Tag: celesteh

A Short Conversation I Had in Berkeley

The scene: New Year’s Day, waiting with a group of 4 mills students and alums for a seat for brunch at La Note

Strange Man: (awkwardly) What’s a group of good looking girls doing here without any men?
Me: Getting ready to kick your ass if you don’t bug off.
Strange Man: (still awkward) What? I’m a nice guy.
Me: clearly.
And then he uncertainly walked off, much to my disappointment. The wait was long and my blood sugar was low and I was really hoping to do some ass kicking. Afterwards, I felt it was good not to have brawled, because he clearly had some sort of disability or problem. Hopefully, at least he got a message that his approach is not going to work for him. I doubt it, though. I bet he went home and pondered how being a nice guy clearly wasn’t working for him and thus resolved to be less nice: ie more aggressive, more mean. It might have been better to explain to him exactly why his line wasn’t working out for him. (“Don’t approach strangers in public. Try bars or singles events instead. Don’t act as if women feel lonely having brunch without men around. Also, hello, don’t we look a little queer to you?”)
Of course, what sparked off my brawl-seeking rage was that he put me in a box marked “girl.” What?!!? Man-seeking feminine being?!? I must destroy you now!!
And then I read Fun Home by Allison Bechdel and I’m pondering gender on a more lesbian-identified perspective right now. I’d still want to fight that guy, though.

Twitching Dog

So it kind of alarms that Xena shakes and twitches while lying down. I went to look at a vet website (since my Oakland vet office is closed and it’s late at night here and doesn’t seem like an emergency). Apparently, some twitching can be cured with Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitors.

Lovely. I’ve given my dog anxiety. Will I have to share my zoloft with her?
I went out for dinner and left her crated at home, but put on my ipod to keep her company. I chose a text sound playlist, so she would hear people speaking. She really did not want to go in her crate. When I came home,the ipod was making airplane sounds.
Good lord. If anybody has any dog-calming suggestions, I’m all ears.
In completely unrelated news, I spilled granola under my space bar.

Vocabulary Building Serial Novel

For previous chapters, look for the label GRE

Shelia and I got into JK’s dune buggy. “My henchmen found this in the middle of the desert.” JK said. “I don’t suppose you had anything to do with that?”
I tried to smile urbanely. “Darling, it’s unlike you to have an evening talking shop when it’s time for a cocktail.”
JK smiled a favonian smile. “You’re quite right.” she said as she piloted the dune buggy around the back of a high dune to an empty hinterland. The shadow of the sun made the valley dark. It was devoid of life, except for a shack. Not even tumbleweeds blew in the strong west wind that gusted around us. “You’ll have to excuse my error in punctiilio.” She halted the buggy in front of the shack. “Would you like to come in for a drink?”
“But of course.” I exited the buggy, hoping that a shared drink with a former lover (or so she thought) would lead to some sort of exegesis. “Do you have any Armagnac?”
“No, Jane Smith, I do not.” JK said, her revolver aimed directly at me.
My eyes widened, but I tried to maintain equanimity. “I was hoping to wassail our reunion.”
“You must think I’m an ignoramus. You think I wouldn’t recognize my own lover?” She waved her gun, gesturing that we should enter the shack. “And who goes to a shack and asks for Armagnac? You’re a fool, Jane Smith.”
The wind howled through gaps in shack’s walls. It was a hastily constructed bricolage of wood from broken shipping pallets and other scrap lumber. Some overturned buckets served as chairs. “Sit there.” JK commanded.
Shelia and I did as instructed.
“Jane Smith, either you think I have no acuity or you let Shelia do all the thinking for you. Given that she tried to signal you to shut up three times during our drive, I can only assume the latter.” JK reached into her purse and removed a brandy snifter and a very small bottle of Armagnac and poured herself a drink.
I knew you’d have that!” I exclaimed before thinking.
“But I never share.” She swirled the amber beverage in her glass. “Let’s say for a moment that my goal now is irenic.”
“Then why are you pointing a gun at us?” Shelia asked.
JK shrugged. “I could efface you from earth right now with a flick of my index finger. You’ll just have to take my word for this.” JK sipped at her Armagnac. “It’s not you that I’m after. I want Dr. Cool.”
“Then why are you holding us here?” I demanded.
“Bait.” JK said, standing up.
“What’s all this about?” Shelia asked.
JK sighed. “An interregnum. We have a power vacuum and like dust mites, you two have been sucked into it. No fault of your own, of course. In a certain sense, though, absolutely everyone is a victim of circumstance. You, me, Dr. Cool, Milligan Peg . . ..”
“Milligan Peg is dead.” I said.
“Yes I know.” JK laughed to herself. “I pulled the trigger.” Her blood red lips formed a semblance of a smile. “I’ll have to leave you two here now. No running off.” She walked through the door, shutting it behind her. I started to go after her, but Shelia stopped me. The buggy started up outside and roared away.
“It’s best if we wait for Dr. Cool.” Shelia explained.
The cold wind blew harder through the shack as the sun went down.
A nascent understanding formed in my mind.

In which I blather about my dog

Xena was acting very strangely and alarming me this morning, but after her walk, she seems fine. She was twitching with every breath and not getting up for her spot on the carpet. ack. but I took her for a walk down to the statue of the kid with the mushrooms and she perked right back up and came in and had food and water. She is funny in the morning, because she knows she has to wait for me to do my routine before she gets walked, so she doesn’t want to rouse herself too much, lest she awaken her bladder. I had forgotten though and thought something was terribly wrong, but I went through my routine anyway. heh. The dog is smarter than me.

She seems kind of sad. I am going to see if she’s allowed in the café from which I buy espresso. There is no food in the house and it’s filthy. I’m guessing that she’s not allowed in the store. I will do much cleaning before Cola returns.

And . . . she is indeed allowed in the café. Also, Dutch for “Sit!” is “Zit!” which caused the café guy to ask if she was a Dutch dog. I wish they all could be California dogs. She’s fine after a walk, but the longer she sits indoors, the more twitchy she gets. I thought she was having nightmares yesterday, but she was awake. Yikes. I guess we go for a walk whenever she starts to twitch and shake. Poor dog. She went more than 12 hours without getting to pee and she didn’t drink any of her water in the crate, she just let it drip on her, so it was like 12 hours of thirst and water torture. I hope she is ok. I haven’t tried leaving her alone yet, but I must go buy food.

In the lowlands

Xena and I have arrived. After spending several hours in a little crate, Xena was very happy to get a walk. As far as I can tell, she drank no water while in transport. When she got back to my place, she drank a few litres and then fell asleep.

Carrying a big heavy suitcase, a dog and a dog crate on the train is a bit of a chore. When I got to the station in Den Haag, none of the taxis wanted to take me because of Xena. Finally one agreed, as long as certain conditions were met, including the dog staying off the seats. It’s hard to explain to a freaked out dog that the normal rules of car travel don’t apply.
My street is a pedestrian street, so after the cab dropped me off, I still had to walk with crazy dog and stuff. It was ok though. We went for a walk and Xena already recognizes the apartment. She’s smart.
Nicole cried at the airport when Xena was carted away in a cage to go into the baggage hold. It’s weird, but it makes me feel better when Cola cries. For two reasons. One is that if I’m stressed about something and she cries about it, then I feel validated. Yes, checking a dog into cargo is alarming. The other is that when I reassure her, I say reassuring things and internalize them, thus reassuring myself. Also, it kinda makes me feel all butch and stuff.
Yay, I’m here. Oh my god, my head hurts. It’s 3:00 pm now. How much longer should I force myself to stay awake? I’d be jealous of the dog for being asleep, but she’s having nightmares.

Resolutions

Virtual Disco It’s that time again, where I make resolutions. Last year, my results were a mixed bag.

I did not develop any sort of calm, see any heads of St. John the Baptist, go to any Armagnac tasting or take any bike trips. I did, however, get much better at French, play a couple gigs in France, write a bit of music and get better about keeping track of dates.
In 2007, I will:

  • Accept myself
  • Get serenity
  • write more music
  • play more gigs
  • Bring the sexy back (see accompanying picture)
  • floss my teeth every day

2006

Here is an unexplained list of events in 2006 that effected my life, in no particular order:

  • 2 gigs in France (well, 3, sorta)
  • students riot in paris
  • Vélorution (French Critical Mass)
  • Lyme Disease
  • Went to Tours, Nice, Orléans Joan of Arc Festival
  • Went to Munich, Karlsruhe, Berlin and Cologne
  • 4 gigs (2 on tuba) in California
  • Dutch Radio play
  • 1 gig in Holland
  • Brother got married
  • got my dog back
  • Moved from Paris, France to The Hague, the Netherlands
  • Started at the Royal Conservatory of the Netherlands (became a snob)
  • Went to Brussels, many trips to Amsterdam and other Dutch cities
  • Zoloft
  • 60×60 Pacific rim Mix
  • anti-squatting
  • Best! Bike! In! The! World!

Virtual Installations

Les Hudson
I’ve spent much of today trying to figure out how to do make virtual sound installations in Second Life. From what I’ve seen for sale, it’s probably possible. But SL is not a sharing sort of community. It’s more of a capitalist system. If you want to upload stuff, you’ve got to have the Lindens (10$L / file). If you want land, you need Lindens. So you can get them by sacrificing real money or you can make stuff in SL to sell (but it will cost you to upload the raw materials, so you have to recover your costs) or you can get a virtual job.

there’s no better way to relax from spending all day staring at a computer screen at work than to come home and stare at a computer screen doing my second virtual shift for (semi-real) play money. No wonder the IRS wants to tax this game. No wonder the NYT and other papers are happily wildly inflating the numbers of regular users. No wonder corporations are busily putting up ads. They love this. It’s a model they get. Money buys stuff. There’s no weird “sharing” or other hard-to-grok economies. People sell stuff to each other and so rich folks and corporations get all the cool stuff because they can invest in finding and paying people to create it for them. Second Life is a lot like Real Life.
I think it is on the upswing and will continue to grow, but probably without me. I would have put in the effort to photograph my favorite shirt to upload it as a texture map for my avatar to wear (in human speak: I was taking pictures of my shirt so my player could wear it), but I’m not going to pay for the privilege of generating content on a private network. I’m not opposed to paying for things. I pay for flickr. Because my free account had upload limits that I wanted to exceed. I wanted to exceed them because of positive experiences I had after I uploaded some stuff without paying. First I got positive feedback, then I gave out some money. The new economy is not dead. First, prove to me that you’ve got something worthwhile, then offer me more if I pay you. It’s a good model.