there is not enough of it. i don't really like to celebrate the passing of it. especially because i waste so much. and new year's eve usually sucks. here's hoping this will be the best new year's ever! (which is not so hard).
-al
12.28.2002
back in time
i fell asleep watching back to the future two and woke up to back to the future three and i have this to say about it: fuck all y'all. those movies are fucking awesome. all of them. not just the first one. they do exactly what movies are supposed to do. well, certain types of movies. and they do it incredibly well. i love them. time, and travelling through it, as well as history and the projected future, are things i am extremely interested in. i think about it all too much. but man if back to the future doesn't hit me right where it hurts. sooo good. i just can't deal with people being so down on two and three. they're good. deal with it. so what if they're cheesy. that's the point. that's what's so great. it's all about foreshadowing and repitition because that's what it's all about. dig? i guess i'm not making a very good cohesive argument. oh well. i still love those movies. and no, it's NOT just nostalgia. there are movies i only like because of nostalgia. this is not one.
osc got me the trilogy dvd and each movie has it's own extras. and there are soo many extras. i don't see much point in buying a dvd that's got say, spanish language as it's only extra (unless your viewing habits include watching the movie with people who speak mainly spanish and then also who speak mainly english). so, not only are the back to the future movies almost perfect as movies, craft wise, they got the dvd thing exactly right. rock.
-al
oh well, couldn't find links
there are two new reality shows i think i will have to either make time to watch each week or tape.
the first is highschool reunion which is soo what i want to happen with my highschool reunion. i want to 'change my reputation'. ha! don't these people have lives that don't revolve around what the people they knew in highschool think of them? well i don't, but everyone else should, right? at least they get to go on a cruise or whatever. how many highschool reunions are like that? i think it's posh when they aren't in the gymnasium of the school. ok, so seriously, i am so stupidly obsessed with highschool, my own and the phenomenon. and as i near my own 10 year reunion (if it happens) (2 years!) i find myself more drawn to reunion narratives than actual highschool narratives. actually, that's not entirely true. but whatever. wait until you see the second show.
surreal world! i cannot believe they made this show. i mean, i couldn't believe celebrity boxing either, so, y'know. but oh my fucking godless fuck, how did they make this show? i forget exactly who is in it, but i remember webster and the old woman (i mean, she played a teenager but she was 30) from 90210. and kato kaelin maybe? if you don't know or can't infer, it's the real world except with washed up b grade celebrities! intense. i can't wait.
when this reality thing all started, well not started, but when the craze really got going, i made a prediction, and i want to put it in writing here. some day soon, running man the movie will come to life as a real show. death row inmates will play games to the death instead of getting lethal injection (or whatever they get in their state). seriously. a lot of people would watch that and i have my doubts about anyone in the tv industry having actual moral qualms about it.
warning: the following is probably kind of distasteful and insensitive. sorry. it has to do with 9/11 so don't read if you have some sensitivity to that topic. oh, and it also includes a spoiler for jacob's ladder. oops.
have you ever seen jacob's ladder? in case you haven't and you don't care about being surprised (if you do care, stop reading. no really, stop. stop!) the basic plot is vietnam veterans in the 80's (i think) who are going insane and sort of trying to figure out why, what they were exposed to back then. they see ghosts and stuff (i saw the movie 7 years ago, ok). in the end, it turns out they are actually all dead, died in the war. forever after seeing this movie, i felt like this had happened to me. except not the war or trauma part. but i felt like i died and was just imagining the rest of my life. now, i just want to make it clear that this was a very serious and awful feeling i had. not a whimsical movie influenced thing. it was/is just a way to describe how my depression feels. another way of saying i don't feel real, stuff doesn't feel real.
anyway, that isn't what i'm getting at though. as i wrote about those tv shows, i thought again something i've been thinking alot the past year or so which is that the world had gotten soo fucking surreal. nothing seems real. everything is a reference to something else. and the point at which it all really hit me was after 9/11. right then actually. when the tv reception finally got up again and we only got channel two. and the propaganda machine was so intense and so obvious and i was just like, 'what?' it was like living in a movie about a dystopic future. how could anyone take it seriously? and it never stopped. i saw what was basically an infomercial (not really, but the same sort of dynamic) for flags! "call now and get an additional flag at NO EXTRA COST! and if you call within the next 5 minutes, you'll get the limited edition faux gold encrusted flag pin!" real patriotic. then last christmas there was the christmas light flag. "i love christmas. and i love my country. so this was perfect for me." and of course, those are just the weird patriotism things. then we have the ENTIRE reality tv craze. and other stuff. fuck, my mind can't even list stuff right now. if i think of stuff, i'll edit it in later. but really, remember when they said 'irony is dead'? not bloody likely. remember on columbus day, they had the parade and people were like, 'we won't let the terrorists win, we're gonna celebrate columbus day'? there is irony for you. let's show those terrorists they can't win by celebrating the imperialistic journeys of a genocidal maniac. go usa!
ok, sorry, i get kind of overly emotionally bitter about these things. i have a lot of anger about all this.
so anyway, in some ways, that surreal, blank, unreal dead jacob's ladder feeling i was talking about has intensified since 'the events of september 11'. (even the phrasings are surreal). and just now when i was writing about those tv shows, something occured to me. maybe we are all dead. or at the very least, all new yorkers. or rather at the actual very least me. maybe we all died that day. i'm not sure how i feel about this thinking. i mean, i'm not serious. i don't think i'm dead. or that you're dead. and i certainly do NOT want to make light of anyone's actual death. but i am serious in that i do think everything is totally unreal. and i am serious that that makes me feel kind of awful.
i watch way too much tv. that's probably the whole problem.
-al
12.26.2002
i dreamt that i quit the band. i'm surprised actually that i haven't dreamt of it before. in the dream, i was in a deli type sit down eatery with osc and joel and i just got fed up and said i quit. then i spent the rest of the long dream crying in various places to various people with varying degrees of understanding. i think i may have said i hated osc and that was part of why i quit. ammi was there, i remember, i was trying to explain but i couldn't. i was crying. and i felt wierd telling her because i knew she wouldn't care. she'd just pretend to.
i found the dream really unsettling. probably because i'm so confused about what to do with my life and i do think about quitting. in my dream, joel was gonna play bass and they were gonna keep playing. but i don't think that would happen in real life. i hate having other people's fates dependent on me. why won't someone just send me a drummer? or send me a passion for something other than the band that will make it clear to me what i should do?
my therapist thinks i need a carreer. i do not agree. i don't know how to tell her that. i've been trying to explain to her i think i need a community. and i don't want that community to be around my carreer. what if i change my mind? no. i think i need to move. she doesn't think i should move right now. i know i should move if i really want to but i don't know that i really want to. and what if i just take all this with me? what if nothing changes? but then again, what if all i really need is to move?
i just want to run away. leave this life, start a new one. i have so many regrets. there is so much i haven't gotten over (stupid shit, too, i am so fucking stupid). i just want to regroup. begin again. reboot. it's funny though, how when i think back i can point to all the moments it would have been easy to change things. to move. to run away. to reestablish myself. but how i always feel stuck while it's happening.
-al
home at last
snow. soo much of it. it looked as if it snowed horizontally the way it stuff to just one side of the trees and utility poles. i'm glad to be back in brooklyn. i didn't get tired/upset hanging out with my parents for 4 days but i'm not sure how much longer i'd go.
christmas went well. nothing bad interfamily related happen. but around 7:30 the power went out due to the storm and everyone left. except me. my dad wasn't happy he couldn't use any of his gifts (video games and dvd's). we ended up playing trivial pursuit by candlelight. i won. go me! there was no heat though. and my parents still don't have any power. i think they're staying at my brother's tonight. only 7 houses in the whole town goes out and theirs has to be one of them.
today, while it was still light out (and therefore, in) the cat jumped up on the back of a chair, lost her balance, fell onto the coffee table and knocked a snowglobe of nyc off, smashing it, then she landed feet first on the mess. i screamed and grabbed her to check her feet for glass, and my mom ran in to see what twas going on. when she saw the snowglobe, she asked me for my camera, which i thought was super weird, since i was still worried about the cat. turns out, the snowglobe base landed upright, with the small city inside still standing. only two of the buildings had broken off the pedestal, and they were lying on the floor in the puddle of water and sparkly green 'snow'. they were, of course, the world trade center towers. my mom was kind of creeped out, but we figure it was because they were the tallest (same as in real life). still though, not a single other building broke off, and they were in the center of the display. plus, they left footprints. they fell out pretty cleanly, you know, not broken off in the middle.
-al
12.25.2002
psycho vegans
so i'm wrapping gifts, which is stupid, i know, because tomorrow they will just get unwrapped, and i put way too much energy into wrapping (this year there is paint involved) but anyway, i'm watching this movie on vh1 called 'they shoot divas don't they' about a girl avenging her mom's suicide by torturing/killing an aging diva played by jennifer beals.
jennifer beals is upset about her missing assistant (who the psycho killed, but of course only the audience knows this)
psycho: green tea. it's very soothing. when she was alive, my mom was an amatuer homeopath.
beals: in wisconsin?
psycho: yeah, we were definitely the only vegans on the block.
i want to say, 'why are the vegans on tv always psycho' but that probably isn't even true. the only other vegan i can think of offhand was in sweet november and she was sick, but not psycho. fucking psycho vegan homepaths.
-al
12.24.2002
fucking cats
why are cats so awesome? it's good i don't have cats at home, i'd never do anything. ha! cinders likes to sit on my bed about 10 minutes before i'm supposed to get up. then i don't want to get up because i think about how cinders won't sit with me at any other time, so i end up staying in bed an extra hour. oops. today i got up and sammy was sleeping on my couch, so then i had to cuddle with her for a while. they make me so late. yeah, it's all the cats, not me. yeah.
there are pine needles everywhere and i can't figure out why. i know my parents had issues with their tree, but there's no reason the stairs to the basement would be covered with needles. seriously. what were they doing? and the cats were taking turns jumping in the tree. but they wouldn't have been in the basement.
sammy really likes to jump into things and sit. she is sooo cute. cinders is cute too, to be fair, but she's just sleeping.
-al
12.23.2002
ch ch ch changes
i had to go back into the city today for a therapy appointment (i came to my parents' yesterday). and now instead of eating out somewhere in town here, my parents want to go eat in the city tomorrow night. it's more convenient for my brother's fiancee. whatever. it just sucks because i feel so torn all the time and i just wanted to be at their house a few days, not be back and forth between home and home. plus getting into and out of hte city takes so much emotional time.
for 15 years, my oldest brother used to spend christmas eve decorating his friend's lawn up in port chester. the friend not being involved of course. one year they had a santa sitting on a toilet. one year they had a santa's sleigh crash site. that one got a picture in the paper. they stopped doing that though. another tradition dies. i helped them the past few years. i missed the real height of it though. regardless, this year, andy's not even coming to my mom's until christmas day. he's having a holiday with his boyfriend, the first just the two of them, no family, no separation. that's good for them. but i hate change. i'm gonna see dom tomorrow at dinner, but he's staying in the city at his new (well, he doesn't live there yet, but his fiancee does) place. and dave has been going to linda's family's christmas stuff on christmas eve forever now. i feel like an only child. well i have no idea what that feels like. but i'm being melodramatic. actually, thinking about it that way, i'm really glad i'm not an only child. but maybe if i had been, i'd hate to think of having siblings, yeah?
anyway, it's lonely up here. i should have gone to the movies today. maybe i'll get to see the kids tomorrow.
-al
12.21.2002
black like the cavernous pit of my vagina
osc is in the other room making mp3's, something we were heretofore unable to do. someone gave me a computer and i'm loaning it to oscar and oh my it's so awesome. my computer is also awesome, but very sick :(. anyway, i'm just excited about it.
i am jealous though. my computer is blurry and it's probably killing my eyes (even more than heredity was already working on) and the new computer is not blurry. so it's probably the monitor, yeah. but dammit. i can't figure out how to fix it.
i guess i need os 9 or something. the message board i go to (one of them) i can't post anymore because the posting page loads wrong and leaves out the 'post' button. oops. i can put in a thousand and one different dancing icons, but the post button is missing.
in other news, i lost my mittens. i really liked them. emily said, 'you'll get new ones, they weren't htat warm anyway' and i was just like, that's totally not the point. but i didn't tell her what the point was. i picture them all sad and confused and scared and not knowing where they are or why. if i thought someone was using them it would be different. but i just picture them on the ground somewhere, holding thumbs together, walking aimlessly, avoiding people's feet.
so sad. ok, i'm crazy and done.
-al
12.19.2002
subtext
i'm not sure i can really deal with people anymore. it takes so much energy and i've been getting so little out of it. all of the people i am close to, or rather the people i see most, i have to have constant vigilance with myself to make sure i don't say the wrong thing. i'm not talking about offending people, it's just that certain topics or certain types of discussion i just cannot handle with certain people and i have to constantly watch what i'm saying so they won't go off into whatever type of thing it is i can't handle.
is that making any sense? you know i've spent the last few years making an effort to understand others. to be understanding if you will, because i thought if i was understanding, i could make myself understood. but no one understands me still. goddamnit if i had a fucking quarter for every misunderstanding in my life.
i wish i could be more specific. but i still haven't really reconciled the whole writing about people i know thing. i don't think any of them read this. but i'm still not really comfortable with it. but fucken if i could just be specific.
i just want out of my life. i'm so tired of it. i know, it's not bad. my life is really not bad. i'm just so tired of being self-conscious. i'm like fucking pavlov's dogs. or maybe not. but give me enough negative reactions and i start trying not to do whatever it is i get the negative reaction for, even if it's something as simple as ordering a fucking coke.
he will say he's sorry only after insisting he didn't do it.
-al
12.14.2002
mom wisdom
talking about job searching
me: when i go in and ask they always say, 'um, no' like i'm not cool enough or something.
mom: maybe you're too cool.
-al
rainy days always fuck me
i hate how some of my favorite words can turn out offensive, and i mean in a real context. like 'fuck' for example is a word i really like. some people find it offensive because it's a strong word but i like to use it when i need a strong word. but often to 'get fucked' is equated with being on the penetrated end of a penetrative sex act and i don't see what's so bad about that. that phrasing puts all the aggression on the penis (or reasonble facsimile [dildo, hand, etc.]) weilder and penetration (which in itself kind of offends me, the word i mean) is seen as an act of aggression when it really isn't inherently so. am i making any sense? yeah, so anyways, rainy days totally fuck me.
from now on, i write my blogs in word so i don't lose them when the power shuts off. goddamnit the electric situation here is out of control. we lose power every day. just because we have way too much stuff turned on. but there isn't much we can do. there are 4 of here and we have 4 rooms on the electricity originally intended for 1. actually, i don't know what the situation is. and you know, we have a fuse box with like 20 fuses but one of them seems to control almost all the electricity in the place. everything except the bathroom and the overhead lights is on the one switch. what the fuck is that about? so frustrating. i'll be honest though. i'm still using simpletext. oops. i just saved though.
yesterday, which was rainy, was a no energy day. i had real big plans, man, real big. first, i was gonna get up at 9 (hahahahahahaha!) and do laundry. then i was gonna go out to lunch, probably at veg city because i go there all the time. then i was gonna go and christmas shop, shop, shop! then i was gonna go home briefly. then i was gonna go to a double birthday party up in astoria for two people i only sort of know. what i actually did today was sleep late while osc did laundry (don't feel too bad for him, i usually do it alone), ate some brownies, went online for soo long. took a shower. got in a psuedo argument with osc. made up. ate some more brownies. went online again. went to the movies. went to veg city. flaked on the party. I suck.
i often worry that my shyness/anxiety comes off as snobbishness or assholeness. ok, i am an asshole becuase i didn't call about the party. but i'm not a snob. really though, when someone doesn't come to your party, do you think, 'oh, they're probably shy and don't feel comfortable in a big crowd'? no, you think, 'wow, they probably think they're better than me. what jerks.' maybe i'm just speaking for myself here.
plus i never call people and i never respond to email.
-al
12.12.2002
what, i have to come up with a title now too?
how can i be expected to do laundry when it's so fucking cold? especially when i have to wash my coats. yes, plural. actually, they're sweatshirts. anyway, it's like totally the opposite of what i want to do. which is curl up in bed with some hot cocoa and maybe some brownies. mmmchocolate. but, since i have no clean clothes and no clean sheets and my comforter is super dirty, looks like i'll have to do laundry. after i procrastinate online for a while of course. and of course, even then, i won't do anything productive like respond to the 12 emails i have waiting to be responded to.
so, i know it's been over a week since i posted here since i finished my course of antibiotics. actually, i didn't take one pill, but since i took 7 days worth instead of 5 (just in case, they said if it cleared up in 5 i could stop taking it) i think that's ok.
to celebrate the end of my uti, i severely burned my hand with hot vegetable oil! yay! party! actually, it hurt and we had to cancel our show. hopefully not our last show. (no drummer now). at the time i burned it, i wasn't sure if we should cancel. it would have sucked to not go and then an hour later realised that i was fine. luckily, that didn't happen and it still kind of hurts. it's not that bad. severely may have been an exxageration. but one of the burns (it's several small burns) is in between two fingers and that sucks. when it happened, my whole forearm was red, but now there are just blotches on my hand. i'm such an idiot. i was flipping a burger. oops.
i guess that's my story. aren't you glad you waited the week?
-al
12.05.2002
AAAARGHHH!!!!!
how am i supposed to enjoy that it's snowing when i have to take the fucking train up to westchester to go to the doctor to get medicine for a fucking urinary tract infection!! i am sooooo uncomfortable. the doctor better be in to work today. fuck. i'd really like to sit around, drink hot cocoa, watch a movie (ok, ido that everyday, but today it's snowing! i so don't want to go sit on the train. i just want to sit on the toilet. once when i lived with john s., i had a uti and it was so bad, i just sat on the toilet for like 30 minutes at a time. and to distract myself i set up the tv in the kitchen and watched mr. show. (the bathroom was off the kitchen. with the door open it was pretty comfortable to watch the tv on the table.) can't do that today though.
and i leave you with this:
uti! you know why!
uti! you know why!
uti! you know why!
fucking uti!!
-al
12.02.2002
better than i do
i have all this extraneous laundry around. all the extra blankets need to be washed. the bathroom rugs. i have 6 boxes of clothes i'm contemplating selling/giving away but in order to determine if i want to keep them, i have to try them on, and to try them on i have to wash them because they are pre-bedbug. in order to sell them i have to wash them. in order to feel ok giving them away i have to wash them. i also have 15 undeveloped rolls of film and 3 undeveloped disposable cameras. what does this say about me?
we had a potluck last weekend which was much more of a hang with way too much food since only a few people showed up. i made cobbler which turned out ok, but not at all how i expected. it was like a sea of peaches with 6 biscuit blobs floating on top. last mother's day, my family went to this schmancy hotel buffet brunch and they had a thousand desserts. they had bread pudding and peach cobbler side by side and i thought the cobbler was a- awesome, and b- alot like the bread pudding. my cobbler was nothing like bread pudding. so now i have to look for another recipe.
in other news i'm sick. and it makes me want to do nothing. and i can't really tell what the deal is with my meds because maybe i'm just tired and disinterested because i have a cold. or maybe it's the meds. or maybe it's because i had my period. i had a lot of uncomfortable dreams last night but i don't really remember them well enough to write them here. or maybe i just don't want to talk about them.
when i started this blog, i totally intended to do some criticisms of the world, media mainly i guess. but it's totally degenerated away from that. i don't really know what happened there. i was hoping all my half analyses, if i kept them up, would lead to a greater ability to make full analyses. i have no conviction. i have that partially written thing about berman and berman, which doesn't even get at the full horror of it. and i'm embarrassed to have written such nice things about the book, cunt, there because when i wrote that i really thought i'd get around to writing another blog entry about all the things i think were wrong with it. i really need to focus.
well, i guess i should get back to doing nothing.
-al
