longing for Long - pt.2

I was born in Portland, the town this island used to be a part of (until they seceded on July 1, 1995 - which makes the week of the 4th of July every year since, a bit hazy for most residents). My parents broke up after three years of my life and my mom took me to Philly with her. I would return to this island in summers and for Thanksgiving and/or Christmas and Spring school breaks.




1. my dad's house (see previous post for more details) which he says he only built for me.

2. where my best friends, Heather and Sadhana, lived. I've been friends with them since day one of this incarnation. They're 11 months older than me and their parents were best friends with mine so my idea is my mom met them and said to my dad "lets have a baby too" and two months of trying later, viola, here comes me!

3. our friend Melissa's house. She came along later. I was jealous of her for a while because I didn't go to the island for a few summers (parental politics) and that's when H & S became friends with her. I got over it eventually and we all had wonderful times walking around the island, in the middle of the street, of course, all night, drunk, and peeing outside, in the middle of the street, of course.

4. the cove where my dad anchored his boat and where he kept the canoe he used to get out to his boat. It wasn't a great place to hang out unless we were getting into the boat but at high tide it was a wonderful place to look for rocks and shells.

5. This is NEW HILL - the best downhill biking EVER, EVER, EVER!!! The hill terminated, as you can see, just in front of a cove, so there was an abrupt turn - probably 85 degrees, so the adrenalyn would get pumping to make the turn without crashing at full speed. The goal was always to try to make it down the hill without using any breaks. i think I achieved that once or twice (I'm a chicken but I have scars on my knees from falling off my bike a few turns later because I went to fast while turning on sand! dammit!)

6. Big Sandy Beach - my favorite beach ever - the sand squeeks when you walk across it - my dad says it's because aliens landed in the water next to it and charged it up. They also call it Singing Sands Beach. My dad would take us there in his truck - we'd stand in the back and jump out without him even having to stop.This is where the teenagers would have bonfires and drink at night. During the day there would be a volleyball net set up by our friend Seth who is sadly no longer in his body. :( He was always so happy and fun to be around... but that's another story.

7. Down Front - where the ferry boat would drop off and pick up. Also where the one grocery shop was and the bar, The Spa (pronounced "Spar") which was also the only restaurant, which was connected to the post office. Edgar was the man who ran the little grocery store with the cement floor that always had sand on it in the summer that would feel so fun on our bare feet. We'd get half a popsicle - leave the other half for someone else - and put the charge on the family charge account. Once when we were at Big Sandy a lightening storm started in the blink of an eye - everyone left the beach to avoid electrocution and headed to Edgar's (a whole mile away) and the road was steaming and we were rain soaked. H, S and I "took showers" under the rainspout that poure down hot rain from the roof of his store. The rain stopped and we all went back to the beach to pick up where we left off.

longing for Long - pt.1

First off, I have to say that there are at least five Long Islands in MAINE alone so please don't say "don't you mean New York?" like most of the fools I've told about my childhood home say to me.

Anywho...
My dad built this amazingly weird and wonderful house (that some said was actually a "cabin") on this tiny island in Maine called Long:
This map shows you exactly where.

He hand sculpted a fireplace from cement and stone that looks like a cat (he says it's a dragon) complete with stones for teeth and pipes for eyes that came from inside the chimney that had little amber marbles in the front of a cat shaped eye that would glow when the fire was tall enough (it was a treat to make those eyes glow).

He put a claw foot tub on top of a hand made stone and cement woodstove in the bathroom so we could fill the tub and start a fire and have a hot tub for as long as you want. When that stopped working, the only option was to shower standing in the middle of a wide open bathroom/shower room that had a showerhead hanging from a hose dangling from the ceiling.

All the doors were thick - at least four inches - and hand made with wood bars that you turned from vertical to horizontal to "lock" the door.

There was an outhouse with an old phone booth door that was spray painted on the inside and latched with a rope for a door.

There was another outhouse with windows from a trailer.

There was a toilet upstairs, because his girlfriend got tired of peeing in a bucket at night, that used water from a hose to fill the tank.

The washing machine had no outer casing so you could watch your clothes washing. This machine was inside a room that had one wall made of fiberglass and that's where my father practiced his agriculture. This room had a door to nowhere (but outside) that my friend Vinnie jumped out of in his doc martin boots on a dare (he landed fine but no one else has copied him).

I can still hear the sound of the fridge latch.

The front door had a lion with a ring in it's mouth for a knocker.

The giant oriental rug that was on the floor in the summer would cover the front stone and glass wall to try to keep heat in but I would sit in front of the fire place, with the kerosene heater on the other side of me, and when I would turn my face up and exhale, I'd see my breath.
I hated taking showers in that big open room in the winter and every time my bare feet would touch the floor, they'd ache.
My room was cozy tho - it had wall to wall carpet and was the size of a walk in closet (probably 5" by 10") so the vertical electric heater kept it toasty.

All of the floors in the house were black and white checkered - upstairs was actual linolieum tiles and downstairs was a painted, uneven, cement floor.

I've never taken pictures.

I took it for granted.

I lost it when I wouldn't go to court with my dad to fight his girlfriend whose name the house was in and who just wanted him to pay the monthly mortgage until it was paid off and then he could have it after she left him for some other man with a house in New Hampshire after 11 years of common law marriage. She won the house because my dad refused to become a part of the society that deals with taxes, W4s, bank loans and other government inspired shackles. She sold it to the neighbors who started using it as a garage.

The last time I was there, I couldn't even get berth enough to take pics of the fire place cuz there was so much crap in the living room.

My dad doesn't talk to me anymore - partly because of my reticence towards going to court, partly because he's a bit insane and paranoid and partly because he doesn't agree with advancing as a human, and I do, and I won't let him get away with that when we do talk.

I hear he's building a ferrous cement catamaran houseboat on a river in southern Oregon. If you look at this map and notice the tressle on the east side. Under that is where this boat is being born. It's 40'x60' with ferrous cement pontoons filled with styrofoam with a house on top.

I hope to get to see it, and take photos of it, sometime soon.

Confessions - my humble review

I just got back from Madonna's Confessions concert and I'm very pleased.
She didn't open with a reading of her confessions like on her website, as I was hoping, maybe just because of how she opened Reinvenion, but she appeared from within a giant disco ball that descended from the ceiling - most likely, she was enclosed in that thing for at least an hour before starting the show - that alone is admirable, tho doesn't make a concert...
The video of her with horses and equestrian accoutremont was fun but, as I will mention for other segments, our side, high view obscured at least half of the half circle screen that was above the stage so we missed out on some of the presentation. Her dancers danced on their hands and knees and moved as if they were horses - so far into the mime was one dancer that he had a saddle on his back and when on all fours, Mrs. Ritchie mounted it. Giggle. I liked that part.
Uh, I forget what song that was, maybe future lovers... oops.

She then had a video montage of kids in africa with a link ad for some organization I've never heard of - the clinton something dot org... she sang Live to Tell for that one. Again, the high side view obscured some of the text she posted and the video feed on the monitors only included the first statement.

There was also a spoken word bit that her dancers seemed to do - one by one they did very personal seeming dances while emotionally vulnerable monologues were played. I thought that was really sensitive and lovely, except that I didn't understand a word of what the girl said - perhaps it was just too highly pitched for the audio system. Sigh.

She came out on a mirror tiled cross, standing on a platform with her hands propped in some hooks and the mic extended from the cross so that it was in front of her mouth - no headsets in this show. She actually encorporated the handing off of her microphone to her dancers when she needed both of her hands, into the coreography - just like the eternal bride she is.

Oh, that reminds me - she sang Like A Virgin with video of people falling off horses juxtaposed against images of x- rays - no clavical ones tho, just ribs, appendages and hips. I loved that - as if she was saying that her accident last year made her feel brand new "feels so good inside..."

She had some amazing dancer/acrobats during Jump. One stunning specimine was a beautiful brown man (they were all beautiful, different genders and colors [duh] and shirtless, with lots of dancer/acrobat muscles - woot) who jumped from the top of one jungle gym to another and then another and then off of it to a ping pong table (those are my shortcut descriptions). Her dancers were all edgy urban style - some post krumpers, some gettin' their anger out thru insane full body movements, one did this really cool dance inside a cage (during the song Isaac - Isaac was there [duh] and sang very well with a stoic face) covered in some kind of hooded cape that she used beautifully.

She played some back up guitar as if she was lead guitar, haha, while her guitar teacher hung out on a bank of white speakers, in his white suit, playing his white acoustic guitar. It was sweet to see her play some rudimentary chords and effects and then leave it for him. I think he played on every song. Donna DeLory and a new Niki (Richards, instead of Haris) were there doing backup and a bit of dancin with her at the end.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessions_Tour

1. "Future Lovers/I Feel Love"
2. "Get Together"
3. "Like A Virgin"
4. "Jump"
5. "Interlude (Dancer Confessions)"
6. "Live to Tell"
7. "Forbidden Love"
8. "Isaac"
9. "Sorry"
10. "Like It Or Not"
11. "Interlude (Sorry remix)"
12. "I Love New York"
13. "Ray of Light"
14. "Let It Will Be"
15. "Drowned World/Substitute For Love"
16. "Paradise (Not For Me)"
17. "Interlude"
18. "Music Inferno"
19. "La Isla Bonita"
20. "You Thrill Me/Erotica"
21. "Lucky Star"
22. "Hung Up"

For all of you who are gay or who love someone gay.

Kudos to playwrite Jeff Whitty for writing this honest and straightforward open letter to Jay Leno.

Open Letter to Jay Leno

I have lots of gay individuals in my life and I find humor against them to be tasteless and ignorant - unless one of them is telling the joke... I've been known to chew out bulletin posters who like to display their ignorance in the form of "humor" that made me want to vomit.

I wish I could show you the text from the above mentioned chew out but he's committed myspace suicide and my sent mails to him are gone (he did apologize, fyi).

Here's the text from the above link:


Playwright Jeff Whitty (Avenue Q) is pissed off at Jay Leno's glib gay joke fodder, and we're right with him. The only way for macho jerks like Leno to realize it's not okay to make fun of gay people and profit at their expense is for us to tell them. And boy does Jeff tell him:

When you think of gay people, it's funny. They're funny folks. They wear leather. They like Judy Garland. They like disco music. They're sort of like Stepin Fetchit as channeled by Richard Simmons. Gay people, to you, are great material ... Mr. Leno, I have a sense of humor. It's my livelihood. And being gay has many hilarious aspects to itnone of which, I suspect, you understand.

Read Jeff's entire letter here.

Dear Mr. Leno,

My name is Jeff Whitty. I live in New York City. I'm a playwright and the author of Avenue Q, which is a musical currently running on Broadway. I've been watching your show a bit, and I'd like to make an observation:

When you think of gay people, it's funny. They're funny folks. They wear leather. They like Judy Garland. They like disco music. They're sort of like Stepin Fetchit as channeled by Richard Simmons. Gay people, to you, are great material.

Mr. Leno, let me share with you my view of gay people:

When I think of gay people, I think of the gay news anchor who took a tire iron to the head several times when he was vacationing in St. Martin. I think of my friend who was visiting Hamburger Mary's, a gay restaurant in Las Vegas, when a bigot threw a smoke bomb filled with toxic chemicals into the restaurant, leaving the staff and gay clientele coughing, puking, and running in terror. I think of visiting my gay friends at their house in the country, sitting outside for dinner, and hearing, within hundreds of feet of where we sat, taunting voices yelling "Faggots!" I think of hugging my boyfriend goodbye for the day on 8th Avenue in Manhattan and being mocked and taunted by passing high school students.

When I think of gay people, I think of suicide. I think of a countless list of people who took their own lives because the world was so toxically hostile to them. Because of the deathly climate of the closet, we will never be able to count them. You think gay people are great material. I think of a silent holocaust that continues to this day. I think of a silent holocaust that is perpetuated by people like you, who seek to minimize us and make fun of us and who I suspect really, fundamentally wish we would just go away.

When I think of gay people, I think of a brave group that has made tremendous contributions to society, in arts, letters, science, philosophy, and politics. I think of some of the most hilarious people I know. I think of a group that has served as a cultural guardian for an ungrateful and ignorant America.

I think of a group of people who have undergone a brave act of inventing themselves. Every single out-of-the-closet gay person has had to say, "I am not part of mainstream society." Mr. Leno, that takes bigger balls than stepping out in front of TV-watching America every night. I daresay I suspect it takes bigger balls to come out of the closet than anything you have ever done in your life.

I know you know gay people, Mr. Leno. Are they just jokes to you, to be snickered at behind their backs? Despite the angry tenor of my letter, I suspect you're a better man than that. I don't bother writing letters to the "God Hates Fags" people, or Donald Wildmon, or the pope. But I think you can do better. I know it's The Tonight Show, not a White House press conference, but you reach a lot of people.

I caught your show when you had a tired mockery of Brokeback Mountain, involving something about a horse done up in what you consider a "gay" way. Man, that's dated. I turned the television off and felt pretty fucking depressed. And now I understand your gay-baiting jokes have continued.

Mr. Leno, I have a sense of humor. It's my livelihood. And being gay has many hilarious aspects to itnone of which, I suspect, you understand. I'm tired of people like you. When I think of gay people, I think of centuries of suffering. I think of really, really good people who've been gravely mistreated for a long time now.

You've got to cut it out, Jay.

Sincerely,

Jeff Whitty

New York, N.Y.

this morning, on Valencia Street

I saw a girl rollerblading down the bike lane in jeans and a knit tank top, with no bra, hair down, smoking a cigarette.
Oh, and, she was listening to an ipod that was in her back pocket.
I love this city.

today on 6th street...

I went to my favorite mexican place for a burrito - it's acutally the less enticing version of the favorite place, because the neighborhood is awful (btwn mission and market on 6th) but it's the same food and I wanted it bad, so I decided to plunge in.

I walked out the back door to reduce the amount of yardage I'd have to cover on 6th street proper (you know, the place glorified in the recent movie RENT - because they couldn't find anywhere in NY that was dirty enough to recreate NYC in the 80s).

Made it to market and across 6th unscathed, un-catcalled, un-anythinged but sun shined-on. Heck, I even made it all the way thru the order at said mexican place (Cancun for you curious types) and then realized I was $1.66 short at this cash only establishment.
(yeah, I know - my bad)

I cross 6th again to hit the $3/service fee ATM at the donut shop. I stupidly decide to try my empty savings account first and add two minutes to my standing there. In those last two minutes, a woman comes up to me saying "don't say no, please don't say no, i need a dollar" - I didn't say no, I said "good luck to you, I don't have $1 for you" and she proceeded to tell me that her husband just died.
"I'm sorry to hear that" and I walked to the curb to cross back over 6th to finish my transaction with the buritto man.

She proceeded to:
threaten my life
threaten my mom's life
offer to spit on my face ["thanks, but no, I'm full,"]
and tell me what a horrid, "dog girl" that I am, along with a bunch of other stuff that I missed because of the adrenalin that kicked in in my "fight or flight? ok, flight" response.

Now I wish I would have told her to go to the city for help.

or to ask her her name so I could have her arrested for harassing me (sadly, I know how to have these vagrants arrested as it was part of my job description for a while)

or just go off and tell her to "fuck off and get a job you fucking crack head! you ruin homelessness for everyone who is drug free and down and out with no help available but to ask people like me for $, food or work!"

This shit really pisses me off - I hate having to be callous because I fell one too many times for someone's "I need to get home" stories.

Actually, some woman I did give a dollar to, well call her Ruiner because she ruined it for the rest of them, told me some song and dance about trying to get $7 to get on the bus back to Sacramento. I told Ruiner why everyone was so "mean" to her on that street "because crack heads are always trying to get money for their fix on this block."

How ironic.

I saw Ruiner three days later giving the same schpeal and I was so pissed.

Pissed for having been "taken" by some bullshit song and dance that NO one falls for unless they're new.
Pissed because I wanted to believe her - like that flute player who only needed another $7 to get his bus ticket to Seattle who, after I gave him $2, I've never seen again (and I happily assume he's reunited with his ex and their daughter up in Seattle)

I saw her two days after that, doing the same thing at a train station I was biking past as I yelled at her "LIAR!" and sped on.


I'm so sad and tired of this. I think I need to move to the country or something - this city makes my heart ache (in love because the good stuff is soo good as well as dispair at the lack of justice for simple humanity)

Stop taking advantage of my sad, broken heart. Please. Don't say no.

And quit coming to the city to "try" one of the millions of ridiculous drugs that ruin people's lives!

short and sweet

I feel like I'm blindfolded in the land of opportunity, playing marco polo with my destiny.

Repost: A Little St. Patrick's Day History Lesson

I pulled this off of my friend Samir's blog because I was thinking the same thing and he did all the writing. If you disagree, post it here and we can have a lively discussion.
I might have written this with a little less agressiveness but the sentiments are the same - and I mean no insults to those of you living your lives as happy christians.

For all of you who are planning on celebrating St. Patricks day today, I thought I'd fill you in on a little history that you're probably not aware of. Being half Irish myself (if you look closely you can see the freckles) I'm very disturbed that so many people blindly celebrate the life of a man that they know nothing about. So here's your schoolin' bitches.

I know some of my readers, and some of my friends, are christians. If you are one of these people you already know that not only do I not care what your religious point of view is, I respect your opinion, even though it is not my own. But, by now you're surely wondering where this is going so I'll get to the point.

Patrick recieved sainthood because of his role in bringing christianity to Ireland. That is well known fact. What isn't taught in schools, and ESPECIALLY in church, is that in order to do this he had to take tens of thousands of lives. He came to the country to "civilize the savages" that were the majority at that time. These so called savages were Druids. Peaceful, earthy type folk who worshiped the world around them and all the great things it offered. They lived in complete harmony with nature, and harmed no one. They lived predominantly in the woods, or forests. They practiced connection with nature in every way, including free, and natural sexuality, which angered Partick and his ilk to no end. How dare someone think they are free to do what they chose with their genitalia. Alas, they didn't worship Patricks god, so they had to go. He traveled throughout Ireland converting the people to weak or weary to fight. The ones who did put up a fight, and stand up for their beliefs, and way of life, were murdered. Men women and children alike were slaughtered without a shred of conscience. No one was spared.There was no tolerance for freedom of choice. Jesus or death. After he had converted and or killed the whole of the Druid population, he burned all of their records. History, art, folklore, and life practices. Can't have any of those "villainous teachings"*(see the true meaning of the word at the bottom) raising their ugly heads and causing trouble for the church. To this day Irish peoples the world over are almost all Catholics. They have no real grasp of what Druidry, Celtics, or their own ancestors, were. An entire civilization was wiped out, all in the name of a supposedly loving and compassionate god. Therefore on March 17th of each year, I wear black. I wear black to mourn the loss of a race of people who only wanted to live in peace, their own way, and not bother, or be bothered by anyone else. An entire civilization erased by a man who couldn't stand the thought of anyone else in the world thinking differently from him. And for this murder, this genocide, a monster was immortalized, Connonized, for his efforts. It is not at all unlike Hitlers attempt to wipe Jews and Judaism off the face of the planet, although not on nearly as large a scale. So if you are Irish, or plan on celebrating today, take a long look at what you're drinking to. Maybe you should wear black and do what us Irish folk (even halfies) do best. Have a wake. Get shit faced drunk and party for the ones who are gone. Celebrate the lifes that were lost, and what they stood for.

If you made it this far, I applaud you. I'm sorry to be such a buzzkill, but someone has to take the initiative to educate the skull orchard that is the human race in the new millenium.

* The word Villain comes from the Latin word Villa, meaning country house. Villain means literally "one who dwells in the country". Patrick assumed that all country dwelling peoples were Druids, and therefore bad people. Thus the word Villain, or "one who dwells in the country" became synonomous with an evil person.

I'm going to go sit in the woods and mourn now.

dead

i see dead animals on an almost weekly basis in this extremely dirty city. there's something so interesting about death that i have to photograph it. i choose the camera phone over the digi cam on purpose - the grains are necessary.

kinda sad, kinda pretty pt II

kinda sad, kinda pretty

How do legos get spilled onto a crosswalk next to the Embarcadero?

this is the first time I've felt pride about my alma mater

"The art of teaching lies in being able to recognize an individual student's unique potential and reflect it back in a powerful enough beam to start a little blaze."

- Gillian Brown, B.A., M.F.A., M.A.E., Adjunct Assistant Professor of Art, Maharishi University of Management







She was my teacher only casually and only during my last year and I feel that her input had a profound effect.
(click the photos to go to the details about the artist and the piece)

mittens

as i put on my coat today, i had to hold on to the cuffs of my sweater so that they wouldn't get caught in the sleeves and i remembered when i used to wear mittens that had a string attaching them that ran accross my shoulders and thru the arms of my coat.

this memory gave me a curious, comforting and nostalgic feeling that is not triggered by much.

best chat ever

jkitten: WOW
jkitten: I just did a HUGE walk about outside

acrimson: nice - what did you find?

jkitten: a new branch of my bank to make a deposit
jkitten: then two little alleyways that cut off the people traffic... and a cute little crafts gallery

acrimson: fun
acrimson: did you get rained on?

jkitten: THEN I went to Hole Dudes and picked up "stuff" for tonight

acrimson: Hole Dudes - I thought you were referring to a gay sex toy shop

jkitten: it is really cruisey at Hole Dudes... esp in the fruit section

acrimson: LOL

jkitten: yes I did get rained on... and when I was totally wet, I started dancing up by the carousel, like flashdance, whipping my hair around my face and through myself up againist the concrete wall... slowly sliding down to the ground.

acrimson: no you didn't
acrimson: I don't believe you

jkitten: I wanted to
jkitten: makes for a nice picture

to the caribbean, me

i'm off to the caribbean sea, to the us virgin island of st john this evening and i won't return to the cold rain, (tho, right now, i'm having a hard time seeing the screen for the bright, warm sunlight streaming in thru the blinds) until the 24th.
i'd love to say that i'll post some travel blogs but if all they have is a dial up, i'll be spending that time on the beach instead.
there will be a summary, and maybe some of my own photos too, shortly after i return.

WOOT!

liquids and gemstones

sometimes
when i close my eyes
i see moving images

* * *

tonight
i saw
up
as if from the bottom of a wine glass
and a blue, faceted jewel
was being dropped into the liquid thru which i was looking

* * *

wandering around my island
on an early winter eve
the light rain
peppering my face with itself
and the full moon in the sky
made me feel as if
i were floating in a glass of champagne
with the bubbles gently and persistently
popping on my skin
while i looked at the glint of the diamond in the ring worn by the woman holding the glass

* * *

liquids and gemstones
interesting...
(to be continued...)

granola

1. I'm having a bowl of trader joes mango passionfruit granola for lunch at 2:55pm

2. When I started living on my own at 17, I made up a pancake that consisted of the following: butter on the pan, arrowhead mills multigrain pancake mix, made thick, on top of bubbly butter, granola sprinkled onto/into pancake before flipping, peanut butter spread on smooth side of pancake, and a mixture of butter, maple syrup and jam poured over top. I sometimes made this pancake for others - especially if they braved a 45 min ferry ride and 10 min "big car" ride to my dad's house when I was feeling like showing them that I came from a very strange place (hence the living on my own part).

3. My mom told me recently that her first bowl of granola took her 20 minutes to finish. This was when she lived in a house with 10 other people, worked at a coffee house where Bonnie Rait (wonderful lady), Linda Rondstat (liked to eat a full pan of brownies and then spend a few min in the bathroom...), Bruce Springsteen (he's very shy, drinks jack and ginger but has to have Clarence Clemmens - sax - order it for him) and the E Street Band (Clarence asked my mom out! I'd have such a much better complexion if she had said yes!!) were known to play small gigs, and was crowned the Brownie Queen (I finally figured out that this must have been because of "special" butter...like mother like daughter I guess...)

a poem

An eloquent friend of mine, Kilowatt, always posts the most amazing quotes and thoughts. This poem really spoke to me and I wanted to keep it close so i could read it a few hundred times and maybe understand it a little. Enjoy.

Woven of Flame and Snow

Finding her body woven
As if of flame and snow
I thought, however often
My pulses cease to go,
Whipped by whatever pain
Age or disease appoint,
I shall not be again
So jarred in every joint,
So mute, amazed, and taut
And winded of my breath---
Beauty being at my throat
More savagely than death.

- George Dillon

if it were up to me...

...i'd be nude descending staircase by marcel duchamp

the latest good stuff

. :chocolate pecan pie without vanilla - kinda brownie like - homemade crust is much better than expected - missing the vanilla but loving the dagoba in pure form
. :birthday pajama party with giant, rubber, blue, nipply ball play (with photos!)
. :3rd grade jokes really make you laugh when you're hiking in the berkeley hills
. :finding birthday gifts in five minutes and then seeing them be received with great enthusiasm
. :down to earth peeps
. :Joe from The Station Agent is my new hero from my new favorite movie
. :morning time schedules *almost* working perfectly
. :the block next to mine has lots of little colored lights up and the photos are really fun - working the shaky hand is my new favorite night time photo shoot.
. :shampoo/conditioner that smells like the tropics
. :warm, spiced mead
. :deep, wonderful, soulful conversations
. :eating all day long and loving it
. :riding bike to work again (no rain all week!)
. :being okay with not handling crises at work as well as I'd like - down with perfectionism!
. :getting over my aunt's beratement for expressing myself in a form she doesn't agree with
. :mac os x tiger dashboard weather report widget (say that 10 times fast!)
. :filling up my camera's memory chip for the first time - kind of exciting!