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Wednesday, 20 June 2001 (careless idle chatter) 8:57am Oh, what I wouldn't give for a print copy of this ad. To commemorate that justice was served, of course. Meanwhile, it's finally been driven home to me that The Fidget Queen is gone: apparently Togo's is giving away free sandwiches today, and yet I read about it on sfgate. It's not so much that I personally care—I have my bagelmich, and even if I didn't, I would want to deal with those crowds—but it's precisely the kind of thing TFQ would have spammed the department about. He also kept us apprised of J. Crew and Footlocker coupons, whether we cared or not. Sadly, he didn't allow an opt-out. Which, for some reason, brings to mind an incident from February '99, when we were both still new at the company. I needed a transparent gif for a page we working on, and since he was the graphics person on the project, I asked him to make me one. He said he didn't know how. And that was that. Never mind that it fell within the most basic parameters of his job title ("Junior Graphic Designer"), and that he should at least feel obliged to look into finding out how to do it. Nope. He couldn't care less. Fortunately, this was back when Lee was regularly online, so he was kind enough to tell me how. I then forwarded the info to TFQ, for future (and present) reference. Because I'm all nice like that. It's nowhere near as morally satisfying as watching the boogeyman being put to death (which we got gypped outta anyway), but tomorrow morning if you're up at the right time with a functioning RealPlayer you can watch a live total solar eclipse in Africa. That's almost as cool, right? I mean, it won't make your children safer or anything, but...
Note to self: brush teeth in morning before putting on shirt. Because the only thing that looks more like a come stain
than yogurt is toothpaste, and it's a lot more insidious. (In answer to the obvious question, because at the time I thought I'd cleaned it off sufficiently. Whoops.)
I have no idea when I'm getting zapped again; probably not until late next month. There's too much going on between not and then, including our anniversary on July 10. I actually got zapped on our anniversary last year, which speaks to both how pathological I was about it and how unwell our relationship was; indeed, we'd functionally broken up the previous week, which is generally considered a sign of malaise. The point being, I won't be doing it again this year—the anniversary zapping, or the pre-anniversary breakup. Both sucked in their own way, and thankfully neither of them feel necessary this time around. Anyway, our anniversary plans this year originally included dinner at The Mountain House, a restaurant up on a mindbendingly beautiful stretch of Skyline. If I could live anywhere I wanted regardless of the cost, that area would be a contender. (Which is a fundamental difference between barefoot and I. After lunch last week we went driving through the Oakland hills so he could show me the houses he's been coveting, even though in another six months they may have to strongly consider finding a cheaper place to live. His favorites had views of the Bay, and more importantly, the cities and bridges; I preferred the ones surrounded by trees, without so much evidence of civilization. Not that I would necessarily mind a bay vu, but...) You haven't seen Neil Young's "Harvest Moon" video, but if you had, you'd have seen the place. We'd originally tried to go last year on Maddy's birthday, but when those plans collapsed in a puff of drama entirely too characteristic of 2000, we decided that we'd go on our anniversary. A swell plan, in theory. Fairly romantic setting, good (if expensive) food, and best of all, a very rare single of Neil's "Opera Star" b/w "Surfer Joe and Moe the Sleaze" on the jukebox. Can't ask for more than that. And, just to be on the safe side, we'd make a reservation; the trick to that would be remembering to do so after 3pm Wednesday through Sunday. Knowing us the way I do, I'm rather proud of the fact that with about a month to spare, we realized that our anniversary falls on a Tuesday this year. Which is as good a day as any to have it on, but that detail, combined with not being able to call and make reservations on Tuesday... So we're going to Blowfish Sushi here in town instead. They're open on Tuesdays, and their site strongly implies the possibility of euphoria. Not like Neil on the jukebox, but anime-related music and stuff like that on the walls, so it'll do. And, most importantly, we'll be together.
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Tuesday, 19 June 2001 (broken butterflies) 9:39am I didn't feel much different when we left Chevy's last night, except feeling fuller and a little guilty for it. My eating habits have been questionable over the last few days, and I no longer have the birthday/vacation excuse. Still, though, there must be some kind of chemical reaction that takes place when their tortillas hit ranch dressing, like the sodium turns into heroin. The cravings can get that strong. Like all, I suppose, they're usually best ignored. Haven't been to the gym for a while, either. 12:28pm Still, this is a world in which in a year's time we'll be blessed with a Powerpuff Girls movie. So it really isn't such a bad place.
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Monday, 18 June 2001 (bus to baton rouge) 10:07am Back again, as I knew would happen. The light wasn't on in my office, which is all I can really ask. Everything seems the same, although I think I may be a little different.
There've been stylistic changes made to some of the projects I've worked on,
stuff which I probably would have been openly unhappy about had I been asked
to do them. Of course, I would be flattering myself to think the timing is
anything other than a coincidence. They didn't wait for me to leave; I just
happened to be gone. More oddly, there's now a temp working with Leigh. Probably
because we're entering into a crunch time. I'm sure it's nothing to be concerned about.
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Sunday, 17 June 2001 (get right with god) 11:22am So I actually blew out candles on a cake last night at Dana's. If I've ever done it before, I don't remember; maybe that awful party my parents threw in '88 or '89, the one which was a combo for my birthday and Father's Day. Certainly not since then, and of course my contempt for that ritual as part of the office birthday party is well-documented. Anyway, it wasn't so bad (even the singing), if only because it felt vaguely sincere, being surrounded by actual friends. Lee gifted me with some of that magical Bolinas grass, and even rolled me a joint (of the genus fattyboombatty) which I didn't try until getting home. Just as well, because it's potent stuff. We also have tentative plans to go up to Lee's weekend after next. He seems to finally be ready to re-emerge into normal space; he probably won't get back into the scene (which is just fine with a lot of people who were happy to see him go), but at least he'll be keeping in touch more. Which is something I've been hoping would happen for a very long time. In addition to indulging my desire to go out for sushi for the third day in a row, for my birthday Maddy got me the DVD of The Celluloid Closet, one of my favorite documentaries, and—laugh if you will—the paperback of Battlefield Earth. She insists that I don't have to read it if I don't want to, but I think I will. After seeing the movie, I'm more curious than ever. And, after all, pure and utter trash can be good for the soul. Meanwhile, I stumbled upon a minor grail at a used bookstore yesterday: Mental Hygiene. Oh my yes.
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Saturday, 16 June 2001 (reason to cry) 9:22am The vacation is over; it officially ended yesterday at 5:30pm. Now it's just a regular weekend. I used to hate that phenomenon when I was in school, because inevitably I felt like I'd wasted the free time I had. I don't get that feeling quite so much anymore, thankfully, and I don't dread going back to work nearly as much as going back to school.
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Friday, 15 June 2001 (essence) 12:01pm I am so going to be hating it when I have to readjust my body to a normal (or, at least, "normal") schedule next week. Not that I've been staying up late and then sleeping late—I've been staying up late then getting up early, which is almost worse. 11:32pm Last night we saw Evolution and Shrek at a drive-in (on the other screen were the David Manning-recommended The Animal and A Knight's Tale, so I think we made the right choice); today we (saw? marvelled at? were pleasantly assaulted by?) Moulin Rouge, then joined Pike and his boyfriend for the Courtney Love/Lili Taylor lezfest Julie Johnson. Tomorrow, if all goes well, we'll finally be seeing American Nightmare, then hanging out with Lee and Dana. Sunday, we rest. That's the plan, anyway. Next time you're in a parking lot or garage with spaces marked "compact," notice how many SUVs and other non-compact vehicles are parked in them. Probably more than actual compact cars, if only because there are so many of the behemoths on the roads lately. As such, we weren't too surprised by the number of SUVs we saw at the drive-in last night—nor were we surprised by how many of them opened their rear doors, the kind that open upwards and obstruct the view of cars parked behind them. If we were in a theater, they probably would keep their cellphones and pagers on. Why, yes, I am suggesting that the tendency towards conspicuous consumption is a sign of low character. The evidence is certainly there.
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Thursday, 14 June 2001 (are you down) 8:23am Hey, everybody, it's Flag Day! Get out your matches! (Yes, I've made essentially the same joke two years in a row. Tune in next year...) 11:54am Since impulsion is a root of self-destructiveness, I bought tickets for a Jonathan Richman show next month within about three minutes of having heard about it, and now we're getting ready to go to Santa Cruz. It has a drive-in theater (showing the latest summer blockbusters rather than Herschell Gordon Lewis pictures, but hey, beggars and choosers), and I haven't had sushi at The Pink Godzilla since—well, since the last time we were there, duh. April of last year. And we both have today and tomorrow off, so, like, why not? I'm on vacation, damnit.
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7:50am At about half past midnight I started defragmenting my hard drive. Four hours later I came back out to find it stuck on 0%, and I had to restart my computer. I'm taking that to mean my poor little computer is ailing even worse than I'd suspected. 6:41pm Since the subject of his increasingly quixotic job search inevitably came up, barefoot showed me the spreadsheet he's using to keep track of the hundred-plus companies between here and Los Angeles to which he's applied. For my company, he included the annotation "Referred to by Sherilyn as well." Which is true; I did submit his resume through the seemingly dormant employee referral program, for which I got a bonus for Leigh's hire, and Summer got one for Madeline's. Although the company's intranet suggests the program is still active, all evidence suggests it is very much dead. Frankly, I don't care so much about any potential bonus as I do getting him a job, which is seeming less and less likely. Anyway, what particularly struck me was his name choice. It's nice to know at least one family member has comfortably made the switch. Then again, I'm very probably being unfair to the rest of them. It's a tendency of mine.
It occurs to me that I need to archive the first ten of this month's entries. I seem to be much more
inclined to do that when I'm at work...
Mallory has just left Mickey after a fight; she's driving down a city street in slow motion, smoking a cigarette with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan wailing mournfully in the background. As she drives by a corner engulfed in projected flames, gunshots echo from behind her. It's always struck me as emotionally pure. By Stone's own admission in his commentary, not every stylistic element in the film is necessarily meaningful. Some are, some aren't. Just because the film stock changes in the middle of a scene (or shot), it doesn't represent anything other than switching from 35mm color to 16mm b&w. The cigar is just a cigar. But at that moment, we're seeing and feeling exactly where Mallory is at. So we were on foot right around the corner from The Red Vic, intending to catch the 9:15pm of American Nightmare, when the entire evening imploded, encompassed by an ever thickening cloud of badly delivered apologies (mine) and even more badly hurt feelings (hers). Within ten minutes were back in the car, heading home. Stopping for a red light at the typically inhospitable corner of Lincoln and 19th, I observe something odd: in the left lane, a car and a motorcycle come skidding to a halt side by side at the same time, as though the motorcycle were attached like a sidecar. The driver then got out of his car and the biker dismounted. (Is that what they call it?) I figured they probably knew each other, and were perhaps confirming directions or something. I see that occasionally. If in fact they did know each other then they certain didn't like each other. I could tell they were arguing even though I couldn't hear them, and every so often one of them would either take a jab at the other—no actual contact, more like a warning shot—or go into a defensive position. I expected an actual fight to break out at any moment, and if so, I hoped that moment would hurry up and arrive since the light was bound to turn green—while my ethics apparently weren't above hoping for a little carnage, I couldn't bear the thought of genuinely rubbernecking and holding up traffic, ergo I'd have to drive away when the light changed.
They hadn't yet come to blows by the time I drove off, so I don't know what finally happened. The
more rational part of me would like to think that they settled their differences amicably and
went their seperate ways. The other part of me thinks it knows what Mallory felt like.
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Tuesday, 12 June 2001 (blue) 7:50am As of last night, my temperature was 101°. I'm feeling a little better this morning, so unless the number has actually gone up, I'll be hitting a couple movies today. 8:39am Well, it's not higher, anyway. And I'm on vacation, after all. 9:51am Mmmmm...caviar.... 5:56pm So I saw Memento, which you've probably heard of, and Keep the River On Your Right: A Modern Cannibal Tale, which you probably haven't. The former is the "see it or lose your hip credentials" movie du jour. I'm still not sure what I think of it, which is usually a good sign. The latter is a documentary about a man named Tobias Schneebaum, who spent several months in 1955 with a Peruvian tribe which (among other things) happened to be cannibalistic. The movie mostly follows his return visit to the tribe some forty-odd years later, although the recurring subtext I found most interesting was self-righteous/patronizing view of Westerners towards aboriginal/"less civilized" cultures—both onscreen and off. Onscreen, the most telling moment was a clip of Tobias appearing on The Mike Douglas Show in 1969 to promote his just-published book, the film's namesake. When asked if he ate human flesh, he says yes. The host, other guests and audience make no attempt to hide their disgust and disapproval, and one of the other guests, a snooty, overdressed woman whom at several points I wanted to reach out and whap on the head, cries out, "How can you say that?" Tobias barely has time to reply, "Because it's the truth" before she interrupts him with the followup question of, "What did it taste like?" Pork, as it turns out—and, of course, everyone is grossed out. Typical Americans, wanting to have their flesh and eat it too. Offscreen, I had a couple sitting behind me who probably would have been even happier seeing The Mummy Returns for the sixth time down the street at the AMC 1000. I mean, there's something heartening about the fact that they were at this obscure documentary playing on what's probably the smallest screen in town, but jeez, the least he could do is not act like he's still in a multiplex watching cars blow up. It was like being back in school. Worse, being back in film school, where my most of my fellow students laughed at every movie we watched, usually because they were older and made during a less ironic time. It's the same effect that happens with most movies at the Castro, especially (but by no means limited to) Hitchcock. Anyway, they were laughing at stuff which wasn't meant on any level to be funny, usually stuff involving those savage tribesmen and their scary, primitive ways, and quite often were silent during parts which were meant to be funny. And, of course, any kind of stimuli had to be announced out loud. The admittedly jarring sight of satellite dishes in a New Guinea village prompted the observation comment, "They have satellite dishes!" A shot of a dog scratching its back on the ground was greeted with a laugh and "That dog's scratching its back!" Now, I'll admit that whenever the cats do something even remotely cute Maddy or I will usually call it to the other's attention (usually with a whispered request for the camcorder), but really.
The worst was after a tribesman spoke for a minute or two (subtitled, natch) about the cannibalism in the past, how they're trying to put it behind
them and move on. The reponse from the peanut gallery was, "Wow, he's smart." And it wasn't saracasm, either; rather, the
Ugly American seemed genuinely surprised at the speaker's eloquence. After all, he's just a primitive headhunter, with a bone through
his nose and everything, so who woulda thunk
he might actually be, like, intelligent? I was tempted to turn around and tell him that the guy on the screen would probably never
make the same mistake about him, that no matter how much he spoke he'd still just be a dumb savage. Needless to say,
I didn't.
Meanwhile, though I'd originally planned on going to The Red Vic to see a documentary on seventies horror movies called American Nightmare on Wednesday afternoon, instead I'm heading into Oakland to hang out with Barefoot. He still hasn't found a new job, and is taking it kinda hard. Seems the least I can do.
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Monday, 11 June 2001 (i envy the wind) 8:04am First day of my week off, and my stomach's very unhappy with me. Seems appropriate, somehow, especially since I have two appointments in the next few hours. I'm sure I'll find time to rest later. Yeah, definitely. 8:13am By the way, Timothy McVeigh is dead.
Now doesn't that make you feel better?
I'd considered making plans with barefoot to get together tomorrow, but I never did. For the best, it seems. Oh, I mentioned I'm on vacation, right?
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