here is something that existed once but can never be made again: a photograph of my dad and i. the photos still exist, but one can never be made again. there are photos of us in places where the whole family went, and now the whole family can never go to those places again.

i think i've been crying in my dreams lately. i was walking around the u-district at dusk and feeling like i wanted to cry, but i had a memory of crying the night before... but last night i was alone, and i didn't cry. i've spent a lot of time alone. i've spent most of my life somewhat alone.

i felt callous. i left scarecrow and passed a man with a cardboard sign that read, "hit and run victim, anything helps." "aren't we all victims of the hit and run that is life?" i thought. immediately i felt i didn't truly believe that, but at the same time...

i feel like so much of my time, emotionally, is spent preparing for endless possibilities. i don't get devastated; i rationalize. i am so sure something will crash that i put it to a stop before it's ready to do so. i often wonder if this prevents me from being able to be as emotional as my relationships might require, but could i change?

at the same time, i allow myself to wander through dreamy happinesses and fantasies that are unlikely to come into being. i've been burned enough with dreaming that i expect very little from reality anymore. it is hard to just accept things the way they are, but i try. i daydream about being happy every day, being comfortable and connected and satisfied. sex fantasy, feh, that's almost incidental (but certainly not to be discounted).

i dunno where i'm going with this. it's blathering. i should be studying and stuff. stuff stuff stuff. i know that something's gotta happen soon.

whoa, ok. minor score. after walking to scarecrow, then that shitty video store on the ave, looking for donnie darko on dvd for less than tower's atrocious $30 sticker, i ended up at tower anyway, contemplating the rip-off. i decided to go check out something else for awhile and discovered their modest used vinyl section. holy wow, they sell used vinyl cheap. it's cheaper than i would expect even from second time around, which is by far the most reliably reasonable vinyl-selling establishment i've seen in the city. i ended up shilling out $15 for three lps--the church's starfish, x's more fun in the new world, and steve martin's wild and crazy guy. rock. vinyl fucking rules.

man, my thrifting karma is low lately. i went out yesterday to look for a dress or something appropriate to wear to my cousin's upcoming wedding. i went to ross and nordstrom rack and pike place market. i'm cheap, but still. i found nothing. (i was also kind of looking for smoke gray opaque tights, but i couldn't find those, either.) today i went to goodwill with josie. we even perused the outlet store. i bought two mugs, since that is about the only kitchen item we don't have quite enough of, and nothing else. i didn't have time to look at all the records or even browse the tshirts. i saw no linens, skirts, dresses, or sweaters that struck my fancy. sigh. at uwajimaya, i forgot my list of things winnie wanted, so i just bought some kind of orange black tea and these little chocolate straw mushrooms with crackers for the stems. they are good and addictive; i will never buy them again.

kevin is going to be up the first weekend after school starts to apartment-hunt. there will also probably be a harem gathering of some sort. that will be busy and fun. i hope i don't fall asleep all the time.

my eyes are twitchy. i didn't sleep well last night (this morning). i went to bed around 2:30, found it somewhat hard to get to sleep, then woke up around 8, showered after trying desperately to sleep some more, talked to my mom for awhile, finally went back to bed and slept until 11. it wasn't enough. caffeine was not enough. sleep is never in the "enough" category for me lately. ergh.

i still need to do stats prep stuff. monday afternoon i should be going to olympia and probably returning on thursday. i will try to post a cam shot of my haircut. i can't remember if the cam is working on valentino. i am going to the doctor and i think we will have plenty to talk about, hurrah. (weird lump on neck, gynecological well-being, tiredness, allergy meds!)

i feel so weird. i want to do something, but there isn't really anything to do, anyone to do it with, or the energy present to get it done. i could just run errands. i could just go hang out on the ave and shop there. yeah. maybe later. or not.

i think now should be my nap/watching jenny's monsters, inc. dvd time. i love that futon for napping. mmm.

so tired.

the only interaction with Real Human Beings i had today was when i went to bartell's to pick up my photos. i only spoke to the kid who rang me up, and even then it was mainly shaking my head yes or no to his brief series of questions. the pictures turned out ok, though.

i went to second time around and wasn't quite in the mood to spend money, though i considered dropping some on a jane's addiction three days 12", echo and the bunnymen's ocean rain, and/or a kinks lp--later i realized i had forgotten that i really want something by the who!--and browsing rekkids is usually enjoyable. i didn't interact with anyone there, though.

this afternoon, i received a call from an att digital cable representative. first she asked if i were mr. or mrs. cannon. huh, clearly their data on me and my phone number is limited... first she informed me that the call was being recorded "for quality assurance" or something. she proceeded to ask me if i'd be interested in this new "deal" to subscribe to att digital cable. i said no. she asked why. "i am a student and tv wastes my time." "all right, ma'am, but do you realize what a good deal this is?" "yeah, ok, but i do not need television because it distracts me from my studies." "all right, ma'am, i just wanted to inform you of this GREAT DEAL..." "right, and i'm not interested." i'm assuming the quality assurance crap just means they are monitoring her to make sure she emphasizes what a good deal it is a certain number of times before she "accepts" my rejection of her offer. they are assuring the quality of their employees in annoying the crap out of those to whom they market their overpriced and useless services.

i was under the impression telemarketers were not supposed to call cell phones, but does that hold true if they have your number because you're a customer of one of their other services? i do subscribe to att broadband internet, i mean, and the cable (if i had it) would be on the same bill. anyway. only mildly annoying. all the bills are in my name, and i don't get a ton of phone calls otherwise, so sometimes i might have the chance to screw with them. muahaha.

i was supposed to be taking my stats test tomorrow, but since my prof is sick this week, we've scheduled it for monday morning. ugh. i so want this over with. i am not even focusing on it. i will have to this weekend, though. bleh.

i had an artichoke for dinner. it was good. i also drank a whole little pot of green tea, followed by a whole little pot of peppermint tea. my stomach is pretty inundated with water at the moment. also, pints of anything delicious and frozen are dangerous. i managed to not eat ALL of one of my chocolate sorbet pints--TRADER JOE'S HAS THEM AGAIN, PRAISE JESUS--but i did eat most of it over the course of the day. this is better than yesterday, of course, when i ate the whole pint of my ben & jerry's half baked frozen yogurt. yeeesh. i should just never have junk food in my house, ever, at all. i crave decent food for about five seconds before resorting to the SUGAR. brown rice and black beans for lunch? sure! why, that was filling, let's follow it up with several spoonfuls of chocolate sorbet! oh boy!

something else happened... oh yes. i was acting crazy and restless and wanted to CREATE or DESTROY or whatever (and in some ways, they are the same, are they not?) and playing with used candle wax wasn't enough, so i chopped a couple inches off my hair. wheee. i think it turned out ok, though.

mostly, though, my day has been records, reading magazines, sitting at the computer, and drinking tea. soooo many records. i love records. i don't own nearly enough of them.

yeah. not much to report.

christine and graylan were over last night. graylan is always entertaining. we baked some death cookies (chocolate chocolate chip with oats and coffee) and watched the big lebowski, which christine had never seen before and graylan barely remembered and thought he didn't much care for. they both enjoyed it, though. i was trying to explain my half-baked theory as to why that movie is just right the way it is, and why it isn't totally random and why the ending isn't dumb, but it was only coming out that i clearly needed to think this through more. i almost wish i were a cinema studies major so someday i would accumulate enough theory and knowledge to properly analyze that movie. that's always what it makes me want to do.

and now, i must pee. it's all that tea, i tell you.

i haven't left the house since i got home monday evening, unless you count the fact that i have to go outside my building to get to the laundry facilities as leaving. i have a lot to do, and i'm sure i'll get it done. i'm tired and excited and sad and scared, but hopeful things will turn out well.

* tired. i slept weirdly all weekend (not that it was a bad thing), and when i came home, i slept a lot. i think i'm coming down with a cold. last night i went to bed around 2am, just because i should've but not because i was especially sleepy, and woke up by 8.

* excited. school is going to start soon. oh, and kevin is working on details to move up here. i am pretty sure the latter is the greater contribution to my excitement, although it's a ways off still.

* sad. i have hurt people. for that, i am sorry. i have tried to be nothing but honest, but that doesn't mean sometimes i get confused by my own emotions and people end up hurt anyway. i cannot speak for those i hurt, but i don't regret it... though surely that's easier for me to say. this goes especially to chris. timing is bad and stuff--excuses, excuses. i guess i can't say anything to make it better.

* scared. god only knows how many ways i have to fuck things up in the future. the stakes are bigger, maybe, and i don't want things to get bad. i have a feeling they won't, but who starts out anything they want to be good thinking, "this is going to be bad?" that's fatalistic.

when i was 15, i used to tell my mom i was a cynical optimist. she told me that was an oxymoron, and i agreed, because i liked thinking i was a bit of a paradox. in some ways, i suspect the spirit of my self-description holds true--i am pretty cynical about most things, but i tend to believe things will ultimately turn out well. i don't know why. the cynicism goes to war with the optimism all the time on battlefield logic.

today is the day to think about stats, some errands (deposit, books, film, groceries), and lunch at agua verde with christine. she wants to hear california gossip; i told her not to read this for a few days. hah. i hope she listens. ;)

i need to be good and do stuff today besides sit here on irk and aim and listen to records. it was nice for yesterday, though. now is breakfast time.

listening: chris isaak - wicked games

hmm. that was a long weekend.

i just fell asleep watching harold and maude from the living room futon. so comfy. such a good movie. i just like to quote the whole thing. "many years later, in brittany, he found out they had only been seagulls...to me, they will always be glorious birds." i'm tired. i think i may be getting sick. i came home to an electric bill for july through the beginning of september--the first full two-month billing period we've lived here--and i have a pile of laundry to do. i also have the practice materials for my stats exam and will have to go talk to the prof and take the test this week. but that can all wait for tomorrow.

there was something that happened this weekend that i couldn't talk about because it concerned someone who reads this, and i didn't want it to be the first word he got. i wanted to tell him in person, but that didn't happen. instead, irc and phone sufficed. that's lame of me, but some things can't be helped now.

anyway. long weekend. lot of good, some inevitable bad. change may be on its way, and i hope it lives up to its potential.

first, however close i was getting to chris before my trip, i still harbored feelings for kevin, though i expected nothing to come of it. of course, i made some wrong assumptions earlier this summer which lead up to what we have now. what's that they say about those who assume?

after kevin picked me up from the airport and we hung out at sammy's for awhile, we took a walk on the foggy, chilly beach near his house. it was dark, of course, and we were talking. i told him what was going on with chris, and i had kind of figured... i don't really know what i figured, exactly, but it was wrong, because we spent the weekend very close together. whatever feelings i had tried to squelch with respect to him came back in full force and then some.

how about a little activity summation before i jump back into the emotional goo, eh?

thursday night, i arrived around 7, and kevin picked me up. we went to sam's, and then got lost looking for the same vegan restaurant we got lost trying to find when aja was there. we eventually found it just before it closed--the hostess came over after we had glanced at the menus just a few minutes and said, "you order now. cook go home"--and it was delish. then we hung out at sammy's awhile longer and did a little irking, much to the confusion of everyone else and our own amusement.

friday i spent an hour on the curb outside kevin's office, waiting for sammy. we headed up to the city, dropped some things off for his friends and hung out with them awhile, then made connections with my sister. we didn't do much with her besides walk up and down van ness so i could get cash and eat bad-for-me food (including evil french fries). we were going to try to find something to do in the city, so we checked some websites, alt-weeklies, and called kevin. one show at bottom of the hill sounded promising until we realized the place was 21+. BLAST. sammy and margot bugged kevin to drive up on the phone enough that he did, but he got there too late for us to really do anything, so we just kind of hung out awhile longer before my sister kicked us out to sleep. on the way home, kevin and i ate at this ultra-hip late-night vegetarian diner in santa cruz.

saturday kevin and i didn't leave the house until 4:30. we went to a park near his house that was the epicenter of the '89 quake. he'd taken me there before, but this time we drove to the end of a road and climbed down to the water and followed it for quite a ways, crossing on rocks and logs. we lay in the dirt under a tree until we noticed the pinks of sunset tint the perfect gray of the sky. we had hoped to catch sunset from a vantage point on a cliff, but it was mostly set behind some dark clouds on the horizon. instead, we watched the moonlight glitter on the ocean for awhile before going to dharma's. dharma's is always good. then we went to hollywood video, were irritated with their crappy selection, and went to blockbuster and rented amelie, which kevin hadn't seen yet. we set it up to watch on his laptop in the loft, but i couldn't keep myself awake.

sunday, we decided to head up to san francisco somewhat early to catch the wilco documentary, i am trying to break your heart, which happened to be playing at a theater near both my sister's hotel and the venue gvsb were playing. we were a bit early, so we looked a nearby bookstore and got some sushi before the movie. it was a good movie, too. i wanted to go explore north beach, so we started following signs on van ness to get there, but eventually we got very lost and wandered chinatown, headed toward fucking fisherman's wharf, for awhile before calling sammy, who found us directions. (we weren't _too_ far off...) after deciding we were hungry and uninterested in the food there, we walked back towards the hotel and ended up getting some decent and reasonably-priced chinese food on polk street.

eventually, people and affairs were gathered at the nearby great american music hall where we enjoyed denali, radio 4, and girls against boys. much rocking out was had. also, there was a drunk guy who kept talking about how gvsb really faltered on their ability to PARTY on freakonica and called radio 4's guitarist "motherfucker" several times while encouraging him to rock. later on, someone clearly on drugs besides just the readily-available alcohol kept jumping onstage and trying to fuck with gvsb's bassist's pedals. my sister, standing right by the stage, pulled him away by his trenchcoat belt once. crazy people sometimes make a show more interesting.

and that brings us to today, where we have to say goodbye. goodbye left us at, this is not the end. which meant some hard things, like feasiblity of changing someone's whole life and having to basically break off a fairly intense but ambiguous relationship with someone else. things are mildly depressing, but nevertheless, i remain somewhat hopeful. i can only hope i'm not doing the wrong thing in following my heart, or whatever you want to call it. this is painful but honest.

listening: 764-hero - satellites