Vibrations

I don't know if you've ever seen the original Aeon Flux cartoon series, but there's this part where they are trying to combat the new guy in charge by rescuing the old kidnapped leader. The old leader is kept in this weird at a slight angle dimension or something where if you look at him, you can see a blurry vibrating version of him, and once you enter the dimension he's kept in, the rest of reality becomes blurry vibrations, while he is solid and real.

I was thinking how cool it would be if we could somehow make a person all vibrate-y without causing any harm or discomfort to them, and then lots of women would come over and use various vibrating body parts to get off, while for the vibrating person it would feel like everyone else was vibrating while they were standing still, thereby making it easy for them to get off with any appropriately placed human contact.

I might have gotten a temp position in a neurology lab, although they wanted someone to start tomorrow and I said I could start Monday next week. I don't know why I said that, it's a good position for me, I guess I just hate feeling like I'm acting at the whims of the temp agency and bending over backwards for them. They make too much money off of me for that. Also, I still have some small hope of finishing this story in time and am kinda holding out today and tomorrow for that. Anyway, it's not like I'd be doing any brain stuff, it's still basically a receptionist position, I'm mostly excited because it's a good networking (ha!) opportunity.

Christopher is dramatically revamping his life this week in several ways, which makes me want to do a life makeover of my own. It's hard to keep any real motivation going though, I lose the will after a few days which leads to more mild depression. What a pain in the butt. But good for him, I respect drastic self-preservation moves, really nothing would get done without them.

Book quote, death, dumb and disco

"It was a dull noise, but deafening - as of millions of heavy, wet pieces of leather dropping on a huge untightened drum." Stanislaw Lem, Eden

Thanks Lem, I know exactly what that sounds like (what???).

Make me into diamonds when I die.

I've been enjoying listening to The Strokes a lot this week, because they talk about a lot of stupid thoughts and impulses they have, and about how they wish they weren't such bad people. Sometimes it's a big relief to hear stupid shit like that, especially when I feel like I'm drowning in a circle of mature, optimistic go-getters. Like I'm the only horrible one. If I had stayed on L.I. I'd probably feel better about myself but also be incredibly bored. I'm still sticking with low confidence and excitement, but maybe someday I'll change my mind. Until then, must keep listening to The Strokes! Too much sensitive and intelligent music! Not enough dumb and disco.

Happy Birthday Joe! Thanks for pulling me and all other awesome into your circle of friends, you are the center of many things and I like living with you.

Stumpy and Hungover

So sentimental right now! I'm addicted to that happy sad feeling at the moment. This happens whenever I get sick, and the first 6 hours of today were spent in Hangover Hell so maybe that's why. I've been looking at old web pages I haven't followed for years and googling my family. Lameness!

I made Italian subs for all of my friends Friday lunch time, which got me and Kris talking about making this sort of thing a recurring event, since it's so much fun and keeps our cooking-for-crowds skillz warmed up. Can't really shoulder the cost every week, so maybe we could do it all KOHA (donation) style, with flyers and everything, all official like.

I don't really have anything to say right now. I just feel sad and meaningful and can't stop myself from writing it down. Stop! My hands, they're out of control, fcuk, must....remove...devil's tools, need a saw, aaaahhhhhh, it;'ss hjard too weritte wityh blooooooduy stuim,pos

On the brighter side, both my short story and my relationship have renewed life. Can't say things are lacking in energy around here. We're starting to plan a trip to Kentucky and San Francisco in July, stay tuned for more details....

A long way off

I keep thinking about what it's going to be like far off in the future, looking back on these times. We'll all be more conscious of how alone we are, I think. Will this all have a great golden glow about it? Maybe I won't remember how often I tuned out of conversations or got tired of it all. I'll remember it as a continuous laugh track, a love affair with media, the feeling that my group of friends would never separate, we'd travel around the world together gradually accumulating more and more witty fun people. We were always on, in those days. We thought we could change all social boundaries, create things. We had clubs for a million activities and it didn't matter how unsuccessful we were at any of them because it was fun and we were brilliant brilliant.

This week is exciting. I am a creator. My story is pouring out of me like I just slit my wrists. The house is clean; I make myself tea. I go to the cafe, I buy fruit, I dance to my new Amazon CDs. I meet my friends for lunch and don't have to hurry away. I think about things more interesting than how I can possibly make this next hour go faster. I can't seem to find a wwoof position earlier than June but that's alright, at least there's a plan. In a couple more weeks I'll ask for a new temp position to last until our Sydney trip the last week of May. Another month and a half of working, another step closer to obliterating any guilt over going to Kentucky in July for another fabulous extravagant adventure vacation.

Things are going well. Work makes not work brighter by contrast. I like waking up stupid early and then taking short naps in the afternoon, it's like I have twice as many days as normal people.

Thursday work bloggy (the last one!)

If nothing has proven this before, today is showing I am indeed a straight woman. I remember Cary talking on her blog about how she knows she's ovulating when all men seem interesting and appealing, and I am definitely having one of those days. It would be cool if this was the same biological signal because I've never been able to tell about that other-time-of-the-month before. There's this guy I sometimes ride the bus with who looks like an attractive version of Mr. Bean, like a Mr. Bean with much cooler hair, style, and voice. Today I couldn't stop looking at him wondering what his life is like, he just seemed so god damn appealing to know. About a quarter of the guys we passed on the street elisited varying intensities of the same response. It's not like ALL men are treating me this way, but it's showing more obviously than normal what kind of men areattractive to me, and it's a much wider range of types and ages than I thought. Which is good! And damn, Francisco sure looked cute this morning, I always find myself staring at his eyelashes, jaw line, and dimple chin when I get this way, he's like a manly baby with curly baby fine hair on top of an obviously man jaw. The best combo!


Our boss just informed us that starting tomorrow, and for the next 2 weeks, 6 new temps will be coming in to help us (well, not me really, since I'm leaving, but I get to witness the start of the mayhem). None of them will have computers or desks of their own. They'll be sharing spaces and basically doing all the photocopying while the 3 others I've been working with will be doing the computer end of the work and file organizing. There are only 2 or 3 copy machines on each floor, so they will be traveling between 3 floors and using all the Mobil copiers available. Can you imagine the mess it's gonna be? Files all over the place, people running up and down stairs and elevators, Mercedes trying to show people from probably 5 different countries what to do, trying to divide labor up so they're not jumping all over each other, having no one central place to do the training or keep all the files. Eek! Have fun guys.

Work bad poetry and tea.

Here's a good fact about tea I learned this weekend from one of the Real Hot Bitches at her shack on Red Rocks Beach (Seal paradise): A nice cuppa tea should always be brewed for 3 minutes. If you brew it less all you're getting is the color, not the taste, so if you want a week cuppa, just add more water after you're done brewing (or brew in a larger pot).

I felt nauseous this morning, but my properly brewed tea is soothing everything. I still feel tired, but in that zombie-content way that makes me want to go through thousands of pages at a slow steady pace. My hangover is in part thanks to free food and drink at Logan Brown, courtesy of this wealthy organization I work for, and part because I had a drink and a smoke afterwards with Francisco, to say farewell to his Scottish bartender friend Andy. It was Andy's last day working before heading off to the married life, hi-ho and away. Now I'm ready to throw in my social life hand for a while, watch some tv, sit on the toilet, read some stories, lie on Francisco. This work day just began, hopefully I can survive until then (good luck required for my coworkers too, my digestive system is not being olfactorily friendly today). Bon Voyage my friends, I'm sure you'll make it through alright too.

****

Salt-rimmed margarita eyes
complain lazily from their fly trap cocoons.
Water washes last night's grievances down the drain,
or would, if the drain didn't have it's own encrusted protestations.
We should call the plumber soon,
before soggy hairballs flood the house.

****

Haven't done this in a while:
Considering not biting my nails,
becoming that confident woman on the street
wearing heels like they suit her feet.

****

If I pick all the pills off my sweater
will I look more respectable?
Or will I be in the ultimate tv nightmare,
naked at work?

****

Your khakis are attractive.
Let's make clean cut radioactive.

****

Fish Bagel?
There's a Jew at the table!
My boss is also Australian,
Desert Aquarium.

****

"Hurray for the weekend"

On Saturday we'll mess up the kitchen,
Sunday we'll clean it up.
Sticky fingers, fart on my belly,
eat the queens with royal jelly.

****

It hurts less than it used to,
but steals my energy faster.

I'd pick sleep over winning the fight any day,
it's more satisfying and the colors are nicer.

Work griping again.

These people I work with (lovely, but limited) can't BELIEVE I am leaving this cushy temp job this week, probably at least 3 weeks before I have to. "It's easy money!" they say, "What are you gonna do now?" I explain I am going to spend next week working on my short story, followed by some traveling and farmwork. "What's the point?" they ask. My temp agency rep's eyebrows went way up when I explained that, no, I wasn't actually leaving the country and no, my work permit wasn't running out,and that I might be back for more work later but right now is some fun time. "Farmwork???" She quickly moved on to the next person in the room, really not wanting to talk to me anymore. FREAK! Why wouldn't you want to hold on to these precious precious filing moments? Everyone around me strategizes to spend as much time doing nothing as possible, occasionally muttering under their breath about how they hate their jobs, and then they question MY motives? Crazy crazy. Hold on tight to what you got, even if it sucks, cause it's better than starting over. Then this one guy, who found it soooo funny I'd be writing a sci-fi story, asked the lamest questions about it, such as, "What is the main purpose of your story, the major theme?" All with a big goofy grin on his face. The same guy I had to defend Francisco's "Fake" photoshopped photography to. Such limited horizons. I hate answering that kind of question because suddenly this magic glowing exciting idea I have becomes boring schoolwork. Why analyse first what you're creating? Go with the rush and the energy and create first, analyse later. If you start off trying to figure out the main point of your story, you might nip that delicious delicious creative energy in the bud. Maybe it's just me that's like this, but I find the traditional school approach drains whatever motivation and excitement I have, and I start treading in place again, going nowhere and filling in the time with office work, tv, shopping. Boring mindset, boring life. Life is magic, I don't care what the weary cynics have to say. It's alarming and beautiful. Sometimes my senses reset and it's like seeing everything new again. I live for those moments. It happened on the bus yesterday evening. IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU TOO.

Ah well, going out for a nice dinner with these fine folks. They're fun to drink with anyway.

****

Alright, actually one of my coworkers is pretty awesome. He made a comment about some action being for people who lack imagination, which means either he looked over my shoulder and read my last email, or we are in basic life agreement. The other guy though, the one with the comments about my writing, made a bad comment about the gays in San Francisco, so I'm officially adding him to my list of people I won't talk about anything "real" with. So there.

More caffeine-fueled work emails to myself.

Stop drinking. Stop drinking stop drinking stop drinking. Drinking is like sipping liquid fat. There are almost no nutritional benefits, and almost as many calories per gram as fat. A coke is probably better for you (except for your teeth). Booze depletes minerals, takes up room in the fridge and in your wallet, causes cravings for the crappiest food, and makes you fall further and further behind on important stuff that will increase future excitement and satisfaction. Basically it makes you rely heavily on the present, thereby degrading both physical and mental aspects of the future. It does, however, solidify connections with other people. Who hasn't bonded with a good drinking buddy? If I hadn't gone out drinking with my coworkers last week, would I really be joking around with them like I do now? It also erases stress and is fun. So, how to isolate drinking to times that will aid in getting to know people better and decrease the need for pulverising stress? Step one: stop dating Francisco. Seriously, the man buys a lot of alcohol. It doesn't seem to have the same detrimental effect on him, probably because he doesn't care much for the future. He is a live-in-the-moment kind of guy and it makes me crazy sometimes! In some ways it's good for me to be around that kind of casual existence, but it's extremely hard for me to let go of so many things I find important and fascinating relating to big-picture-future type stuff. Being raised in a planning-every-detail household and reading sci fi every summer makes it very difficult for me to even want to stop thinking about the future. Days go by and he plays video games, messes around with photos, goes to parties, indulges in food, alcohol, tv, pleasure. He is the ultimate picture of contentment, he wants nothing more. I see him so happy and indulge with him. It's fun while it's happening, but lately my life path feels more and more out of control . I need to practice some serious Francisco Moderation. I want to be moderate and happy and free from this obsession with pleasure. Maybe I will die from too much pleasure. Maybe that should be what my death machine story is about. She commits suicide in a fit of despair of how pleasure obsession has stolen her life. Or she just dies, fat and happy. Maybe in the ultimate future everyone dies of pleasure. Joe wants them to die of boredom, the ultimate fate for a nanosociety without death.

Not trying to imply here that I think Francisco is unintelligent. He's simple, but in a wise way. Don't know if I will ever be like that, but I admire it. I am a woman, complicated and obsessed with how complicated I am. I rejoice in a large pile of complexity shit. I roll around in it, making snow angels in my logic circle overemotional poo.

Last night we saw The Fountain, a movie attempting to reach for the stars, about death, it's so big it can't fit on a movie screen. I admire that sort of effort. Deep down it's what I want to do with writing, movies, other creation tasks. Too bad it sucked! It would have been great if it were 20 minutes long. The sound was amazing; quiet, dramatic, good directionality. Some of the visuals were beautiful too. But after 2 hours it all decayed into cheesy listlessness. We get it, ok? Death life death life, a great cycle. I KNOW. Just end the friggin movie already before I blow Enya colored chunks of disgust. I do not want to live in a new age video.

Alright, back to work, no more obsessing about obsessions.

...

Dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum!
Dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum!
Oh Mr. Sandman, you haunt my head.
While I'm at work wishing I was dead.
Lots of coffee, cheers up my soul
Makes 5 o'clock more palatable!
Dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum!
Dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum!
Mr. Sandman (Yes?), the seal was deceased.
His fishy smell noticeably increased.
Boston friends were great motivators.
Guest bed now empty, thank God, see you later!

...



A Cafe, some tea, a fashionable scarf
So hip I could barf.


Lunch deal alcohol,
Suddenly I know it all.


Cross your fingers, make amends,
Otherwise tomorrow ends.


Piranha I don't wanna
Lasagna mega slaughter.


No letters for nine hours
The 8th floor might have showers?
Wrist hurts, breath smells,
Across the floor, no one yells.
Tomelike, boring shuffling,
Papercuts, frazzled ruffling.
It's the best I can do, and it's far too much.
This job requires a stupid touch.


Painful, cannot talk.
Suppress the chicken squawk.
Boyfriend doesn't know what's coming,
Preoccupied with pictures or something.

...

Nitrous deficiency (or oxygen efficiency)
Lung capacity decreased
Three more synapses deceased.
Complaints of long sobriety
From unintentioned piety.
A beer would do me good.
Who will have one? The dairy should.

The numbers are bolder when contrasted against
The cardboard grey codafile.
Cardboards hurts more than paper,
A slip of attention means poor blood retention.
The ipod is our missing saviour,
Left at home, attached to its charger,
The battery bar growing slowly larger.

Email to Myself

Today I spilled coffee on my skirt. It was very Cameron Diaz sort of comedic fuck up, the lid all like "Yeah girl, I'm really attached well to the cup, PSYCHE!" So now I keep running and hiding from the boss with the coffee allergy. I wonder if she thinks I hate her? Maybe I can shout across the room for her to stay away from my death skirt.

Today I am a vibrant working machine. People all around me are falling down sick, maybe I'm sucking their energy out. Or maybe my thick layer of fat is protecting me. I swear I've got some sort of body dysmorphia (the thing where you perceive your body all wrong aka fat?) this month. For the past few weeks all I can see are fat rolls when I look in the mirror. I've been obsessively keeping a food log this week, and it really looks like I've been doing alright. I feel good, healthy, clear-headed, but there's some sort of disconnect somewhere. Please donate stacks of money to prop up my failing self-confidence! I need about 3 feet of non-counterfeit American currency, 5 feet of the New Zealand version. Non-monetary forms of goodness, aka adventures-of-a-lifetime, new-best-friends or hard-to-get substances negotiable self-esteem currency.

Email to Myself

I figure if I can't blog online while at work, at least I can by email, with the added bonus that there's no risk of my browser suddenly committing suicide in a fit of firefox jealousy.

I've started a caffeine addiction for the first time since college the past few weeks. I don't smoke when I'm sober, what seems so gloriously headrushy when I'm drunk is puketastic the rest of the time. But smokers get breaks and fresh air all the time. I feel a bit odd going down 21 floors just to walk around the block but it's fine to go with my coworker for a flat white. Oh Paris Blend Flat White, so deliciously creamy, you make my filing suddenly meaningful. I count the minutes until I get to see you again. The best (for me, don't mean to be insensitive to others' problems here) part is I HAVE to finish it outside in the park, because one of my supervisors is allergic to coffee. Not just drinking it, even a whiff of it sends her into anaphalactic shock. She has extreme allergies. She didn't go out to the Mobil free dinner with the rest of us because she wasn't sure whether we'd be having spiced food or not. Food with a spicy odor also irritates her.

I feel a renewed sense of interest in something I was getting pretty damn bored by. Sorry I can't tell you more. I've been zoning out thinking about it all day.

Ack! Who am I kidding, this is friggin boring! I walk up and down flights of stairs several times a day when my body starts screaming from chained-to-desk torture syndrome. Noel ran into me between floors 22 and 23 and seemed bemused by the whole thing. How does everyone stay sitting at a desk all day?!?! I hide in the stairwells and stretch, and this is the highlight of my day (after the latte). I wish I had a job where it was absolutely imperative for everyone to jump around to some upbeat tunes for half an hour a day to keep the company running. Maybe it's an office building that feels sad if we don't do it, or just needs the energy to keep baseline maintenance systems running. I wouldn't mind spending my days inside a living building if it meant I could dance. Oh, and if it didn't eat me. Or suffocate me.

(Home now!)

30gasms later...

Alright alright, I'll post. It's hard because I don't have internet access at work, and when I finally get home I'm too zonked/don't want to look at a computer screen anymore. There've been plenty of times I've thought of something fascinating or witty to blog about, but couldn't be bothered.

So yeah, Mobil corporation. They are my fine fine employers at the moment. They are evil and enormous, but they also bought me dinner the other night. Fancy dinner at the same place Joe and Kris went for their wedding anniversary. And unlimited alcohol. And 2 games of bowling. There's something to be said for working for a gas giant (heehee). I calculated out that what they spent on me was about $24.83 an hour, about 50% more than I make entering data into excel spreadsheets and filing. You too could have me drunk and your best friend for an evening, for the low price of $25/hr. My services include staggering down the street arm in arm, singing lively tunes, for no extra charge. Amateur evaluations of fermented beverages also available.

The deadline for the death machine writing contest approaches ever closer, and I'm still psyched to enter. Once this job's done I just need to focus for a couple days. If I'm fortunate the weather will be bad for a nice chunk of time.

I know this sounds crazy, but I'm so into this job thing right now. The weekend is awesome, I buy things for myself with impunity, I eat better because I'm not doing the bored eating, sometimes I take a shower when I home from work in the hour window I have before the guys get home and most of these showers are in my top 100, and I get to experience "Morning Tea" and "Afternoon Tea" and "Time to stop working because it's 2:35" and "Let's all make paper airplanes because it's team building time." Seriously, Americans and Japanese businesses are for suckers. The Brits, Europeans, and Kiwis know what's what. Even low-level admin office work doesn't have to be torture.

Francisco and Joe are playing Quake 4. In that world all written language looks like simplified katakana, which is already sorta simplified Japanese symbols. They bought it yesterday because yesterday was official shopping day. I got a vibrator that plugs into an ipod and vibrates in time with the music. It's called OhMiBod and has that minimalist white design that all iStuff has. Cool concept, and definitely opens up the sex toy market to the kind of people who are squeamish about giant purple veiny realistic cock toys, or the ones with 2 or 3 branches that are filled with giant silver beads and have fish heads. I suppose it can be a bit intimidating, although that's never stopped me from buying a vibrator before. Anyway, I appreciate the aesthetic and simplicity of design, but I'm not gonna lie, the ipod part doesn't really do it for me. For one thing, the intensity of the vibrations is controlled by the volume dial on your ipod, which means if you want a powerful punch, your music can't be listened to if you want to preserve your hearing. For another thing, you can't listen to the music really anyway, because the y-splitter that allows both the vibrator and the headphones to be plugged in at the same time must be kinda crappy because the music coming out of your headphones is distorted and static-y. Maybe it's just the one I got, but it seems that's not the only faulty connection, there's another bit inside the vibrator that sometimes gets really loud unless I squeeze the base in a certain way (I tried rewriting that last sentence twice and it keeps coming out sounding dirty so I'm just gonna give up and let you laugh about it.)

So yeah, I had a lot of orgasms yesterday, which made me happy. Also, I bought a shirt for work, somehow Clodagh got me over a tiny bit of my shopping aversion. Hopefully she got a work-worthy outfit together too, for her job-interviewyness. Thanks Clodagh. Shopping alone usually makes me feel fat and overwhelmed. If I want to be stylish and find good bargains oh-my-god there's so much I have to do and buy. Maybe I should lose 10 pounds before I start because aaaahhhhh the salesgirls are all judging me and why didn't I spend half an hour on my hair this morning and how do I get them to leave me alone until I'm ready to purchase something. But a good shopping buddy gets rid of most of that. Now all I need are 3 more shirts, a sensible pair of black shoes, and I'll be all ready to...quit this job and start farming. Hmmm. No luck getting a wwoof job yet, think it's time to step it up and move on from emailing to phone calling.