she's the only rocketeer in the whole damn place

mother nature brought me snow for my birthday! how nice of her!

miss kat and mr morgan are coming up from portland to visit for the weekend. it'll be great to see them again and to have two wonderfully creative people around to talk about ideas and such with. it will also be nice to have some old friends around... the kind who know me more than the few months i've been here. i've realized it's rather easy to lose sight of who you are when you pick up and start a whole new life with a whole new set of people. everything is still so new and relationships somewhat delicate if for nothing other than a lack of passing time. trust and all of those other attributes seem to need time to develop. i think we store parts of ourselves in others, memories etc, that partially define who we are. it will be nice to be reminded of how i got here... yay : )

goodnight moon

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O
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girls in stilettos

i found this picture of angie on her myspace and i really liked it. it reminds me of this photographer who did a series of people on beaches... renejke dikstra perhaps? i saw it and wished i'd taken it. i've been thinking about angie lately.

all this weight, is honest worse?

mr jason hosted the anual thanksgiving refugee dinner at his humble abode on 100th & arora and i had the honor of attending this year. it was my first big holiday away from home, and when i talked to my mom as i was purchasing yams for my part of the dinner she was quite sad. i reassured her that i would be home for christmas. aaw momma.

i actually consumed the turkey, and it was probably the most deliciously juicy turkey i've ever eaten. i'm pretty positive it's because it was filled with regina's love. more relistically it was probably because it took a 24 hour brine bath in a bright orange home depot bucket. contrary to popular belief, soaking a turkey in salt water does not make it salty or dry. it actually has the opposite effect, and when you stuff it full of rosemary and apples turns out quite delicious! thank you alton brown. you are a god. also at the behest of alton brown was regina's pepper vodka that i'm pretty sure removed some vital organs upon consumption.

after drinking a substantial amount of champagne cognac and vino (we're just so damn fancy!) we crashed at jason's for the night. the next day, jason chopped down a small shrub in his back yard and we had our very own charlie brown christmas tree decorating celebration.
me: it needs a star!
jason: if we put a star on top of it it would probably fall over
solution: a single-ply tinfoil star
we shuffled around the house listening to the charlie brown christmas soundtrack while decorating our tree. i've also decorated my little room on phinney with some white christmas lights. it's quite quaint if i do say so myself.

my phone was also found on friday morning in a shallow puddle of water, rendering many of its keys useless. cingular has promised to send me a replacement, as it's still under warranty.

last night i went dancing with phill and his lady friend whose name i can not remember... phill said think of "insert super model name here" but she looked nothing like said super model so i still can't remember her name. she was a very sweet girl, but phill said something about three strikes and you're out. all these damn dating rules. i really freaking hate dating.

miss kat is currently on the left coast and will hopefully be visiting me sooooon : )

i've been working on a poster at modern dog for an emily haines show at the croc and have done several versions. i was talking to rob about one of my executions and he said what's your idea? and i said i guess it's more about a feeling than an idea and he said i needed to turn my feeling into an idea. good call rob.

i also had a really interesting conversation with mike about another execution that was really helpful. he said i needed to be able to know exactly what i was trying to say, and instead of metaphorically interpreting things in a very willy nilly sort of way needed to be able to very directly communicate with my audience what i was trying to say. seems like an art vs. design sort of conversation to me. i'll file that conversation under *remember this whenever you go to design something*

it snowed today!

we're moderate we modernize

meet phill. phill he is scottish and has a delightful accent. phill and i have been working our way through the godfather series and have decided to bring back both the peasant look and the mafia. today we went to gassworks to test out phill's new camera and talk about pixels and f-stops and such.

so damn sleepy. i think i'm getting a sickness as well... blech
goodnight, moon


What I thought it was it isn't now
All this weight, is honest worse
We're moderate, we modernize
till our hell is a good life
All we know what to forget... how to do right

by my only things are clear

it always amazes me how, in a world so full of people, we can sometimes feel so tiny and alone

flying so you won't land

{ A }
i walk down 36th towards phinney with my eyes trained on the ground 5 feet in front of me, the way i walked for 21 years until i lived in new york. sometimes i try to see how much information my brain can record at once, and i study the leaves rather intently as they pass quickly beneath my little brown sneakers, the ones that allow me to move silently like a stealthy assassin. i'm moving at my usual pace which seems to be twice as fast as most people walk around here, except for regina whose muscle memory is still embedded with the pace of the 42nd street subway station.

my phone rings. jason sounds pissed. am i really late again? am i developing a habit of not being on time? i dislike when people can't seem to get their act together enough to show up someplace on time and i know i am perfectly capable of being punctual.

back to the leaves.

i look up from the damp carpet of red, orange and gold for a split second. my brain hits the record button. i see:
1. ) a girl
2. ) a boy
3. ) they are kissing
4. ) they are in the parking lot of a mexican restaurant

i hit stop and then rewind. in that split second my brain has recorded much more information than i'd originally realized. the girl was blonde, fair skinned. the boy taller, dark curly hair. both of their eyes were closed and there was no awkward space between them. i watched as they both gently pressed closer to each other. is it longing for more, something fleetingly physical? or is it the kind of longing that involves exchanges of scribbled notes on counter tops, sunday morning flower clippings or the memorization of the contours of ones' shoulders?

i immediately look away. despite their moment being shared in the parking lot of a mexican restaurant on 36th street i know they are the only ones that exist in this moment and i feel like i've intruded. i take 3 or 4 more quickened steps before glancing over my shoulder. they have parted and are walking towards what i can only assume to be their respective vehicles. i don't know if they have butterflies in their stomachs, but i do. i think it's hope. i hope for them and for me.


{ B }
i find jason at ladro where he is curled up over a crossword puzzle. i appologise for my tardiness. he tells me he should have known better, that he should have called before he left the house, that this sort of thing is not new with me. it doesn't hurt so much as itches, the way thoughts or accusations in my brain do when i can't figure out "why."

we dine on thai before walking half a block to the 45th street theatre to see babel.

babel is a movie that you feel in your gut more than you follow. over the course of the two and a half hours i fealt tense, scared, happy, embarassed, ashamed, sickened and despite my best intentions to quell those same butterflies, hopeful.

regardless of the fact that throughout most of the movie they are both filthy and covered in blood, brad pitt and cate blanchett remain stunningly beautiful. in the beginning they quarrell and disconnect but cate is shot in the neck and i guess that's just one of those things that brings couples together.

there's a scene where ms. blanchett is lying on the dirt floor of a moroccan hut, talking about how she wet herself and is about to do it again. brad, being the gentleman that he is, asks the hut owner for a pan for his wife to do number one in. he slips the pan under her skirt and proceeds to gently lift her up over the pan. the camera does not cut away. we watch the entire painstakingly awkward process. it sort of reminds me of the time i tried to pee in the woods with jamie, except cate has a bullet hole in her neck and isn't intoxicated.

the camera cuts to a closeup of their faces, and my mind is subconsciously memorizing the minutia of their expressions. i watch as this cinematic moment transcend film and once again my brain is recording and stringing threads through my own thoughts.

a voice inside my head whispers, "see kiddo? that's love."

nobody knows me at all

when i was a child
everybody smiled
nobody knows me at all
very late at night
and in the morning light
nobody knows me at all

i got lots of friends
yes but then again
nobody knows me at all

very late at night
and in the morning light
nobody knows me at all

i don't give a damn
i'm happy as a clam
nobody knows me at all