3 cheers to long ago advances in western medicinal technology

speaking of allergies, wtf. my world is collapsing in on itself - a direct result of the vicious battle (my body vs pollen) that has been waging for the last few days that reached a fever pitch this afternoon. jehus h christ i almost sneezed out a kidney.  

i was in new york last week and was telling my friend, yeah, i didn't have any allergy problems there, it was amazing. to which she deftly pointed out, that's cuz there are no trees in new york city. point taken. here on the west coast, things be different.  a day or two of rain followed by bright sunshine kicked everything and its amebic version of a mother into motion.  for those of you blessed with bodies who dont decide one day that (insert innocuous species) is now your mortal enemy, consider yourselves lucky.  allergies are dreadful. you know that feeling like you are about to sneeze? take that, multiply by always, add what amounts to a heinous, watery sinus rash, put a bucket (or giant zip lock baggie) over your head and walk around, that is pretty close to what it feels like. oh, and get no sleep the night before. i'm staring at the beautiful blooming trees that surround my house, my feather comforter, the adorable BABYSEAL asleep atop it, and my vision is intercepted by a circle big enough to encompass object of my gaze in a thick red halo with a giant diagonal line across it. get. away. from. my. face. 

today, i finally, after a whole day's worth of violently sneezing, finally, after years of suffering in all my life of residing in the pacific northwest come spring time, finally, broke down at 8pm and walked to the drug store to find some quick (as in not 3-4 months worth of preventative acupuncture) relief. i bot two kinds. on sale. 

. . . ok, i was gonna go on to talk about how, on principal, i generally tend to use nonwestern medicinal fix its. (uh, can you believe both my parents are nurses? and no, it's not some rebellious act. that would be taking things too far/silly). and how i would rather have puffy red eyes sitting pretty above a nose that never stops water making than take over the counter meds. but that today was exception and maybe there is something to the OTC, as long as you don't abuse it. but right now it feels like my fingers are disconnecting from my hands i took the super allergy kind that didn't say *non drowsy*. must not operate heavy machinery.  i will sleep well tonight, there is no question about that .  i , have ,.nothing else. my eyelids weight a thousand pounds. there is an invisible axis that goes straight out from my solar plexus that my chair is slowly spinning on, the computer spins opposite. let us hope i wake up on time in the am. good bye cruel world.

on account of others, including the full moon.

today i ate meat. on accident. it was hiding ever so quietly in the vat of beans that sat between the mango salsa and the tray of white rice. a spread of brazilian fare to make the visiting brazilian dance company feel at home.  i thought i smelt meat, but i had the garden vegan sausage in the bottom of my bowl, it was a subtle, pleasant aroma, therefore easy to dismiss. as i went up to get seconds, i overheard coworker who moments ago saw me go to the bean vat and partake say, 'yeah the beans look really good, too bad they have meat in them or i would eat them.'  so that's why they tasted so good. 

last summer i had 'spinach dumplings' with a friend and the secret ingredient was pork. didn't have the gusto to return it. conveying my self imposed dietary restrictions to native english speakers is tedious enough. i think that, even with the proper asiatic vernacular, my discourse on what i consider to be food would have been meet with a blank stare. i finished my dumplings in silence. with extra fish sauce.

the fall before that, i was at some opening to a play. there was a buffet in the lobby: many unmarked, unmanned goodies. i (thought i) could identify a few's ingredients by sight, one of which was a bruchetta (sp? it's late. . .) style appetizer that had bean paste on it. they were the tastiest thing there. i went back for more. and then more. and ok, maybe one more. the last one i ate, i bit into something the texture of bone. yes, a small bone. oops. well, that will be the last one for me.

i read this short story once, about a newly wed couple, traditional in their ways. they were very open and loving. the husband had but one request, that the wife never cook or feed him red meat. no concrete answer was given as to why, but perhaps some squirrelly replies involvin phrases such as 'this is how i grew up,' 'my mother's dying request,' followed by an adamant 'just do this, or else.' the wife let it go and focused on the good of their relationship, which was everything but this culinary taboo.  days, weeks, months go by, wife is out shopping, comes across a nice cut of red meat/(insert proper cut of meat verbiage, this veggie is out of the loop) and decides to why the heck not surprise her hubby and make him something containing the forbidden protein. so home she went and prepared a delicious soup, disguising the meat texture with fine chopping, it's flavor with finer spices. husband comes home. they sit to eat. throughout the meal, he tries to get her to tell her what is in the soup that he is enjoying more than any other meal she has cooked for him in their entire abbreviated time of marriage. she teases and keeps him guessing until finally, his bowl is empty, his curiosity is peaked, she drops the bomb and as it lands the smile from his face falls and he stares with horrific disbelief. turns out the guy was allergic to red meat. and by allergic, i mean that the consumption of red meat triggered an irreversible process where in he morphed into a werewolf.  oops. 

moral of the story is: A. make lllittle labels if you bring/make/serve food at a potluck style event. as a courtesy to those with dietary restrictions and allergies. B. if you are strictdfaffse -(woops, 'scuse me, dont know what that was) vegan/veggie, best not just go sampling the spread all willy nilly. (unless it's free, of course) and C. when @9 93 (* Hehisf  (darn, that is weird, it's like i lost control of my hand just there) someone says they don't want to eat whatever food, they probs have HU(eJKjf (oh my, i'm feeling a little woozy, must have been something i ate...) a good rrrrrrreason.  rrrrrrraaaBANGaaaaaaaahhhhhggggggghhhhhh CRASH

AGHGHHHARARRR H GAG aaaoooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuu!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(exits room as wear wolf)

BELATED MIRACLE OF MIRACLES!

BABYSEAL has returned! unscathed, hungry and dandery as ever.  little lost kitten is neither little nor lost no more.  tho the little part and the kitten parts have long since gone out of fashion.

ok, she actually came back like a week ago. sorry to keep all you in suspense. why the delay in announcing such momentous mews- i mean news? well i have not one, but two excuses cooked up for you. ready? here we go:

1. i was ill. i was in bed for a few days, basically adopting the covetous daily routine of my beloved by proxy felines: lay in bed, get up to snack, lay in bed. the only glaring difference in my days and the cats' days was that my routine was punctuated by laborious descension/ascension of stairs to bathroom to properly respond to all the liquids i had been downing. the cats, they do not deviate from the invisible path that marks the beeline from the bed to the snack bowl. prostrate field research leads me to conclude that domestic felines retain their water well. quite well.  further investigation into the matter is neither interesting to me nor called for.

2. i am in new york now and have been here since sunday. i got busy with prepping and getting all my proverbial ducks to fit in one carry on and one personal item. now i am here, sans personal computer. equipped with nothing more than my notebook and a metro card.  this time it is i who is feeling a little lost. . . 

BABYSEAL IS M.I.A.!

and not the pregnant paper planes kind!

i had written some text the other day under the title BABYSEAL WENT MISSING FOR ONE.5 DAYS! but now one.5 days after her return, she is missing once more! what once passed as humourous prose now seems rather insensitive considering the current state of affairs. . . .

so now with all due respect, i shall put here few highlights of the piece which i shall respectfully rename MOMENTS, WITH BABYSEAL:

-BABYSEAL snores in her sleep. it is adorable. and remarkably loud.

-BABYSEAL lives. for snack time. ilvs: did you just throw something at me? geode: no, BABYSEAL was eating and turned her head fast to look at Peter Peter Jennings and a piece of cat food flew out of her mouth. ilvs: BABYSEAL, i love you.

-BABYSEAL is a lover of animals. except for her brother Peter sometimes when he comes in from being outside and smells of foreign smells at which point she turns into a hissing gremlin and lazily swipes at him from her prostrate lounging position when he gets too close.

BABYSEAL, please come home.

it's bloods and CRIPS - not bloods and CRYPTS

'Can i draw on your face?' 

my roommate looked up at me from her book, 'Um, no. But here,' she added, moving her top left extremity in my direction, 'you can draw whatever you were gonna draw on my face on my hand.'

ok i actually didn't have an idea of what to draw on her face, i was just amused by the very idea of it, but as my pen drew near her skin, it came to me.  i inked on her paw a single teardrop. she looked at it and we both laughed. as funny as she thought it was, my request to gift her a matching one under her left eye was rejected. something about not wanting to get beat up or something.

also rejected: my idea to dress up for the movie we were gonna see later on, a documentary about crips and bloods (dir stacy peralta). i was even gonna give her first dibs on colors. . . oh well, probably for the best, i wasn't gonna have time to iron the creases in my dickies anyways.

(about half hour later)

so, you're gonna have to search some other blog to find a descent review of the film. we didn't make it. well, we did, but it was sold out. we opted for some slots on the waiting list and waited in our non represent attire. several seats opened up, we got called to the counter. they had 2 seats, but they weren't together. roommate and i are joined at the hip, this will not do at all. a 2 minute mini conference confirmed our suspicions, separation would be less than ideal. so we passed on the 'well i might as well be watching the movie by myself - oh wait, i am' seats and went home.  probably for the best, the average movie goer who is seated next to me by chance is generally not fond of unsolicited peanut gallerying however interesting/witty/thoughtful i think the comments are. 

that and sitting next to tall one would lessen my chances of being beat up/lonely/kicked out for talking to myself. tho, had we dressed up, we could have divvied up the audience and assigned ourselves leaders of each side and made it more of a participatory event. . . please file this under 'what's black and red and not a very good idea?'

fancy is as fancy does. actually, i'm not sure really what that's suppose to mean. . .

so during my time in milwaukee, i had the pleasure of staying in a 4 (does it go up to 5 or are there only 4 stars. which ever it is, it was full star) star hotel in the historic east side district (hotel metro, for those who value transparency in a writer). i tend to be understated and what im about to say mos def keeps me true to my nature: that place is fancy. it's bigger than my apartment. granted it is a studio on capital hill that i share, but feel me on this one, the room was nice. real nice.

i, on the other hand, am not. fancy. im about as scrappy/rough and tumble as they come. put me in a tent on the roof with a warm sleeping bag and a thermos of hot tea and im good to go. the 5 layers of EGYPTIAN COTTON sheets and not 1 but 2 flat screen TVs were lost on me. same goes for the 12 super fluffy towels in assorted sizes, the cosmic array of travel(er) sized AVEDA products and 24 hour room service that included organic salads on the menu.

for the first day or two, i pretty much tip toed around. i made my bed. i wiped the glass bathroom sink counter top free of post teeth brushing water beads. i avoided like the plague the gigantic bath tub and accompanying salts.

day two or three rolls around, and really, i start thinking to myself, this place isnt all that bad. i nibbled the large piece of ok chocolate enrobed in gold foil. i hung my running clothes in the closet on the pink satin cushioned coat hangers. i broke open the AVEDA facial soap and body soap. 

day three or four and i catch myself midway thru transformation from nice scrappy privileged DIY bike punk to impatient high maintenance privileged DIY bike punk. the hot water spewing from the high pressure variable stream handleable shower head was not hot enough. the shiny white porcelain basin that floored the slate rock tiled shower was too slippery. the 'business speed' internet was not fast enough for my 'business.' the complimentary fruit from the basket on the receptionist desk had a bruise on it. 

wow. so this is how some people get to be that kind of person. somehow in the process of fancyfying my surroundings, the internal relationship between my environment and my dealing with it became inappropriately inversely proportional.  things got superficially nice, i got superficially lily livered/weak. i stopped myself from calling the front desk to file a formal complaint using the phone conveniently located right next to the toilet. 

i put my complaining for the sake of well cuz i can to a halt went for a walk to the health food store market. leaning my graciously offered umbrella into the blustery rain, i set off to find some snacks, my sense of reason. 

back at the hotel, i spent a good 15 minutes tidying up before check out. i wanted to leave a tip on the pillow for housekeeping (i hadnt let them in the whole time i had been there) but stood there with my wallet open, staring at the 4 ones and the single ten. 4 bucks seems lousy, i had been there 5 days. but ten bucks, that felt like it leaned towards patronizing. i agonized longer than necessary then rested mr, uh, mr whichever president is on the ten on the soft feather comforter and walked out. wait, do people even tip housekeepers? i dont know. oh well.

in the lobby waiting for my people, i grabbed an apple from the free basket. i got most of the way thru then stopped because the core and its immediate surroundings were brown. the apple was well on its figurative way south. i stared at the apple, then to the uniformed staff behind the desk, then back at the apple, then at the fancy run on the floor. be right back, i told my on time people, and walked across the lobby to throw the rotten core in the trash can.

rock paper scissors

im in milwaukee. it is a dry town. in the sense that there is what feels like zero moisture in the air. between the arid theater and the super fancy hermetically sealed hotel room, i feel as if my skin might crack if i move to fast or bump into something too hard. like all the freaking mannequins i keep seeing. i don't know if it is the unfamiliarity of this place that makes them stand out or what. even the headless one threw me off. as did the bronze duck by the river. as did the bronze Fonz by the river. (sometimes i wish i had a camera crew following me always and not just some of the time.) The Fonz has fared well considering the weather and weather fighting salt. i, on the other hand, could really use some lotion. i am a lizard. and this is my rock.

it's was that 'oh shit' sinking feeling that hit me like a ton of sand. it was and accident, i wasn't being careful, i was going too fast. but it's too late and now there is nothing i can do about it. my fingers, that where moments ago nimbly flitting about the keyboard now feel like disconnected tubes of lead. it's like the world/my heart has momentarily stopped and im feeling the rush of wind as the rest of the universe wooshes past me. file this under the list of cyber related maladies of today/tomorrow. i just sent an email to not the intended person. correction. i just sent an email to not the intended personS, plural. i feel like a partial, if not complete, ass. sigh. don't get me wrong, i heart me some technology. i really can't think of how we all survived without a cell phone. or email. or blogs. but that whole instant access/gratification aspect has got a case of the double edged sword. oh well. there is nothing i can do but brace myself for the aftermath. and hope for the best. maybe i aught to stick with letter writing when going personal. this kinda shit never happens on paper.

years ago, i took a sign language class. don't remember the impetus of such academic pursuits, much less any actual sign language save for one simple mildly useless phrase (I have a book). one class did stand out in my mind. it was when we were visited by real live deaf folks. two of them. an older married couple. one was deaf and mute, the other just deaf, but deaf from birth so any vocalizations were lost on those with an intact sense of hearing. at one point in the class the husband of the team addressed me and mistook me for a boy. hilarity ensued. with the teacher as translator, the man said something to the effect of 'why do you have short hair? you are a girl. short hair is for boys.' i think there might have been some reference to 'god' or 'the lord' in there as well. i don't know how i answered exactly, but i'm almost positive that it was accompanied by a shrug and a 'help me!' glance directed at my sister who was also taking the class but was spared this particular lesson due to her mid back length hair.

years later, i finally came up with a clever enough response: it was not god who gave men short hair and women long hair, it was scissors.