* Next day note: I wrote this entry late at night and I woke up thinking about what a cheap shot it is to go to a Ren Fest and take pics and then poke fun at people wearng jorts and foxtails. My brother, an enthusiast of magic: the gathering told me that the foxtail may be from an anime character and then he told me a story about one of his coworkers who used to dress up as sailor moon. He was a six-foot-two dude.

I’ve lived alone awhile so being back in a communal living situation is interesting. I love being able to sleep through the night knowing that my chances of getting attacked by werewolf or serial killer are reduced by each additional body in the house (10% reduction for each adult, 5% for children, 25% for each adult sleeping on couch near door or window). But, there is something about living with other people that makes me think I don’t have to do dishes. The beauty of living with other people is that things get done even if you don’t know who did them. Some things bad, like drinking the last Coke Zero and other things good, like replacing the toilet paper. Of course in most living arrangements that involve more than one person these everyday tasks will inevitably rake on someone’s nerves until they have to leave a passive aggressive note or have a blow up right in the middle of a perfectly entertaining marathon TV sesh of “The First 48.” I don’t plan on sticking anywhere too long to deal with that or dishes for the matter. I’m a rolling stone.

In other news, I visited my ol pal Kendra* today in the posh suburbs of West Bloomfield. She showed me how she taught her baby "baby sign language" - it's not for hearing problems, it's just so the little bugger can ask for more food without having to learn adult english. Funny, a little creepy, and useful. A triple hit in my book.

*Kendra and baby E are cute as cupie dolls!

For the past week I’ve been staying in the one-stoplight town I grew up in. It has a few more stoplights now thanks to urban sprawl but almost-small-towns don’t have quite the narrative impact as small towns do so try to hold the one-blinking-stoplight image in your head. Also think about how people leave their kids strapped in their car-seats, trapped in minivans, windows cracked, engines still running while they run into the IGA and then post office and look oh there’s Mrs SoandSo let me stop and talk about band boosters. If this place were LA I would be a childnabber. I have needed a small chubby-cheeked child since opening day at DodgerStadium. It is nearly impossible to get on the jumbotron in the cheap seats unless you have a 6-16month old to dress up in baby MLB gear and throw over your head. But kidnapping will not be my crime here, I barely had enough time to settle in and wake up my criminal self. This place is even more suited for drunken disorderly. I am moving on to the city tonight. My offense there will be small town envy.

152
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

I saw this in real life. I captured it in my Lumix and in my heart, like Bethany and I do with sunsets. Someday, and the time may come sooner than I'd like, I will die and the coroner (there will be an autopsy if my final wishes are adhered to by my friends and family) anyway the coroner will have to crack open my chest to rip my heart out to put it on that metal scale that weighs bananas and murder evidence. My heart will weigh exactly six tons of butte, mesa, rainbow and road. And even if everyone had thought at first that I died by setting my self on fire or by choking on an apple fry from BK, the evidence will show the cause of death was road denial.

Pops! from kayekilla on Vimeo.

Modesty and humility rule here. The grass is a nearly green and the trees are nearly tall, they aren’t trying garner praise or win awards, everyone and everything will be paid off in heaven. The cars are spotted with rain marks on gray and burgundy paint jobs. The trucks are brown and forest green – all the colors in the lifespan of a blade of grass. It all rolls out on bumpy two lane highways made of crumbly blacktop and faded paint. Every so often a pothole throws you up in your car seat and you wake up and fear for your tires, and your transmission, and your windshield, but not your future, you rest in the comfort of knowing that you are doing the right thing. You are in the motor city and there’s more where that came from.

I made it back to Michigan. My first thoughts about being back in the Midwest are that the place still reminds me of bugs and moist skin and animal hair and two lane highways and Mountain Dew. But I do feel the possibilities and the excitement of adventure and change. I think that has something to do with the Olympic opening ceremony - it makes me feel like a champion.

I miss my Angelinos but I can't wait to see my gals tomorrow.

Be sure to check out my new favorite website: Beth and her benches.

The Devils Rope

108
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

It's amazing how fast you can pack it all up and put it all behind and dream it all away and put it back together and stand in four states at once and make to it Shiprock in time for tater tots.

I thought the earthquake was a sign for me to leave but now, after packing up, throwing away, and shipping off all of my stuff, after driving 300 plus miles to our first destination, I get the news that the Dodgers got Manny.

The earthquake was actually a leaked super secret seeping up through cracks in the earth, directed by the universe to let me know the big one IS COMING. First Casey Blake, now Manny. It's no wonder someone stole my last mini-plan ticket out of my mailbox before B could pick it up tonight.

Enough of me trying to direct my attention away from my sadness. I'll miss you LA!

I was in Studio City in my parked car when the earthquake hit. I thought Doctor Dre had spontaneously set my car up with hydraulics or something. I was rolling and bumping alongside all the other cars in the parking lot. I kept looking for a giant ruck or a spaceship lift-off - I couldn't figure out what was making everything so windy and rolly. What an amateur.

Anywho...I sold my Nagel this evening. My bed too. I wish I could say I am sitting in an apartment full of nothing but the only thing that getting rid of furniture has done for me and my stuff is to let things that I never knew I had spill out everywhere. Furniture contains things. It is more useful than I ever thought. So now I have to just wait until my sister gets here and hope she knows what to do with my mountians of bullcrap.

I only have one DVD left unpacked: "Mommy Dearest" and I have been watching it with the John Waters commentary. It's quite good. I am most intrigued by the similarities between Joan Crawford/Faye Dunaway's cold-cream-make-up in the "wire hanger" scene and Heath Ledger's Joker makeup in "The Dark Knight."It is errie.

I made two trips to the Atwater Post Office today to mail some of my books to Michigan. I really should hire a personal assistant to help me with the packing and errands that I have to deal with to make this move happen. Anyone want to come work for me for five dollars an hour and all the frozen vegetables you can eat? Why should I hire someone really when my favorite mule/worker, my little sister, is coming next week.

Besides my friends whom I will miss beyond belief, I’m going to miss the Dodgers and Dodger Stadium, The Americana, the walk to the coffee shop, the 8 am street-cleaning panic, two-story Forever 21's and the people that forgive me for shopping there, the Arclight, Club Tee Gee, Carousel, Zankou, the Pacific Ocean, Glendale Public Library, Brand Arts& Music Library, Larchmont Beauty Supply, Eat Well, Dusty’s, The Vista Theater, walkin around the reservoir, teaching Body Blast at Total Woman, driving to the desert, Lone Pine, Writegirl, I Love Super Beautiful, Palm Springs thrift shopping, Bethany & JG's house, and Pinkberry.

After I got back from my trip to Seattle and vicinity I got right to work going through all of my stuff. I need to toss or sell nearly everything before I leave. In my piles of stuff everywhere I have found little pieces of paper with my writing notes on them. My favorite so far is a note that asks "How many times a day do you get slapped?"

I know this is child explotation but I can't help it:



Cari's Traveling Rock Band from kayekilla on Vimeo.

Back

209
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

It’s past midnight so now it’s my birthday and I am already getting everything I ever wanted. I did laundry this evening and witnessed a bodacious Russian woman put her wet clothes in a side-loading washer because she thought it was a dryer. She didn't realize until it was too late and the water had started to pour in and the machine was on lock down. One helpful man told her that dryers usually don't cost three-seventy-five and offered to chat her up for the ten minutes she was going to have to wait. He asked her a lot of questions about where she lived.

Looking Out

019
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

I swear I remembered that I had a class to teach this morning. I was remembering all day yesterday but not in the productive way of remembering. I remembered just enough to set my alarm. I remembered to wake up to my alarm and put on my sneaks and leave nearly in time. I was a few minutes late to a room full of twenty plus elderly Armenian women waiting for me. One lady always sets up my “step” and weights and mat at the front of the class. They got new blue mat,s this place. The microphones weren’t working or maybe they changed them up in the past three weeks to another nonbattery supercellular system, who knows. I had no plan and no microphone so I just sent these women on a bare-voice-scream-instructed freestyle-fifty-minute lunge and squat odyssey that I am, well not me, but my legs are personally regretting at this very moment. And tomorrow is Independence Day for everybody but this body.

The other day, when walking with Bethany I had the strangest blackout migraine attack. I woke up a few days later with a medical condition that can only be described as a hybrid of chronic fatigue syndrome and agoraphobia. I did leave my place for long enough one day to sit on the beach and get a front-of-the-legs-sunburn but for the most part I have only been able to watch movies and nap and make lists of people I should call before dying of this terrible condition. If you haven’t received a phone call from me it is because I would rather you remember me as spunky. I went out once to Fresh and Easy and the post office but for the most part I have been inside watching such uplifting films as “Autumn Sonata” and “4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days.” So I am even more convinced that you don’t have to leave your home to find pain and suffering. I wonder things like how does one age as gracefully as Ingrid Bergman and did communist Romania really keep track of their female citizens menstrual cycles or did they just withhold shampoo? Or was the only shampoo available for normal or dry hair? Why is everything always limp, greasy, and acid-washed in eastern europe? What does it mean that two of the last couple winners of the Palme D'or made movies about selling or aborting babies? What is that about? A step beyond baby-boomer apocalypse-ism. Future-murder? Feminist implosion? Tell me and I will stop having migraines.

I'm back from my trip to the mitten. What a time. Not fully recovered from jetlag or firefly separation anxiety. Working backwards, my most favorite moment was seeing the Dymaxion House at the Henry Ford Museum.


Dymaxion House Henry Ford Museum from kayekilla on Vimeo.

Derby

258
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

Jetlagged.

Surround sound isn't that great in a regular family living/tv room. It's just startling actually and it does not make "Godfather III" any better of a movie.

I took a long walk with my madre today. She wanted to show me the new walking track around the old community park. I love that park because it's where the town hosts the Fourth of July fireworks and it reminds me of being dazzled as a kid and drugged as a teenager. I saw my first swear words carved into a wooden slide at that park. The tennis courts remind me of my dad leaving me and my brother in our tan VW Rabbit. My brother burning his hand on the cigarette lighter while he played. The courts are cracked and full of weeds now but my mom showed me the new ones near the high school. Not to worry. This town has moved on from black top courts. We walked past a t-ball game. The kids playing were so little - their little melons swimming under black brain buckets. One kid crouched in the infield drawing who knows what in the dirt. His head not big enough to pay attention or fit in a helmet. I thought of the little helmets that frozen yogurt comes in at Dodger games and I miss home. My other home. The slide full of vandalism and cuss words is gone now. It doesn't matter that I carved my name and some good swears in the slide either. They took it out. Took it out and let the courts crack up and they paved a whole walking path so you can see it all at a distance.

Sumo wrestler applying deodorant while waiting for the first pitch at Dodger Stadium.

This is what I see on TV: Paul Pierce is on a stationary bike in what looks like the middle of the court-side fan seats and there seems to be a lot of ridiculous Cubs fans at Dodger Stadium but you can't really tell because it's all blue anyway. Fans, rivals, team colors, teammates all blending together like peanuts and caramel over popcorn in crackerjack.

I feel bad that I just sent my mother an email about the end of my short lived middle school teaching career. She has dedicated her life to teaching and I just had to mention that the only benefit gleaned from my recent experience was a confirmation of my belief that most schools are dream-crushing factories for future wage-slaves.

A Streetcar Named Salvation from kayekilla on Vimeo.

I have the kind of insomnia where you wake up at four am. I don’t have any trouble falling asleep because I have been drinking Kava tea (after a half to ¾ bottle of wine) and reading a Russian novel before bedtime every night. So I’ve been getting up mad early. This was ok for me one day out of the week because that is how many days I am a fitness professional. But now I think it’s really going to start to work out for me, this reverse insomnia, because B and I have taken to patrolling the Silverlake reservoir in the morning. A nice five mile walk-a-bout with a 70% chance of running into or getting run over by Giovanni Ribisi. He nearly hit us in this giant Cadillac/Chrysler 300 today and B shouted “there’s that man again!” Like he was the same dude that had just oogled us seven blocks back.

Yesterday N and I learned a wonderful city secret that I’d like to share with those of you living on the east side or close to Pasadena. The Academy Theater on Colorado in the dogged-out part of town has two dollar matinees and one dollar hot dogs. Those are seventies prices folks! We saw “Standard Operating Procedure” and I highly recommend that everyone go see it. It’s not much of a date movie (unless you met your date in the trader joes parking lot after admiring each others “Fuck Bush” bumper stickers) but a great thing to take your parents to. I love that all the soldiers got to tell their side of the story and I love how Errol does his visual thing by concentrated slow motion reenactments on key or offbeat elements. One particularly unnerving part presented a close up of an eyebrow getting shaved off with a disposable razor. So close up you could barely make out what was going on; is that the logging of a forest or the close up of that play-dough salon toy? Some old lady in the theater couldn’t control herself and yelled out at one of the young soldiers, “don’t you have a conscience?!” The five other people in the audience shushed her. She was missing the subtleties of the movie, the overall argument made by the film; that the big big guys in the US administration put the blame and the burden of the immeasurable corruption in our armed forces on our undereducated, and oftentimes poor, entirely volunteer, young-as-hell soldiers. And conscience? Well maybe they do have a little trouble in that area but in my opinion (and Errol Morris agrees, I can tell by the slow-mo dog growling footage) that is yet another thing the US Military took away from them when they signed up.

Peace in the Middle East.
End for-profit culture.
Stop nuclear testing.
Support our soldiers.
Love one another.

Happy Birthday Bethany. That is your free revolutionary message. Enjoy.

Another taste from the hot flavor that is an ingredient, known as Vistas Video, in quite possibly the longest website launch in history:


Salton Sea Vista : The Biggest Butte from kayekilla on Vimeo.

Goodbye Kelly, I will miss your celestial ways.


Circle in the Moon, Heaven is a Place on Earth from kayekilla on Vimeo.

K and I were trying to tell Mims that it is a miracle that people were even outside on such a day. Poor kid was born in Missisippi or something and now lives in New York where people are forced to go outside all the time- sometimes just so they can pee in the street because people can’t afford both a bed and a toilet (at least that’s what I hear about NYC).

I came home to find the Dodgers game postponed in the 9th due to rain so I found Casino on Bravo TV. I have sworn to cancel my cable after the playoffs. Who can get anything done when Casino comes on every six hours? I'm helpless. A commercial just came on saying, “You think you know Denise Richards?” and I was like I don’t, I don’t think I know her. I thought Denise Richards was a fitness instructor featured on Buns of Steel Vol 4-7 but that isn’t the same one that has a new reality show.

Last night I watched the new Coppolla film. "Youth Without Youth" and I was confused and dissapointed. Today I saw the new Speilberg film (at the Dome, ahem) and I was pleased and nostalgic. I would like an appointment with Blanchetts facialist. Wouldn't that be a fun sweepstakes prize? These aging directors should just stick to the formula that worked for them twenty-five years ago. Really that isn't fair, Coppolla doesn't have a Harrison Ford to pull out of retirement, and he has to deal with all of his obnoxious children and the winery and the short fiction mag.

But really do you think you know Denise Richards? I bet you don't.

THERE IS A FINE LINE BEWTEEN SABBATICAL AND UNEMPLOYED

So what if I recently decided to quit another job. I am going on sabbatical. I’m surprised at how this freaks people out. “What are you going to doooo?” is an annoying question that I have been answering: I’m going to just wait for my trust fund to kick in.
But I can handle (or at least make fun of) annoying - what is really frightening me is this response; “oh I would go crazy if I didn’t work, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself.”

I mean people, seriously – you wouldn’t know what to do if you were in control of your own time? It would make you crazy? This is a pandemic of lost souls. What the hell? Who cares about the terrorists, apparently the mind supply around these parts is tainted.

I can think of three million things I would and can and will do whilst not boarding my soul at some random place of employment. Here is a short list of what I have planned for my first week of sabbatical:

Finish one of seven-trillion already-started novels/essays/short stories/scripts, eat seven thousand king dongs, find a celebrity to have a baby with, stalk Russell Martin (goes with previous suggestion), make a movie about my feet, make a movie about social injustice, make a movie about a car, race a car, build a car, ride a bike, write about a bike racing a car, make interesting shapes out of fruit roll-ups, write a letter to the WNBA, write a letter to a friend, help a neighbor get their cat spayed or neutered, put together 24 hour long movie of Dodger highlights, buy some land in Salton City, paint my nails purple, set up a kissing booth in the back seat of my new car, gamble, finish reading one of five already-started novels, drive the 10 freeway all the way to Florida, see new Errol Morris film, learn to swim (butterfly, backstroke), hang out with David Lynch, clean bathroom tile, walk to Long Beach, untangle hair, pray an entire rosary at a Korean catholic church, learn to play backgammon, attend professional tennis match, invite Bernard Cooper out to coffee, interview Tayshan Prince, make out with one of the two dudes who were up at the Tee Gee writing on legal pads (prefer taller one) earlier this evening, review back taxes for favorable discrepancies, write tell-all book about working at Glamour Shots, work on Obama campaign, watch horse racing at Hollywood Park, sit on sand at El Matador, walk through cacti in Joshua Tree, complain about consumerism at the Americana, visit with Kelly K who is in town from NYC, and of course, blog.

Everyone that knows me knows that cancer survivors rule. We all have a very specific lust for life, an aversion to medical dramas, and a joyful seriousness that fuels our every venture. Whether it is cliff jumping, selecting shampoo, or accomplishing one of the rarer feats in Major League Baseball, we got it. I just get tears in my eyes when I see the highlight clip of Jon Lester’s no-hitter. Lymphoma forever.

For anyone that is feeling the pressure of this technology rat-race we now call normal life, I recommend getting a new laptop with Windows Vista. I have had my new laptop for about a month now and I can testify that with Windows Vista it’s like I’m back with my Tandy500. It really forces me to slow down and wait. From power button to actual interaction I’d say I have about ten minutes. A little longer than it takes my coffee to brew in the morning. It teaches me lessons like don’t take for granted that your computer is on and two programs are running at once. You never know when that black screen is going to come.

We have bigger problems though, sick and serious problems that will throw a black screen the size of ten million lives over us all if we do not post up. Today over a egg scramble at Millies, N told me that she has very legitimate information that we are going to be experiencing an earthquake of a seven or higher magnitude on the Richter scale within thirty years. Not maybe, just when. I usually find this kind of information liberating but not today. I’ve become hip to FUN: the Fierce Urgency of Now - which is not only an Obama campaign slogan adapted from a MLK Jr speech, but a training motto for the Ohio State football team. It is now the battle cry for the seven people I have assembled on my earthquake apocalypse team. Doomsday in a hopelessly un-evacuate-able city is a challenge not even Survivorman would take. We know we won’t have the luxury of choice or superior camera equipment so we have started to buy bottled water and Cliff bars. We have a pedal bike route to some off-the-grid hippy compounds in the desert and I am teaching myself general surgery and welding. I can only hope it is enough. We can’t all be Windows Vista all the time.

On Friday night at the stadium, B sang the seventh inning stretch anthem, "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" with such gusto that the man in front of us turned around with tears in his eyes and said, "that was inspiring." No joke. Some people are gifted in that way. Well, don't get too big for your britches Miss B, some songs are just spiritually uplifting in that way.

AAA from The Big D was in town all weekend and I am a little pissed off at her for actually getting on the return flight. I don't know if it is because she didn't get to hear the Randy Newman song at the Dodgers game or if it's because I introduced Pinkberry too late, but she's gone and now I am back dealing with my own regular home life which has lately been involving lots of solo typing and Sportscenter.

A was trying to shake the aftershock of a (wrongfully/dishonorably discharged) broken heart so we took it to the streets. I have a time-tested theory that driving on an open road has a therapeutic effect; if you can't move forward at least your car can. It's even better if you can get out in the desert to see some prehistorical nature. So, I had planned on driving her around until she was cured but that was a lofty goal. Instead of total cure, we learned valuable lessons from random roadside prophets. As the Mariachi band guy says about heartbreak, "don't waste your time." Confusing advice for a messy, unfair world but totally perfect coming from a musician who speaks only one word to his partner on the harp, "SIXTIES" and he knows to play the "Hey Jude/Tomorrow" medley.

AAA's Visit

AAA's Visit
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

check

I just wanted to share that today I went on a field trip with the 6th grade to the "Human Bodies" exhibit at the science center downtown and it has the oddest senisibility; bad-art; like what biology class would look like if the old-couple that runs the wood-burned roadsign booth at the local craft fair had a say in it. Everything looked like a mess of bones in near flight with skirt-steak wings.

Dawgs on a Roof

016
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

I spent most of the day outside at the LA Times Book Fair. I helped out at the WG booth for a bit and took some time to wander around. I watched the long line at the Ray Bradbury book signing for a bit and studied the area map.

What the hell are you really supposed to do at these things anyway? I stopped by the Poets&Writers booth to let them know I am a subscriber. One of the P&W ladies left like that was the cue to take a lunch break. And I thought that if I stood by the McSweeney's booth long enough someone would recognize me as the person that sent in a story that they rejected and they would try to befriend me.

There were three people in that booth. On the left was a guy with dark curly hair, girly thighs crammed into faded levi's, and thick black glasses. He spoke with a voice that sounded like a mix of Ira Glass and Fran Drescher. I imagined him writing stories about being a picked-on bookworm in private school. In the middle sat an expertly freckled fresh-faced blond girl in a modern-cut ethnic print sundress. She didn't speak unless spoken to. I heard her say "Those are fifteen dollars." On the right was a cartoonist from San Fransisco. Tall, skinny, dark skinned, with a patch of hair on his chin. Standing in front of his books. What a set of jerks! I stood around for a while before screaming, "you don't know me!" and rushing off to find the shuttlebus.

No escape from street fairs though. As soon as I got home I was reminded that today is the Atwater street art fair. I spent the remainder of the sunlight deepening my sunstroke by walking around in the smoke of meats on a grill.

Sorry KK but I never used your wok or your garlic paste that you gave me before you moved to New York. You must already know this because revenge has been served. I had the wok on my floor, near the door so I wouldn’t forget to take it, and several other items, to Goodwill. Everybody knows that anything you want to remember you put near your doorway. At 11something pm, fifteen minutes into the dramatic suicidal tale in “Taste of Cherry” I decided to get up and grab a little something from the kitchen (beer) on the way back I slammed my foot into the wok on the floor. It hurt in that mutherFerIjuststubbedMyToe kind of way. I danced around for a second or two before I sat back on the couch holding my be beer in one hand and my wok-ed foot in the other. It wasn’t until I let go to concentrate on my beverage that I saw the blood. Covered, dripping, totally bogusly gross. I glanced at the wok to couch pathway and saw the trail of blood. The wok had nearly severed my little toe off. It wouldn’t stop bleeding. I held a towel around my foot for fifteen minutes and took a peek and ended up slipping around in a pool of my footblood on the bathroom tile. It’s very hard to nearly bleed to death on your own because you want to live, you want to fight for your life but you keep thinking, “if I live I am going to have to get the blood stains out of my couch and carpet.“ I don’t know exactly when the bleeding stopped because after about an hour and a half (I finished my beer and the movie) I got tired of applying pressure and just passed out leaving my fate to the gods of coagulation. I woke up to a bloody towel and a painful, crusty baby toe. I’m finding out that you really need your little toe for balance but you don’t need a wok to cook vegetables. I still haven’t gone to goodwill but I put the soon-to-be-donated items in the trunk of my car.

I have huge gaps in my literary knowledge. For example, I only know a few things about Graham Greene, I've read a short story or two and I know that his novels make for some tight movies. But I've finally gotten around to reading one. I'm in the middle of "The Heart of the Matter" and I know it's good because I'm rewriting one of my seventeen novels as I read it. What appeals to me most about this book and his work in general is that I consider his characters and settings to be straight out of my past life destiny. It's all horny Anglos dressed in linen written as outsiders/foreigners in the mid fifties southeast Asia, western Africa, Cuba - those kinds of places. The same kinds of things that made up the good journalism dramas of the eighties "Year of Living Dangerously" "Salvador" and the recent "Blood Diamond" (so retro). I really think Greene would appeal to those of us raised on Indiana Jones. I'm rambling but I promise you it all goes together. I'm just so tired from working with spastic minipeople all day.

To be a master giftgiver is to achieve a status higher than the pope or the president or the Boston Red Sox.

PJ gave me the greatest gift ever this evening. I was so stoked I could barely concentrate on "Street Kings" but I managed. I do think the film would have been much improved had they cast Rutger instead of Keanu as the lead cop with a dead wife. It also might have been better had they not let the craft services people write the script. Between "Street Kings" and "21" I have seen possibly the worst screenwriting in the history of screenwriting. I mean I've seen episodes of "Guiding Light" that had more continuity and believability. Its maddening knowing how many writers there are that could have done a better job in a first draft than what ended up on screen. I'm not going to get mad though, I'm going to get busy. Busy writing my own street script. "Blind Fury" meets "Drumline" with a "Coach Carter" twist - get ready for it.

I've got a design challenge for my homies. My new ride has this rad cassette tape storage compartment. I'm trying to come up with some ideas on what to do with it. Suggestions?


Cassette Storage Contest from kayekilla on Vimeo.

Have you ever had an MRI? I just had one. It sounds like a Wolf Eyes concert. I wish I would have recorded it but I didn't so you'll have to just ask me to reenact it for you.

The dude blew out my vein when he put the contrast in so I'm totally bumming - a little cotton ball with ridiculously sticky medical tape is not taking the pain away. I'm going to have to start drinking before lunch yet again.

I came home to find that I had left my gas burner on about medium flame. Nearby was my plastic Dodgers thermalunchpack. It was far enough away to not cause a house fire but I'd say just barely. This reminds me of the time I left for the aiport in a rush and forgot that I had just cooked a snack in the oven. 375 for five days - ho-o-o-t in there but no house fire. Why isn't this shit on those times when I neurotically go back to double check?

I am afraid they are going to find a hole in my brain where the gas stove mechanism is. At least then I will have answers.

The best internet time waster of 2008 has arrived: 54 Years of Sports history.
Thank goodness, I was getting a little too productive.
A few of my favorites (as in covers or photos - I haven't gotten around to the articles too much yet) can be found:
Here,
Here
&
Here
And just cuz I like toothless hockey players from time to time: Here
And because E and I decided to pick one thing to really get into and that thing being the 84 Olympics: Here - It's really no wonder I moved to Los Angeles.

So it's been a swell at-home weekend, minus the hour and fifteen minutes I spent on the phone with HP tech support only to find out I had a bunk SD card - good thing I spent 40 minutes of that time ranting about how much I hate Vista and how I was probably just going to return my new laptop. Anyway, enough of that, I liked hanging around town for a change. I had to stick around for a pals birthday extravaganza and I had a class today. The class went well and all the students obeyed all of my irrational requests and were generally rad, even if one seemed to know a little bit more about AfterEffects than I did. I can't know everything all the time, it just seems like it. The real take-away lesson of this first weekend in April was to not over-mix cake batter because you will get spongy cupcakes. It's not like I ruined J's birthday or anything but whoever gets my next batch of cupcakes is really going to be in for a treat. Maybe I will give them to neighbor that has a condo in Maui.

Rolled..

P1080363
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

in fields of poppies. Just like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz.

Golden Child

P1080355
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

It's very difficult to write a weather blog when you don't like the weather. I would not make a good journalist. That's like the number one reason I am not writing for The New York Times. I could if I wanted to of course, same deal with the WNBA, but I don't like their uniforms and I think they should lower the rims.

I taught my first full fitness class today and it was awesome. I mostly catered to a couple chubbier yet jovial participants because they gave the most feedback. Feedback meaning, "ouch" and "whooa, is the air conditioning working?!" I guess I need to get over the fact that people aren't in a group fitness class to chat it up or laugh at my jokes. I suppose they are trying to concentrate.

I quit my stupid corporate job today. I do hope someone will show up to pay my bills. A few helpful fellas did show up this afternoon (thanks J+F!) to help me paint my bedroom a youthful lavender. A colorful testimony of my avoidance of adulthood. I should have Swiss Almonded this place like a proper renter.

I don't really care about work or any of that time-sucking bullshit truthfully and keeping up that facade has been exhausting! I only care about it because people seem to talk about it a lot and I have a tendency to want to please others (which is why I always look so good). I know what I am supposed to be doing and thank god I freed up some time so I can work on my petition to change Jeff Kent's batting song. I have a few other like-minded projects and I am looking for collaborators, residency not required, but an undying passion for the baseball zen peace movement, is.

FINALLY.

It's a bit late to be typing some BS but I am waiting for an episode of Lipstick Jungle to download so I can lull myself to sleep to the sound of an aging Andrew McCarthy. Guys with no jawline don't look great in their middle ages.

So much happens in my day that I darest not write about. Hopes, dreams, crushes, cheers, and jeers. Sigh. I want to start another blog, a secret one where I won't be identified and arrested for posting transcripts of conversations with my doctor involving me begging for vicodin and the doctor giving in only after delivering a speech (in a thick Armenian accent) about Heath Ledger and Ana Nicole Smith, ending with a request for the name of my hairdresser.

My plane ride home took over five hours due to a strong headwind. I think that could be a pilots term for "the unbearable weight of unreasonable children screaming." I am jetlagged to the #%$nth degree. It was a couple of fun filled days in my favorite American city visiting my favorite American people, driving through inches of my favorite American precipitation. The trip included a stroll through the MGM with my sis, movie ("Vantage Point") with the lil bro, an easter dinner, a couple gatherings at E's house and a trip to Bob Evans with my mom. Needless to say, the visit was not without snacks or scandal. I voted for the hip-hop mayor into his first term and now look what he's gotten himself into. I can't wait to see how this pans out.

The movie D and I selected to see was "Vantage Point." Movie selection with a family member is an entirely different thing than normal movie selection. Everyone knows this. This is why I have seen "The Family Stone" and "PS I Love You" in the theater. I blame those on my sister. My brother is a little more easy going. "Vantage Point" is everything you would think it would be and if you aren't thinking about it much well then there you go. It's a movie about a presidential assassination seen from several different viewpoints. We found it more enjoyable if we turned to each other in between viewpoints and whispered vantage point. Try it - it's sure to be a hit.

Speaking of hits. I finally read "The Road." A book never made me feel so dusty and sweet. I liked it a lot, just like y'all said I would. I can't help but think that it had some kind of right-wing message though. I'd have to form and report to a book club to flesh out this idea. Who do you think owns apocalyptic imagery and literature? The right or the left or just the baby boomers? I heard that it is going to be made into a movie starring Viggo Mortenson as The Man. Of course.

Springtime in Mich

Springtime in Mich
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

March 21st marks the first day of spring. To celebrate I hopped on the red eye to Detroit and was greeted by a blanket of beautiful snow and an army of frozen planes. Its so good to be back in the midwest amongst the indoor animal hair and damp cold.

P1060940
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

During a recent self-guided tour of the Texas state capital (in Austin for those of you who failed geography or fail to recognize Texas as part of the United States of America) my camera leapt out of my hands and fell to the ground. I knew something was different when I salvaged my little lumix off the laminate tile. The strong spirit of conservatism had excised the black spot demon. It hasn't appeared in a photo since!

Desert wildlife: talons, paws, and claws.

Poppies.

As I look into the future I see a sky full of possibility and a land full of hope and poppies. It's the desert wildflower season and our hunt started last weekend in Joshua Tree National Park. It was going to start in Antelope Valley but I got freaked out about a snow warning in Palmdale. The boys brought a football to prove that they were there for sport and not delicate seasonal flowers. There weren't many places in JT to toss around a football unless you wanted to spike up your shoes with cactus prickles so we had to save the pigskin for an elementary school palyground near the In and Out Burger in Indio. Besides my jammed finger and B taking a hit to the face, it all worked out.

I take back all the complaining I did about the rain this winter - the desert was as green as I have ever seen it. There was an area rug the size of, the whole desert, which would make it a carpet, of fine green non-mossy-moss and little precious yellow and purple flowers were everywhere. The gentle landscape was offset by the sight of a giant hawk/falcon gutting out a bunny rabbitt. That is the kind of totally tuff stuff that inspires spontanious songwriting. I expect to have our hit single "Hawk with a Rabbit" up in a few days.

These cacti make me weepy.

P1080082
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

P1060974
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

We were greeted at the Alamo by six bizzllion tourists and scads of era-wearing reenactors. It just so happens that this weekend is a special "Remember the Alamo" weekend. People love an excuse to fire an old time canon for real.

Am I the only one that thought the Alamo was in the middle of the desert? It isn't. It is actually in the middle of San Antonio. I'm not an idiot. I think the website for the Alamo is deceiving. Report back to me if you disagree. SA is a great city but we got suckered into the river walk which probably would be fine on an average day but during Remember the Alamo weekend it was like walking around Universal Studios only there was a serious danger potential since the river walk is completely rebel-texas-style: no railing or ropes. I thought I was going to get knocked in the river by a stroller. Dirty water. Dirty water.

We leave tomorrow. I am so tired and I think I have a head cold. There are many questions I still have about Texas and I am afraid they will go unanswered. Like where does the term "Lone Star" really come from? Wikipedia tells me that it comes from the state flag but that isn't a satisfying answer now is it? I want to hear a story about a cowboy being lost and pregnant and not having a place to stay and being guided by a single star to a stable or something.

And the other pressing question I have is: are people allowed to bail out on the highway if the traffic gets too bad or is Texas just full of automobile outlaws? We saw tons of people crossing over grass and dirt to reach an exit ramp when the going got tuff. I'd love to adopt this technique in cali.

In case you need up to date cellphonephoto documentation - you can visit my tumblr site.

It's dry and windier than a skydiving simulator here in Austin. Please send hand lotion.

There is a lot of hustle and bustle downtown. I have never lived in a city where the downtown area was bumpin at night. It's like East Lansing under a Texas flag canopy here. Better dressed fellas though. I like tall skinny bored/disinterested looking men and I prefer to live in places where going downtown at night is more of a dare and best done on bikes or acid or the power of love.

Our hotel is presh. We got here early and went to a taco place two blocks from the motel. The first person I saw when I walked in was Luke Wilson. The second person I saw was an unknown bearded man. The film and interactive parts of South by Southwest are underway. So we celebrated by napping for two hours. I talked L into checking out a screening of The Upsetter at The Alamo Ritz Theater. Interesting venue. L loved it because each row of theater seats has a skinny bar table and you can order food and drinks from the comfort of your theater chairs. Our waitress was slightly unreasonable though. She didn't like my witty comparisons of 7-up and Sprite and she told us that we had to move a seat closer to the couple next to us because it was going to be a packed house. It didn't get that packed and I ended up sitting next to someone that ate garlic pizza and giggled every time they showed pot in the film and some bald euro dude set up shop right next to L: shoes off, backpack in our old seat. We got salads.

Yeah salads. Just a ridiculous choice for watching a movie. I had to put the thing in my lap and lean to one side so the Exit sign could illuminate the feta and olives. I gave up after awhile and set thing on the bar table in front of me and had to smell the rings of red onions for the rest of the movie. But it was a surprisingly enhancing experience. Smellovision.

Tomorrow we go to the Alamo. I'm going to bring chili cheese fritos.

There are a few signs that you come across in your life that let you know you are on the right path. One of them is getting back to your hotel room to find that 'You Got Served' is on the USA channel.

A few weeks before the national sales meeting the HR or the marketing department or the activities committee sent out an email saying that it was mandatory that we send in a picture of us with our families. And if we didn't have a family yet, it said, that we could send in a picture of us with our pet. So I was at a total loss. I wish I would have just photoshopped myself into a Kohls ad and sent it in but those kinds of creative things don't occur to me whenever the corporate forcefield is involved. So I just sent in a pic of me in Dodger Stadium and another of me holding a hundred and fifty bucks in poker chips in a casino bathroom. That's probably less money than Leslie from corporate accounts spends on her cocker spaniel. I wonder which one they will chose. Thanks for the snap Miss J.

Today so far has been very exciting because they are really pulling out all the stops. Gratuitous use of injured children, frequent mentioning of Martin Luther King Jr (an often used public icon in the corporate world, probably because he was such a good capitalist?) and lots of talk about overcoming obstacles and challenges. I'm very cranky. I just opened the twenty dollar half-bottle of wine in the mini bar. I've been texting my friends that it all sucks and everyone (except B) is like "at least it's the last...blah blah blah."

Look, no one has ever, in history of all complaining, whining, bitching, venting, and sharing, no one has ever been comforted or renewed or satisfied by someone saying "AT LEAST....something something something bright side something." Unless of course they say something like, "at least we got to orbit the earth once," or "at least they will never find the body."

As a friend you have a responsibility to commiserate. So if you get a text from me complaining about how awful my free spa facial was, I expect you to just respond with something like, "I can't imagine how you are surviving, that sounds terrible!!"

National Sales Meeting

I'm heating dirty hotel fruit in Austin. I'm eating the dirty fruit from from the hotel in Austin.

They come into our rooms while we are in meetings to leave 'gifts' like sweatshirts with the company logo and a can of red bull. This makes some people happy. It makes me suspicious.

This morning we had to report in the hotel lobby at 615 am wearing the company logo sweatshirt. The escorted us outside in the dawn freeze and we waited until five guys dressed like (deer-skin-mocassin-style) indians came out to perform a sundance. Then a larger man dressed like an important indian came out. Judging by his headdress I would say he was 'The Chief.' He talked about the four elements and the talking stick and how togetherness will bring our company into a new dimension.

Hmmmm. If you are uncomfortable or confused reading this you are no further along than I am.

Words overused at corporate meetings: change, growth, opportunity, and most of all 'challenge'

If everything were feathered.

P1060772
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

It's overcasty and raining in Phoenix. Go figure. Rain can even visit the desert from time to time. I think it's just mother nature's way of telling me that I do indeed have a packing problem. Radically inclusive is a writing technique and not recommended for application in areas of packing or travel. For ventures away from home one needs a sharp focus and an appreciation of the freedom that brings. Worry about only your next meal and let everything else fall away.

My sharp focus made me forget all about the lunar eclipse last night. B tried to remind me but I was sincerely focused on not checking my phone. I bet it was fun to watch the moon dissapear. Of course I can always recreate the same thing in Aftereffects or outside with a sheet of construction paper but there is something to be said for an authentic eclipse. Again, I wouldn't know for sure since I didn't see it.

I think I might be the first person to say this but, teens have no respect.

They also are oblivious to the standard rules of the Library. I am listening to some full-volume-idiotic cell phone conversation right now. It's bleeding through my new Philips noise cancelling earbuds. I'd kick some A** but I am afraid of groups of teens. Alone they are weak and insecure but together they form a powerful superconductor that translates insecure energies into supersonic interference.

Yesterday I spent nine hours at the Los Angeles Athletic Club for the group fitness certification.
As an aside, if anyone is interested in helping me bring my dream of air guitar aerobics to the world, I am looking for investors. I was stoked that it was at the LAAC because I have been dying to see the inside of it but never had the pocket change to pay for the parking garage or the gumption to finagle a tour. The place has some excellent photos of strong men in unitards holding dumbbells, the kind of dumbbells men used before interchangeable weights.

They throw a hundred wanna-be aerobics instructors in the gymnasium (the same one many famous athletes trained in. Many of them probably from my favorite historical moment, the 84 Olympics) This is the kind of gym that has a track above it so the gym members that were there for a Sunday workout were treated to watching 100 ladies and three men practice warm-up and cardio choreography.

For the final test you have to perform a three minute warm-up routine, a four minute cardio routine, and a one minute cool-down. Here is the kicker: everybody, all one hundred plus, is divided into three groups and sectioned off in the same gymnasium. And everyone has to do their routine at the same time. No one is leading. It’s just mayhem. So picture three sets of 35 people doing their own aerobics thing (not just dancing, that would be like a rave) to some really crappy techno music while the towel guy and some older dudes from the LAAC look on from the top track. After that part is over the examiners shout, “now show me a strength exercises for the gluteus maximus, now one for the rhomboid….” And everyone has to simulate movements like they are holding weights or resistance bands.

It was probably one of the most amazing things I have participated in in a long time (and that saying a lot since the day before I had just participated in the shoot for the second episode of TBABC). I wish I could have videotaped the exam part. Framed just so, the whole ordeal would have looked like a perverse internment camp activity. Now I am going to have to go to all the trouble of getting back into the class just for videotaping purposes. I need some more material for my upcoming short film titled “Towel Boy and Group Girl.”

Railroad Depot

IMGA0005
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

P1060469
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

I now have a special black orb on all of my digital photos. Even after scrubbing my camera lens with my scarf, some paper towel, and the bottom of my forever 21 t-shirt, the orb was still there. It's on all of my pictures now. It's very noticable when you see all the pics lined up side by side.

It's a dark spirit circle trapped in my camera. My friend N says to send it away to panasonic but what will I do in the meantime? What if the orb follows me around? I can't imagine going a day without my dig. I think it's a censor, I mean sensor problem. Maybe the orb will be my trademark.

At the gym that I go to the fitness classes are sectioned off by a clear wall so you can see all the people working out on the stairclimbers and treadmills behind you while you are in aerobics class. My spin instructor likes to make fun of people who are using the equipment wrong. I also think she plays illegal music. It's totally lawless an irresponsible. I have begun to model my life after her.

I feel pretty good writing about my silly camera problems before even mentioning the fact that a huge building that housed one of my friends and about who knows how many other people and a rad independent record store burnt down in Detroit today. I think it is something so crappy that I prefer to just bury it away. I feel totally helpless not being able to do anything for her. I can't imagine what it is like to have your home and all your stuff burned up.

Pear Blossom Winter

P1060455
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

Ever drive from Victorville to Palmdale on the Pear Blossom Highway?

It's just Glendale

P1060355
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

Saving Lives

So this week I did my part as a super citizen and future aerobics instructor and went and got myself CPR certified at the local Red Cross chapter. This event was frightening and enlightening.

First of all, did you know that many people successfully perform CPR from just what they see on TV? On shows like House, ER, and CSI? That's one of the first tidbits the instructor told us at the beginning of the four and a half hour course. If I hadn't have already paid my 42 bucks, I would have raced home and checked my VHS collection for some old Clooney ER episodes and just forgot about spending four and a half hours in a room full or randoms.

When I say randoms I mean myself, one larger bearded lady, two loudmouth personal trainers wearing blue track suits, one guy from Cal-OSHA and a roomful of Armenian, only half English speaking, women getting certified to work in childcare.

For class demonstrations the instructor used the one guy as the victim and the large lady as the rescuer (it was her fifth year renewing the certification). There is just something so uncomfortable about watching strangers touch each other in a non-emergency and non-errotic situation. Yeah, so I'd never be a nurse. I think I had really low blood sugar because I felt, for most of the class, like passing out. It's likely that I would have been saved but, I wasn't so sure at the time.

The Armenian ladies paired up so that one of them would translate to the other while the instructor read over the booklet and played the instructional (and well-acted I must say) videos. They did this throughout the whole class, most of them at full volume. I was worried because the instructor could not have possibly be monitoring if the correct safety information was being translated.

This became very clear when they broke the mannequins out at the end of the class. If I wouldn't have had my own certification looming over my head, I would have performed a citizens arrest on at least three of the women for what they were doing to the mannequins. They were wrapping the mouth guards all over the face and neck and laying on top of the plastic half bodies, all in an effort to perform CPR. The loudmouth know-it-all personal trainer kept going ahead of the instructor and she was screaming to her partner, "30 compressions! 2 Beaths!" It was complete mayhem. I was getting so frustrated for the instructor but it also angered me that she didn't know her own power. She could kick all these people out, they could go home and watch ER and hope that practicing on a teddy bear will give them the skills to save the lives of people they love. INstead she just plowed through the instructions and we all, in our own special way, completed the practical part of the training.

In the end, we all read the written test out loud and got 100% of the answers right. Strong as a group. We all came as different people, but we all left CPR certified.

Money can buy you anything! California is so accepting that you don't have to put your blow-up girlfriends in the trunk when you go to the grocer.

Today I dropped my phone in the toilet, saw a lexus with a mannequin in the passenger seat parked behind anthropology in Pasadena, and I got a new ipod.

It was really a day of firsts. I've never dropped my phone in the toilet before but I have made fun of people for doing it. Nor have I ever actually seen someone with a mannequin in their car, who hasn't thought about doing that for the HOV lane? But I would think that you would trunk it for public parking situations. The other first today is the ipod. I never ever had one before, well N gave me a hand me down that broke a few months ago. Mine is so cute. I can watch an entire episode of Gossip Girl on a two inch screen.

I fixed my blackberry by letting it sit in a bowl of rice. The chick at the verizon store told me to do this. I asked her if it mattered if I only had minute rice and she said it did and that I should just put it in a bowl of white rice. So I went home and empitied the rest of a half box of brown minute rice over my phone and put it in the oven for 40 minutes at 350 and now I am back in action. Feel free to email or text me between civil twilight and radical dawn.

Place: Kyles.
Purpose: Top secret pilot shoot

Rod doesn't like flash photography when the camera is rolling so there isn't much to do but write my thoughts. I've learned a lot today dressed like Ally Sheedy from the breakfast club. Now I know what it is like to be an outsider. A pre-goth outsider with dark feelings that nobody understands. Someone that shows up without invitation. Someone that is unliked, even considered weird. Until today I had no idea how it felt. Thanks guys for opening my mind.

You wouldn't believe how the Sheedy BFast Club uniform (baggy black sweater, giant skirt, dark tights, black chucks) still works amongst the WBN (why be normal) underground. K and I walked to starbucks between scenes for some fresh air and fresh joe. We'd only been there for three minutes when a young dude wearing suspenders and a hat (fedora? Reporters? Ducky?) Started in with me.
'Haha sometimes I think the best part about coffee is mixing the stuff in after'
'Me niether'
'I like it more than drinking coffee.'
'Go away'
'It's like ooooh what will happen if I put in four sugar packs?'
'It tastes like throw up'

Anyway. I think I've found my fashion message. My brand. My story.

My hot water heater broke and I had to shower at the gym today. I now think that I didn't really get all the shampoo out of my hair because my head feels odd, and I'm not just talking about my insane headache. Maybe it was just a problem with the shampoo supplied at my gym - it was for dry hair. I don't have dry hair. I have fine, bouncy, lively hair. It's not moist or anything but it sure isn't dry. Before you feel too bad for me showering at the gym, you should know that I belong to a fancy one. It's got a spa attached to it and those don't get attached to or affiliated with just any ol' place.

Last night A and I went to see "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" and uh, its really good. Besides how Schnabel pulled off the POV shots, which make up most of the movie, the repetition of the special alphabet makes for an oddly engaging soundtrack. The kind of thing where you begin to anticipate the next sound. Like listening to shoegazer rock. It's really awesome.

I just reminded myself that I meant to make it my New Years resolution to stop using the word awesome to describe things.

Ruined Blow Out

P1060253
Originally uploaded by kayekilla.

There are things I start to ask myself after an extended stay in Michigan. One of those questions is, "How many times can I watch 'The Departed' on cable tv?" And another is "How did I ever drive in snow before?" And another is "When did my mom stop complaining about the toilet seat being left up?" Because that rule is being broken like crazy around here. People just don't care. Manners aren't important anymore, common courtosey is up for debate. I am the only civilized person in mid-michigan now and I leave tomorrow. Good luck people.

New Years was fun. We had dinner at Sweet Georgia Brown's which had crappy service but a nice atmosphere and a frightened chubby keyboardist and then to LJs which had low-budget drinks and free party hats. Can't complain - even the heavy indoor smoking added a little character and a scent my coat and I will remember forever. It was a hard evening to plan at first because everyone kept saying 'I don't want to do anything too crazy' as if saying that would prevent a spontaneous rave from happening. It's good that we settled up on the crazy ahead of time because it got real snowy and if we had decided to get a helicopter we would have been grounded on Belle Isle for hours.

I hope we all get what we want in 2008 (especially the Dodgers) A new car for E, a new job for N, Mo money for all and less work and more fishing for me.

I resolve to return library books on time and to go to the racetrack and movies more, and the doctors office and bills liquor less. What about the rest of you?