What a voluptuous mountain ash

Friends, Romans, countrymen and countrywomen: I am terribly delighted for the time being.
Vacay started out marvelously. superbly. STUPENDOUSLY. Ma mère has taken note of my obsession with food blogs and stocked our fridge full of vegetables and other such and suches and we've dug through cook books and made everyone's taste buds happy.
Christmas Eve morning mon père, mère, and I loaded the snowblower into the back of our little Stratus*. Stratuses are little cars and snowblowers are large things and the trunk just wasn't closing. Meaning when mon père drove off he spread Christmas cheer as the Mormon Tabernacle Choir gloria-ed from the speakers in the trunk loud enough for all pedestrians to hear.

And today....

I WENT WILD. I went to my ye olde gem of a thrift store. It didn't fail me, no no no no not one bit. I keep worrying that we'll run out of senior citizens who are giving their closets away, because senior citizens with London Fog coats are a nonrenewable resource. We haven't run out yet and I am going back again. I had to exercise such restraint, I can spend hours in there. HOURS. I didn't know where to look first. I went back to the dressing room quite a few times. I started out with a basket and I had to pick up a cart half way through. It was a treasurable overload. THIS IS THE LIFE! I chill at home with mes parents, watch movies, read books, thumb through records, put together puzzles, cook up storms, lay down on a mismatched couch and stare at the hand painted wooden Rudolph, sit around the kitchen table with ma mère and paint with watercolors. I make a couple of social calls a week and I go to the thrift store. My thrift store. Lovely thrift store.

Don't worry ma soeur, you are not forgotten. Te amo.

And Merry Christmas, Happy New Years, Hanukkah, Seasons Greetings, Happy December, Love to all my family, Joy joy joy to you all.

*(don't worry, no one ever sought to end an argument at the dinner table with "I DRIVE A DODGE STRATUS")

NEWS HOURS with Jim Lehr....

I'M GOING TO FRANCE!!!!! At least that's what my uni says.

Today is a bit of a big game for the football teamers I have previously mentioned feeding. On Tuesday I was working at the grill and stressing over finals when a man called in to ask if we would be having another banquet during the game like last year.
"No, I'm sorry we won't be open"
"You won't be open? You guys are naughty. It was so fun last year. You should be open."
"I'm sorry. All of the students will be gone, campus will be closed." Naughty????
"I can't believe you won't be open. You should really have a banquet again."
"I know it's terrible of us. But no one will be here to work. We'll all be done with our finals and going home to see our families."

I guess we should all be expecting coal for Christmas, though, for being so naughty.

what, what, what? He said something clever

Finishing up my finals was a bit hectic, I didn't even start packing until ma soeur was driving over to my apartment to pick me up. Despite the line of 20 people on my first flight that had been overbooked I made it all the way up to sitting on the plane for the second half of my journey.
And then I gave up my seat and went through another 24 hours of limbo. They had already pulled away the walkway that goes between the gate and the plane so I had to leave by a little stairway. Airport Grandpa (a wizened airport worker) was golden. He offered his hand to make sure I made it safely from stairway to ground as if I was a lady and he kindly offered his arm so that I wouldn't slip on the ice on our way to the little hidden door to take me back to the gate. I love to be taken care of like that. It's unnecessary but at the height of heartwarming.
I did get a flight yesterday. I always feel a kinship when I get on the plane for ye olde home. It's always a small flight and the people all have a pie shaped piece for ye olde home in their heart. When you share a piece of the same pie you've got to have some comradery. My accent from there is mainly an adopted thing. My best friend and I used to sit around and imitate all the native olde homers. (It's one of those places where you must settle for generations before you're a native.) So I notice as I get into conversation with the Grandma next to me (there were lots of grandparents in this trip. I met a Grandpa who was a stained glass artist) and we're talking about different travels and world things that I'm molding my vowels out more than I normally do.
The best part (besides having lefse in the fridge) is when I arrived home in the middle of my parents Christmas party hungry--I went straight for the cheese ball--and in clothes that I'd been living in for 34 hours. Luckily I'd worn a comfortable and unwrinkle-able dress.

And because of my trouble I have a Christmas present of a roundtrip ticket anywhere in the 48 states. Who's up for a trip?

joyeux noël

CHECK THIS OUT!!!!! WHAT JOY!!
A site where you can pick out a Swiss grandmother to knit you some socks.
Net Granny

I have three kitchens but don't go

On my cell phone box (the mobile I detest) they tried to find a picture that would make me feel like my cell phone is a real party time. What this picture really does is make me feel like I have a cheep, cheesy, and chunky phone. And what especially gets me is the large note in the upper left-hand corner that says:

FREE
Hands-free headset
with purchase.

You see, I tried to call someone yesterday. I heard them perfectly: "Hello? Hello? Hello? There's no one there." They did not hear me perfectly: "Hello. Hello! HI! No! I AM here!!"
I was about to despair, but I'm a resourceful little dear. So I plugged in my FREE hands-free headset. It may be hands free but it's not cordless. I look so cool walking around ending a phone call and then wrapping up the headset.

On another note, the Onion-Cutter and I started fighting at the grill today. Normally I wouldn't argue like this. But it's as if he's my younger brother. He started it by imitating a chicken.
"Are you making fun of me?" I asked.
"Yeah! You're a chicken!"
"Well you're a turkey."
"You're a chicken leg!"
"Why am I not even the whole chicken?!"
Later on he told me I was a chicken head and maybe even at one point a chicken ear. I don't know Onion-Cutter kind of mumbles.

The children qui sont...oh tenenbaum fake tattoos

Editing labs can eat your life away.
You know, each time I make a film I think it's going to be different. As I edit a piece I realize I know nothing about what I'm doing. But I learn as I edit ten million things I can fix for next time. Next time I will show the fine cut of my film to people. Next time. This time? No.
It's like when you take a test and you think, "Wow, I'm a clever little child, I geniused that test." And you get the results back and....you did not genius the test. I am not geniusing documentary yet. I would be the film programmo's prize novice. Emphasis on novice.

I'm trying to bring the Christmas season into my life a little bit. Christmas Season Me woke up from a nap the other day and went grocery shopping so I could have fresh baked french bread with avocat au sel fumé, or in otherwords avacado, lemon juice, paprika, and radish. In case you can't tell, I'm still religiously reading food blogs. And I also want you all to know that lawyer and avocado are the same word in French: avocat. I think this means avocado is our advocate. Did you know sedan in Swedish means "then" or "afterwards"? In other words, that's an afterwards that just drove past. If we go by dear LaQuina's theory, it's like a nice Norse man saying "So then" in a funny accent.

Mainly we (C.S. Me and I) are in love with the holiday decorations. After I left the supermarché I passed a dry cleaners that was closed for the evening. There was still a little Christmas tree lit up in the office spreading cheer out onto the street. It reminded me of Mr. Krueger's Christmas not because of any loneliness, hallucinations, old people, janitors, or carolers, but because I was walking past an out of date shop celebrating without a grand reception. The out of date shop thing is kind of the season of all my Christmases growing up. Remember ye olde home has a lot of dirt roads and such.
Christmas Season Me also got Bag Clips for a friend of mine. When we were university freshmen we decided to try to start a trend. Not too seriously, but we went to a little shop walked around and picked out Bag Clips. For a few weeks we wore bag clips everywhere. He's been in El Salvador for a while and I'm thinking maybe he would like to start a Bag Clip Christmas revolution there.

(bag clips avec a note and my fingers)

i snoop into your life, you snoop into mine, lets all have a snoop dogg time

My Boss has superpowers. I don't know how he's done it, but he got me to write on a paper, "Can work as much as you need me to."
What have I done?

Alors, mon cousin is in a heavy metal band. Tydligen (that's Swedish for evidently) their band is pretty goot. I dunno, I haven't heard them, and I haven't listened to much of anything heavy since high school. I never got too deep into it then, I stuck with Metallica and didn't trap any excursions into the serious Scandinavian bands. I'm supposed to go see them perform on fridag...fridagen....Friday.... (Mon cousin loves Sweden). This could be quite an adventure lita på mig (believe me).

P.S. I'm beginning to realize how fantastic my little Swedish book is. If only I could pronounce these wonderful phrases they are feeding me:

Det börjar en socialvårdskongress där i dag. A social welfare congress is opening there today.

...har 7,5 miljoner invånare. ...has a population of 7.5 million.

Den rika tillgången på vattenfall... the numerous waterfalls...

I tried to face Sleepy Hollow but we were out of butter

Last night I went to a festival of ten minute plays put on by the local playwrights I chill with upon a few Wednesdays. They're hurrayed for a celebration because they've finally got a venue with a stage maintenant (now. pronounced....well say it six times fast and you'll be close). I was a little sad for the days when we met in an upper room of the public library and sat on quilts as they performed...but we all grow old and professional in the end.
I went by myself which means I went on foot in the pouring rain. By pouring rain I mean I crossed a few motes and hopped over a lake or two.Oh, fine, I can dress for weather, but for reasons other than what fit in this story I wore high heals. And sometimes I couldn't see the lake to hop over it.

Dear Vera,
I'm sorry, I'm much too wander-lusted, dirt under fingernails type of person. It took me a moment to realize my feet were splashing around in the puddles of water that had formed INSIDE my shoes. Your design took quite an adventure last night. But genius girl, they held up.

Love me anyway,
Marge

I was running late. Since it's a small troupe I run the risk of arriving with no one to sell me a ticket and let me in at the gate. Oh please, oh please, you know me! I tried to telepath to my troupers since they weren't answering their cell phones. I ran into one piece of luck, a boy with an androgynous voice warned me I should ford out onto the street since the corner up ahead had become Lake Como. I made my way across the muddy grass, stepped over the mote and onto the street...but I left a shoe behind stuck in that muddy grass. Oh @#$%^&*. Symbols and numbers, just like that, started scrambling around in my head and for less than a split second I seriously considered what I'd been tossing around for the last few blocks. I took my shoes in hand and ran barefoot. Barefoot five blocks, thinking HOW NUTS if someone does this at home we amputate feet (C'mere Earl and bring us the ax). Oui, barefoot five blocks evading one car full of boys who started to roll down their windows.

And quelle chance! I didn't miss a bit of show.

I bit of tarnish on that silver tea set and I might drink out of it. tarnish! tarnish dagnabit!

Don't worry guys, I found my ring. You might not have caught that (j'ai perdue ma bague). Je ne sens encore nue. I don't feel naked anymore. It was terrible to look down at my hand and see my right ring finger instead of a large black ring.

I've had trouble deciding what to wear lately. With the onslaught of snow and rain (it's attacking me!) it took me over an hour last Saturday before I finally decided to just go ahead and do the awful, lazy, ski bunny, trendy, "I spend too much money on tasteless clothes" look of tucking my sweatpants into my boots. Thankfully my sweatpants were not Victoria Secret or Juicy Couture. I hate looking like a name brand. I wouldn't even do that for Balenciaga no matter how much I love you Nicolas Ghesquière. Nor was there fur or fake lamb's wool anywhere on my boots. I even put my voodoo love chain on to feel a little better about myself.

The chain is really an odd piece of necklace passed down to me from my Aunt Milly. I have one distinct memory of her. I was très jeune and she was baby sitting ma soeur et moi. I was eating fries from McDonald's watching the news with her. McDonald's! What a treat! And the news! World affairs! Vistas never seen before! Important events! Aunt Milly is magical! She had fantastic dresses fit for real parties not church potlucks and she let ma soeur and I dress-up in them. She had feather dusters (how romantic, a feather duster instead of an old rag!). She worked in the White House as a secretary. She'd been places. Her shoes weren't from Payless, they came in beautiful boxes. I was too young, but I bet she even had hat boxes. Hat boxes! She would dip pretzels in white chocolate and sprinkles in her little bungalo kitchen and lay them on waxed paper. I've got a dream of Aunt Milly's life. She must have seen great things, had lunch at the Smithsonian everyday, been to cocktail parties, typed on a typewriter. There must have been unrequited love, foreigners, three piece matching dress suits made out of wool.

I thought it was magical to live in a little brick bungalo all by yourself.

Hat Boxes! Imagine!

j'ai perdue ma bague! Je sens nue.

You know those University decals you put in the rear window of your local vehicle? Here's a new one:

Poupon U

Hmmmm....How about these ones:

Poupon Snow
Poupon Rent
Poupon analyzing films
Poupon lack of sleep

Can anyone tell I'm ready for Christmas vacay? Sighhhhhhhhhhhhh...I might be going downhill fast.

I watched Tender Mercies in the Great's class. It was as if I had gone home for an hour and a half. The terrain was flat and it always looked like late fall or early spring. The sound of wind was always present, the people kept to themselves fairly well, and there were cowboy hats and country music. Now I know what to watch when I'm feeling homesick.

I feel inspired to channel my late 1970's/early 1980's small town hick. How can I resist? Tess Harper was inspiring in her knee-high boots and cotton dress.

oh yeah yeah

I've got this theory that I've proved right time and time again. No one, OK, I never go very long being sure of anything. This is partly why I keep one foot in the pool of existentialism. If I'm sure of something it becomes essence. But essence is a vaporish thought.
Mainly I have no idea what I'm doing in documentary. I still can't believe they let me into the film programmo. Do they have a quota of novices they have to fill? A quota of one? A quota of me?

One thing I can be sure of though: I am not good at the orange game.

i've got lists i could throw at you from here to new zealand. so watch it pluto!

Coworker One and I always do the banquets scheduled at the grill. Last night was fairly calm. There was no rush to set up the banquet. Alors this is how Coworker and I spent the later part of yesterday afternoon (aka: look how delinquent we can be):
1)We snuck outside and threw snowballs at each other and at the grill.
2)Boss told us we could take these triple chocolate cheesecakes home. So we locked ourselves in the freezer and munched on them a little. Not our brightest idea. It was a freezer and the cheesecakes were frozen.
3)For some reason there is a mini goal post upstairs in the banquet area. We played a mini rendition of football. It consists of one person holding the mini goal post in the air and dancing around and the other person trying to make a goal.
4)We also started composing a new song. (I like long backs and I cannot lie. You other sisters can't deny. When a guy walks in with an itty bitty head and a hairy back you have some fun! braiding pieces of it...)

We missed out on two of our favorites we had this past August:
1)When everything was said and done and the hurricane of football teamers was gone, we'd stand in front of the large projector screen and act out ESPN. I'm not quite sure why this is fun. But it is.
2)Our other proud favorite, when there would be just one football player left eating....forever... we'd stand where they couldn't see us and whip out our mad dance skills. I kept thinking over this idea to pick up extra money: we could set out one of our uniform required baseball caps (they go great with everything and you look so professional and sporty! woo!) to collect cash in and provide entertainment for the teamers. You know, I bet my running man could rake in some mulah.

Sigh....yes this is how I spend my life. Maybe this explains a lot.

is there a sign on my head?

My life is turning into a continuous train of jokes.

One morning I had finished the usual batch of soup and the phone rang.
Hello, -- Grill. This is Marge, how can I help you?
Football player, I call him Paisley, always orders the same thing. After he tells me his order I habitually say, This is Paisley, isn't it, and write his name down on the ticket. Not that day. That day he says:
"You know who this is. I know you know who this is. I know you know."
Yes. Paisley knows that I know that he doesn't want gravy on his mashed potatoes. Last night he says to me, "I haven't seen you in a while, I thought you might've quite. I'd be so distraught!" Ha, ha, Paisley. Ha.

The other week on campus this kid who wears a cape and often sings to himself told me I was weird.

I went to a concert with a boy last month and he said,
"I'm not trying to make a move on you but this is the only way I can stretch out my arm."
So Shorty Petite puts his arm around my waist but not touching my waist. I can't help but think that wasn't comfortable for him. Who stretches like that?

And today....my crowning moment.
I kind of got stood up. I'm actually still a little confused.
This kid from my church, who I've never noticed before, called me Monday night and asked what my schedule was for Thursday and Friday. That was it. No other introduction. Well that's a 48 hour period. What do I say to that? So I said, I don't know. This all ended in this plan that today he would make us peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and we'd go feed ducks.
Yes it's been kind of rainy today. But I don't remember any clause in our conversation that said weather permitting.
It had been 20 minutes from when we were supposed to meet and I hadn't heard anything. So I called him. Again, what do I say in this situation?
"Umm...did you decide we shouldn't feed ducks in the rain?"
"Yeah, I figured it wouldn't be a good idea."

Sometimes these people leave me speechless.
I'm not even that weird. I'm laughing. But I'm not that weird.

ya, sure, you betcha

It's a real thing! I was perusing foodblogs again (quelle surprise) and imagine what I've found. Oh joy, oh joie de vivre, uffda!

Lefse.

It's my adopted heritage in chewable form.

Anyone have a potato ricer or know what that is?

Norwegians don't take good photos of their food apparently but here are the pictures I've found on googling lefse.

Panda black licorice. chocolate as a heating element.

May school come down and hit me on the head with a peck of pickled peppers.

Yes every student suffers the shock when they go to a private uni freshman year. Some of us got off the same boat: small town and a high school of simple means. There are three times as many people on this campus than in my small town of ye olde days. My general classes are three times the size of my graduating class. And now it's not a senior citizen telling ma mère at the public library how I'm such a good cashier at the local supermarché, it's some student calling me out "Hey grill girl!"
Please don't class me as the prosaic over-achiever. I think I frustrated every teacher I ever had because they felt I had potential but I would never apply myself.
My grades at high school and uni haven't been too different. And I've never cared about grades too much. What's a grade? I'll throw your alphabet in your face. The grades aren't the problem. The regard people have for me is not the problem. I always felt the praise I received in high school was a little undeserved.
Do you know those tiny holes in bricks? I feel like I've been shoving my brain through a brick wall. Ah-ha! I'm being challenged!....?
Sometimes.
But sometimes, I know exactly what I'm talking about. Sometimes I'm writing a paper for a film TA who doesn't care about my sentence structure or my prose (I could write a whole paper like Yoda "Good this movie is" and they wouldn't know the difference). A one page paper. A one page paper like I've written every week for the last year and a half analyzing a film. All this TA wants to know is that I got a theme out of the movie and I have points to support it. I've just got to prove I've thought. One simple process: THINKING.
I THINK therefore I AM. But I am not writing.
I'm not getting anywhere.

Ah the joy of school.

recommendations for swiss account transfers

I've been reading food blogs again and listening to Pink Floyd. I'm feeling a little trippy right now because the Lunatic is in the grass*. Or grahss, since it's a little English sounding. I feel like I've mastered a few things in cooking as I make my tri-monthly personal batch of soup (kind of mimicking the tri-weekly ritual of soupings at the grill). My cookings are these easy habits I've picked up and so my new goal is to cook something new each week. I'm searching for healthy little main dishes on the internet of blogs I peruse because ma soeur still has my Vegetarian cook book. Notice that word? I don't eat meat. And most of the blogs I read are very french-habited with french titles for their recipes. So as I sift through archives I keep having to look up words to see if I'm about to read instructions for a sausage or something.

It's chilling out here. I've been adopting layers into my outfit all day, right down to two pairs of socks. If I throw on another pair of socks I think I might be able to stay toasty all evening.

Hier (yesterday) (pronounced ee-yair with not much emphasis on the r), I stopped by a couple of chums' appartements. One was my old British chum, the other was the strange girl from my freshman ward. Mmmm...is a better word "interesting"? I'm fascinated to figure out how she continues to exist in a world separate from...everything. She is devoid of interest in clothes; current movies, music...I see her about uni campus and she's got her hair in a high ponytail with a scarf tied around it but there's nothing even bobbysocks about it. Anyway, I've rarely had anyone be so delighted to see me visit. She treated me with a cup of homemade cider she'd brought from a Thanksgiving back at her family's ranch, played that old bugle call for me on a wooden Native American flute. She showed me pictures of her family, warned me that history classes have a lot of reading but none of it is busy work (I was hoping to take a Scandinavian history class but that's not happening). She told me about this boy her roommates think is perfect for her but their similarities seem superficial to her because he's a city boy and she would never survive in a city. She's happy to be an old cat lady even though she doesn't care for cats. And apparently her père sometimes professionally jumped trampoline. You know, a side gig.

Ciao bellas and bellos.

*Brain Drain

sigh...Cinderella discussions on intuition and creepy men. oyster crackers.

I've got more Bowie. Can you understand how this makes me terribly happy? I am terribly terribly terribly happy. Did you know David Bowie has taken a turn at being a mime? Oh, oui, vraiment. I nod my head at you very affirmatively. Alors, this completely blends in with my new found obsessions of the time being. Amazing how this all happens. You pick up a piece here and there and the next thing you have a well-rounded, cross-referenced index of fascinations. Mimes, face paint, old rock stars, matte black walls.

Consequently, my application to France is almost in the bag. Yes, I'm determined to move there despite the Frenchie from the lab who tells me I have twisted logic. I try to arrête (it rhymes with stop) myself from devising lists of things to bring, not bring, give away, and purchase. After all it's not official, it's only a chance. A chance in a rag of many colors.
I'm having a harder time this year of not hoping. It's not like when I applied myself to the film programmo. I had a million plots all of them centering on rejection. I did not ever think of this future (the one I'm currently living out), the beautiful futurish dream of being admitted to this program. In fact they centered around being rejected a second time. Because that's all the chance I had at this uni: two. And neverthemore, the slots were shot last April, and as you might have figured or heard me screaming, Luck was a lady and came as an email and letter blessing me with my dream come true. I screamed, I cried, and jumped with hugs on anyone I saw. (Yes, ma cousine, Beef seems to be crying a lot lately, but only in the best of ways.)

(I hesitate with this last section because I'm not finding words to fit together.)
And so this exponentially led to moi qui sat in the Great's class this afternoon for discussions of religion brought into cinema and theatre. I have one thing I want to say. I'm increasingly drawn to people (What?! Oui! Despite all claims of hermitism). And I increasingly find I can't draw limits to their validities and spirit. What I mean to say is this: the more I live the more I'm finding God in all people. Because God to me is a heavenly person and also all that is good. Please don't stand off at the limitations of my linguistics. I want to tell you that I don't know how to dismiss the sins of others as sins, I don't know how to plug my ears at their swears anymore and I can't close my eyes at drawers full of unsent letters because I feel like there could be a valid cry sometimes.
Yes. I have a tendency for a bleeding heart.

It's my brandy alexander*.

*inspired by a Feist song, Brandy Alexander

short and defeated. but I'll keep chasing after tuft tuft tuft tuft tuft

12 and a half hours.

It's not as if I haven't worked longer than that (at the grill).
But I hate the grill.

I kept believing until the very last that I would actually get to leave mid-afternoon. At 4:30 when I was assisting Boss at the flat-top I asked him when I could leave (after he'd assured me five hours ago I could leave at four).
Have you seen the crowd of people that just came in?
Then I knew.
I knew that "8-until" meant until the end of time.
Until all rivers run dry.
Until everyone you once knew forgets your name.
This is why my summer ended on August 13th. Until means until you stop caring how you look. Until you stop caring about what you eat. Until you stop caring about sitting down. Until you stop dreaming up plans for your day and instead you work until your feet have swollen and you hobble home in the dark and all you can do is vegetate in front of the TV.
Until you stop painting.
Until you stop trying to contact friend or family.
Until you stop all capability of being able to concentrate on a movie.
Until you just function.

I hate until.
I hate until even though I'm exaggerating my day and feeling sorry for myself (I am not exaggerating August).

But I had an effing lame day.


It's this day that makes me think with a terrible circular feeling maybe I am selling myself short.

it doesn't seem like the days are getting shorter. Yesterday lasted a week.

My magazines came into use tonight.
The appartement has looked as if someone threw sterile wall paint to the walls to balance out cootied couches. What a universal theory.
IF WE PAINT THESE WALLS BLANDLY ENOUGH NO ONE WILL NOTICE THE SMALL ORGANISMS CRAWLING ALL OVER THESE PLAID COUCHES WE PUT IN HERE IN THE EARLY 90'S.

And so I prada-ed the walls. I editorialized the walls. I janis joplin-ed the walls.

Someone talks about how they quoted Bob Dylan at a Mariah Carey party on my wall. Does your wall do that?

My wall is a static name dropper.

I'm kind of a whispery person. So it's a bit odd to be supervisoring at the grill.
I'll share a classic tactic of mine with you.
I approach a couple of aimless workers.
"I'm going to need someone to cook more chips."
It's not even specific or direct (although slightly redundant). I don't even sound commanding. But they do it.
Oh the insanity.

I like jobs that pay me to live but don't pay enough to live it up.

you can bet, you can bet, but it's going to track track track

What happened? It all prosaicked out and soon I was speaking in a language of use and not of the mythical, lyrical internal speak I've been speeching. I've got to do it, I've got to rebel against it. Because when did we give these letters, symbols, numbers their meaning? Did we arrest them? Did we always think in these rules? You can blame opium but I find a lot in "A noir, E blanc, I rouge, U vert, O bleu*." I wasn't digging at carpet, there was never carpet, there was buried treasure vast with possibilities. Don't we want multiple paths of possibilities instead of sitting at a screen with half starts and logical blandness?

It doesn't fit through my sieve.

Sometimes I've got to yell it out.

Sometimes I've got to tear myself away from the une page of analyzation papers.

What a prolific evening.

*Arthur Rimbaud, Voyelles

KITCHEN DANCING! That's another communion.

(And look to the right. I added my Christmas list in case you get confused. Not that I'm pressuring anyone...But if you were curious.)

Movie Quoter doesn't work at the grill anymore.

some puffs shrink not from nine times

I miss the dance floor.
WHY HAS IT BEEN SO EFFING LONG?
Peut-être à cause de three amis scattered to the different states. Two are in different countries.
There's a drain on my soul from a lack of the matte black walls of my cathedral.
I mean no sacrilege, mais the lights. The Smiths. It's my communion. Not to replace, but just as a different kind.

No
body
moves like you.

I could be a heavenly person today*.

*Blue Monday by New Order

We need to be more outlandish, we're too safe

I think the Great said that. So outlandish? Party at my place?
Naw.
Too safe.
And stale.
I made these little tiny pita breads (how do you say that? because they weren't chips...) to take to a party tonight. It left me wondering, should I get large tortoise shell glasses and a cardigan with elbow patches and carry a book under my arm? Because I feel like looking like an absent minded professor might cover up or account for the fact that I kept finding flour dustings from the pita's on my sweater dress. I think I'm gonna go for it. Note to self: always go to a party with a book tucked under an arm. Ho! It could double as a little lap table!
Utter genius.
Until someone thinks I'm stealing their coffee table book at the end of the night.
That would be outlandish.
You know what is crazy? The title of this blog makes sense, it doesn't have some obscure meaning to just me, AND it directly correlates to this blog.
You're thinking joie de vivre.
I'm thinking torn curtain.
Where's my crypticosity and made up words?

Yes sir, run, run to your test sir
it will not wait for you
you may hurry until you are dead
but the test is always testing
until your spirit is flagged
and victory is void
forget the grade, dear sir
it will just spin you around
until, until, until, until
it was all better in my head
before I could join pen to paper
but testing doesn't care.

I had this phase last January of putting together words in different combinations because there were all of these potential possibilities that we were never using because they didn't make sense. Or they were redundant.
How did we decide that?

What two futures combine to become half?

It's happened again.
Two things really.
I woke up for my 8 am shift when my boss called me at 9:30am.
And I've gotten sucked into reading food blogs again.
I usually keep my kitchen life pretty basic. My soup (vegetable broth, potatoes, carrots, celery, maybe onion or garlic) or maybe a coarse pesto (basil or parsley, olive oil, parmesan, salt, pepper, some nuts), and bien sûr my pretty little sandwiches.
I'm in the west. An isolated west. A kind of isolated suburbanite college town west. I have limited resources. And looking at pictures and reading about other people's adventures in finding quince trees and then making quince caramels is kind of a beautiful experience for me. The little dashboard on my Firefox window keeps growing. Now it's not just an exalted spot for Chocolate & Zucchini, I've got Chez Pim and The Amateur Gourmet on my watch list.
This isn't the best thing I could be doing with my time. You see, I live in a small apartment leaving one room to be my bedroom, my office (...we university students have offices....maybe I should stop reading blogs of professional "amateur" chefs that have offices....), my vanity area, and also my set for Super 8mm films. The 8mm films tipped the balance. My room has been torn apart for the last week in an attempt to make a film about a mécanicien français, my little loner French mechanic that I've been writing about for a few years. He's really so far just a collection of post-it notes and napkins I've rubber-cemented into the little notebooks I always carry around with me.
And the movie making hasn't happened yet. Last week the camera wasn't working, this week I've been busy catching up on my 19th Century French history and Victor Hugo. And, oui, watching The Hills. I've written a haiku about this television show selection of mine:

Oh MTV
Reality
Shine Down on me

Which isn't even a proper haiku I believe.

I think I must partly stay at the grill because my Boss just laughs at me when I don't wake up for work. My Boss who's laughing won't fire me. I don't know why this happens. Well, really, maybe if I actually got enough sleep. Peut-être. But I've never gone a long enough period with enough sleep to know enough if I would always wake up with enough time to get to places. So that's really just an unfounded hypothesis that some people have.
And I'm not a science major, mes lecteurs, I'm not qualified to use the scientific method.

I'm dreaming that next week with the oncoming Thanksgiving vacation I will finally be able to make Pain Ordinaire and hummus.

you're joking, paisley. no more burgers, and no more workers?

Tonight was one of those nights where I would usually start thinking about finding a new job.
Instead, I finally like the girl at work who used to try to make everyone sing Little Mermaid songs at the tops of their lungs with her.

It helps that she doesn't sing the Little Mermaid anymore.

AND...

I finally have fall appropriate shoes!
They seem to say they're made in China USA. Do you think it's political statement?

that old house had lights on. panes of light.

It's been in the air a lot lately. An equation I've been avoiding.
guy+girl.
I think I was thrown off.....in kindergarten...??? But really yes. Because somehow I was built in with this factor, the x factor where I wanted to be intelligent or something or somehow I was hyper aware of the seeming lack of depth of massive amounts of girls giggling together and accompanying each other to the bathroom. It has something to do with that. Or maybe copying the drawings of ma soeur who seemed to me to be independent, strong, cool and wearing flannel, having parties, and reading books. Or how I was always called upon to fill the role of the mean step-sister or witch in childhood games. Or when I was left alone to my own devices and I remember often playing at being a construction worker. Not that I'm butch. Hardly.
I just know that in high school I decided to try and master girl+intellectual, smart, eccentric. I mastered eccentric. But other than that I kind of turned into a failed poet.
Recently I've been trying for girl+I don't know all of the answers and I'm going to be wrong but viva la revolución!

I like to subtract boy.

Because I'm afraid of other things that might be subtracted.
Boy might not equal my music tastes, my people tastes, my fashion tastes, my food tastes, my movie tastes, my religious tastes, my political tastes, my philosophical tastes. And there are ways I know I could compromise. But there are some things I can't. For instance:
He must like Macs better than PC. I can't live in a house that runs Windows. I just know it. I think it would kill me a little bit each time I thought about a PC being part of my lover's soul. Linux, fine great, just don't get too techie on me. But Microsoft is a death machine.
And I would kind of have a problem if he didn't understand or at least respect that Balenciaga is better than some store in the mall.
Those might seem like terrible reasons to you but...
je pense, donc je suis.
This smart kid, Descartes, said that once.

can a bit more come out of the vault?

I reeeallly like onion.
(that was half of my lunch)

I'm trying something new tonight besides adding peas to my basic soup recipe, which (bite...hoo boy too hot still) has turned out just fine. I'm making a scaled down batch of these tomates confites that I was staring at hier á 3h22 du matin. I love to pour over the pictures and the words of Chocolate and Zucchini which is where I found this recipe. I don't love it quite so much at 3:22 am but...

Here is something slow and not of much excitement, but it's never been said before by me.
I almost always eat three meals a day. Even if one meal is just a slice of bread. It's got to be three times at least. I taught myself to eat three meals a day the last half of my freshman year of high school and I'm still too wary. I have a vivid recollection of my permanent pass to go to Algebra 1 late. My stately walk down to the generalized cafeteria. A s'mores poptart. Classy. But habitual. I had to have habit. Habit, habit, habit, habit, habitual. Ritual. That's it. I couldn't lose a ritual. I don't even aime bien s'mores poptarts. A solitary walk to the empty peer room which was filled with old couches. A saggy wool and polyester couch where I sat on the edge of my seat as I broke off pieces of poptart and took small bites in some sort of pattern. My left was windowed, so sunny cold. The sunny winter cold; I'm glad that's what I remember because so often the winter was just white. White on top, white beneath. Right and behind was the health teacher's classroom connected by a door. Ajar. The door would be ajar and I would hear her teach junior high lessons. That was the snack time. Every day. Ritual.
Algebra 1 was kind enough to allow this. However English had fits about my once weekly absence. I loved/hated the gone-ness. It was ritual. But outside of that and into that office of muted purples and low lights. Calming? Ha! Hateful. Even the venetian blinds where dark muted purple. I could sometimes see through the slantings a nice sunny world outside. Why couldn't we take a walk instead? Why would I tell you why I stopped eating when I can see the foundation painted on your skin and your brows are always knitted up and overly concerned?
Now I'm a little sickish and the appetite is a little abate-ish. But I hold to three meals and I pour in peas for an extra vitamineralwater.
This was probably all the more an entertaining blog before I started outing a few things that had never been said before by me.

Onion-cutter hello'ed today by throwing me a bite size Twix. I didn't catch it but I said hello back. And Movie-quoter showed up today in the sportsy jersey work uniform with a long silver pirate-y necklace.
Is that your bling?
yeah.
Later I bumped into him in the too small grill and apologized asking him not to gang-bang me.
When I'd converted to city hit the street clothes I showed him my long silver necklace.
Check out my bling.
It looks like something Indian.
Oh si, j'ai dit (what convenience espagnol and french rhyme!)
Do you ever feel odd when you're half inside a dessert case cleaning it out? I felt a bit happy I knew what I was doing and a bit awkward in the old and hanging khakis I porte (that's some kind of french verb for wearing clothes. I probably conjugated it wrong. do you think I did that on purpose?)

My gosh I could even go on more!

Because the Great brought up existentialism. Finally. Je l'aime. I would love to say I'm existentialist but I'm a bit mixed up with essence. However I've been fixated, like my fixation with vulnerability, sin, and wrinkly old people. And it parallels! He says they search for something in The Fall of humanity. Their trouble with organized religion, institution, education lies in the essentials and generalizations. How could encompassing sentences be said they asked because how could you know. How could you know something you haven't existed?
I'm looking for the great and grace in your wrinkles, in your misspeaks, in my downs, struggles, in our hypocrisy. I can't find the lines to separate the ills into ills away from high-mindedness. Maybe I'm losing my way but I'm stuck on the lessons of adultresses, the reference to John 3:16 on the bottom of my Forever 21 bag a clothing store my friend described as being "full of cheap clubbing outfits," I'm stuck on the blue collar worker mon cousin who is genius but wants nothing of sophistication, or my boss who only likes to watch sports. I'm stuck on all of these things that have edges that sometimes fit like a puzzle but they keep melding and molding and not fitting and switching. I'm nothing but essentials. But I feel so un-wise because I can't know these ideas that fleet through my brain because I've never lived a day of them. I go in circles chased by my belief in existentialism and organizations and I won't end it. I'm choosing this.

oh boy, the only things that I understand

The blue rose which signifies hope for an unattainable love is often predominantly featured on lingerie.

The good which was recorded was the good of sad kings
sad kings
sad kings
sad kings
oh I echo it around and around
following it about
but put at the end of the day
half heartedly
and the guilt builds
emanating and escalating
oh no!
not toys! not failings!
endless rows of buildings
and I've opened every door
instead of walked down the street
out of view and into the sunset.

"the prosaic poetry of everyday speech*"

There were cirrus clouds today.
You know the lament that everyone's always looking at the ground, they never look up? I am not that lament. I can't stop looking up. I walked to work with the nearness of tripping over sidewalk cracks because the sky was striped. Veritably striped with lines of clouds in perfect measurement. What was this formation? How was the rest of the world not in neck-craned unison with me? Art! Art, children! There's art above us! [I'm being too pretentious, je m'ecuse]
When I entered the grill I rushed to the counter to ask anyone if they knew what kind of clouds they were. If I was to find the information out anywhere I'm sure I could find it out at the grill. I'm certain that with the wide range of people there I could find out anything.
Cirrus.
It's a layman's library. A conversational library.
My bit to throw into the pot from a short life of experience and periodic shy-dom:
keep saying hello.
Maybe the receiver is a bit slow to hello back.
Someday they might be ready to respond--what jokes you could find then sending laughs down into grandchildren's upturned eyes--but you've withdrawn. Oh frowns and busy streets of New York.
We're all intimidating dinosaurs.

I hear tell the Movie-quoter wore a hideous wig and make-up yesterday for Halloween. He went around tossing his synthetic strands telling everyone he was beautiful.

I've beat the french lab at their own game. I have a friend qui teaches some such of the français. He's all about the revolution baby.

*Worthen The Wadsworth Anthology of Drama

I can't keep rubbing my eyes they'll go puffy again.

"Twenty years ago, the Cuban writer Guillermo Cabrera Infante sat in my sky blue Volkswagen Karmann Ghia, about ten inches away from me, and told me:
'Las canciones populares han reemplazado la poesía en este siglo.' Popular songs have taken the place of poetry in this century. He was dead serious.
I agree. And this is why I play my stereo as loudly as possible."
[an excerpt from Waiting for Snow in Havana by Carlos Eire.]

I had looked forward to this concert for two months or maybe my whole life. Would I have liked them when I was younger? It's almost necessary I should be alive and listening to music now and this band be around and playing now.

In The Great's class on Wednesday he brought to our attention the album cover of Who's Next (The Who).

Yes. It is how it looks, they just peed on that monument. A large cement block in a slag heap. A monument to a destructive materialistic world and they peed on it.
In their song Won't get fooled again there's that long sequence of repetitive synthesizerness that pushes out a little too long but then is broken by a human cry.

Outside in line we had waited in a construction zone surrounded by unknown chums in long tunics, leggings, and thrift-store jackets. Girls who style their hair to look as though they've chopped it all off in chunky desperation and boys who style their hair to look as though it's never been chopped.
The first opening band came up. A boy with his synthesizer and a girl with her jazzercise. I danced. And despite the fact that I couldn't quit beaming excitement I notice her face is lined. Is she youthful? Stage make-up? No one understood a word jazzercise girl was singing. I remembered a time when I went to a local venue with a couple of boys and as we leaned against the brick inside wall we mainly watched the crowd that watched the band. A band of boys in glitter and wings, a dress and jeans, four-eyed glasses. The only thing we could make out that glitter king said was "Something bad is going to happen tonight."
What's the story behind her? Graceful dance moves. Lines on her face that don't laugh. Look at it, it's a perfect film in a box. Expressionism. Flat foundation and prettied eyes. Hair sprayed into school girl curled ponytail. A Ralph Lauren Polo sweater. Exaggerated grace.

So I've got a built in Brechtian filter from all of these classes I've been taking.

Architecture In Helsinki was almost enough to turn me into bobby-socks with a Beatles poster except that I like to dance in my own little world. I did however try to profess my love to them between sets, but as my voice is a bit whispery none of this carried the five feet over speakers and amps to the band. AIH doesn't even specifically sound superb live. The harmonious levels are much more mastered on an album. It's the spirit not the law. And I love the spirit. I love the boy in red jeans standing on tiptoe playing the trumpet.

Onion-cutting dishwasher patted me on the back today.

utilities are of the devil

A friend once told me I walk like a happy pregnant mother. I am neither pregnant nor mother. Perhaps happy.

Fall is intoxicating.
I can't stop crunching through the leaves.

why are you calling everyone mo, mo?

I was sitting in a café of a Barnes and Noble yesterday. I love a good small bookstore full of identity but how many places will leave you alone with books, food, chairs, and tables? Play place olé.
There was a boyfriend visiting a green-aproned café clerk and a table of friends off to my right. I had lost a couple at a Thai food restaurant and another girl was somewhere shelved and reading. Probably in the political section.
I was "browsing" through a book of E.B. White essays (although I knew, even then, it was a joke to even suggest that book was making it back to the shelves. ka-ching)
and listening to a mix of Cat Power, Bob Dylan, and the Lovin' Spoonful. All I needed was my Fly Wild sweatshirt (complete with mallard ducks in V formation) and I would have been so golden cozy. I looked up from my book at one point to see the sign above one of the bookshelves "Diseases." Underneath was a book with title "It's your Hormones."
Diseases?
Oh well. I saw a book about Geisha's in the African American section.

He rode a roller coaster and that seemed to be the key

Warning: I am in one whole and happy piece eating my breakfast of apple and hot cocoa in my apartment.

Thursday afternoon I was curled up on a hospital bed in an ER crying. J'ai la tolérance des dieux for pain. Or I thought. Maybe I'm not quite there yet. I was in my pleated polyester dress with my Audrey Tautou bangs staining the hospital pillow with my not waterproof mascara.

On a scale of one to ten, ten being the worst, what would you rate your pain?
I'm sure she was wearing scrubs. The light green pants with the children's printed tent top.
Nine.
I won't rule out that it could be worse.

There are some amazing things you realize when you force yourself to think through the pain.

I didn't start crying until I asked for help.

ethics kill a smirk but fake funny accents will always renew the twinkle

A Short Haiku

Ok.
I'll add in hello terms
strobe light

My boss imparted some wisdom to me today. I woke up at 8:21 a.m.
My shift starts at eight.
I'm never going to be able to keep a real job. I just can't seem to wake up, I said over to my left as I chopped up celery for my tri-weekly ritual of soup making.
He stops and thinks about it for a while. You need to be excited to wake up. You need to have something exciting to wake up for.
Having onion-cutting-dishwasher-boy tell me he likes my haircut isn't exciting? I suppose it might be only heartwarming.
So heartwarming doesn't send a jolt of alertness through my half-dazzled sleep ensnarled self.
I used to be an admirable pro at the discipline of rising by myself early. Oh those yester years I can hardly recall. This was even long after I stopped begging my mom to let me wake up before 7 a.m. This was long after I learned the pure blissful joy and need of sleep.
What was it?
What happened?

It was the minutes turning into seconds and the hours changing from days to minutes.

I have a fascination with tattoos. And I've recently had the idea of hanging out in a tattoo parlor. Maybe it's the whole idea that I'd get one but I know it's too permanent for me. Too pretentious for me, I change and improve and disprove, sin and repent too much. And so now I need to know everything about tattoos and the people who get them.

look at those cavemen go

How is it I spent seven and a half hours trying to edit and burn a two and a half minute music video? Yes, sadly, for the first time I missed the Great's class.
And it has come to my attention, ma cousine must think I am the most uncomfortably awkward person on earth.
What did you and mon ami talk about when he drove you home lastnight?
son ami--her friend and not in an I-hope-you-weren't-talking-about-me sense.
Maybe in some ways I am. My interaction with my roommates seems to be limited to the times when I indulge in watching MTV reality TV shows. But can we really be too harsh seeing as how I'm generally only home to do homework and sleep. That's right, not even eat. Eating is done during stolen moments when a project is taking insanely long to render or compress. Sad for this foodie. The bagels on campus aren't even that great. Oh well. I think the last time I burned my tongue on the hot chocolate at my grill, well, I think I did permanent damage.
And I should stop awkwardly ducking my head as I smirk to myself. Why not share my smirk with the paisley wearing football player? Why not smirk him in the eye? Why duck my head because coworker 1 and ma soeur are both trying to be my yentas? This is my year to step out and smirk you all in the eye.
Encore!
World, to you I say fastly and proudly: This is my year to step out and smirk you all in the eye!
¡Viva la revolución!

Anarchy all the wavers
utilities are the same anywhere
march march march march march
a beat
a beat
tap tap rappa tap tap
rappa tap tap

"child star, child star, child star, child star, child star, child star, child star*"

oui, mes deviors, je sais, vous m'appellez

"This is not your best work^"

*Upon this Tidal Wave of Young Blood by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.
^ My quotation of a TA, because I feel it fits this blog.

j'aime les ésharpes

Mon professeur tells me it's very French for the lab to tell me how to say things. Apparently they are taught how to argue and my "twisted logic" doesn't fit into their learnings. Downfall. I shall say it all anyway. "Sans uniforme est égale aux mensonges." Voila.
It is done.

I spend sweet fall days in the basement of a building in an editing lab now. Oh edit edit like a frog waiting for flies when all of the flies are outside. I guess frogs have to sleep sometimes. Sometimes there needs to be underground time, eh? Edit edit.

Ho! Oh please, watch On Approval so you can enjoy Ho! too.

I have found out, that as ma mère I laugh the loudest and most joyfully in the theatre and I take after mon père as I am never serious but everyone always thinks I am. Vraiment, a boy at the grill asked if he could go on break when he was done with his doings. A nice hardworking folk dancing boy. I said no as I always say no when they can go. I said no, oh no, but yes. I guess dead-pan doesn't work at work. Another child asked to go to el baño. Ask? It's the baño! Again I had to clarify and tell him to go. The dear children will keep out of the bathroom but will not stop the shoving the chocolate pudding in each other's faces. Wait I guess that is a bit what children do. Why haven't figurative phrases kept out of life? They're not really children.

And for you, Frenchie, my paper had full marks on compelling style. Vote for me! Vote for me! Le Président who is the king!
Ho!

Red plaid!

rustle and layered to beat. what flying hair? no, LOTION LOTION

We had to hand in our first storyboard today. The problem is, we already made the films last weekend. And I had to take a quiz on Monday. And I never carry sheets of paper around with me. Alors, aujourd'hui (which doesn't rhyme with "today" but you could pretend it does in your pretty mind) I had to hold up my storyboard that was missing a corner to ask my professor if he wanted a new one drawn up.
I decided I need to organize things a little better.

A lot of people frown at the milieu who study and analyze analyze analyze films and theatres. As if milieu (a place and humans both?) were stabbing art repeatedly and heatedly. Debating metaphors behind snobisme brick-built closed doors. They couldn't have possibly meant all that. We're making it up. Oh, but step back, just as the milieu can go too far, so can you, the other milieu (which can be pronounced milyer, take note). Never neglect They studied the same as We. They were taught to analyze so much.

Circles.
There are always circles to everything.
For what circles around in logic may come from beginning to end to I see your point. War must be a delusion that something can be linear which becomes the biggest and saddest mess of scribbles. A black mark in lives, history.

Naturalism. Can be so fascinating but something with such potential to be a horrible heartless gutteribe of life. Momma Roma. Are all of Italy's film prostitutes (not pornography. Cabiria) hysterically laughing, rural women? Nights of Cabiria, 8 1/2, Momma Roma. Oh, Momma Roma. Not a typical Naturalist piece selection as par usual for The Great film prof. With the combination of my youth in a rural outcropping, Resurrection by Tolstoy, and dear Momma Roma and her boy Etorre I almost cried for a state so eternal yet only a desperate fleeting moment. God sometimes the world is made so Heaven is a star and life is the endless, shapeless, directionless black abyss of space. Very little else can remind me of my privilege. No political idea is enough to counter the human traits that allow some to amass wealth and others to further degrade. We have created money and it is the current form that buys us in and out of degradation.
I feel that prostitutes teach the best lessons.
I never want to teach any lessons.

I'm slightly becoming british. I can't stop typing "humour" or "behaviour" I try to correct myself. Though, why? Why correct it? That's just another border. I'm going to climb into Swiss mountains and be Russian or Tahitian.

I am a limited child in french. My ambiguous speak n'existe pas in the language of love. yet. Alors they make us cram into a French writing lab for our three page papers of adult third gradedness. The Frenchies run the lab pretty tight. I always end up arguing with the Frenchie. She can cross out my sentences, je m'en fiche. But what about my voice. My, you make me sound so dry and not of dry sense of humour (British?). And so I argue my points and refuse to change phrases every once in a while. At least I'll have character even if it is grammatically incorrect and makes no sense to the proper madame who peruses words and not spaces. Have you no sense of humanity, woman?! I become the outraged américainne shaking my fists on front pages of futility.
Does it just take time? Do I have to lose myself in the meantime? Why won't France accept me?

There's a winter dying to fill up the outside. October 16th? Don't surrender outside! It's not time yet. I want galoshes and wool socks first!

Today I brought a long mixing spoon to the dishwashers. There wasn't anyone there. So I rinsed it off, dear woman who job coaches for the boys, she keeps getting burnt pots. So I rinsed my barbeque spoon off. I turned around and what should I see in the corner but the film quoter. He was sitting cross legged, arms folded, head down. Was he praying? Was he sleeping? How long had he been there? Most importantly how had he blended in?

It's 12:16 am. I should be going to bed because I work at eight in the morning.
poo-pooh.

The first time I noticed October the 14th I was sitting on the edge of my bed. I had just laced my shoes, it was afternoon; I was looking out my window. I could see the front yard across the street layered with yellow leaves over old summer grasses. The little house with the old woman who was so short and had such large glasses. The kind that take over your whole face. Did she always wear blue, or did I make that up?
The house next to that was light gray with a door rojo. I think my third grade friend's mom's old boss lived there. Manicured. Formal. Did anyone really live there?
I could see lots of tops of trees and tops of houses, homes.
I was about to jog about town with a cross country team of mine.

I noticed October 14th because I realized it was the last time I would ever notice an October 14th from that vantage point. From that room, that seat, that window. That state.

One takes last in stride just as if it was first. Physically, logically, reasonably, right? C'est le même, n'est-ce pas?

I sent my resumé to the uni broadcasting company like a good child. I sent it in with my fingers crossed and a love for the grill and a squint at my principles.
Sometimes you do have to squint at principles. Just to learn what's outside them. Because maybe something has a point.
But my point is the joy of digression. I don't want editorial. No interstitials. No exploitation of emotion. Lets have no drama, no sound bites. I want me, one mic and the world.
I'm trying to bite my palm again.

How could I ever leave the movie-quoter, the ESPN songs, the football player with multiple aliases, or my boss who calls us all crazy. I could maybe leave the girl who sings The Little Mermaid at the top of her lungs and pesters baseball players every Monday night. But I figure that even just needs more time.
I will graduate from this uni with a degree in grill.
I don't want Hollywood, so what's the problem?


...a few camera skills shy of a crew, that's what.

oh, bonne nuit. C'était une belle jour. Ma vie, ça va. et encore, ça va. va. va. va. va. va.

what's last and what's first?

circular.

biting my palm.

Oh what a night. A little prosaic but I've got to get it all out! Now!

Sometimes I feel like I'm in a dream. Like I've won the prize for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Am I really a film major? It's like they let me in to play because they know I'll love it and it's just a little wish they can grant for a little while. Why not? I'm funny to have around.
The autumn smells richer. Dreams. Fogs. Mists. Passions. Fading sunlight. White balance. Theatre analysis. Limited space. Deep Space.

Color, texture, lights, patterns, camera, sound speed, ACTION.

Seven hours at the grill tonight. It was an effing major football game. I would have wanted to crawl into the smoker to end with a hickory smoke flavor, except for a good friend. Instead I sang tonight (no Little Mermaid of course) I smiled. Well I almost yelled at my boss.
Ok, I'll get sides for the burgers
I'm one step ahead of you, the cinnamon apples are cooked
YES I'll keep moving
well that customer wanted---
Sure I'll take a minute and take the bread from the oven to the proofer

ask him what sides he wants for this steak
I look wildly around and see a few hims. Was it you who had the steak?
ask him what sides he wants for this steak!
ask him what sides he wants for this steak.
THAT'S WHAT I'M DOING.

Can we lock the doors?
Why?
Because we close at nine.
How will people get in if they want to watch the football game?

They won't.

But I am here at a restaurant and my purpose is to serve. That's not a bad thing.
Frustrating.

I am continually confused though by customers.
Why have you been waiting in line to order a fatty burger for half an hour?
This is where I really have to bite my tongue:
I was just coming to check on my order.
I look in front of me at the row of springy hooks. Ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, ticket, David.
How long ago did you order?
About 10 minutes.
.....
How long did you wait in line? Oh, 40 minutes? What do you think all of those people in line ahead of you were doing? Ordering food? Really? Well, it's a 45 minute weight.

Even more phenomenal are the people who are told right away, before they order, it will be an hour long wait and THEY STILL ORDER.
WHY?! Restaurant food isn't that great. You must be the worst cook EVER.


I could go on and on and on and on.

And so my friend and I met together after work to burn a few printer paper signs we put up tonight in the grill. Three. Three signs. I picked up a box of matches chez moi, went to chez friend, and sat in a parking lot burning papers and wet newspapers.

We wrote some new verses to our song.
Our August was spent in the grill with the sole purpose of feeding football players. Hoo. Rah. We watched ESPN tout le temps. Except for Little League, this fealt like dying. So we set new lyrics to an old I-mourn-my-cowboy song.
ESPN
Why don't you run out of sponsers
your co-hosts are monsters
they drive me insane

The new bits are just as clever but wouldn't pass a Scrabble game.

Tant pis.

And I still have a french paper to write!

my health is soaked in olive oil....?

In the spring I went shopping with a friend. We don't normally shop together and I would normally never go into American Eagle. I have mon père's voice in my head asking me why I would pay to wear a companies name. However, I wandered around in the store as she scoured the sale racks. She found a great deal on jeans, I found a men's shirt that said, "Do you want me to buy you a drink or should I just give you the money?" No, I don't take drinks or money. Yes, I was offended at all females being generally instated into life as prostitutes. It makes me suspicious and sad it could sometimes be true.

I was looking at the fruit salad in the great white bin at the grill. I had cut it and I knew its entire genetic make-up. However I found myself looking at the hotel room in Pretty Woman. The colors piled in large masses of flowery shapeless dresses. Is this fruit my tower of captivity?
I love the grill.

In seventh grade my appetite lost itself. For a girl who had always though she was fat, it is a chilling thing. The only thing to rival it is the first time I made myself throw up. I was empowered yet powerless. I didn't choose not to eat, I couldn't make myself. But it spurred on the calorie counting, the weight-loss, the binging, the purging, the terror, the self-destruction.
Thank God for redemption and love.

Mon petit, mon petit
I didn't mean to pour the wassle down your back
I had no accord
no thought
no c-major
the christmas party was blustering around me
in an all too familiar fashion
I will wash your feet

News for the world: I have a passion: documentary.
There.
The list is now two items long, people of the kitchen table conversation.
My Passions: skinny jeans and documentaries.

I walked past a time or two to see if it was you

I watched an audience watch a student film today. I also wrapped myself up in post production sound editing: which I would somewhat love to never worry about again. I dimmed the lights and donned a fantastic usher vest.

Last night I spent in a dark room. A developing room. We all traipsed over to an old apartment to group into enclosed bathrooms. We milled about in variating patterns. A stand across the room, corner of the couch, guitar hero, professor's glasses, agitate the spaghetti ball of film in the sink.
What do you know about university children who's hands smell of developing chemicals?
I know they must be thinking their own thoughts often similar to mine. There is a terrible awkward girl. But this is a great small film classes. And great small film classes have no room for outcasts. Because she has a story. And we're all liberalites and hater-haters. Ho!

what ho, green carpet
of multiplying floors and nightmares
clashing with blue carpet couches
and testifying of uncares
uncares for the picture to hang on the wall
uncares for the student who communes with tv
lay back into cooties of generations of tenants
no one cares
no one cares
for we upholster in carpets of:
worn down
bathroom threaded
plastic fiber

"Child, there were many days of fall left to be won. I tucked my scarf tenderly into my bag every morning and tried on a different cardigan on every different day. None of it was taken to because the weather stayed a gentle summer staying."

He was confused and tried to be himself. For confused reasons there were rules that became obstacles and barriers. Everything had some validity. Who was right and how could anyone have done anything better? But now as I watch the man on the screen with the tattoo, I think of the boy with the tattoo and processes. Realism? Idealism? What heart holds into you or pours out from you? Nothing so moves me; I love you my friend.

"Hi, I'm Icarus, I'm falling*"


*This is a quote from a Regina Spektor song. I don't know which one. The other quotation has no reason to be cited. It came from some well of imagination.

a hero to the lot of them

During the Nazis rise to power in Germany, Berthold Brecht was changing theatre. It had been a mainstay to lead the audience to identify with particular characters. Brethold wanted his audiences to be critical. An audience cannot be critical if they are allowed to lose themselves in a performance. "So he devised a theatre of mixed and constantly changing forms to keep the audience aware they were watching not an imitation of life but a show with an urgent and dialectical purpose" (Rabiger, Directing: Film Techniques and Aesthetics, Third Edition).

Brechtian Distancing.
Demanding.
Nazis rising.
Timing is everything.

slowly filling time distilling and an oregon moment

I have noticed I've been picking up the colloquialisms of the grill. Like my boss I keep thinking I should be saying "Whatchoo doin?" But not in an overly quoted drunken commercial way. In a grammatical error way. "Whatchoo doin" is not a native thing to say for a Scandinavian. Néanmoins, Joachim du Bellay encouraged France to do like the romans and devour all that's best of a culture and make it your own.
Watchoo doin?

This year I stood up and said I WILL BE ME. And I stand up and say it over and over in between times of crawling into the box and curling up in quiet shrouds of hermatism. Being me sadly requires putting a stop to many a waterfight and preaching safety in the workplace.

I like crèpes. I LOVE them with lemon and sugar. Apparently it's the way the English do it. And who could resist. Ce n'est pas possible. Oh sweet drug I call thy name lemon.
So that was my plan for a warm end to a rainy day meal. Guess what. You can't cook crèpes in a cheep college apartment in a cheep teflon pan without cooking spray. Ce n'est pas possible. I had to drop that pancake mush like it was 1989. Plan A: strike.
Plan B: create a film. Black and White Reversal Super 8 extravaganza complete with a mime. What was that about the camera not working? Oh.
So I sat amid the varied impressions. The impressions are difficult because I have to ignore them to find the realists. Why is my friday night spent in art history divorce papers?

Then I thought, commence oh what sleep may have you
but sleep have me not
the tea is too stale for my immunable liver
I bumped up to milk for a sweet silver sliver
Doth not I tire?
Oh no I am wired.

oh no.
how lame.

"let it be, let it be, let it be, yeah let it be"

I watched a beautiful Mongolian film, The Cave of the Yellow Dog. And I learned a great lesson. Try to bite the palm of your hand. You can't do it. You can't have everything you want, even if it's close. You cannot have your palm and bite it too.

the fish bowl was curtained. barn. barn.

Today I ran. A few sections only jog. And after a brief stint I wrapped up the headphones to hear the rays and warm grass. "I've been acting like sour milk fell on the floor/It's your fault you didn't shut the refrigerator*" served it's purpose in the first fifteen feet: I was out the door.
I saw a woman being picked up from work in a dirty diesel construction landscaping truck. Maybe he and she did not have the jobs they dreamed of. Maybe they never dreamed of a job. But how beautiful.
But that's romanticism. We can't stay in that season. There are more roses to smell.
I also noticed when I say Hi as I pass on a run, it sounds nasally.

There was a large gold vinyl arm chair at my grandparents. I once chopped my hair off down to my scalp. Then three years old, I sat behind the gold arm chair and snipped everything I could. My sock. Just a snip. The inside of a pocket of the skirt I was wearing. Just a snip. I sat behind the gold chair and looked up creative and guilty. I started going to a salon recently. Fantastic. Does this mean I'm sitting in the gold chair now? It's vinyl, is it all that great? Where do I stand in relation to the gold chair? I think I'll just play musical chairs by myself. And occasionally lose.

There is a sticker on my textbook that says: "Used saves textbooks from your bookstore." Who is this used that saves books from my bookstore?

Pit. pat.
pit.
pat.
tick tick pat.
tick tick tick tick tick.
pat.
pit.

pit.
pit-pat.
pit pit pit pit pit pit pat
pit pit pit pit pit pit pat tack.

Cement block porch. Card table. lawn chairs. plaid blanket. "I'm just sitting back loving you**)

*Gwen Stefani's The Sweet Escape
**The Lovin Spoonful's Lovin' You

there seems to be a central idea to what rolls along

It would be nice not to work, sometimes flows on and through. But through it goes.
One: I spend money
Two: I love the grill.

Face it.

Just like the discordant melody I love to be pounded out over and over again. Beating into rhythm and whim. Nuance.

Next step is that. Step. Step out of the box. Out of the box and into life.
A dance. In and out, test and taste. Spit it out again, one two three.

You know I've forgotten a lot of my childhood. Haven't we all. I mean though, in a reaction to the pain in my head, it's all gone. I don't remember it. I can't feel it. Vague recollections like a third party observer. A moment at a time. Sunday evenings with a glance at a warm corner as I head into the cold bathroom. So familiar. Did the sickness create part of the box?
One thing I know is a bathroom floor. The cold, the ever soft tufted rug. The antiseptic smell of the toilet bowl. One bathroom to the next. Downstairs, upstairs, school gym. I can't cry over physical pain. I have twice in the last ten years. Both of them had to do with surgery.
It's all just moments. Moments from a small corner of my brain that wasn't being wracked and stretched and twisted and tightened and pounded and everydayed. Migrained.

So you don't remember these things but somehow it wove into something else and then into you. Some of the trailings leaved into good things. Somethings dripped into bad. It doesn't ever end. Or begin. The answer begins and ends in a question. To define? How? It isn't done.

But I enjoy the searching. Searching me, searching history, paths, life, your life, his.

At times I've experimented. With good and bad, boundaries, skies, plains, mountains, berries, accents, tomb stones. To feel what I can. What is it all? Where does it stand? Which side of the line that lies where? But mainly I am compelled by the aged child of ninety and nine sitting in a restaurant booth all by themselves.

I can't leave it alone.


Today I told the film-quoting dishwasher he was creating a traffic jam. He told me he was a door. I asked if we could lock him up.

I'll patiently sit here with my camera unfolded on the world. Sitting, holding the shot.

one song i float my boat

One proverb for you to show you that I care:

Three dishwashers can do more than two.


I saved some film children today by yelling:
C'est la guerre, c'est la pamplemousse! Je voudrais un croissant! Qu'est-ce que tu fais? Qu'est-ce que tu fais?!!
That's war! That's grapefruit! I would like a croissant! What are you doing? What are you doing?!!!

the truth can be such an absurdest piece at times.

take the world into your smile

I have decided the grill is a fascist dictator.
Alors, I stand and shout proudly VIVA LA REVOLUCIÓN!

Not that I really know too much about fascism, they don't teach you anything but republican or democrat in school these days. More than that is total anarchy. I learned from You've Got Mail and Greg Kinnear to associate Italy's Franco with fascism. And leather jackets and movie theatres. I. just. can't. help myself.

Oh but I can. I grill to live not live to grill. I'm taking my blood back, I'm going to live. Yes how I love the grill, but dear grill this must be a healthy thing with some give and take. "If you wanna be my lover/ you have got to give." If I keep giving, I will give until all I have is gone and I must quit and live in the streets. There would be no friends with couches to call home. I would have given you my friendships, grill. You will not be my abusive boyfriend.
VIVA LA REVOLUCIÓN!
VIVA VIVA VIVA!

Already I'm smiling more.

Yesterday I woke up and reset my alarm. Half asleep me decided a real breakfast wasn't worth getting up for. But then it happened. Déjà vu. Peaking out from the unbleached muslin I am wrapped into I can tell by aura of the rays of light shining onto the wall next to me it's later than I wanted to wake up. It isn't always the same time. For some reason light gives off a certain feeling when you're late. Rain or snow, sun, hail, morning, afternoon.
15 minutes to my first class.
Half asleep me thought I was smart and didn't need to look at the numbers I set for the alarm on my mobile.
12:05am.

The ipod has created further confusion in my life. I used it on my run today. That's great, I even smile more to hear my strobe-lighted tunes as I rhythm along. But whenever I hear "Brass monkey, that funky monkey" I inherently feel I must do the running man. The running man and your friendly neighborhood jog are not the same thing.

"Children it's a sin to lump all hypocrisy together. If none of us were hypocrites we would be dull and dead. There is the hypocrisy of moralling more than we can ever avail. En d'autres termes, hold yourself to a higher standard. For you will fail, you hypocrite, but on what other terms does improvement come by?"

viva la revolución.


(Song lyrics in quotes: Spice Girls' Wannabe; Beastie Boys' Brass Monkey)

these are my static works of clay for you today

Here in my language I can communicate to you (for that is what is important, that I communicate to you, not that I am verbosing). I can be free with form and grace and style and say all I want to you. But I am bound by this language, this country. Withdraw these native things, I want to expand to those new horizons I've always been gazing after. Bound. The travel ties my tongue. I could drown in those autumn leaves before I could think of a way to express my need for help.

I'm guessing, francophonally, I communicate at the level of a 10 year old.


The other day at the grill I was trying to reach newer spiritual fields in my reflections and I looked down at my hands and realized how very much I was handling a chicken. A smoked and trussed up little chicken. There are times when it hits you that what is in your hands at one time stretched its mini-me muscles. That flesh and cavity, there, stiff in front of my face, there were thought processes once attached to what I'm holding. And as I'm tearing this dead chicken to bits for a large batch of soup, wondering transcendently, from back by the dishwashers comes an unexpected monologue.
Obi-wan. Luke! Use the force Luke!
During the day there are some middle-aged developmentally disabled men who do the dishes. Such an odd broad term. I learned on my spiritual day, there is a child of the movies among them.
ADRIAN!!
Here is classic cinema brought to me by my neighborhood dishwasher.
I asked him what his favorite genre was, apparently we can find him among the horrors and gorrors of the world.
Now he continues to regale me with movies clips and classic rock songs.

Did you know candy corn and pumpkins are made with real honey? Sleep safe and sound with that knowledge citizens of time.

Today I was discussing the aging process and assisted living with a friend as we lunched together upon a wall. The sun was crisp and everything was brisky color enriched and folded. Scarf me up. Oh friend of mine was explaining the character of dears she worked with at an A.L. place. One inhabited a mother role, another was sweet and frail but insisted on helping move about the long banquet table. What is it they're learning in this process? It must be such a beautiful, tragic and tender time. A time when bodies fail and minds might too--but there has been and continues to be life. And life knows. It lives, it breaths, it feels, it grows. How rich, how sad, to know so much, or know to have known so much, to have done so much and seen so much and now to be set on our social constructs as so little. I want to kneel at their feet and take their hand and plan adventures for us all to live-out.
But here in the A.L. places we invent a sort of community of wizened heroes. It's small and each holds his own role: the village that does not take care of a child, but each villager. What magic.

There.
I have done a thing we must be aware of because it colors facts and truths for good and ill: I have romanticized a thing.

To everything there is a season.

adieu.

under an umbrella out of a fishbowl i watch the trudging heroes

"Shoot, coward. You will only kill a man" reported last words of Ernesto Guevera

We are all only men.
(You too could be on the t-shirt of hundreds of teenagers who don't understand what you've done)

Here is the key of The Great film professor's lectures: they are a practice of what he preaches.
He preaches that life and the stuff that makes it up is flawed. Be critical, don't ever stop, but respect it. What is the intent? Is it achieved? Is it worth it? Let it be slow, let it digress, let us be patient, let us be aware.

Today I happily settled in for lecture. I had a real lunch from the soup I made. We are reaching the days when I would like a nice soup, a nice hot drink, a nice scarf, sweater, socks. Boots, friend! Boots. This lecture from The Great, full of intellectual wisdom and challenge. The soundtrack settled into my brain however went:

"You can stand under my umbrella
ella ella
eh eh eh
under my umbrella
ella ella..."

Did it fit, did it contrast, did it compare?

All this while Shakespeare bounded around our heads and tested our language skills. The Great asked us if our language had deteriorated. I stood up and shouted "Viva la revolución!" and we all ended in summersaults.

My only answer can be:
"Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
or to take arms against a see of troubles
and by opposing end them? To die; to sleep;
To sleep per chance to dream. Ay, there's the rub."

You can stand under my umbrella
ella ella
eh eh eh eh
Under my umbrella
eh eh eh

Ay, there's the rub.

(Song: Umbrella by Rihanna)

pump up the jam, pump it up, pumpkin pumpkin pumpkin

Wrap me in fall, enfold me in scarves, in sweaters, in cocoa, in pumpkins.
Paint my face for halloween
set me down in dress to sit surrounded by cinder-block squares munching candy corn to play dr. mario with mes amis.
Let me drive off with mi familia into the mountains under a cold gray sky to drink a pumpkin cheesecake shake.

pumpkin, pumpkin, pumpkin.
Ring in the seasons.

All this, and yet it is still september. Am I breaching a patriotic code? Can it be? But July is long gone. Love the summer while you can I say, but embrace all that keeps on coming. Cuddle under that unbleached muslin, something plaid, or red, or bold.

Funny as I write this the wind is growing and I'm learning there will be a nice draft to my room. A nice strong draft.

pumpkin, pumpkin, pumpkin.
Ring in the seasons.

Ring in the shivers.

the amber woman with her bouquet, encased in lilly's, some grace in a period of fighting for peace

Hello world,
I am mono.

Not to be worried at or fretted over, but it's there.
The puffed up sickness lays beneath my eyes, aches my swollen glands and passivizes my reactions to everything. Except for doors that should swing both ways but don't.
As I understand mononucleosis is a virus and only united states-ians get it.
Because it's a virus it will always be in my blood. This blood that has keeps me alive, beating, and fresh can now weary me into a world where I start seeing card board boxes in the back of a grill as comforting beds.

I wonder, will I spend all of my university years in and out of mono kingdom?
Maybe not if I learn to take care of myself.
Some lessons are hard to learn.

When I was young, in elementary school, I would stay home sick all of the time. And even when I was genuinely sick, I could still do a nice dance across a couch. PBS was my most loyal friend through those years. My favorite has been Mr. Mahuta. How he probably never thought the whistling theme song with poppy keyboard that belonged in a 1970's series would stay with me. Ho! That whistle has been in my blood even longer than mono! Take that!
I used to lay on our interesting patterned couch with a sippy cup of juice, creating intricate houses out of construction paper. They were full of bold colors and a doorway might be unframed or it could have a large swath of green paper fringe elmers glued upon it.
Such energy and vivaciousness.

How sad it was for me my freshman year when I was sick: I could curl up on a dorm bed that was four feet off the ground and do nothing. No paper, no PBS, no sippy cups, only desperate phone calls home for some sense of comfort. I couldn't away to ma soeur's, for I still had classes to see and homework to lay my head on. I, who had never been tired a day in her life (maybe crabby, but oh never tired), I had to shut my eyes and curl under covers as my friends lounged about and cracked jokes in some outer place. It was too much for a poor little freshman. So instead I often went out anyway and developed a habit of finding corners where I would curl up and sleep at parties and other social gatherings.

Now I live a bit further from those girls I've lived with. All of the people I ever really went about with, called up and whatnot, they're all gone. One's even in Paris. Ma soeur isn't even on campus which is terribly upsetting. J'ai une cousine, mais pas ma soeur. She even has a job now so I can't bother her all day long with texts and phone calls. Everything is different.

It is easy for me to wonder what the people I see these days must think of me. Rarely does any new bug see the eccentricity that won me the "Most likely to start a new fashion trend by not doing laundry" superlative in our apartment awards last winter. But is it what they see of me, what I create, my state of artistic genius and productivity, or is it how I try to send a ray of light their way?


I used to be upset and tear out ads for Walmart, Payless, or some other low mill shop in my Vogue magazine. I used to think Vogue was slipping. Fashion ads should be beautiful, not commercial. There is no room for that tawdriness. If you ever want to see true art, true beauty, true trueness, find an ad for Jil Sander. However, I have realized fashion in the past was not accessible. I have grown up in a time when it is more and more accessible, and now even we, the lower classes, can see clothing as an art form instead of just trends. I'm still not a fan of Walmart or Payless, or Pennies and co., but ho! I won't rip you out of my magazine anymore, because I foretell that someday you will be more fashion forward, you are slowly crawling into this race and we will all find access to this joy. End the snobisme.