Archive for July, 2008

Of lysergic bliss

July 28, 2008 at 8:31 am · Filed under Adventure, My ride, Topic gumbo

I have an actual art gig!

The pay is pathetic ($80 for a 9×12 full page) but at least it’s something. It’s a one-off for a splash page, basically. She’s a brand-new t-shirt peddler, I’m trying to beef up my portfolio and to do so for some cash vs. pro bono works for me, and it certainly works for her. Sold! I have several sources to work from but she really liked James Jean’s work for the 2007 Prada campaign so I’ll be focusing on that style-wise. A little of that, a little Bosch for surreality’s sake, and of course a whole lotta me.

For having absolutely nothing official about my illustration abilities, I was flattered to have essentially scored this purely on this drawing which, I gaged correctly, fit what she was after:

Obviously she wants something a little more crisp, something with her subject matter.

And I guess I shouldn’t kid myself. Definitely I want my art to be “worth” more, but when it all comes down to it: when you have $5.86 in your checking account, $80 really is a lot of money.

LINKY-DINKS

I have been binging on ectomo’s archives, because I haven’t been reading it since I moved here. Usually Anthony reads this and most of the Wired blogs religiously and bubbles all the interesting stuff over to me. This was one of the many things I enjoyed.

I kind of look like this kid, particularly the four pictures in the middle where he’s making faces. That’s basically my haircut, and what I look like in the morning before coffee. I don’t know that I look that charming, though. I should do my own shoot and find out.

This is fantastic. Good stop-motion gives me a warm fuzzy feeling inside, as does weird surrealist stuff.

I do this.

THIS WEEKEND

I went lazer-tagging. It was a sort of last-minute thing for me, I invited myself to another outing, but I had fun. We were the oldest people there. Our team obliterated everyone in the first three games, and then we were stalked and murdered by all the little kids in the subsequent two. Fair play to the kids, really.

And I also went walking around for the geohashing time. It was just myself and one of the guys. I drove, he (sort of) navigated, and we just had a nice two hour walk near Eagle Fern Park. We didn’t really make it to the point, but we had a nice walk. And I saw an inch-worm! I have this catagory in my head: quasi-mythical beasts. Things like aardvarks and such, that you hear about but never see in a zoo and you almost wonder, real? I think I always placed inch-worms in that catagory, but Saturday! Saturday I saw one. I also saw a caterpillar that morning when I went to get coffee. It was a good wormy-day.

Then yesterday was interesting. Got the art gig as I mentioned, which was essentially a result of my insomniac questions about the ad on craigslist. And when you ask questions about art stuff, the best was to do it is with sketches, and the rest just worked itself out rather well. I took my $20 advance and bought coffee beans, and then went right home to get started. About two hours later, Anthony and I texted each other at (weirdly) the exact same moment:

Me: I got the gig!
Anthony: I am thinking seriously about buying Dani’s car.

I guess I need to back up a bit so you can understand my shock.

Anthony did not drive when I met him. His learner’s permit had expired long before, and he’d never bothered to learn to drive, as he’d been carried along by friends up until that point. About three weeks after we started hanging out/ kissing, I lost my license for six months as penitence for being a lead-foot. And when you live in a place like Greeley, CO, there is only so long you can go without a way to get out of town, particularly when you are used to having a car. So we dealt with it for awhile until about a month later, when Anthony told me he’d get his license so we could go to Denver sometimes on the weekend. So we reinstated his learner’s permit, I guided him through some basics he was rusty on, and two weeks later we were mobile. I essentially played the part of hardcore copilot — checking shoulders when he didn’t and telling him to BRAKE sometimes. And, when the weather was icy, occasionally I was illegal pilot. (Only twice.)

So Anthony can drive, but since he hasn’t constantly since age 16, he isn’t very good at it. He’s fine if it’s a long stretch of highway. But shaky skills in conjunction with absolutely no sense of direction and you can understand why we usually just let me drive. I love to drive, he loves to be a passenger, so it works well for us.

So he’s buying a lemon off a friend. Or wants to. Part of me was thinking Dude we have a beautiful little beet that is paid off why would you want to insult it by doing that? But of course this does make lots of sense when you remember he will be going to school in Eugene for the next two years. And on the weekends, we certainly won’t want to be spending time there. (No offense, Eugene.) The logistics of me driving there, getting him, driving back, then dropping him off and driving home Sunday night…quite a headache. I just assumed it wouldn’t be able to happen all that often, but now it looks like I could be seeing a lot more of the guy, which is always a good thing.

And let’s be honest: it makes one feel pretty special to know a guy would buy a car so he could visit you more. Oh yes indeed.

Here are two things about the river from lately:

1. Last time I was on the bus, I saw a barge with big piles of sand on it! I have no idea what it was doing, but I liked it.

2. Overheard on a different bus ride: “I like bridges — it’s like a city stitched together.”

Well, I have some drawing to do. And then cleaning, since Anthony is coming in on Wednesday.

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Ultra cool grey

July 24, 2008 at 9:25 am · Filed under Lions and tigers and bears, Topic gumbo

It sure feels decadent to spend the morning setting up another blog: playing with code, tweaking existing images, posting an apologetic note on OldBlog and a welcome note on NewBlog.

Nothing to do with this — I’ve upped my CSS subscription here for another year, so I’ll stick around for a while. This was for my art blog, which is now here. I’m a little mixed on the whole thing — it seems to defeat the purpose of “establishing Google-able credentials” when you start from scratch. But I can’t afford CSS subscriptions for both this and poliwog, and ultimately after working with blogspot with Goose I have come to really like it.

However! I like to keep this one on the quasi-DL, at least for now. And you can’t do that really when you share a blog with someone on a server that features a profile page listing your every blog. So I will continue this straddle for a bit, methinks.

Every time I move a blog, which has happened a lot over the years, I think about the implications of such things. Not so much the Crisis of Conscience(tm) thing regarding writing an online semi-public type thing, because weirdly having done it since my formative years it seems only natural to me at this point. No, I think more about this weird need to move blogs. People do it all the time for all sorts of reasons, and then some people NEVER do (refer again to exhibit A — it will be a cold day in hell when Ms. Mimi moves, and that is fine by me). For me it all comes from wanting to try out the different platforms. It’s like being into film or wine — you need to try a whole bunch of stuff to know for sure if what you’ve been enjoying is really the best fit for you. (Hmm. Didn’t seem to follow through concisely on that metaphor. Ah well.) Usually this “trying” for me is just that — I set up a page, run a few tests somewhere, and then shut down. I outlined this a bit on my “intro” page, which was originally my first post.

But then you move away from places. I left diaryland for something else, went back and started about three different things (two for extreme thoughts, one for a more public thing), then tried to streamline again, then came here. I left diaryland for things like labels and categories. I have failed to use this as much as I thought I would, and now l look wistfully backwards (to diaryland) and forward (to blogspot). But mostly, I just stay here because of laziness. And because really, once I figure out how to make the archives usable, this will be just fine. Until something really big and new happens.

But I do at least string you along, right? This does not make you hate me right? You still want to know what I’m up to right? Right?

Ah, butter your own toast. I don’t care if you read it or not.

Because I’m an addict.

ANYWAY

Silly kitten things

The cake I just made. Pretty good. Can’t go wrong with Clotilde’s cakes, that’s what I always say.

This is, I think, a good idea in theory, but also probably a little over the top. I also worry about the implications of a product like this. A culture that has fast food, too much work, and now can’t even be bothered to actually hold their to-go cups of expensive lattes? Though I may try and modify a design like this for the coffee-whilst-biking problem I’ve been having lately. Can’t stick that mug in the water bottle holder.

Dude! Polenta! Where have you been all my life? I guess what I mean is the real polenta, dried and requiring a dangerous period of bubbling and spurting over the stovetop. Not the freakish tubes of yellow mush I saw on my first polenta encounter.

I’m a bit shy when it comes to food. I can encounter nonstop blog-ravings over something — Quinoa, lately — but I can’t just come to a new food like that. Not usually. I need to get there with a dish, preferably one that is served to me in a restaurant, cooked to perfection, so that I can go home and have a goal in my mind of what the thing should taste like. Which is why I’m a little proud of myself coming to Polenta, since it wasn’t something anyone had given me. I just came to it like a grown-up person.

WE PAUSE TO ACKNOWLEDGE CAT PROXIMITY

Six days. Six days until Anthony gets here, with Spike the cat. Oh my God. Did I mention Spike? Spike the cat? I guess I’ve mentioned it in passing, but I think it deserves it’s own little moment right now. Pretty soon there will be a cat living here, in my apartment. I had a couple horrific dreams about this about a week ago — a crushed kennel, a house completely unprepared — so that day I ran around town stocking up. I am mostly all set now. The bowls are out and the litter box is in place, although these receptacles are not yet filled with the appropriate things.

I’ve considered renaming him, and indeed I considered what sort of name he SHOULD have when we were bottle-feeding his orphaned litter. Teague [teeg] really suits him, as does something sensible like David for some reason. However it seems wrong to rename an animal when he’s had a name for two years, and since he’s practically a gift from Nicole’s family I really don’t want to insult anyone by changing his name the moment he arrives in a new place. And actually it’s interesting he’s named Spike, since there is some borderline-uncomfortable significance for me with that particular name and falling completely and instantly in love. M’epine. So he will not be rechristened. Spike is really not a Spike though. Not a playground bully, a pit bull, nor a frowning Harley enthusiast. He’s more like one of those felt tubes you place in the cracks of the window. I keep telling Dani I feel like I’m inheriting a skinny little throw pillow instead of a cat.

STUFF I DIDN’T MENTION ABOUT MY OUTING A WHILE BACK

Because John is gay and Rose is coming off relationship crisis, (she may be like a straight Dani, in terms of drama. Uh oh!) both of them Notice the way guys look. A lot. Vocally. Our wine server in particular, who I just thought was really chill and gave us a lot of good pointers for our wine selection (and also confirmed that the people over at stark naked pizza are always kind of out of it, so it wasn’t just us!), was reportedly very attractive. Because I’m happily all taken care of as far as a relationship goes (ha which is putting it lightly. Oh yes it is.) and because I tend not to gawk at attractive people anyway (since I have that artist problem, what the hell is attractive?) I didn’t contribute much to this conversation. Which later into the wine led someone (John?) hinting at setting me up with someone, to which I just laughed and basically said oh perish the thought. But kind of left it at that, since then the conversation went to Tarot cards which was much more interesting. So basically, I’m in this nice nebulous world where no one has any idea about me in that department, and it’s funny. And because I’ve been spending the last four years or so hanging out with mostly guys and lesbians this is a big change in gears for me. People oggling men. And expecting me to follow suit. A very different dynamic.

I guess part of it too is: having been in a circle very aware of my relationship with Anthony, I haven’t been overtly flirted at in a while. Not with any seriousness. Not with Intent. And twice now I have hung out with people who seemed to be making Overtures, which is another very different thing for me. Not necessarily flattering or exciting, just kind of amusing I guess is the word. I will have to go root around in some old mental boxes and dig out my Not A Snowflake’s Chance In Hell hat for such occasions.

ALSO

John is the second person I’ve met who reminds me of someone on QC, right down to the discussions of what makes hipsters hipsters. John’s gay and Martin isn’t, but otherwise the similarities are astounding. I need to get out more.

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from “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!” by Dr. Suess

July 21, 2008 at 12:10 pm · Filed under Topic gumbo

And when you’re in a Slump,
you’re not in for much fun.
Un-slumping yourself
is not easily done.

You can get so confused
that you’ll start in to race
down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace
and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space,
headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.
The Waiting Place…

…for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go
or a bus to come, or a plane to go
or the mail to come, or the rain to go
or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow
or waiting around for a Yes or a No
or waiting for their hair to grow.
Everyone is just waiting.

Waiting for the fish to bite
or waiting for wind to fly a kite
or waiting around for Friday night
or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake
or a pot to boil, or a Better Break
or a sting of pearls, or a pair of pants
or a wig with curls, or Another Chance.
Everyone is just waiting.

NO!
That’s not for you!

Somehow you’ll escape
all that waiting and staying.
You’ll find the bright places
where Boom Bands are playing.

window

quilt

elephant

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Surprise coffee garage

July 18, 2008 at 11:08 am · Filed under Adventure, Topic gumbo

All right. Since last we spoke I didn’t get a job. I only heard from one place, the button place, who said “sorry we went with someone else”. Is it wrong that I cried a little bit? Yes. Yes it is.

The good news though is that last weekend I went pub crawling with some people, participated in a mass pillow fight with strangers, and swam in a river. It’s true. I went from weeks of solitude to a weekend filled with people.

To back up a bit: I went to the PFLAG meeting last Tuesday It was actually their celebration of 25 years as a chapter, so it was less normal-meeting stuff and more kind of ‘this is how far we’ve come’ kind of stuff. Still good though. We all went around the great big circle and said a.) our name and b.) why we were here. That took close to about an hour and a half, because of how many people were there and what everyone had to say. Some highlights:

a.) the mayor of Portland, Tom Potter, was there and spoke about how his daughter came out back in the late 70’s when he was an officer with the city police. He’s evidently been involved with PFLAG and helping people out for a long time — he walked in the parade with his daughter in uniform, much to this alarm of his co-officers, which still did not stop him from becoming chief of police and eventually the mayor, which I think is pretty rad. A representative from Multnomah county was also there, which was neat. I was starting to lose track of who was on the board of trustees for the city/county and who was on the board for PFLAG.

b.) two people I noticed right away were a father and son almost directly across the circle from me. I noticed him because I think besides the president of PFLAG’S son, this guy looked to be about the closest to my age (everyone else was like late 30’s – 80s), When the circle came around it was noted that this was thier first PFLAG ever, which garnered huge applause.

c.) My turn came right after the treasurer for PFLAG. The president cut in to say “Richard’s actually one of those rare gems — a straight ally with no kids, just giving us his time” which was cut off by huge applause by everyone. Which of course led to my…ah well, I am kind of in that boat…

d.) I mentioend Sam’s PFLAG in Colorado, said hi I’m here..I kind of forget what exactly. I kept it brief. But it was good that I mentioned both “PLFAG” and “Colorado,” because after we adjourned to eat snacks, that guy’s Dad made a beeline right for me and said ‘where in Colorado??” Apparently the dad is actually from Colorado, and was needing to start to come to terms with his son’s sexuality, and knew of this group but was a little shy to go alone, so when he was out here visiting they decided to come together for the first visit, so then he could go later on his own. I told him that Greeley is probably not where he needed and the dad was kind of like “oh yeah but anywhere…Grand Junction? Boulder?” “Well I KNOW they’d have one in Boulder. That’s for sure.”

So we had this nice little conversation, and then later after making intense eye contact off and on, I crossed the room to introduce myself to John.

“I don’t mean to stare,” I said, “You just look REALLY familiar to me.” (Now that I think of it, I think it’s just that he looks like this art major I knew at school.)
“No! It’s funny becuase you look really familiar to me!”
“Really??”
“Yeah! It must be something about your face-shape or something…I dunno. I was sad you aren’t gay cause I thought, ah man that would have been something we’d have in common.”
“I know I know..but maybe we can find something else! Like…I like…green!” (I point to his very green polo shirt)
“Well good! I like yellow!” (I was wearing a yellow shirt)
“Good! I think we should be friends!”

I was hoping that I didn’t frighten him off with my blunt Lets. Be. Friends. But as I’ve mentioned, I was getting a bit desperate. We exchanged numbers and made vague let’s-do-something-this-Friday plans.

FRIDAY
Spent most of the waking day talking to one of the geohash friends (John, who conveniently spells it Jhon on the wiki which helps me differentiate from my other new-friend-John) about the possibility of doing technical website type stuff as a job. I think it is a stretch but made me feel happier that day, and encouraged me to type out a cover letter to that effect and apply for some different jobs. Somewhere in there I also bought a robot bucket at a toy store, which made me really happy. I was walking that day so I carried it from the toy store all the way to the coffee place on Belmont and then all the way home. It had a little wooden boat and my sweater in there.

Then it was pub-crawling time. I met up with John and another friend of his at the park and I spent much of the evening listening to the two of them talk about another friend of theirs (not on purpose I don’t think, she just moved close to Rose so they had seen a lot more of her lately, so she was on the brain.) We had pizza and beer (them), then had a glass of wine at a swankier place down the street, then hit up another place for beer (them) and jack-and-cokes (me), and then headed back near where we started for more drinks (them) and dancing. It was intensely social and SUCH a great time.

NOTEABLY
1. We got pizza at this pizza place on Stark St., called ’stark naked pizza’. Ar ar. Rose was admiring the supreme pizza (which had giant cloves of garlic and big chunks of beef, peppers, onions and stuff. I was feeling adventurous enough by going out with people, so I opted for pepperoni.) She told the guy, “I’d like whatever magic is right there.”
The guy kind of snapped out of his dazed lull to say, with deadpan gravity, “Oh. You are right. It is magic.”

Aha! A clue, Sherlock!

This, combined with the fact that we had to go back to the counter twice to ask for their drinks, plus noting how at one point he loaded a pizza into his car and left for a delivery when we weren’t sure there was someone else there (there was, we later discovered) was great entertainment for us. He was either very stoned, or cultivating some sort of weird aloof hippie thing a little too well. Perhaps both. Is there a difference?

2. At the penultimate bar there was a coaster with this weird looking lady printed on it. On the back was the same lady, redrawn in ballpoint, and the words BUTTER YOUR OWN TOAST in quotations. Rose and I had a guttural kind of 50’s Brooklyn Mom voice for this sentence. I drew it in my notebook and she took the coaster. We also thought this would be a great thing to shout to someone as you slam the door in their face.

3. John was wearing a thrifted t-shirt that was from some sort of bible camp that had the word JESUS! on the back, in a red 70’s type font, with a little hill and a cross and a sunset. His explanation was, “it’s the expletive, not the guy.” Which led us to shouting JESUS! every time anything happened. Which I have been unable to cease doing. In other words HE HAS BROKEN ME.

THIS IS GETTING LONG BUT THERE’S NOTHING FOR IT BUT TO PRESS ON INTO SATURDAY

The pillow fight was but one activity during a pastry shop’s Bastille Day block party. Rose mentioned it but neither of them could go, so I loaded up the mini and took a quick drive up north to see. It was a good jaunt; I hadn’t actually been up to that section of town because I hadn’t yet been given a reason to. I saw great looking stuff I’d like to lose myself in. I also had a pillow fight with about 30 other people to like music. And then I had a macaroon for the first time (blueberry). I was very HOT and SWEATY after this, since I was running around flailing in direct sunlight during the hottest part of the day. My head was throbbing and although I knew I was going to be working up another sweat on the geohash, I hopped in the shower just to make my head stop throbbing, and to let my clothes dry out.

Then geohasing! Wil had emailed everyone and said, look this week’s point is basically inaccessible. So instead, let’s go to Oneonta Gorge because it’s near there, and because it’s awesome. Also, bring water shoes because you are going to get very wet.

Took I-84 backwards, which is something I hadn’t done since Anthony and I left Portland/Eugene after the trip in December. So that was neat — one of those moments where you re-recognize some things, but notice them very differently now that they are added to your bigger map of the area. Now that there is a context.

The ‘trail’ was essentially the river itself. Lots of clomping through water, occasionally it got waist deep. Scrambling over fallen trees, over boulders, and marveling at the sheer cliffs on either side of you. This wasn’t layered rock like desert Gorges, this was just sheer granite and shale, (i.e., dark greys) with moss and tiny plants clinging to it all up and down.

Now. The water was cold, yes, but it wasn’t like SNOW MELT cold, it wasn’t like standing ankle deep would turn your lips blue. Which is a good thing, since there was so MUCH of it, but also meant that it was a constant shock to me. I was bracing my legs for the swoards of coldness, and then would be pleasently surprised when it lacked the stabbing. The first waist deep part wasn’t pleasent, but at least it wasn’t life-threatening. Sweet. No problem. It made you feel like you were on an adventure.

Then we reached the falls. Underneath the falls is a deep pool, and just on the other side of the pool is a ledge. So of course, we had to swim out there. The pool is only I think about 10 feet across, and probably about 10-15 feet deep (I touched bottom when I jumped back in from the ledge) but I must say … I think it was the longest 10 feet I have ever had to swim. I have never been totally submerged in water that cold without a life vest, so the mechanics of forcing my body to actually move was a challenge.

Well worth it though.

Note how dry the Dad is, in that last picture. His shirt was blowing in the breeze, and I think he managed only to get his feet wet. During the waist deep parts you can try and be a human fly and scale the walls, which is possible (he did it there and back) but really tricky. Many people would do this and then slip in. And frankly, when your head was pounding from heat hours prior, it’s nice to actually be shivering from cold.

That was last weekend. I have more to say believe it or not, but it must wait because I need to hurry and bake a cake before the weather warms up.

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C is for Craigslist

July 8, 2008 at 2:24 pm · Filed under Topic gumbo

SHACKLED TO THE GALLOPING HORSES OF WOE

I didn’t really make this clear in my last post: when I was calling Anthony and ended up complaining about how lonely I am, what I’d meant to call about was how hopeless I feel about getting a job.

I know I have it relatively easy. I have not been cut off from my parents, I don’t have a family to feed, it’s just me and my anxiety talking here. I acknowledge that. I am also not like some of the people I have been hearing about, these 20-30 years-of-service-to-the-company-that-just-laid-them-off people. But sometimes I find I am in the same boat as these people, in this economy, and it scares me.

My problem is that nobody will pay me to go on travels, drink coffee, and blog about it. Right now that’s what I really want to do. And no one, as yet, is interested in my paintings or my drawings, to any degree of seriousness. Strike two. I have an agreeable employment history, a lovely little path which leads into moderately responsible office work — I could probably manage something on a small level if given half the change — but the truth is office work doesn’t really suit me. I liked it okay, don’t get me wrong — it’s nice to have weekends off and insurance and stuff — but it’s a bit like high school, and it’s a bit soul-draining. I had a hard time coming home to paint when I had the office job, particularly when I worked in classifieds and everyone told me how slimy and evil I was all day long. So I don’t know how aggressively I should pursue that, particularly since people in these office-bound temp agencies have career-flavored mantras; they are trying to find you placement that has advancement that will benefit your career. And that scares me, because I don’t want up that ladder. I want it to be something I can do while I get art going.

You can’t tell people this of course. You need to be very positive on the job you’re going for, because at the end of the day you NEED it. You really do. And while we’re at it, office work pays much better than retail, and you are treated slightly better in an office than you are on the sales floor ruled by a passive-aggressive power-hunger assistant manager. It’s nice to work somewhere where HR actually can do something if shit goes down, and having health benefits is something my weak-tooth-enameled, hypochondriatic, severely myopic self needs in this country, at least until we can have free health insurance for all. And paid vacation is nice for that travel-coffee-blog dreams. So suck it up and look there right?

So I thought. It’s vast tangled web of dead ends. Every cavern I shout into swallows my voice completely without hearing so much as an echo, which would at least tell me to get knotted. Editing jobs — jobs that reflect my degree — are few and far between, and it seems like they only go to people who have 5-7 years experience minimum, even for “entry level”. But I expected that. Meanwhile I feel like I’ve applied to every office admin position within a 50 mile radius, and there have been TONS, yet no dice. The smattering of other jobs I’ve gone for have not responded back. All the while I wonder how much of this time I should be spending fleshing out my illustration portfolio, if that’s what I eventually want to be doing anyway, and I am scouring old blogs and papers looking for anything I could call “writing samples”. I sent off for a mail carrier application, but the process will take so long I worry that by the time I send it in they will not need mail carriers in my area (a bit of a shame, since they apparently make a decent sum). And then yesterday I stumbled upon a job with a button-making company here in my neighborhood and oh my God I would love to make buttons. I would so love to work with cutting and setting machines and make tiny round things. I cannot even begin to tell you how happy this job would make me, it satisfy so many of my small qiurks and joys:

1. I love small things.

1a. I love lapel pins, not for wearing so much (though I have quite a few) but just their small little voice and existence.

2. I love to make things with my hands. (See countless posts about paintings, quilts, bags, etc.)

3. I love to make things fit. I think I have talked about this here before. I worked at Pier One for a long time and hated it except for working back stock — making things fit. I could make more things fit out on the shelves than any of my co-workers could, and when we had to reorganize everything back there I was usually the first one to volunteer. My first job at the Greeley store was actually to reorganize this giant shelf that held many of the smaller display shelves. To make the smaller shelves fit on the shelf-of-shelves. Then I went to work for the Tribune, where I had to make letters fit onto four lines of text 20 characters long. Then I became the legal notice goddess and do you know what I did? Every morning I drew up a big blank document and made everything fit onto a single 9×21.25″ page for Alan to print in the paper. It. Rocked. I loved that. So there’s no guarantee, but I’m betting this job involves getting a flat piece of something and then…yah ta da…making it fit onto the round button template.

So. Of course I sent my resume, immediately, and then took a small break to daydream about how freaking awesome that job could be. Walking or biking to work. Working with a smallish group of other people who go home and paint or write songs every day. Making neat stuff. Oh man.

But then of course now it’s been all of 27 hours and I’ve heard nothing, probably because the rest of Portland is also sitting around unemployed and looking for something cool that pays well, and undoubtedly someone in that vast collection of people is a professional button master, had a father who’s father was a button master before him, and obviously that guy’s a shoe in and here I am sitting in my apartment just hoping. And I am hoping so hard I am positively glowing, because I want this button job more than anything I’ve wanted in a long time yet cannot express this to anyone — particularly those who can give me the button job — because that’s a really great way to come off strange and creepy. A good way to not get the job at all. So I’m left to hope hope hope. Hope long and hard all the while that sickly feeling in my stomach reminds me that I need to keep looking for other things. Reminds me to remember about the other couple jobs I called Anthony about, saying ‘hope hard for this one!’ I can’t remember what they were, because they are completely eclipsed by the coolness that is the button job. But I guess that’s how it works.

MEANWHILE, HERE ARE SOME BITS THAT HAVE NO OTHER PLACE

It was a real dodgy landing in Dublin, the worst I have ever experienced. Jerking plane, the pilot had trouble staying level, and we kept loosing altitude in worrying ways. When we did touch the ground, everyone cheered and broke out into applause.

OH CILANTRO

You are not that tasty. Yet you are necessary, in very small amounts, to make my fish tacos orgasmic. Yet you are not sold in very small amounts, but rather in fist-fulls that would take me an entire year to get through, assuming you would stay fresh. And you wouldn’t, because even when I place you in a glass of water in the fridge, you wilt long before I can use you up. And I can’t use you up quickly, because I don’t cook with you much. Because I find you kind of metallic-tasting in large doses. Yet you are like basil, and really cannot be used dried. OH CILANTRO YOU VEX ME SO.

SOMETHING I NEVER KNEW

When you hit the toothed end of a hammer onto a roof, sometimes it sparks. Probably because of the nails.

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