For a while there, I was feeling all groovy and urban about the fact that I now take the train to work two days a week. I’m saving gas, I’m saving money, I’m saving the environment, I’m losing twenty minutes of sleep and two hours of commute time every time I take the train.

I know, I should be proud of the fact that I am taking advantage of the wonderful public transportation system we have here in Chicago. But when it means I have to get up a half an hour earlier than usual (which turns into twenty minutes and I usually miss the train I really should be on and have to catch the next one) to stand on an el platform on a chilly October morning when it is supposed to get up into the mid-eighties by the middle of the day so I’m wearing a skirt with no pantyhose and debated with myself all morning about whether or not I should bring a jacket and I didn’t but as I’m standing there on the platform, I start to doubt that I made the wisest choice in the matter, I start to bargain with myself about whether or not I can spare the eight dollars to park downtown at school, environment be damned. Of course, I always opt for keeping my eight dollars, but the debate exists. Good thing this whole “school” thing is only for a year.

To be a Cubs fan is to relegate oneself to a life of disappointments. Every year, they get our hopes up and every year, they let us down. But we still love them more than we love our own mothers. Why is that? What is it about the Cubs that attracts the most loyal of fans? Do we love them because we are losers or are we losers because we love them?

It really is a bizarre phenomenon. Wrigley Field is always packed, no matter how badly the Cubs are doing. And even if we are second to last in the pennant race, we still have hope that we'll get there this year. What makes Chicago northsiders so optimistic?

We lost tonight in eleven innings. It was a nailbiter of a game. Literally. I don't bite my nails, but I was chewing on them from the top of the eighth until I got in my car to go home. And yes, I almost cried. Why? This is only the first game of a seven game series. We could still win it. Prior is pitching tomorrow, and Wood the day after. It could happen. But I was devastated tonight. It's stupid. It is dumb to get so worked up over a baseball game, but I do. I've been a Cubs fan since before I could walk and I have been waiting for them to get to the World Series that whole time. I don't know which is worse -- to have a season well under 500 or to get to the playoffs and not the World Series. This is pretty heartbreaking.

I know its dumb. There are so many more important things going on in the world than baseball. But for right now, my team, my Cubbies, the boys I grew up with and who I have loved dearly my entire life are doing well. I want them to continue to do well. We, as Cub fans, need to win the 100th World Series to prove that we aren't completely hopeless. We'll happily go another 100 years without making it to the post season if we could just have this one. For us, it is a once in a lifetime opportunity. And for us, it means a lifetime of disappointments. Why do we do this to ourselves? Because Wrigley has ivy.

Okay, so fake meat products.

I know a lot of people who have problems with fake meat products and they cite this as a reason why vegetarians and vegans are crazy. “If you want something that looks and tastes like meat, eat meat,” they say. And to a certain extent, I agree with them. If you want to eat chicken nuggets, eat chicken nuggets. Chik’n is kind of strange and takes a while to get used to. Anyway.

I went to this one wonderful vegetarian Chinese restaurant in New York that served things like General Tso’s chicken, but it’s not chicken, it’s a soy substitute. That kind of thing. I tried of piece of this fake chicken and it was almost identical to the piece of fake calamari I tried a few minutes before. In this particular case, the substitute for calamari was a better substitute, I think, because calamari is supposed to be kind of smooth and rubbery. Chicken is not. But I digress.

With a few notable exceptions, fake meat products are weird. I love Gimmie Lean. I like Yves fake turkey slices. And in some cases, TVP in sloppy joes or chili is really yummy, but TVP isn’t really trying to be meat. But a lot of other fake meat products are just strange. The texture is off. Which got me thinking. Here was an entire restaurant making a business out of selling fake meat products to people. Almost every vegetarian or vegan restaurant I have been to sells fake meat products to people. Perhaps in an attempt to make omnivores feel comfortable there? Or to give their patrons the ability to say to their omnivorous friends, “Yeah, well, I had a burger for dinner tonight, too, with coleslaw and mashed potatoes?” I kind of want to say, you know what? You’re vegetarian. Celebrate the fact that you are vegetarian by not eating fake meat products. Make for yourself nutritionally balanced meals that don’t involve fake meat products. Or better yet, open a vegetarian restaurant that serves nutritionally sound meals that do not involve fake meat products, to show people how much variety and how much fun stuff vegetarians and vegans can eat without having to resort to pretending to be omnivorous. Isn’t that kind of the point of being vegetarian in the first place? Getting your nutrients from sources other than animal sources? So why do we like to pretend we’re eating animals? Why not do interesting things with grains, legumes, fruits, and vegetables that don’t involve pressing them into patties and adding artificial smoke flavor so you think you’re eating a grilled hamburger?

I know, I know, for a long time people though that all vegans and vegetarians ate was red beans, rice, and salad. I’m not advocating that we only eat red beans, rice, and salad. Because, as we all know, you don't win friends with salad. But for instance, my brother gave me a Mediterranean vegan cookbook for Christmas last year that has a million dishes in it that are completely vegan and don’t require fake meat products. Really yummy things, nutritionally balanced. If we look to ethnic foods, we will find a lot more vegetarian and vegan options that already exist there without having to put forth the extra effort. Why not explore that more?

I don’t know that I really have a point here except to say that I understand people who make fun of veggies eating fake meat products. I’d like to see more non-fake meat product options in veggie restaurants.

This rant brought to you by the letter E, the number 7, and the fact that I made some really yummy risotto last night.

So I may have to be a pescatarian for a week. But I'll only eat Marlins.

The train was eerily empty this morning. I’m not sure if it is because of Yom Kippur or if it is because too many people were out partying last night celebrating the greatest thing to happen to Cubs fans in ninety-five years (in case you live in a cave, the Cubs beat the Braves last night and took the series, three games to two, marking the first time since 1908 that the Cubs have won a post-season series), but there was nobody on the train. I kept having to ask myself, “Is it really Monday today, or could I have stayed in bed a few more hours to sleep off that third beer?” But sadly, it is Monday. I’m not a big fan of Mondays. I used to kind of like Mondays because some really great dancing happens on Mondays in Chicago, but now I really don’t like them. Why? Because I have class on Monday nights which cuts into my dancing time. Granted, class is over before dancing actually begins, but what with travel time and so on and so forth, on Mondays I leave my house before 7:00 in the morning and don’t get home until after 10:00 at night. That makes for a long day and I am usually tired by the time I get home and I have problems motivating myself to go out and dance. Which sucks because I miss dancing. But on days like today when I only got about three hours of sleep the night before (though I wouldn’t have traded going out last night for the world. It was really incredible to be a part of the mob in the intersection of Clark and Addison and then to go into the bars in Wrigleyville and sing “Go, Cubs, Go” a million times and drink with other Cubs fans and whatnot. Some random guy bought shots for half the bar, just to celebrate the win (yes, I was a benefactor of his generosity). And everybody was smiling at everybody else. Everyone was everyone else’s friend in Wrigleyville last night. It was really amazing), it’s a little bit hard to wake up and face a long, slow day at work (because it is Yom Kippur so a lot of people are not on campus today) in a nice, warm office and then a long slow night in class and then think about going out dancing afterwards. Call me a wus. Maybe I’m just getting old. But I’ll still poke you in the eye if you tell me I have a case of the Mondays.

I think I have officially run out of interesting things to say, so I'll just give you a random smattering of thoughts for today.

It is really nice to see the Cubs in the playoffs. I wish that Harry Carey was still around to see it, though. And whether or not they win today, they made it to the playoffs and they have played a season of really good baseball this year. They should be proud of that.

I like being a hippie. But I still don't feel like cooking.

I want to be a rockstar.

I love seeing old friends and knowing that they are doing well. I don't like seeing old friends and knowing that they are not doing well. It makes me sad to know that there are some destructive patterns that people fall into that they can't or choose not to get out of.

I hope I will get to talk to him again. I disagree with my one friend who says he still likes me, but I hope that I will get to see him and talk to him again. He's a good person.

I'm tired of wearing contacts that dry my eyes out so badly.

If you eat a superior salsa on an inferior chip, does it lessen the worth of the salsa? If you eat an inferior salsa on a superior chip, does it lessen the worth of the chip?

I think pickles need to take a more active role in the daily lives of American citizens. Citizens of the world, as a matter of fact.

I hope Arnold Schwartzenegger is not elected governor of California. I can't really support that emotion, I just have a gut feeling that he is not the best man for the job. I'd rather see him make more action movies than run a state.

Weekends when I have class aren't really weekends and they always make me want to call in sick on Monday so I get my two days off like the rest of the world does. I could use two days off. Maybe if I had two days off in a row, I would feel like cooking.

Thank you. We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

I had dinner with my mom last night and as we were talking, I remembered a kind of interesting moment I had when I was in New York.

First of all, I know I’ve said it before, but I think it merits repetition – I love my mom. I am thankful every day for the relationship I have with her. She is one of the most wonderful people I know. It was really lovely to just sit with her for a few hours and talk and drink cherry wine and eat fried rice. Not many people that I know get to do things like that with their moms, so I feel really lucky that I do.

But we got talking about body image and eating issues and whatnot – she did the Atkins diet thing for a while and of course, I’m a vegan. For a while there, we couldn’t eat out together. But it reminded me that while I was in New York was the first time in a long time that I have felt really heavy. Maybe because I was staying with a tall, slender hostess, but I felt heavier than I have in a long time. So many of my eating issues and body image issues have simply left me in the past year. I eat when I’m hungry and I eat until I’m full. I don’t waste hours upon hours counting calories anymore. I don’t obsess about a pound or two. I’ve actually gotten to a point where I can look at myself in the mirror as I am getting dressed in the morning and think that I have a really nice shape. I look like a woman is supposed to. I have breasts. I have hips. I am not now, nor will I ever be a size two and that is okay with me. I have gotten to the point where I like the way I look. I’m not going to just let myself go now – I’m still going to work out and eat right and stuff, but because it makes me feel good, not because I think I need to lose weight.

But the strangeness in New York happened when two of my friends (on separate occasions) made comments about what they had already eaten that day and how much they were “allowed” to eat later because of it. Like they were counting calories or fat grams or protein/carbohydrate grams or something. And it struck me that that is not a part of my life anymore. I wasted years counting calories and it never did me any good. I wasted a lot of paper writing down everything that I ate and all it did was make me miserable and give me something else to hate myself for. And I’m done with it now.

No, I am not a scrawny vegan. I don’t know that I ever will be. But I have been released from the obsessive/compulsive battle with my weight that so many women (and men, too, for that matter) are still fighting. I feel for them because I have been there and I know how all consuming it can be. I’m just tired of it. I want to wear pants that are comfortable and if that means they have a bigger number on the tag, then so be it. I would rather be comfortable in my clothes (and therefore comfortable being myself) than spend twenty minutes trying to zip up my jeans in the morning and the entire day sucking in my stomach. It’s just not worth it.

So my question is why is Novocain not an illegal narcotic? My jaw was pumped full of the stuff about two and a half hours ago and I still can't feel half of my face. Granted, she gave me a lot of it because I had three cavities filled (check out my shiny, silvery mouth!), but seriously. I can't feel half of my face. From my cheekbone to my neckline, nose to ear. It's kind of cool in a way. I have to make a conscious effort to not bite my own tongue, though. And I'm kind of getting to that "okay, that's enough of that, thank you" stage of drug usage. But I can see a bunch of young kids shooting themselves in various body parts with Novocain just to see what it's like and then doing crazy things like, I don't know, branding each other and stuff. "Did that hurt?" "No, man, I couldn't feel a thing. They had to rush me to the hospital once we started to smell burning flesh, but it didn't hurt a bit. And then at the hospital, they gave me morphine. Score."

Anyway, I like my dentist, pusher of should-be-illegal drugs or no. She's cool and she does good work. I look forward to going back to see her again in six months.

I can hardly think of a lovlier sound to wake up to than the sound of one's radiators turning on. And despite my penchant for sarcasm, I am not being sarcastic in this case. I literally smiled and said, "Hi, radiators," this morning when I heard them turn on. Because for once, this means I won't have to hastle my landlords to turn on the heat. For once, I will be cozy in my little apartment when it's all nippy outside and stuff. Yay radiators.

And I have all of this food in my house to make things with (soup, risotto, etc.) and I have absolutely no desire to cook today. Drat it all.

I had one of those moments last night where I found myself thinking, "If I was a rock star, this would be my life." I didn't go to work yesterday and I didn't go today. I'm still kind of recovering. Mentally. So yesterday was a day of shopping and practicing my guitar (new song is called "Astoria Park" and it went over pretty well. It's short, but it's really fun and it makes people laugh) and just kind of taking it easy. And then I called up a bunch of friends and said, "Hey, you wanna go out?" and they all did. So we went out to what we thought was going to be an open mic, but turned into a night of watching the Cubs kick the Braves' behinds (Yay Cubbies!) followed by the five of us sitting in a corner of the bar jamming on our guitars and singing. It was fun. Nice and low key. I wasn't at all nervous about playing. And this random guy came over with a harmonica and started jamming with us when he could. And I thought to myself, "What a rockstar moment. To be sitting here with some friends, enjoying a beverage, playing my guitar in a bar. If I really was famous, this is the kind of thing my fans would kill to see and the media would be all over. But I'm not famous. Yet. So this is really nice."

So thank you to my friends who came out last night and made me feel like a rockstar. I'll see if I can comp you all in to my first big Chicago show.

Another song using the word "ass." Well, every rock star has to have a gimmick, right?

One day...

I love New York. I don’t really know what else to say about it. I love New York. I think that at some point in my life, I will need to live here for a little while. New York just feels good. It feels right. It feels like I belong here. It is really strange for me to feel that about a city that isn’t Chicago and I think in my heart of hearts, I’m still really very much in love with Chicago so I couldn’t leave it right now. And maybe it is the newness or the foreignness of New York that I am attracted to, but it really is a great town. There is so much here going on and to see and to do. And I like the people. I think I would fit in, minus my “fashion sense.” Though if I wait until I am rich and famous to come here, I can walk around dressed the way that I do and it will be my fashion statement. People will be like, “Oh, that’s just the way Kitty dresses.” And all will be good. I’ll spawn an entire generation of little girls who wear green corduroy pants and black t-shirts. It could be worse. At least I won’t be encouraging them to wear chaps with bikini tops or anything.

But I don’t feel like I need to do everything here and see everything and go everywhere while I am here. I’m happy to just be here. Emphasis on the be.

I played my guitar in both Central Park and Astoria Park. And yes, I got a few strange looks from people, but most people just kept going as if I was your ordinary, average, run of the mill crazy person. I want to be your ordinary, average, run of the mill crazy person in New York. Not necessarily the guy who walks through the subway station at four o’clock in the morning saying “fuck” a lot. But the kind who just likes to play and will play anywhere she has a chance to.

I don’t even really know what I am talking about anymore. I have had a wonderful time here. I will be sad to go home tomorrow. I wish I had gotten to see Moby at Teany the other day. I hope maybe he will be here today. I have enjoyed seeing friends who I haven’t seen in a while. I have been very happy to get to spend some quality one-on-one time with some of my friends. I have been happy to watch groups of swing dancers interacting. I have danced. I have enjoyed excellent music and good food. I have given three New Yorkers a copy of my demo disc and have very much enjoyed the accolades and enthusiasm that has accompanied the giving of the discs. I finished working on a song that has been kicking my ass for a long time and I got some ideas for another one. I have had a wonderful, wonderful couple of days and I am now very sad that it is coming to an end. I will be very happy to be home where the water pressure in the show is good and where my cat will curl up and go to sleep with me. But honestly, if my cat was here, I would stay a lot longer. I think I need to live in New York for a while. Hopefully while I am still young enough to enjoy it. I understand the intense provincialism that happens in New York now. It is a really good place to be. It feels like home.

So despite all of my current physical problems, I made it to New York without a hitch. I left my hitch at home. I might need it later, so I'm a little bit bummed about that. But anyway, I'm here. And the kind of weird thing is that as I was flying into the city last night, I got this strange feeling of, "Oh, I'm home." And then on the way to the home of my lovely hostess, everything was familiar, even though it has been a year and a half since I was last here. Kind of cool, kind of creepy.

Anyway, I have to venture out and find some guitar strings because my high E broke and I can't very well tour the New York City park system without a high E.

I will be in New York by the time I go to sleep tonight, whether my body likes it or not. So there.

I got a really amazing compliment from one of my directors last night. We were doing a practice run-through of Floss! for the new cast members and to be honest, my heart was really only half in it. I didn’t want to be at rehearsal. I wasn’t finished packing; I wasn’t ready to leave my house and not come back for five days yet, you know? So the first walk-through, I marked it. But by the time we were doing the actual run-through on which the directors were taking notes, I was fully in character and ready to go. Doing my part and making sure the new people knew where they were supposed to be and whatnot. And at the very end of the show, I was filling this one Beboian in on something and I almost forgot that I had a line to deliver downstage left, so I kind of bolted to my position, said my line, and went back to the new Beboian. The one director erupted in laughter. I don’t remember how I said the line. I’m not sure how it looked, but apparently, it was funny.

So we finish the show, come down off stage and the director says to me, “You’re really funny. When did that happen?” Now, in order for that to sound like a compliment, you first have to know that I play kind of the straight character in this group. So many of the rest of the Beboians are so crazy go nuts that I decided my character should be more reserved, quiet, and focused on the dance. And this very same director pulled me aside once in my first run and told me that he and the other director really liked the choice I had made – it offset the other characters nicely. So now to have him notice that such a character can be comedic…well, it was a big deal to me. Plus, he had this newfound look of respect in his eyes. Or it was all the wine, I don’t know. But two other times while he was giving notes, he mentioned things that I had been doing on stage and expounded on them to say that I was so uninhibited and true in my Beboian-ness that I was really funny. I wasn’t me. I was Hacamba. Which I guess makes sense because I don’t really remember doing anything funny. I was just trying to do a good show. Like Hacamba would.

So yeah, that felt good to get that kind of praise from that director. He’s not one to dole out compliments freely, so to get the “you were honest and true and had some really wonderful moments as a result of that” compliment is really amazing.

So I heard a rumor that it is Banned Book Month, or something, and in honor of Banned Book Month, someone sent my office a copy of a book called It's Perfectly Normal. I can understand why it was banned by conservative religious types -- it talks about everything kids might want to know about sex. It covers masturbation, birth control, sexual abuse, sexually transmitted diseases, sexual preferences, artificial insemination, you name it, it's in this book. There are illustrations that show that everyone's body is different. There are illustrations of sexual positions other than missionary with the man on top. There are illustrations of homosexual couples kissing, hugging, and holding hands. There are illustrations of interracial couples. There are pictures of old couples. This book has it all. And I, for one, would like to applaud the authors for taking on these topics in such a straightforward, candid manner. Their whole premise is the title of the book -- it's perfectly normal. This book tells kids that it is okay to masturbate. This book tells kids that it is okay to have sexual thoughts and feelings about persons of the same sex and persons of the opposite sex. This book encourages kids to talk to someone they trust about sexual abuse. I think in addition to having these conversations with my kids, I'm going to buy them this book. It certainly handles things much better than the books I had when I was younger.

So hats off to the authors of It's Perfectly Normal. Your book is in very good company on the Banned Book List and you should take it as a compliment that your work has been deemed worthy of banishment. I hope that one day, if I write a book, it gets banned, too.

Warning: Moment of Weakness Ahead

Because I bet you a dollar he's not thinking about me. Hell, I know he hasn't wondered where I am or how I'm doing once in the past three years. So why do I do this to myself? Why do I see him everywhere? Why can I feel him nearby? Am I that desperate to get back what I once thought I had? God damn, I'm pathetic sometimes. And no, I have not been drinking tonight. I'd probably be more coherent if I had been.

I think the moment has passed. I'll post about monkeys or something in the morning to offset this little outburst. Sorry.

I've been having all of these strange dreams and feelings about him lately. Like he's nearby or going to show up somewhere unexpectedly or something. I know I've had these feelings before, but they are unsettling. They make me wonder what I would do if I actually saw him again. Would we speak? Would it still be there? Or would he just walk on by? I'm guessing the latter. And as much as I hate to admit that, it makes me very sad. I hate to think of things as being over forever. I don't like that sense of permanence. I don't like the idea that I could never again experience what I once did. And no, it probably isn't smart of me to sit and listen to "Lost Cause" on repeat as I think about these things, but I never said I was smart all of the time.

It's almost a need to see him. I don't know why this happens from time to time, but it does. I know I've written about this crap before. Maybe a year ago? Maybe because it was getting around this time of year three years ago that I saw him last? Like revisiting someone's grave on the anniversary of their death. Something did die. Nothing tangible. But something did die. Sometimes I feel like a widow; sometimes I feel like a divorce (I don't know how to add an accent mark to the e in Blogger). And then I stop myself and tell myself that I am being overdramatic, that it was never that big of a deal. But it was to me.

I almost wish it would happen -- that I would see him somewhere randomly -- just to get it over with, you know? We're both in kind of the same business; chances are I will see him again before I die. I hope I survive it if I do.

I will be in New York in two days. And I can't even tell you how insanely happy that makes me.

I want to write a song that makes one person at my concert weep.
I want to write a song that makes an entire room full of people jump up and down.
I want to write songs that make people feel something. For such is the power and the joy of music. And such is the duty of the musician.

Everything is better with hummus. Except soggy carrots.

So two of my favorite musical artists have very different opinions on the whole file-sharing/downloading music for free issue and I myself am kind of torn.

On the one hand, Moby is of the opinion that he doesn’t care how people are getting his music, as long as they are listening to it. He is disgusted that they are now prosecuting 12 year old children for illegal downloads. He also is probably still living off of royalties from Play and now with his restaurant doing so well, I’m guessing he doesn’t have too many money issues.

On the other hand, we have Liz Phair who was recently on Bill Maher’s show saying that basically, it is stealing and those persons who illegally download music are ripping off the artists. And she is a single mother who has not put out an album in five years, and the last album she did put out didn’t do so well.

And I’m torn on the issue. I think as long as I am a wannabe musician, I will be torn on the whole thing. Right now, I want my music to be heard. I don’t care how people listen to it; I just want them to listen to it. If that means free concerts or people copying the demo discs I have given them or paying me $20 for a disc, then so be it. Actually, at this point, I would feel a little bit guilty charging people for my disc because it is just a demo and really, they are doing me a favor by partaking in my art (this goes back to the whole “does art have inherent value or is it only given value through sharing it with others” debate). But then again, I have a stupidfey day job that pays my bills and keeps me overfed and whatnot. If my sole source of income was my music, I might be pissed off at people getting it for free, too.

Where I am right now in my life, I would like to be idealistic about this and say that I don’t think downloading music should be punishable by law. If I buy a CD and copy it for a friend, that is not illegal. If I have music that nobody else does and I make it available to people (my friends, perhaps) via the internet, that is illegal. It’s a fine line and one that I think needs to be defined better or erased entirely. My mp3.com site was created so that friends of mine overseas could enjoy my music easily instead of me burning them a disc and trusting that whatever shipping company (not the one that uses a certain color in its advertisements as I am still convinced that they are the servants of Satan) I employ does not lose or damage the CD in transit. I want people to hear my music. People want to hear music in general. And I do not think that they should be punished for wanting to broaden their musical horizons on a limited budget.

Or maybe I’m just a dirty hippie.

If I could count on one hand the number of friendships I have that are based primarily on a mutual love and quoting ability of The Simpsons, I'd be a mutant with, like, 87 fingers.

I’m going to bitch for a minute because I can and because I feel like it.

My office is located on the first floor of a three and a half story building. So naturally, everyone assumes that the receptionist on the first floor is the receptionist for the entire building. And the kitchen on the first floor is the kitchen for the entire building. And everything on the first floor is for the entire building. NOT TRUE. Our receptionist is our receptionist. Our kitchen (and its contents) is ours. And while we do not mind other people using our conference rooms (if prior arrangements have been made), we should not have to staff/set up/clean up after their meetings. Think about it: you go a private place of business to use one of their rooms. If your meeting requires food, you make those arrangements. If your meeting requires tech support, you make those arrangements. If you need copies of handouts for your meeting, you make them ahead of time and bring them along. You don’t tell your guests to “help themselves” to the coffee in the kitchen. And as a guest, you don’t go barging into the kitchen to help yourself. I don’t care how many times you have been there before; you don’t go barging into someone else’s kitchen and take their food/beverages. Granted, rental spaces will often have things like food service and tech support available, but usually at an extra fee and arrangements have to be made prior to the start of the meeting. You don’t show up one minute before the meeting is to begin and say, “Can you set up the equipment for me?” I actually had this conversation this morning:

Meeting “organizer” (at 8:29, in reference to an 8:30 meeting): Do you have a minute to show me how to work all of your equipment in there?
Me (knowing that there is WAY more “equipment in there” than she will need): What do you need set up?
M”O”: I’m not sure, really. What do people usually use when they come in for meetings?
Me: They usually either bring a laptop or a disc and we turn on the LCD projector for them.
M”O”: She just needs to be able to see the screen.
Me: Is she bringing a laptop?
M”O”: I don’t think she is bringing a disc. She’s bringing those papers that you can look at on the wall.
Me: For an overhead projector?
M”O”: I think so. I talked to the other lady who sits out here [who has only been here for two years and sees you on a daily basis and you still don’t know her name?] and she said there was one in there.
Me: Well, let me check and see what there is.

So I go into the conference room to search for the most antiquated piece of equipment in there, I find it, and it takes me a minute to set it up. During which time, the meeting “organizer” asks if a specific co-worker of mine might know how to set it up. A co-worker of mine whose office is quite visible from where we are standing and at this time of the morning is quite empty. I reply as nicely as I can, “She’s not here yet this morning.” To which, the meeting “organizer” replies, “oh,” sounding very disheartened.

We all know that I need to develop a greater tolerance for stupid people. And I know that I need to not let it get to me when other people take advantage of this department and the things contained therein. It’s just irritating to start your day with stupid people hassling you about things that could have been taken care of well in advance. And the icing on the cake? They didn’t even use the overhead projector.

There are days when I love my job. This is not one of them.

I know some people who claim to be anti-social. They don't know anti-social. They still crave the attention of people. They like to be anti-social in public. Their idea of being anti-social is going to some crowded place and not talking to anyone. That's not anti-social. A true anti-social person doesn't go out. A true anti-social person doesn't even call his or her friends to see what's going on that they could miss out on.

I have decided that I am the second variety of anti-social.

So if you were a bird doctor (and no, I don't mean a vet, I mean the local doctor that pigeons take their children to when they get the sniffles), I bet the biggest complaint you would get is neck strain. Because take a look at how birds walk. That can't be good for the spine.

There are times when I wish I was brave enough to say to that random hot guy on the train or walking down the street, “You are a very attractive individual.” That’s it. Not ask him out on a date. Not exchange contact information. Just let him know that he is a very attractive person. I think that would make someone’s day to have a sort of cute girl come up to you completely unsolicited and give you a compliment like that. But then I second guess myself and I just keep walking.

There are times when I think I should drink more than I do. Do you remember about a year ago, I decided to give up drinking entirely? And what I found was that I dream more when I’m sober? Yeah, well, my dreams are getting really weird and kind of exhausting. So I wake up tired even though I know I got some good sleep (because if you get to REM sleep, that’s when you start dreaming, and that’s the kind of sleep you should be getting, right?). Like last night, for instance. In my dream, I was telling people about dreams I had in the past, but then I woke up wondering if I really had those other dreams, or if I just dreamt about having those dreams? Because those dreams seemed really real, too. A dweam wivin a dweam. Or something. What it amounts to is an overactive imagination and a hankering for a dream-catching machine so I can show people some of the crazy shit that goes on in my head when my head is left to its own devices. Or a need to drink more so I’ll stop dreaming and get some rest.

I’d like to give a little shout-out today to my Bostonian guy friend. Because he rocks.

I think we all know that I am bad at asking for help. Asking for help means relying on someone else to do something for you and relying on someone else to do something for you greatly increases the chances that you will be let down. So I tend to try to do everything by myself.

So my back was hurting really badly this weekend. I was walking around like I was eighty years old. It was very “not pretty,” as the kids say these days. I mentioned this in passing to my Bostonian guy friend as the reason I would probably not want to go out gallivanting all over town on Friday night and what does he do? He buys me heating pads. And rubs my back. And asks a friend of his for advice on things that he can do to help me. And he checks in with me all weekend on the intensity of my back pain. All without me asking.

The problem with never asking for help is that you forget just how nice it is to have someone help you with something. To have a friend who will not let you down. I was kind of blown away by his level of concern for me this weekend and it made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. This is just one of the infinite number of reasons why I love my Bostonian guy friend. If you do not know him, you are missing out on knowing a truly fine human being. Thank you, honey, for being so wonderful. Thanks for being you.

Please forgive me if I am a little less than jovial today. I am in really horrible pain. Physical pain. Mental anguish I can deal with, but physical pain can reduce me to a little puddle of sad and pathetic. Mental pain is something I can work through on my own because usually it is something I created in my own head, so I can just work through it and sort things out. Physical pain I can’t deal with by myself. I can’t massage my back in the way I am guessing it needs to be massaged just because I am not a contortionist. Though, even if I was a contortionist, I probably wouldn’t be able to massage my back the way I am guessing it needs to be massaged because movement hurts. Bending. Twisting. Walking. All of it hurts.

This is not fun. This is not right. My screaming back keeps me awake at night. Time to pump myself full of pain killers.

Happy birthday to Moby.

I know he doesn’t read this and that’s fine, but I’m going to say happy birthday anyway. Yes, I have given up on my dream of one day marrying him. No, I’m not as super crazy obsessed with him as people once thought I was. Yes, I still take great comfort in the fact that someone like Moby exists in the world. Yes, I will still bend over backwards (though maybe not today as my back is once again killing me and I’m not sure why) to see him live in concert. Yes, I really hope I get to see him when I’m in New York in a couple of weeks and I hope that if I do see him, I have the courage to talk to him. Yes, I still think that we could be great friends if given the opportunity. But if that opportunity never comes, I will still listen to his music. I will still read his journal entries as they are a great source of comfort to me. As a matter of fact, I think that’s what I’ll do today. It’s been a while since I went back and re-read some of his old stuff. And since it is his birthday today, may I suggest that the rest of you pop on over to his site and read some of what he has to say if you haven’t already. I am almost positive that even if you don’t develop an appreciation for him as a person, you will at the very least understand why I hold him in such high regard.

Happy birthday, Moby. And thanks for everything you do.

Moose. Mousse. Mouse. Explain.

Whenever something really bad happens, people prepare themselves in case that same exact really bad thing happens again. I found myself thinking on the train this morning about the blackout on the East Coast and about how people who lived through that now carry flashlights with them. And how many people on the train with me this morning had a flashlight with them “just in case.” And how many more would start carrying flashlights with them “just in case” if they were stuck in the subway during a blackout and had to climb out through the tunnels like some New Yorkers did. It seems perfectly rational to prepare oneself in the event that some catastrophic event happens again.

The thing is, the chances of that same exact thing happening again are really slim. And not necessarily because you are prepared for it, but because really big catastrophic events don’t occur all that often. Since the invention of electricity, how many times has the entire Eastern Seaboard (and then some) been without power for over 24 hours? Once. And I can guarantee you that nobody will ever fly another plane into the World Trade Center because the World Trade Center doesn’t exist anymore. Sure, you hear about the random person who has been struck by lightening seventeen times, but even that’s very rare.

I guess what I’m getting at is wouldn’t it make more sense to prepare ourselves for things that haven’t happened yet? Stampeding hippos or something? That hasn’t happened in a major metropolitan area. How do we know what to do in case large herds of hippos go running through the windows on the ground floor of the Daley Center?

We don’t know. And we can’t know. We can’t anticipate every situation before it happens, so we have two choices: 1) worry about everything or 2) worry about nothing. Me personally, I’d rather not spend my life worrying about things that could happen someday but most likely won’t than drive myself nuts trying to guard myself against every possible thing that could ever possibly happen, no matter how probable it is that said thing won’t happen. Things happen. You fail a test. You hurt someone’s feelings. You get into a car accident. A loved one dies. And you take a minute, absorb what happened, figure out how to handle it, and move on. I can’t spend all of my time worrying about the future because I don’t know what the future has in store for me (or, in some cases, if the future even has anything in store for anyone or if it is all random chance). That’s what’s fun about the future. The best I can do is worry about it when it happens and try to react to it in a calm, logical, safe manner that will not cause further harm to myself or anyone else. And in the meantime, I’ll keep dreaming about that cake in my fridge.

And here we go into that time of year when I start waking up before the sun does. Actually, this morning, it was a pretty close call. I don't think either of us wanted to get out of bed. But we both did and hopefully we'll have something to show for it. I forgot my cake at home, though, which I'm kind of upset about. It was going to be my dinner. I had dinner with a friend last night at a lovely vegetarian restaurant and I bought a piece of their vegan chocolate mousse cake to take home with me that I was going to have for dinner tonight before class. But I forgot it at home. In my fridge. In it's little box. Waiting to be eaten. Crying out, "Kitty, why hast thou forsaken me?" I have not forsaken thou, my piece of vegan chocolate mousse cake. I will eat you when I get home tonight, all tired and stressed out and in need of something to cheer my broken spirit. You shall be that something and I shall be eternally grateful to you.

But yeah, the daylight hours are getting shorter. Which also means I'm going to have to start wearing pantyhose again. Woo hoo. Or buy more pants. Woo hoo. I hate shopping.

I just got my hair cut with a straight razor. Yeah, baby.

I know this is really wrong of me to talk about, but I'm going to anyway.

So the other day, I'm actually reading the subject headings of some of the spam I have received, and there is one that says something along the lines of "Watch this horny teenager fuck a horse for free!" Maybe it was because I had been talking about this comedian with a friend of mine just a couple of days before who says the most random sentence he has ever heard is, "If it wasn't for my horse, I would never have spent that year at college," or maybe I was just that bored, but I decided to read the body of this e-mail. Because seriously, who fucks horses? And who lets people film them fucking horses? And who lets people film them fucking horses and then puts that up on the internet? I know who is watching it for free -- really bored and horny people. But who makes that stuff in the first place?

I've still kind of been trying to figure out the logistics of such a manuver in the first place. And what did they have to do to the horse to get him to agree/stay relatively still. I didn't actually watch the video (despite the fact that it was free and would fall into that category of "things I thought I'd never see") and it is quite possible that all of my questions would have been answered had I simply watched the eight minute video. Eight minutes of a girl fucking a horse.

People are weird.

You know how they have obedience school for dogs? Do they have bug-catching school for cats? 'Cuz I think Owen could use some help.

Okay, here’s something mundane that pisses me off because it is quarter after two in the afternoon and I am trying desperately not to fall asleep at my desk – automatic flush toilets. I understand the need for automatic flush toilets, I really do. Sometimes, restrooms that are not as technologically advanced can get pretty…uninviting. But automatic flush toilets are not a good option. I don’t know if it is a problem with the sensors or what, but they don’t work the way they should. In the midst of my very long day at class on Saturday, I had to use an automatic flush toilet several times and during every single visit, the toilet decided to flush while I was still seated upon it. If I wanted a bidet, I’d go to Europe or some big fancy hotel in New York. One time, it flushed just as I was moving to sit down. And god forbid, one should have to adjust one’s seating position on the toilet – a move that surely guarantees a pre-emptive flush.

So for all of you toilet inventors out there, would you please work on the sensors on your automatic toilets? Perhaps make them weight sensitive? Thanks. I’m just trying to help save water is all.

I don’t understand the fear of being alone. And by “alone” I mean “not in a romantic relationship.” I can understand the fear of never speaking to another human being again for the rest of your life, though admittedly, having this blog lessens that fear for me, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about people who are so afraid of being single that they will remain in bad relationships much longer than they should.

I know that from a societal perspective, men are not encouraged to form deep, meaningful friendships with other men and that men are often defined by their partners and their partner’s friends. So maybe men feel differently about this than I do – if they don’t have a romantic partner, they don’t have any social interaction whatsoever. Which goes back to the fear of never talking to anyone ever again. I guess. But that is so seldom the case. You find these attractive, intelligent men in relationships with clingy, needy women and you think to yourself, “He could do so much better. Why isn’t he doing so much better?” And then you talk to him and find out that he is scared of women and he is happy enough to be with the one he is with because at least it means he has plans for Friday night. That, to me, is very sad.

Maybe I’m just lucky to have so many friends. Maybe I’m lucky to have enough outside interests that I am forced to interact with people on a regular basis. Or maybe there really is something wrong with me that I don’t crave romantic involvement so much that I will settle for less than what I deserve just so that I don’t have to be alone. But I don’t understand it. I honestly don’t. I wish I did so that I could help some of these people get over that fear. Being single can be really fun. I know there are merits to having a relationship, too, but I think that alone time is really important. If for no other reason, so that you will get to know yourself well enough to know what it is you really want out of a relationship. Because once you know that, it is much easier to find and much easier to avoid the relationships that are not fulfilling.

My, but I’m preachy today. Sorry about that.

Is anyone else bothered by the fact that our President is asking for eighty-seven billion dollars to rebuild Iraq? And that at least sixty-six billion of that will be available for military type purposes? Granted, I’m just a peon who makes almost nothing for a living, so I can’t really comprehend eighty-seven billion anythings, but that seems like an awful lot of dollars to me. Especially considering the huge budget cuts every state has had to endure for the past two or three years. If we have eighty-seven billion dollars sitting around waiting to be used, why not fund schools? Or healthcare programs? Or fix roads or something? Why send that eighty-seven billion dollars overseas when there are so many things here at home that could really use it?

Okay, maybe I’m being selfish. Sorry about that. I know the Iraqi and Afghani people need our assistance. But here’s a novel idea – don’t fund the building of their armies. Wasn’t our very own technology, sold to Iraqis and Afghanis oh so many years ago, that came back to bite us in the ass just two short years ago? How about this: why not set up a new, democratic Iraq that doesn’t have an army? Or that is not allowed to build an army for X number of years? Is it Hong Kong that is not allowed to have an army, but if they are ever attacked, it is up to Great Britain to defend them or something like that? Maybe I dreamt that scenario, but I think that could be a novel approach to the whole rebuilding of Iraq and Afghanistan thing. Because think about it. It would cost a whole hell of a lot less than eighty-seven billion dollars to rebuild those countries if we weren’t building their armies. It would lower the chances of military strikes by Iraq and Afghanistan on either the United States or other countries. It would reduce the need for intelligence forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. And it might just make it that much harder for a new dictator with delusions of grandeur to take control of the blossoming democracy. And then, say, in fifty years or whatever, when democracy is in full swing and has become the “norm,” then they can start to build their own army. Have provisions in their Constitution as to how that army is to be built. And let them build it themselves – no fair sharing technology only to have it used against us someday, right? And no fair making the families of those slain in combat finance the construction of the very army that took their loved ones.

Call me naïve, call me stupid, call me selfish. I can’t wait for the next Presidential election. People have made jokes for years about how if we had a female President, she might be a little trigger happy for a few days every month when she’s feeling moody. I think, though, at this point, that I would happily take that chance over the possibility of keeping a paranoid lunatic in the White House. Please start researching your candidates now so that when the time comes, we can get an intelligent person into the office of Leader of the Free World. This living in fear thing has gone on long enough.

A lot of the glamour of being a movie star is lost when one takes the subway to the premiere.

It was fun, though. The audience laughed. They asked questions at the end of the whole ordeal. It was a sell-out crowd. And some of my friends were there, so that was cool. And then when it was over, we left and got drinks. Very non-Hollywood, but fun in it's own way anyway.

Now I get to look forward to the next one wherein I have a lot more screen time. That one, I'm going to totally glam up for.

Yeah, if I was a big truck on a mission to retrieve a dumpster left over after a three day roofing project that had lot of pretty lights and horns that go "BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!" really loud, I, too, would make sure to do my job at QUARTER TO SIX ON A SATURDAY MORNING. Wouldn't want to disturb the flow of traffic later in the day.

I wonder if there is any way to definitively figure out what percentage of the population of the world is gay and what percentage of the population of the world is straight. I know people who seem to think that being gay is a fad or cool or whatever or they think the gay population is growing and I wonder if that is really the case, or if it is a matter of the population has always been this size, we just didn’t know about it until recently, you know? I’m really just curious.

Like, could someone devise a test that would be administered anonymously to every person on this planet in such a fashion that nobody would lie on the test, and it would be able to say who was gay, who was straight and who didn’t fit into either one of those categories? Simple, straightforward questions like, “Are you turned on by men?” and “Are you turned on by women?” and “Are you a man or a woman?” or something like that. And people would have to answer them honestly. It would be a way to find out who the closet cases are, and who the people are who are out there pretending to be gay. Because in all truth, my guess would be that most people fit into the “none of the above” category. That nebulous land where you have, at one point or another in your life, found yourself sexually attracted to a person who is the opposite gender from what you are usually attracted to. I think most people are just afraid to admit things like that for fear people will think their sexual orientation is other than what they say it is.

Either that, or I would bet that the gay population and the straight population are pretty even in numbers. And I would bet that if you could go back and administer said test throughout history, you would find those percentages to be pretty constant. Why do I think this? In high school, one of my teachers brought in a book of newspaper headlines from some Podunk town from the 1890s. His point was that things were just as screwed up back then as they are now – there were stories about missing children and rapes and murders and stuff, just like the ones that fill the newspapers today. He was showing us that there really weren’t any “good old days.” If anything, perhaps we are just more paranoid now than we used to be. I would tend to think that a similar theory could be applied to sexual orientation. It’s not that there are more homosexuals walking around than ever before, they’re just not afraid to say it like they used to be.

So what’s my point with all of this? It’s nothing new. It’s not a big deal. Let’s just all go get a cup of coffee and enjoy the sunshine while it lasts.

How Geeky Can One Girl Get
Chapter 64

So Mix Tape is premiering tomorrow night. I’m excited. But perhaps more exciting for me is that this one is actually getting some press coverage. Sure, they are just little tidbits in a couple of newspapers, but we got press coverage. This is no longer a film that Only I Know About.

And the really fun thing about some of the press coverage is that I’m mentioned in it. Not by name, but I am “the ex-girlfriend” who is mentioned in a couple of the articles. Meaning the people who saw the film remember the relationship between my ex-boyfriend and I. And they liked us.

The problem with indie film is that post-production takes such a long time. You put in all of this work to shoot the film, but the payoff doesn’t come until much, much later. Well, here comes the payoff for this film and I’m having a blast. And yes, I know it is distasteful to boast, but I never claimed to be a woman of taste. I’m going to enjoy my thirty-seven seconds of fame, thank you very much.

I'm going to do really well in school.

I was walking to the train station last night and there was a man with a shopping cart walking just slightly in front of me. I am assuming by the way he was dressed and by the contents of his shopping cart that he was homeless, but I could be wrong. But I found myself wishing that I was brave enough to talk to him because the collection of stuff that he had in his shopping cart was kind of interesting. There wasn’t a whole lot in there – a few cans, some papers, an empty cigarette box. I wanted to ask him how he decided which things to pick up and which ones not to. I can understand collecting empty cans because in some places, you can still recycle them for money. Paper, too. But an empty cigarette box?

When one becomes homeless, can one find, like, a mentor to show one the ropes? Like, these are prime locations for collecting empty cans, or this place has a shower you can use, or if you’re really nice to the people at this bagel shop, they might give you a day old bagel when they close. That kind of thing. I don’t know that I would last as a homeless person. In a really bizarre way, I have respect for those who can do it.

I know that I am a cold person. And I don’t mean that in the “harsh, unfeeling” sense of the word, I mean I get cold easily. Physically. I have a low body temperature. Which explains my love of warm weather and thick sweaters and lots of blankets on my bed. I hate being cold.

That being said, I know that I like things warmer than most people do.

That being said, I firmly believe no matter what your body temperature, that there is absolutely no reason to have the air conditioning on when it is in the mid-seventies outside. Most people set their air conditioners in the mid-seventies. Why waste that energy cooling a room down to the temperature it wants to be anyway? Why not open the window and enjoy the sunshine and the breeze? Call me a hippie, but I prefer fresh air to re-circulated air any day of the week.

That, and I’m tired of freezing my ass off at work.

School starts today. What if I turn out to be dumb? What if I’m wearing the wrong shoes and all the other people in my class make fun of me for it for the next year? What if I talk too much in class? What if I don’t talk enough in class? What if I pass out from exhaustion in class? What if I turn in my homework late? What if I get a bad grade? What if my backpack breaks? What if the bookstore doesn’t have the books I need? What if I spend three hours in a room freezing my ass so badly that I can’t concentrate? Or perhaps worse than any of that, what if I really enjoy myself?

I think my New Years resolution this year should be to be less responsible. Because in all honesty, being responsible sucks. I woke up this morning convinced that I shouldn't even get out of bed, but I knew that one of my co-workers was going to be out today, so I dragged myself in. And lo and behold, it is only quarter after eight and my suspicions have already been confirmed. I should not have gotten out of bed this morning. Stupidfey twisted sense of responsibility.

I think the first thing that bothered me about soy milk is that it comes in a cardboard box. Because seriously, we all know what happens to cardboard when it gets wet. It's not pretty. So how could they package milk in a cardboard box?

I'm glad I got over that one.

I'm also thinking about selling my video collection. Or at least the pieces of it that I could replace with DVDs. I know it makes sense to do so, partially for the whole "there's gelatin in film" thing and partially because DVDs take up way less space than my video collection does, but somehow it makes me sad to think about parting with some of these movies. Even the ones I got really cheap when I worked at a video store. They were my friends for a really long time and I will be very sad to see them go. But sometimes, you need to move on from one chapter of your life to another, right?

Last night, I was supposed to go out with a friend from high school who I haven't really talked to since maybe my second year of college. And I went. Sort of. I met up with her and some other people and it took them about two hours to get it together enough to go out, so a couple of us went ahead and said we'd meet up with them later. And it occurred to me that I really didn't want to be there. I'm not into the frat bar scene. I'm not into standing around drinking, knowing that anyone in there who happens to look at me is judging me based on the fact that I'm not dressed like all a trixie. And as much as I would like to be able to say I am still friends with this girl from high school, I don't think that is a true statement. We're just different people with different goals and that is fine. I love her still, but I couldn't subject myself to that even for her sake. I'm sorry. I've worked too hard at being comfortable and confident to thrust myself into situations like that.

I dunno. I'm just kind of out of it and sad today. I'm sorry. I'll be better in a couple of days.

It's starting to feel like fall. Today is one of those days where you just want to stay home and eat soup and cuddle up on the couch with a special someone and watch movies all day. And yes, I mean "watch movies" in the traditional sense, not the high school date with the parents upstairs sense of the phrase. So I ate pizza and watched a movie by myself this afternoon. And now I'm thinking too much.

I've got a couple of things going on right now that I'm not sure I really want to get involved in for various reasons, but none of them seems like a good enough reason to not get involved, if you know what I mean. I was offered a role in an indie film and truth be told, I'm just not getting a good vibe from the whole deal. The script is kind of fun, but it doesn't knock me on my ass. The first time I read it, it looked like it would require some gratuitous nudity on my part and while I am not opposed to nudity on film, I am opposed to gratuitous nudity. But in the more revised version I have read, it looks like most of that has been taken out and what remains could be done by hinting at nudity with camera angles, if you know what I mean. But...I dunno. I'm just not getting a good vibe from it. I haven't signed the contract yet and at this point, I'm almost thinking I should walk away before I do it. Not to mention the time issue with school starting and whatnot.

But then I start to think that it could be fun. I get to kick some ass in the script which could be really fun. I haven't gotten to do real fight scenes in film before. But then again, who knows how good they are going to be? I could come off looking like an ass. But it could be good experience.

This is where I run into problems. Is an experience worth experiencing if you know the outcome is going to be bad? Or not what you were going for? If you know that in the long run, it would probably be better to avoid a situation, but in the short term a lot of fun could come out of it, should you do it? I've always been a subscriber to the avoidance path but I think part of my yuppie crisis that I am going through right now is telling me to take a chance on any crazy thing that that falls in my lap. I should say no. I should walk away. I don't want to regret this later.

"It's been so long since you've been a friend of mine."

I find myself mesmerized and transfixed and speechless. I'll be glad when today is over.

I just saw a very lost-looking rockabilly boy walking across campus. I didn't thing rockabillys woke up before noon. Check me out, learning something new.

So thus far, I have missed out on the whole Mars sighting thing. I feel kind of bad about it, but at the same time, I don’t have a telescope and I live in a big city, and both of those things would seem to hinder my viewing abilities anyway. Maybe I’ll end up somewhere over the weekend where I can see it. It would be a shame to miss it, though it would be a good reason to live another couple hundred years…

I had to explain to my doctor today what veganism is. She squinched up her nose and asked me three times, "So you don't eat any meat?" I love my doctor -- she is absolutely adorable and she always takes the time to talk to me about whatever I want to talk about. But yeah, she was really thrown by the vegan thing. She was like, "So, what do you eat?"

But I'm all checked up on and healthy and stuff. And my arm is killing me because I got a tetanus booster. Rusty nails of the world, come and get me! I'm ready for ya! But if you could please avoid my left shoulder for now, that would be great. Thanks.

On my way in to work this morning, I thought of about sixteen things that I could talk about today and now they have all left me. See this? This is Kitty. See this? This is Kitty when she’s sleep deprived. Sadly, keyboards do not make good pillows.

So many many people are amazed that not only do I not have air conditioning at home, but I don’t even have my window fan this summer. I have survived this summer thus far partially because it hasn’t been ungodly hot, but also almost completely unassisted when it has been hot. I don’t know how I feel about air conditioning in general, though, so I’m okay doing without it for the most part (I still have questions about the environmental effects of air conditioning even though I am assured time and time again that modern air conditioners are “safe”). Besides, my office is air conditioned and my car can be if I push the little button with the snowflake on it and the little green light comes on.

But yeah, air conditioning. I appreciate the fact that it removes humidity from the air because if there is one thing I could do with less of, it’s humidity. Well, suffering, anguish, fear, pain, and then humidity. But it’s still in the top five. Or twenty. Anyway, I’m not a big fan of humidity so it’s nice that air conditioning cuts that. The thing that irritates me is that often times the air conditioner’s temperature control is set so low that I end up freezing my ass off. Summers are supposed to be about being nice and warm. Isn’t that why we all look forward to summer? So we don’t have to bundle up anymore? But I still do, any time I spend time indoors – at work, at the movies, in bars – because the air conditioning is cranked up so high my teeth are chattering. I’m sorry, but there is something wrong with wearing a heavy sweater at work in the summer and still freezing.

So in the meantime, since I can’t mandate that everyone set their air conditioning at 75 degrees Fahrenheit, I will sit in my office with the door closed, my window open, and the air conditioning off and I will sleep with no blankets and very little clothing on. A lot of people spend a lot of time trying to find a reason to get naked. “I’m hot” sounds like a pretty good one to me.

So orientation wasn't quite as groovy as I thought it was going to be. I was all geeked to go into a room full of people eager to learn and I swear, you could have heard a mouse fart in that room it was so quiet. (Dick and fart jokes. You'll never go hungry telling dick and fart jokes.) The people running orientation seemed pretty cool, so at least I respect the important people in the program, which is a good thing. I learn a lot better from people I respect.

There was all kinds of talk about finding jobs and stuff which is really useful information for most of the people in the class, but me...I have a job. They want me to acquire these skills. And I couldn't, in good conscious, complete the program and then go look for a different job. That would be very "not cool" as the kids say these days. But I think I will get a lot out of the actual classes. I'm looking forward to starting them. One more week of freedom, baby.

I went to another open mic last night and it was completely different from the one I had been going to all along. This one was more of a jam session. There were only about six of us there and the format was such that if one guy was playing, someone else might go plug in his bass and start jamming along, or someone might pick up the little bongo drum or orange shaker thingy and add some percussion. My friend who came with me for moral support and I provided background vocals on some of the tunes we knew. It was incredible. If you have never made music with other people, please find a way to do so. Even if all you can do is clap in rhythm, please do so. I think I would be hard pressed to find an activity that brings people together in the way that music does. Which brings me to my other point about the evening.

I felt really out of place walking in there. Until my friend showed up, it was me and four guys who seemed like they all know each other and have been doing this for a while. One guy walks in wearing beat up jeans, a wife-beater, and has tattoos all over his arms and I think to myself, “They are really not going to dig what I have to play.” I need to learn to stop thinking that. That very same guy got up on stage and did Willie Nelson covers and did them beautifully. I got to talk to him for a little while later in the evening (some ego stroking on both sides) and he had a really good point – if you put a bunch of good musicians in a room together, they will appreciate each other’s music, even if it is not their personal genre of choice. These guys really appreciated the fact that I got up there and did some original tunes because a lot of what they did was covers. Granted, I was intimidated as hell trying to follow the guy who covers Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desire and Fur Elise (oh my god can that guy play!), but they liked hearing something new, even if I don’t have the technical guitar skill that they do. It was like each of us were bringing our strengths to the table and everyone else was appreciative of those strengths. It was incredible. I walked out of there feeling like I had four new friends.

So I’m walking across campus this morning convincing myself that yes, I am a good musician. The things that I write speak to people in one way or another, be it through the quality of my voice or my lyrics or whatever. Other people appreciate what I do and I love what I do and that makes me just as capable of calling myself a musician as anyone else. And then I see a woman walking towards me carrying either a penis pump or a vial of plutonium (a la Back to the Future) and I completely lost my train of thought.

Check it out. There’s a plum on my desk with my name on it.

Ah, sunglasses. One of the greatest inventions of all time. Maybe it is because I have light colored eyes, but I am very sensitive to bright light. I’m one of those people who sneezes when exposed to direct sunlight. So sunglasses have been my savior for many a year, saving me from the humiliation of squinting and sneezing in public (don’t even get me started on sneezing – I’ll talk about that another day). But finally, after months and months of being stuffed in my purse, my sunglasses died, probably a month ago. They just wouldn’t sit right on my face anymore. And just as they were dying, I found this promotional thingy in a magazine saying you could get sunglasses and only have to pay the shipping costs for them. Up to four pairs. It is a new brand and they want people to be out and about wearing their glasses, hence the “free” offer. So I figure why not? I’ve never owned sunglasses that cost more than five dollars at the gas station and with this offer, I would be paying approximately that much for some (supposedly) decent specs. So I ordered three pairs. And they just arrived today. Ah, sunglasses. I knew I missed you, but I had no idea how badly until you once again became mine.

Oh, and after I’ve tried these glasses out for a little while, I’ll tell you who made them. I don’t want to advertise on here for something I haven’t really experienced yet. But I'll let you know how they work out.

So I went to an open mic last night. The same one I used to go to, but I haven’t been there in approximately one million years, give or take a few months. I played my two songs that I’m pretty comfortable playing in front of people and I did pretty well. Positive audience reaction, which was really nice. Of course, I didn’t make the top three, but that’s cool. I got a lot of kind words from random people afterwards which was just as good, if not better.

The thing that I noticed, though, is that when I was up there, my songs each felt like they were about an hour long. Which is funny because they sound so short when I listen to them on CD. But yeah, I felt like I was up there forever. Maybe because all I really had to look at was a sea of blank faces. Which makes me appreciate live audiences. Audiences who participate in what they are viewing, be it through laughter or smiles or singing along or whatever. Live audiences. You don’t realize exactly how much they are worth until you don’t have one. And don’t get me wrong, I think it is really nice that the people in the audience at that open mic are respectful of who is playing. It’s just a switch from the kind of concerts I hope I can throw one day.

Though as two of my friends pointed out last night, I only play sad stuff. I know I play sad stuff, but I also play bitter stuff. Which may not be the most appropriate kind of music for bars and whatnot, but it is the kind of music that I play. When I feel like playing something else, I will. For now, I think I just need to find my niche and play there.

Now, I'm not really a techie, but I have noticed an interesting phenomenon. A couple of days ago, my cat got behind my television and knocked the plug out of the socket. So of course, I plugged it back in and now I have better reception than I have had in probably a year. I did not touch the antenna. I did not suddenly get cable. But suddently every one of my eight channels is crystal clear.

Who knew?

Last time I checked, cinnamon doesn't qualify as a "mint."

So the thing that irritates me about sex in the United States today is that it is all or nothing. There is no middle ground. And I’m not just talking about in movies and on TV; I’m talking about in real life, too. You can’t kiss anyone anymore without it turning into a big, “I don’t know if we should do this. Are we ready for this? I want to come upstairs, but we should probably wait” kind of thing. I know, this seems like a really odd complaint, but I’m serious. Get ready for some more of Kitty’s sexual oddities. Ready? Okay, here goes. I don’t want to have sex with every guy I meet. I don’t even want to have sex with every attractive man I meet. No, I am not a prude, but I have figured out a few things about myself and my own sexual preferences and I know that I enjoy myself a LOT MORE if there is more than a physical connection involved with the person I am sleeping with. Which is why I don’t sleep with many people – I don’t often feel that mental/spiritual/emotional/physical connection and unless I have that, I’m just as happy not having sex. Call me crazy. I blame it on the fact that I am female.

But at the same time, there is something really nice about sharing a level of physical intimacy with someone who is just so frickin’ hot you can’t not touch them, you know? You see someone walking down the street and fixate on his lips thinking to yourself, “Your lips the perfect suck me size.” Well, if you’re a Liz Phair fan you might think that. Normal people probably think, “I bet you taste really good,” or something along those lines. Me, I go for the “suck me” line. So anyway, my point is, sometimes I see someone who I’m just curious about and would like to explore that a little. And personally, I don’t think there is anything wrong with that curiosity. The problem occurs when that curiosity is acted upon because what could have been a mostly innocent kiss is now interpreted as an invitation to fuck me. That’s not what I’m going for. There is so much fun to be had without intercourse. Especially with someone new. There is a lot of joy to be derived from finding out how this new person’s body works and reacts to various stimuli. And I’m not talking about five minutes of dirty talk before the deed is done. I’m talking things like finding out how they kiss – are they a top lip or a bottom lip kisser? What is the lip to tongue ratio? What other places on his body respond to being kissed? Yes, there is the obvious answer, but where else? Men have more than one erogenous zone, as do women. And they vary from person to person. And for me, sex is a lot more fun if he knows what gets me (other than the obvious). I don’t want to tell him that. I want him to find it out through experimentation. And I want to find out through experimentation what gets him (other than the obvious).

And, if can step up on my platform shoes for a minute here, a lot of this kind of experimentation can be done with at least some of your clothes still on. Meaning the risk for STDs is significantly reduced and the risk of pregnancy is eliminated.

I dunno. Maybe I am a freak but it makes me sad that, “You want to come inside for a minute?” is synonymous with “You want to shag me silly?” I kind of missed out on those years of just making out with people (like most people do in high school, or maybe its junior high now. Kids are so anxious to grow up these days) and I think they are really valuable experiences. And just in case I ever invite any of you, my faithful readers, into my home, please keep in mind that I am being very literal and unless I specifically invite you ravage me, that’s not what I’m going for.

I think I have a new reader now. Welcome, new reader. Take a look around. Enjoy. And it will all make sense later.

So I think I have decided that when I am a rich and famous rock star, touring all over the world, I am going to have people working on my website whose sole function it is to take care of ticket sales. It will be their job to procure seating charts from the venues and then keep track of what tickets have been sold and what ones have not. There will not be huge service charges (actually, if I am in charge of pricing, I would just set the ticket price at a fair price that would cover operating costs) and I would instruct my ticket sellers to not sell tickets to brokers. I don't really have anything personal against ticket brokers, they just end up cheating people out of their hard earned money. Think about it. When you go to a concert, do you see more executives there than teenage and mid-twenties kids or the other way around? I would make a guess that the majority of concert goers (with a few exceptions like on a Rolling Stones tour or something) are people for whom $20 is a big deal. So ticket brokers swoop in and buy up all of the tickets at face value and turn around and try to sell them to kids who work in grocery stores for five or six times what they are worth. That's, like, a whole week's paycheck now for some kid to get to go see his idol play music. And it isn't the artist who is benefitting from the price hike, it is the broker.

So I guess my point is that if I ever get to the point where people actually want to pay money to see me mess around with my guitar, I would like to make sure that they can get tickets at a reasonable price and that everyone there paid about the same amount to see me (with the possible exception of front section tickets costing more than nose bleed seats). Of course, I would also love it if one day soy ice cream could be as yummy as Ben and Jerry's, so we'll see.

I wanna be a rock star. For real. And I know my wonderful, beautiful Bostonian guy friend is going to tell me that I am a rock star to him and thank you honey, I love you for that and for many, many other reasons, too, but that’s not what I mean this time. I want to be a rock star. I want to get up on stage and play my music for a room full of people, most of whom I have never met, but who are all there because they want to see me play my music (or because their boyfriend/girlfriend dragged them out but hey, it’s not as bad as they thought because this Kitty chick is actually pretty decent. You can tell she really loves to play and she puts on a good show) and I want them to sing along at the top of their lungs as if their lives depended on it and I want them to chant my name when I’m done so I’ll come back and play just one more song. And I want to hang out after my shows and meet some of the people who are so moved by what I do that they absolutely positively had to be at my show and they absolutely positively had to wait around afterwards in the hopes that they might get to meet me and shake my hand. I want to be the reason why some little girl somewhere picks up a musical instrument and starts to mess around with it, regardless of her musical background.

I saw Liz Phair last night. It is so bizarre to see your idol doing what it is that she loves to do and doing what it is that you love her to do. That makes no sense. I love Liz Phair’s music, so to get to watch her play it is almost unreal. Yes, I wish she had played more than she did, but she played so many of my favorites that I can’t really complain. The only things I really would complain about are that the volume on her microphone could have been higher and that she looked kind of silly singing some of the songs that aren’t really hers (i.e. written by the Matrix or someone else). But when she was playing the songs she wrote and that have personal meaning for her…she was beaming half of the time. It was incredible. You can tell that she really loves to just rock out now. And we all know that I love to watch people do what they love to do. I love seeing that joy and freedom inhabit someone’s entire being. It really is amazing to behold.

The opening band was okay. There was one guy in it who reminded me of my dance instructor friend from Switzerland/Germany. I think he will always be my dance instructor friend from Switzerland because that’s where he lived when I first met him. But yeah, this guitar player was kind of built like my friend and I could totally see my friend rocking out the way the guitar player did. The guitar player was really passionate about the music he was playing which is always fun to watch.

And I get to see it all again tonight. I love seeing live music. Good live music. Good live music that has played such a huge role in my life. This is why I need to marry a musician. A musician whose music I really love. Which kind of reminds me that I saw Nosferatu on the train the other day. We didn’t really acknowledge each other which is probably better. Yeah, he’s a good musician, but I don’t know that I could be as passionate about his stuff as I am about Liz Phair or Moby. And now I’m rambling and off the subject. I want to be a rock star. And I have a movie premiere coming up. I will be a rock star one day. I will play at the Metro to a room full of people who are all rocking out to stuff that I wrote. I will touch people’s lives in that wonderful way that mine has been touched by the artists who I love and respect.

I think this means my crisis of faith is over. The strength of its renewal almost makes me want to cry. Which is a good thing because that means it will last for a while.

Okay, I think today would be a good day to write an entry about things that are making me happy right now because there are a couple of people out there who are annoying the piss out of me and I really need to just let go of that. It’s not constructive and I don’t like it that I am so easily irritated by some of these people. Ignorance and laziness are just a couple of things that I have a very low tolerance for and I am finding myself surrounded by both of these things much more than I would like to be lately, so I need to write about things that are making me happy right now.

Adam Brody. He plays Dave on Gilmore Girls and Seth on The OC. Now, while I will stand behind the first of those shows until the day I die, I cannot really in good consciousness recommend the second one. Except for the fact that Adam Brody is in it. He is wonderful. Very fun. Cute in that dorky way. I see big things in his future.

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. This show just makes me smile. I love Ted Allen, the food and wine guy. And Kyan Douglas, too. And the really nice thing about this show is that since I don’t have cable, one of my co-workers tapes it every week and brings it into the office, so at lunch on Wednesdays, we order out and watch Queer Eye. Makes Wednesdays go by a little quicker.

Liz Phair’s “comeandgetitEP.” I know I talked about it yesterday, but it really is worth mentioning again. These five songs just make me feel good. Right. Like everything is as it should be in the world. Not that they are particularly happy songs, they just feel like home to me.

I’m planning a trip to New York in September, just to hang out and have fun. And not be here for a little while.

They are putting new windows on my apartment today. Truth be told, I am a little nervous about this because I had to leave my door unlocked so they could get in there, plus I’m always nervous about having work people in my house with my stuff there, and my cat. He’s probably going to be pissed at me for closing him in my bedroom again today (I thought they were going to do the windows yesterday), but in the end, I will have pretty new windows on the front of my apartment. Which is a good thing because A) hopefully they will clean the outsides of them before they leave so I’ll have clean windows, too and B) they will be replacing the screen that is kind of messed up from the days when Owen had claws and liked to climb the screens which means I won’t have to replace that or have the cost of replacing it taken out of my security deposit when I move out.

I got to see one of my friend’s new abodes yesterday. I have a lot of friends who either have moved just recently or are getting ready to move in the near future and I got to go visit one of them last night. It was very unstructured time and it is a very cool condo. I think he has some cool ideas for things to do to it, too. You can tell he’s excited to be living there, which is really nice for him. Plus, he is a friend of mine who I haven’t seen in a while, so it was just nice to get to chat with him about nothing and get a hug and stuff.

I’m going to dinner tonight with a friend of mine who just moved back to Chicago from Connecticut. I haven’t seen him in a while, so it will be nice to hang out for a while. Plus, he’s buying.

My cat has become very snuggly. He likes to sleep near my face at night now, which means I can kind of cuddle with him while I’m falling asleep. I don’t know if you’ve ever gotten to fall asleep with a cat, but it really is one of the sweetest things in the world. And even when he tries to wake me up in the morning, it really is cute. I know I gush about him a lot, but I really do love my cat.

I’m going to see Liz Phair on Friday night. That hasn’t really hit me yet, but I should start getting excited for that. Though I’m pretty sure I’m going to be scanning the crowd for Fucknut, I’m also pretty sure I am going to have a great time. And I have a really annoying question to ask her if I get to meet her again now. And more music to thank her for.

I found an understudy for one night of the show I’m in so that I can, instead, go to the premiere of Mix Tape and I think my name is in the promo stuff for the premiere as in, “Director Jefferson Root and actor Kitty Mortland will be present for discussion following the film.” Or something like that. Makes me feel all important and stuff. I gotta figure out something to wear, though.

I’m still annoyed that I don’t have much to do at work today. I’m still annoyed at how few people will step up and take responsibility for things. Though I am kind of happy about my new song “Glue Stick” wherein I take responsibility for things I have done wrong in the past. I’m excited to lay that one down and let my musician friend go nuts with it.

So, theoretically, could I take my guitar with me to Central Park and just sit and play? I wouldn’t be playing for money, like a street performer or anything; I’d just be playing for the joy of making music outside. There is something really wonderful about making music outside. Maybe I’ll just think about that for a while – making music outside on a beautiful afternoon in New York City. That just might become my “happy place.”

Oh, and for the record, I’m kind of giving up on the whole “I need to marry Moby” thing. I have relegated myself to being a fan of him as a person and one who will see every show I can and will buy every album, but I’m convincing myself that an interpersonal relationship will not exist there. A good friend of mine looked kind of sad for me on Monday night when I told him that, but really, I think it is healthier in the long run. And that is something else I can add to my list of things to be happy about right now – becoming healthier in the long run.

And one of these days, I will once again be animated and coherent. Today is just kind of a blah day.

I don’t really want to admit it, but I will admit the fact that Liz Phair and Fucknut are intimately connected in my brain. He introduced me to her music – without him, I would not know any of her stuff, really. I would be missing out on all of this music that hits me in such a personal way that I feel like I should have written some of these songs myself, she just beat me to it. So when she sings, “It’s been so long since you’ve been a friend of mine” or about getting back together after a break up, I can’t help but associate those songs and the motivations behind them with Fucknut. Probably unhealthy, I know, but I do it anyway. I can’t help it.

And I know I have posted in here a billion times that I am over Fucknut and I really am over Fucknut, but I get these little pangs every now and again. “What happened? When did you let go of me?” I wonder. I’m human. I am a human being who never got any sort of closure in what was probably the most influential relationship of her young life so of course I am going to think about it from time to time and of course I am going to wonder about it. I’m good at this whole justification thing, aren’t I?

But I know I shouldn’t wonder. I will never get closure and I have to accept that fact as my closure. So should I stop listening to Liz Phair because she reminds me of him? Do I need to mourn her and purge her from my system as well? ‘Cuz that would be really hard. She is such a big influence on me as an artist – she made it okay for me to not rhyme or to sing too low for myself because she does the same things. I don’t think I could get rid of that. So does that mean I will never be completely Fucknut free? Do I need to be completely Fucknut free? Should I stop thinking about this and go home?

I think that, like schools, many places of business should shut down in the summers. Not restaurants or grocery stores or hospitals or movie theaters or water parks, but corporate type offices. Because seriously, so many people take vacations and whatnot that how much work actually gets done? And the people who do still show up to the office are so not productive it’s really laughable. Because we get stuck inside over-air-conditioned offices on days like today that were supposed to be ungodly hot and sticky but turned out to be absolutely beautiful days and we spend the afternoon staring out the window wishing we were out at a water park or beer garden.

Think about it – it’s a win-win situation for everyone. Water parks and restaurants and touristy type locations would get increased revenues because of all of the corporate schlubs out having fun, meaning they could hire more college kids in the summers, meaning the college kids would have more money to spend during the school year. And the increased revenues that these businesses could bring in over the summer would make them less dependent on holiday revenues and fewer of them would have to declare bankruptcy as a result of the proliferation of online shopping. And if you were a corporate shill who had the entire summer off, think about how relaxed you would be when you went back to work in the fall. I bet the national health level would skyrocket.

Man, with ideas like these, I bet I could win governorship of California. Too bad I’m not old enough to run. Or a citizen of California.

If you are a Liz Phair fan or have ever even heard and enjoyed one Liz Phair song and you have not yet run out and purchased her latest album Liz Phair, I would like to encourage you to do so at your earliest convenience. There is an internet only EP that you need the actual disc to be able to get at and it is really wonderful. It's like finding a friend you haven't seen in years and picking up exactly where you left off. I like the new disc, but the EP is so much better. So please go pick up a copy so you, too, can enjoy these five songs. You will not regret it.

Okay, but here’s something else to think about. I know of at least two married couples who met in law school. So not only am I starting law school in a couple of weeks, but I might be setting myself up to meet the love of my life. How does one prepare for that and exactly how disappointed should I find myself if I don’t meet the love of my life in law school? Because in all truth, I don’t know how happy I would be spending the rest of my life with a lawyer. Unless he had a punk band on the side. That could be cool.

So we all know already that I love Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. I spent a good portion of my evening on Saturday night discussing the merits of the show from a sociological perspective. My whole point (‘cuz I’d had about two martinis on an almost empty stomach by this point, so I couldn’t have multiple points or I would have confused myself) was that the show does not perpetuate stereotypes because of the spectrum of gay men represented on the show. Sure, you’ve got Carson who is over the top, but you’ve also got Kyan and Thom and Ted who are not. Jai is somewhere in the middle. And you have about a ten year age range and many careers covered and stuff, so I find it hard to swallow the assertion that the show is demeaning to gay men because it perpetuates the stereotype that gay men are artistic or whatever. People who say that, in my opinion, are homophobes themselves because they obviously can’t see past the fact that the men on the show are gay and see them for their intelligence, humor, and talent. But I digress.

There is one stereotype about gay men that I would like to point out that is perpetuated on that show and in many other forums (i.e. the CD from Gay.com that I am listening to right now) and that stereotype is that all gay men like dance music. I don’t know if it is true or not, but I certainly see it all over the place. Any gay bar you go into is playing the stuff. And this CD is full of it. And the theme song from Queer Eye and so on and so forth. This is one stereotype that I would like to see broken down if it is not true. Show me some wonderful, fun gay men out there who dig country music or contemporary jazz or classical music or something. Or someone let me know if this is a true stereotype so I can stop worrying about offending my gay friends by giving them mix CDs of dance music.

Physically, this was a rough weekend for me. I don’t like it when my body doesn’t want to work the way I want it to. I don’t like it that when I go to rotate my torso, my lower back starts screaming, “I don’t think so, buddy!” And of course me and my bizarre sense of pride, half of me doesn’t even want to admit that anything is wrong and/or ask anyone for help. I’m sure it’s nothing serious but gosh darn it, it hurts. And that makes me really pissy and cranky and not a very nice person. And I don’t like the idea of having to take pain killers every morning to get through the day. Guess it’s a good thing that I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow morning, huh? Here’s hoping I don’t forget to ask her about this.

I guess it is equally frustrating after seeing something like Cirque du Solei, too, because those people can do so much with their bodies that I wish I was able to do but this pain in my back is preventing me from doing the few things I know I can do and I know I can do well. I know it is temporary, but it is still frustrating.

How is everyone else feeling this lovely stinkin’ hot Monday morning?

And I want to wish a very happy birthday to two of my very dear friends today. My honorary sister and my music producer friend. Both born same day, same year even. Both hitting a milestone of sorts this year. Both really wonderful people. So happy birthday to the two of them.

So I made up for my cultural miscalcuations yesterday by going to Cirque du Solei today. I still don't know how to spell it, but I know I like it. Holy crap, is that a cool show. And holy crap, there's a lot of stuff I just can't do. Largely because I don't have ropes and things in my apartment or a fifty foot ceiling. But if I did, I'd be all over that shit. It's just so inspriring to see. These people do things with their bodies that are now reserved for CGI characters and they make it look so effortless. And the costumes are the most amazing things. And the sets and lights and music. Yes, the tickets for Cirque du Solei are expensive, but as far as entertainment goes, you're not going to find much better stuff out there. If you've never seen a show, please go see one at your earliest convenience. And if you happen to be my very talented dancer friend in Europe, please go audition for this. You would be incredible as a part of this show.