The family, meaning mom and dad, woke me up around 9 in the morning... those poor souls. I was so cranky this morning, and retardedly moody. Its so funny, 'cause by and large my moodiness is unnoticable. To those that have seen the force-of-nature that it can be though, they'd laugh at the very insinuation that I'm anything less than volitle.

They also, I hope, would agree that they are the closest people to me, and the fact that they see Hurricane Mike at all is a testament. But whatever. I'm a pineapple.

My friend lauren came up with the notion that we should make Fruit ID Cards for all of the queers at Cosi South, just in case anyone questioned that we were fruits. I would be a pineapple; sweet to the taste, bright, vibrantly yellow... kinda cute, but definatly spiny to the touch sometimes. Also terribly acidic, but you never quite notice how acidc cause of the sweet.

Sweet Sweet Sweet.

But, yeah, it was definatly a spiney day... My poor folks, they had to deal with my unidentifiable ire when speaking with me. I apologized profusely, telling them that I know that I'm not the most pleasent person in the world right now, and they understood. Its just really hard to explain why I was crying at christmas.

Frankly, for someone who has been dubbed beligerently chipper, I've done a fabulous job of being a little raincloud on christmas. I didn't ruin christmas for anyone though, I self-medicated myself via sleep all the way up from my folks' to Jersey. Can't be a crab all day =P

I knew I had to let something inside myself play with these emotions, cause I wasn't winning. I just kept thinking that I never got around to giving either Trev or Emily their presents from last christmas, and now neither of them would ever get a gift from me again. Gawd, how fucking melodramatic.

*crab pinch pinch*

Trev's not dead of course, but to a boy who's clearly being a nutball, thats hard to explain. Blasted ex-boyfriends... I was thinking about him that I fell sound asleep in the back of the car for the 4 1/2 hour drive, and when mom woke me up ('cause we were getting close) I was positively chipper. Grinning from ear to ear as a matter of fact =)

Yay! Declawed!

I'm sure as hell glad I was grinning when I got here, too, cause I love my family. I hadn't been in rare form with them in a while... I missed the family reunion, then I dropped off the face of the earth for those couple of months... and I still wasn't 100% at thanksgiving. I feel a lot closer to it, moreso than I have since Em kicked, and that makes me feel great. My cousins and I have these fucking barrel laugh sessions that I have with few others. Those consistant, big, huge moments of connection that make it hard to breath from laughing.

That bein' said, I'm all the more excited cause the whole Bailey Crew is a'comin' to DC for new years. My girl Kelly has these friends who are renting out the top of a club in Adams Morgan, Bossa, and we're going. Krista, Charese, Tabby, Aric, Aric's Girlie Girl Tara, and maybe if I can find a way, Mara.

But, thats a pipedream. I haven't even talked to her about it... but gahdamn gahdamn, wouldn't that be some fun shit?

Today I moved out of the Dirty House for good. Mara and Krista left at around 3:45am to get Mara to the airport, and I decided against tagging along. It would have been silly for Ristika to come all the way back to my house from balitmore to drop me off and then diddy bop back up past balitmore again on her way home to Jersey... it would have been silly just so I could say goodbye at the same time.

I'm a mushy boy insofar as that I cried when my ladies left. Not bawling or anything, but definatly streams down the cheeks. How big of a geek am I? I couldn't help it, I had such an amazing time this week.

Krista and I came down to the Dirty House, then proceeded down to my folks for a financial pick-me-up as well as to retrieve my car. Of course my car didn't bother to start when we got there (dead battery), so we just hopped in the Krista Mobile and returned back up the Fairfax. I reckon its a good thing we took her car anyway, 'cause its so much easier to parallel park than my Big. Red. Boat.

On our first night out in the city, Krista and I went to Cosi (you'll see that as a developing pattern) for dinner and to celebrate the arrival of my bag of Holiday Greens. We ran into my friend Nuvia, and she was on the prowl for Santa's Good Stuff, too, so we drove around until she saw a dealer on the corner that she knew. Krista and she bonded over the pains of ugly puerto ricans, and we all rolled a festive blunt and walked through Dupont smoking. I couldn't have felt more Gang-Star.

On Christmas Eve Eve I called my friend Markie and we went to his place to hang out. He lives up by the convention center, on 10th and M, and so we ended up taking our Chariot (the G2 Bus) into Dupont after we pregamed with an entire bottle of our friend Jim Bean. Lawdy. Needless to say, the bus ride was particularly drunktastic, as was running into Mark's ex Brandon, who I had met previously. I had actually met Brandon on my own and realized his relationship to Markie via the powers of the Triumvarate. Poor ol' Brandon didn't realize that we have some sort of freak ability to triangulate people on the greater eastern seaboard... he couldn't have known that his exboyfriend's best friend is a SuperTwin.

Anyway, we decide that we're going to go to Cobalt after we find out that Apex is closed for the night (who closes on Tuesday? Ew), and we proceed to get in the middle of the herd. A drunk Maneuver was going to have to be performed to get Ristika, myself, and Markie into the venue... but at the last minute the maneuver had to be aborted as one of us got caught. Defeated, we headed for Cosi....

As luck would have it, Mark noticed a door slightly ajar. Printed on a small sheet of paper taped to the door is "Employee Entrance Only", and we realize its to Cobalt. Without much hesitation or delibaration, we're sneaking in the door and shimmying up the fire escape. As we arrive at the final door into our RetroNight, Mark tells us the game plan: sprint to the center of the club as fast as you can. Stay in the crowd. We may as well have synchronized our watches.

Oh yes, we danced to Step By Step and "The Last Song." No need to even question whether we got in or not! Speaking of synchronizing, I got to synchronize my hips with a cute boy's on the dancefloor... I'll never know his name, but doesn't that just make it better? I was on my way to the bar with Krista and Markie, and the boy pulls me over to him, allowing my cabal to venture further forward. About 20 feet ahead now, Markie looks back and stops Krista... "We've lost one."

It didn't last long. The sheer combined force of the three of us that night was probably too much for most mortal men to stand, 'cause Markie and I shortly discarded him back into the pile of boys.

On our way out, however, Krista broke the heel on her leather boots, and proceeded to throw 'em into the Trash and walk 10 blocks back to Mark's in her bare feet. Atta-Girl! I was soooo proud of my gurl! Anyone FRC enuff to throw their Leather Boots out and highstep their ass golden style through dupont gets props. We earned our Denny's Breakfast at 5am.

The next day Krista and I are preparing to get my Supertwin, Mara, from the airport when we notice that the car is overheating. We had to make the executive decesion to have her come in via the train to Union Station, as we returned home to take my cousin Tabby (tabitha called Tuhbabitha much to her chagrin) vehicle into the city.

Tuhbabitha and Charese came down for new years, and I could talk about it at length, but there is no need to. Tabby was ragging and bleeding through and bein' ultra-snotty. Charese is just so young. Bleh. I can't fuss too much, cause Tabby let us take her car into the city to wait for Mara, who, the poor thing, had a delayed flight as well as less than perfect flight companions.

I want so badly to go into stories or yarns and talk about Mara, but I don't really know how-- she's my supertwin, so knowing my reaction means you prolly know her reaction. Something you Replace that begins with an "H"? What would you put down? In the last game of scattergories we played, we both had "Helium Tank." Thats the best way I can put it. I love her with all my heart.

So, that said, we shopped around at Union Station for a while for her, but then grew tired of the wait and bopped over to Le Cosi to grab a sandwhich. I grabbed one for Miss Mara, too... I had to. I'm a fatty... I know the only thing that fixes these sorts of delays is food, so I had to get her one, I just had to. But I was left with a condumdrum: what the hell type of sandwhich does mara prefer? The only thing worse thing worse than me not bringing a sandwhich would be me bringing a yucky sandwhich. I had to get it right.

Turkey. Its gotta be turkey. You can't go wrong with turkey and cheddar. Who doesn't like turkey and cheddar? To not like it would simply be UnAmerican.

I think she liked it =)

Anyway, New Years was spent in Silver Spring at one of my friend Jackie's friends house... I didn't really know 'em at all, but by the end of the night, we were the definition of "the life of the party." They practically took notes and fought over who got to tell the story of our family. Huge house, Jewish Dentist Dad. Nuff Said.

So, Crababitha bitched at the party. She bitched in teh city. If bitches were hammers, she'd have had a folk hit. She and Charese disappeared from whence they came the day after they came down.. really, it was less than a 24 hour visit.

Clearly I'm upset. Clearly.

So broken up that we actually made it out *again*, and we went to two different college night events, one at Platinum, the other at Apex (Gaypex). At Platinum I saw a cute boy talking to Mara, and apparently the conversation started as such:

Dude: Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?
Mara: No, I don't really dance like this! I'm just having fun!
Dude: Thats not what I wanted to ask you.

It turns out he was asking about me =) The only fags in the place found the other one. They wouldn't come up and dance, though, they said it was better to admire from afar. "admire"
Whatever.

I love dancing with my cousins. It makes me so happy. They're goofball chowderheads and I love it. Love Love Love it. I am so blessed that I get to share blood with my best friends... you can't choose family, but I wouldn't choose anyone else.

Anyway, the next few days were spent bonding... we made it to the hirshorn (the hub of all things is awesome), to the cosi, and around scott circle and dupot circle countless times. We ate at the GhettoStarChineseWok... In fact, we ate just about everywhere. Cause we ate a lot. A lot a lot. Mara made alfredo. Brownies. Krista made Jello. We made 10 mile long trips for ice cream. In fact, though we failed at our attempts to get ice cream a couple of times, we really did make like 3 efforts for 3 different varieties. Gosh we ate.


But, eventually it had to be done....and my girls left today.

I don't even wanna talk about it, 'cause then I'll start missin' them again. I also don't want to talk anymore about the food we ate, 'cause then I'll be haungry again.

Mm...haungry...

Oh! About the move: I left sooo much shit behind at the Dirty House... my poor fuckin slumlords. If they didn't suck so badly, I sure would be upset about leaving them with all that junk 😉

Chapter Heading
by Hemingway

For we have thought the longer thoughts
And gone the shorter way.
And we have danced to devil's tunes
Shivering home to pray;
To serve one master in the night,
Another in the day.


Amazing, it still fits...

Before, it was about the pressing feelings one conjurs when they are embarking on a decision. Intellectual intercourse and the idea of entertaining a new voice; Was I to accept the request for rekindling of relationship fires, fires I never extinguised internally, from the only boy I, at the time, had ever loved with all my heart? The one that I had loved infinitly, but also the one that had done a complete emotional whitewalling and had repeated a vicious cycle of leaving and regretting? I had trusted this boy on countless occasions with my trust, and this new voice was whispering "drive to him." Something inside me knew that "him" wasn't the boy who wanted to rekindle.

The poem, for me, had a lot to do with correct decisions and the fear associated with the haze of indecision. It was a battle of inner bravery yet exterior cowardice....Which voice do I obey? The idea of even going to see this new boy was a betrayl... but it was also *right*, and you cannot betray those who let it happen to themselves.

Drive, Drive, Drive Away.

this boy who was my best friend... I wanted to go listen to him talk for hours. I had cell phone bills that clearly showed I was practicing. I wanted to drive the hours it took to visit him, just so I could lay next to him, knowing that at some point in the night he would scoop me up and twist me into a pretzel, hugging me as tightly as he could. I wanted to feel it in every chakra of my body that I was wanted and loved.

I've never known more than when I was seventeen, and there I was eighteen. I could have made the decision so much more properly had I been forced to six months sooner.

I heard this poem in my head the first time I made the drive home.

I felt like I was doing such wrong. I couldn't help but drive to see him every second I got. To stay for as many weekends as possible. To envelope him the way he enveloped me. I can still smell his presence when I close my eyes, a phantom of pheremones that I wish more often than not to forget. But the voice was right. I needed to make that drive.

That poem is so different now. Its bigger, meaner. It's begun to embody a gorgeous, worldly woman with all natural hair-care products and a biodegratable poly-cotton blend power suit. She is the the corporate gaia, red tape incarnate. And, this poem comes to mind every time I'm forced to reflect on one of her assaults.

I was so much stronger and smarter. I wanted to be so much "more." But, now that more seems like so much less.

Frankly, things felt different the first time I thought about this poem. One emotion and one person had the potential to fill the world so much darkness... this vast, loud darkness-- and I thought I had somehow bested it.

Its different now, I said, some how flipped inside-out. The logo seems to be on the inside.

Before, it was one emotion affecting the world, now its the world affecting one person.

I wonder I'll ever flip it right-side-out? I think my eyes have readjusted to the very loud dark. I know that black bleeds with just a little water and I realize now that that's the only color corporate gaia paints in.

I don't get a sense of accomplishment from helping very rich people get very richer anymore. I can strike out on my own right now and start at some shmuck corporation... I know I can. But muthafucker, I know I won't be happy being a corporate tool, and I don't mean to be a sqwaking cliche.

I think that my ambition has changed. I'm so much more driven to being happy, as opposed to my happiness driving me to my ambition. I think my goal sets are very different, and I kinda fear that. I wanna be happy with making 24,000 a year and doing really engaging things. I don't know right now whats going to fulfil me at 45 because I don't know whats fulfilling me right now.

I don't know if anything is.

God, to be 17. I've gained perspective in the past couple of years. Frankly, though, I think I liked it better from over there. I can still remember the smell created by lovers body against me, but I can't taste ambition. Yet I can feel my powers rageing beneath the surface, ready to be used for something... Not love, not work, but what?

"It must be stretched before it is to shrink" -- Lao Tsu.

My cousin Mara has this anteater, and its really very adorable. The anteater has some great story attached to it, and an equally great name. I don't really remember the story or the name, because it was probably a really cute boyfriend-y story, and judgeing from my last couple of entries, I have reason to block out cutesy boyfriendy stuff 😉

Nono, it's Mr. Something-er-other, but really, he's cute.

I, too, keep an anteater next to my computer at all times. He's a teenie-beanie baby from McDonald's.... it's the mini-me of hers. Who keeps an anteater at the computer? Honestly.

Well, in my car there is a purple otter named Pip that lives in the sunglass holder. He has a brother, Pop, who resides in sunny California with one of my dearest friends, Becky. He's a great otter, and very few people know he even exists, since he spends so much time in the shades holder.

Becky was my first roomie ever, and I love her dearly. One late, late night we watched simultaneously the sun come up and "The Bear in the Big Blue House."

So, anywho, I found out today my father has a road buddy. We were taking some cars up to the auto auction, and I happened to notice that he had some weird figurine wedged in between the windshield and the dash board. Otter!

They talk. Kinda crazy, both that they talk, and that he too has an otter... I talk less to my otter than my father prolly does to his seein' as how a friend had to reprimand me once for talking to Sketch while driving. I was chatting with him on the phone, and of course he had to hear my talking Sketch Doll (from the great movie Kilo and Sketch) start ta1lking in the background. Those things are so accurate (hahaha), and they respond to so many things you say (or what they think you said). I was busted, but thassokay (it prolly would have responded to that).

Oh! My cousins Krista and Aric had a conversation recently that seems fairly fitting, and fucking kills me:

Aric: What does my m2 get at a 1/4 mile?
*begins to flip through book*
Krista (from across the room, barely looking up): 15.6
Aric: Damn! 15.6! You're Right!
Krista: No way! I pulled that out of my ass!

One Last Sketch Tangent: My Sketch Doll wears a burgendy bandana now, to differentiate himself from Jeremy's. That was a neccesity once Kate started SketchSitting my Sketch and Jeremy's Sketch. Headwear makes it happen!

Le sigh.

Well, I'm putting in a retroactive withdrawl for this past semester's fuckups. I certainly have enough proof to show I had outstanding circumstances all semester, so I will prolly get it. The dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, my new subcollege, decided to return to me my schedule that the system ate, and told me to just go to the classes and explained what happens.

The retroactive withdrawl should be a good thing. I went on a blind date last night with a boy named Chris. Chris goes to Hamden Sydney, an all boy's school, and came with fairly high recomendations from one of my high school team mates.

So, I meet him at Friday's, and of course I'm 20 minutes late. And, of course, he's drunk. Not so much there, buddy. The muthafucker deserved a merit badge for his fucking crackscout troop. So, I gave him the cold shoulder and made friends with the table next to us. When he got up to use the restroom, the guy at said table leans over and goes:

"Whadya think?"
"I think he's a douche."
"No kidding. If he hadn't gotten up, I would have said something."

Now the time come for us to do something else, and he wants to take my car. My response is fairly simple: I don't have room. He got the hint. He leaves, and I end up chatting with the guy at the table, Sean. Sean goes by the name Newman, and dates the manager Sabrina. Pam, who has been at friday's even before I came and went, comes over and gabs, keeping us company. Well, then walks in a guy named Dominick. Dom is hot. Hot, Hot. Nice... and funny.

Fuck.

He has a boyfriend.

I couldn't maintain eyecontact with this boy. I didn't want to talk for to long, I almost felt nervous! I really try to be good around people who are taken, but I have a hard time with my Ps and Qs when I'm sober, and a helluva lot harder time when I'm drunk. So what else, knowing I have to be good, would they do except invite me to Merriman's? You know Merriman's-- Fredericksburg's very own gay bar.

Not that I'm sayin' I would have bagged him or anything, lemmie just say, but it was neat to get those butterflies. Either way, Merriman's was incredibly dead, so I bounce on home.

It gets to be about 3am-ish and I'm on the computer, and my friend Dave is a bit upset. His new boyfriend and He broke up earlier in the day, and I felt bad for him. I knew he needed an ear, so I turned around and drove the 45 minutes back into fredericksburg to meet him at Denny's around 4.

Dave and I have a fairly neat history. I met him at in a hot tub, both of us fucked up, naked. We chatted, realized we went to the same school, and clearly, since we were both naked at the same party, had mutual friends. Dave's body really kinda "does" it for me... he's a beautiful person, and I mean that through and through.

Initially, he knew Jimmy, who took Dave in when Dave was younger. We call Jimmy Ma Harper, and he kinda keeps watch over all of us, for what I generally feel is a benevolent reason. Dave has differing views on Jimmy a bit, but he still calls Jimmy "Dad" and Jimmy still calls Dave "Son"-- Lets just say sociopaths exist everywhere. And the drugs can bring out sociopaths, which is scary. Dave is mistrustful of Jimmy, and tina users.

That said, I recently kicked my own tina habit. The fact that I know Jimmy and the fact that I used made Dave really nervous about me, and those nerves turned into an accusation right before New Year's. We had managed to spend a lot of really good time getting to know each other on an intimate basis at thi point, but on the last day we were together, he got a lil weird. I kinda just decided to chalk it up to the "whatever" category, since I know full well that I have a boy who's personality and looks I really like, and he also happens to really like me. His name is Jarret, and he couldn't be more wonderful. Not a lick better!

Oh, but the flaw.

Its a wonder to me how much I dig a guy who legitmatly understands me. I reckon there are very few sensitive guys out there, and Jarret is definatly one of them. He likes me to explain my emotions and my darkness, and he listens intently. But, I also realize that he doesn't grasp a lot of it the minute I throw it out; not because he's slow, just because we've had different life experiences. I'm just weird.

Jarret and I have a lot of roads left to walk down, and who knows, he may be a boy I see in a monogamous, serious capacity. I think about him in that role a lot, and I know he does for me as well... heck, we've been on-off since august.

But, we were discussing Dave. Weird as I may be, I was happy for Dave when he said he was in a relationship with a new boy, even though it hadn't been that long since we last went out. I can understand it though, since Jarret and I could up an item, and I'd have been the one that seemed to suddenly be "committed."

I had assumed the boy would have to be better than me, or more ready to commit, or something, so I figured he clearly was a good guy. I was excited and happy for Dave. Pissy, true, but also very happy.

They lasted 16 days, and the dude was an Alcholic. The capital "A" is for asshole. I discovered all of this at Denny's chatting, and I think it went until around 6am. I come back from the bathroom, and Dave's sorta making a face, so I ask what he's thinkin'. He was tryin' to figure out weither to ask me home or not, and how to do so without there being some sort of subtext. He was trying to be nice, and you know what? Krista and I are gonna have to stop calling him by the nickname "Crazy."

Krista:"Talk to Crazy lately?"
Me:"Nah, Crazy's been writing too much poetry about the drugs I did to talk on the phone."

We're not nice. But, I guess the good behavior from earlier that day kicked in again, cause we cuddled and stuff, and didn't hook up or anything. We just snuggled, and it was very nice. He's a good snuggler.

So, ya, we managed to watch moviesall today and it was the perfect way to spend the day-- I feigned that i ran errands to those that would have cared, but really, it was a movie day. Dave and I stayed on the couch, under the covers, and practically in our pajamas for "Roger & Me", "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", and "The Lost Boys." I barely watch one movie every three months, so I'm setting a high benchmark early on in 2003.

Lots of other personal though, but I'm tired. I'll remember to talk about the fact that I've decided not to move back to DC for a good long while. But, sleep now.

I Said Gah-Dayum, Gah-Dayum.

Fuckin adventures out the wazoo in the past two days. For Christmas, my brother Trey gave me Capitals tickets. I couldn't have been more thrilled, the only time I make it to a Caps game is when he throws tickets my way.

And, of course he has seasons tickets, and the seats were amazing. That said, I got to the stadium, and suddenly I'm a star. I'm sitting in Trey's section getting looks, and he hasn't quite arrived yet. I'm there maybe 10 minutes and he shows, headed to his buddy's section.

He calls me over, and we shoot the shit for a bit. I have to fess up to circling the wrong date on the calander, so I was like a half an hour late, and dateless, but I think it was better that way. Why you ask? Cause Trey and I got to do some major drinking and some major bonding.

Everywhere I went, I got treated like VIP, and whenever Trey would say "that's my little brother" people would come up to shake my hand, or tell me how wonderful my big bro is.

Weeeeeird. So, Caps won, and Trey kept grabbing me Tanqs and Tonics-- I love that my brother knows exactly what I like to drink.

But, either way, we had a really nice time just bullshitting at Nick and Stefs, and then made our way down to Rosa Mexicano. Of course they had to be booked, so we diddybopped right on down to Zola's.

Its Resturant Week in the city, so it was all sorts of packed, but we got this swank-ass booth in the back. I had this awesome pepperoni fondue, a veal dish, and a chocolate fondue dessert... oh my god was it fuckin' lucious. It was all very hoity-toity, and I of course ate the atmosphere up with a spoon.

Hell, I woulda sopped it up with a biscuit.

I parted ways with my brother and then made my way to Cosi. I hung out for a bit, smoked some with the Nuvia, and met the members of Stomp!

They were eating in Lauren's section, and then we went out together. We headed down to Ben N' Mo's where we partook in an apple hookah and watched the MC Battles. There was this one little white girl who was off the chain... and she was punkin' the big dudes left and right.

You know I gotta cheer for my underdogs.

Out with me was Lauren, Jess, Jarrett, and the guys from Stomp... and after we parted ways with the Stomp-Heads, we went back to the house on Holmeade and smoked. Lauren and I proceeded to make our infamous Grands Biscuit (which we make EVERY time we're stoned in that damn house) and egg sandwhich. Yessah, it was good.

Jarret drove me back to his place and I had a nice sleep. I also have come to the realization that Jarret and I just aren't sexually compatible. He's a great, amazing guy, but he just doesn't do it for me.

I can sleep next to him without getting hard. Its done.

I'm concerned that we may lose our friendship, and I'd hate to see that happen. I love spending time with him, and hanging out with him. As a matter of fact, Jarret's done a great job of always being there when I needed him, and he makes me feel good. All that said, he still doesn't do it for me sexually. I won't call him a bad kisser, thats not nice, but he sincerly doesn't work me out. I wish he did. It would make it easier.

Either way, its the next day, and I'm giving Nuvia a hand in upper Northwest. Picture it: Martin Luther King Day. Empty, but car lined street. Me driving. Car *reversing* out of a parallel parking spot. Crunch.

I manage to tag the back of his car and seriously fuck up the front of mine. The muthafucker was drunk and stoned, and didn't speak english-- but get this, Nuvia knew him. He fucking sells heroin apparently, and she knew a boy that owed him 15Gs. She told me not to give him my real info, and since she was translating, I was sure not to.

Attafuckingirl.

We walk a few blocks up and catch a bus down to the Fort Totem metro stop, from which we caught the red line down to Dupont South. Nuvia made it home safe and sound, and Jarrett came and kept me company all day.

Thats partly one of the things I'm worried about with the Jarret, for the record. He's a good buddy, and I don't wanna hurt him. I know that he once had trouble dating another boy because that boy just wasn't me, and as ego-inflating as that is... I wouldn't wish that shit on anyone. I know what it feels like. Men suck.

Um, yeah, bitter faggot shit aside, I called dad, and he comes up to tow my lovely car away. He gets it all set up good and tight, and I tap the gas just a tiny bit to align it all properly, and we're all good to go... when my car goes over the edge of the dolly, falling and wedging itself now *on* the dolly. Yah, thats a fucked up chasis. Somehow, Dad and I managed to fix it with the help of two extra jacks and some 2x4s.

Let me just also repeat that I have somehow fucked a heroin dealer and we are in the sketchiest neighborhood around. I'm scared shitless by my city for the first time ever, and I'm just glad that we're ready to go.

Oh, thats when the tire on the dolly pops. My father's a bright guy, he knows when I'm around to expect the unexpected, and he just so happened to have a spare dolly tire.

Which pops, too. So, my dad's now towing my car through Georgia Avenue on a rim, just praying that a gas station appears. The dolly's shaking like crazy, and I'm nearly in tears for my poor car. We've travelled maybe 2 blocks with a tire, and now maybe 7 more on the rim.

When things are starting to get a little bleak, and the dolly's begun ratttling crazy-style, we look and see a "Now Entering Maryland" sign. And, then, like the fuckin' burning bush, a BP appears, and lawd-love-ya, it had a service station. AND it had a 13 inch tire to fit the dolly.

Yeah, we made it home alive... but now that I've decided (oh, you may not know this) to stay home and not move to DC until prolly August, I don't know how the fuck I'm gonna get to and from class... argh. Its a 2 hour commute each way, and I can't exactly take the bus.

Ahh, well, we'll see. I refuse to let this strip away my clarity and good mood. I forged the beginings of a real friendship with my older brother, decided exactly how I do and don't wish to live out the next 7 or so months, and have found a way to actually discuss things with my father when we have differing view points without either one of us feeling attacked-- I don't know what silly braid the universe is trying to weave with these incidences and calamities, but I refuse to let it be anything other than a bright knit.

Huzzah.

I spent Christmas Break rediscovering unconditional love; the soundtrack was a very broad selection of Alanis Morrisette, Jason Mraz, Sex and Ego, Eminem, and others. I really got to listen to Jason Mraz while Krista and I were together, and again with the arrival of Mara.

Hehehe, it was actually the background for our hunt to find a parking spot on Indepence... before we put on "Bully." A far better track to be aggressive to. "faggot ja, hahaha"

Anywho, Krista has a version of "Waiting for My Rocket to Come," Jason Mraz's debut album, that contains a very different "You and I Both." I've yet to buy the album myself, I think I'm going to have to do that today, so I don't know for sure that the album even contains her version, but either way, the radio play is different on that track.

So, that long as blurb aside, the song is distinctly sadder and carries a resonating note of meloncholy through out that I just don't feel on the radio edit. Jason's inflections and modulations can make the song a tough listen... it's beautiful, and I'm filled with different emotions everytime. Its not always good to get choked up while driving.

The last time I was with Jarret the song came on the radio. Again, it was the peppier, happier, more-remedy-er version I felt compelled to share with him the fact that I like the album version better, and to explain to him why. It's in his buddy profile now:


"And with this silence brings a moral story
More importantly evolving is the glory of a boy

Cause you and I both loved
What you and I spoke of
And others just read of and if you could see me now
Well that I’m almost finally out of
I’m finally out of
Finally-dee-deedle le dee dee
Well I’m almost finally, finally
Well I am free, Oh, I'm free

And it's okay if you had to go away
Oh, just remember the telephone well their workin it both ways
But if I never ever hear them ring
If nothing else I'll think the bells inside
Have finally found you someone else and that's okay
Cause I'll remember everything you sang"


Is he aware completely of how I feel now? I don't know for sure, which makes me feel like I have to have a heart-2-heart. Perhaps now I know what it feels like to be on the other side. It reminds me of "Jolene," it can be either pathetic and sad, or empowering, depending on who's vantage you take, Jolene's or the Singer's.

Harumph.

Something funny: "...Rivals Neil Finn in his ability to invoke the spirit of Paul McCartney." -- Amazon.com's Review

Don't you have to be dead to have your spirit invoked? If not, wouldn't it hurt to have your spirit go on vacation? Is that what Day 7 feels like?

Grumble, grumble.

I need to get lean. I need to get myself going to the gym regularly. I'm frustrated with myself doublely today, and its my own fault.

Thats the term used to describe what I was when I was bein' a hot-mess in the city, at least according to a couple of people. I was lean then, and now I'm "still cute", but not as cute as I was "when [I] was lean." I have this stupid complex already, and I realize its outta hand.

Krista has made her case thorougly-- she's been pushing for me to get off my weight-loss issues and move on to the gym. Get lean, get toned. She's right-- I'm not 300lbs anymore, and I can't keep yo-yoing these last 15lbs. I've fought with them for more than a few oscillations.

I have the campus gym for when I'm there, and Mom has suggested I start going to the Pumphouse right here in town, as it has a tanning bed to boot.

I'm going to be working at TGIFriday's starting on Tuesday, and I get to be excited about that. I'm also more than a 'lil excited at the notion of reclaiming my cell phone from UPS. I can't wait to have her back. I miss my phone.

I'm being a fussbudget right now, and I know why. I was hooking up with a guy named Chris for a while this Summer, I guess it was earlier on while I was still at Peace Action, so about May-ish. Chris was a nice guy, but he was about as on the ball as a brick. He also was a crazy substance abuser and got kicked out of his frat/school for being such. He wasn't out, he was a nice guy, but fairly low calibur.

I see him online today, and I said hello, and he told me that he had seen my name on his boyfriend's buddy list. I was of course intrigued, so I asked who is boyfriend was.

He said Dan.

Do I even know a Dan? I think I do, but I can't for the life of me pull the memory of where from. I'm bothered by this for a lot of reasons... argh.

Part of me also believes that this is the boy who is dating Dave, and that he typed the wrong name. I'm going to be more than a little irritated if he is dating Dave and said Dan, but whatever.

I told Dave that I wanted to ask him out to a real date the last time we were together, but I would have felt like a creep doing it after coming up to help him deal with a break-up. Thats just a little skuzzy in my book... but I did tell him that I had the thoughts of asking him out, and that I knew these were things that were wrong to tell a boy who was dating someone else.

Dave said that if he left his boyfriend, he wouldn't hold any feelings towards him. I don't know how to react to that.

Tomorrow I'm gonna go by the Pumphouse and see whats what. Aside from wanting to start lifting, and I would desperately like to go for a run... nothing cleanses my soul like a good run. I just can't go in the cold, its too hard on my lungs.

Its also almost time for my checkup, and I've got anxieties this time around. I reckon I'm gonna go pay the money on campus and see what happens. I can't let fear get to me, I just need to go get a clean bill of health and be done with it. I'm just scared of big red marks this time.

I so don't like that fear. It gets in the way of things. All the more reason to go and have it dispelled.

Since I'm about to trek back out into the snow to make my way up to Mason, I thought I'd share a moment from yesterday.

I used to play football with a guy named Duron; Duron's about 6'2, 280lbs, and a total powerhouse. He was a senior when I was a sophmore, and I eventually took his spot on the team. Imagine a thugged out Ruben Studdard, and we're getting closer to the picture.

He's got a lovely fiance who I've known for quite a few years named Patrice. Patrice was my "special buddy buddy," we were partners in the most random little food adventures together for a couple of years... she's great!

Well, she arrived in early to work to drop off Duron yesterday, and proceeded to tell Jess, Brandi, and me how she learned to "drift" last night. She and Duron went out to the closest empty parking spot, picked up some speed, and then yanked the e-brake. You spin around a few times, wash, rinse, repeat.

It's a lot of fun.

Well, she winked at me and ran to the back of the store, then returned with a set of keys. We ran over to Wawa, purchased our cigarettes, and then went driftin' for about 20 minutes. In Duron's little red eclipse! Hehehe.

When we got back in, Duron looked at Patrice and was like "Baby, why didn't you just walk."
"Honey, you know its cold, and you wouldn't want your boo gettin' cold spendin' too much time outside, now would you?"

HeeeHeee!

Anywho, I'm gonna trek my way up to Mason and have me a day.

We enter in the midst of house warming party held for John and Liz (dating); more correctly, we enter in the midst of a conversation being held by John and Phil (college best friends, now 26) conversing on the matter of why Phil has left his amazing job. Phil responds, only half flippantly, "I left, because I plan to Save the World."

4.18

"And how do you propose to do it?"
"Well, Lungless labs; thats for a start.
We'll picket it, disrupt it, sue it--"
"Phil, Lungless LAbs won't give a fart.
They'll slam you straight into the slammer
Where you can practice Russian grammar
Until... (By ones and twos a knot
Grows round the disputatious spot)...
Sense penetrates your soft ingenious
Cerebrum." "John, you've missed the point,"
Says Phil: "The world is out of joint;
And such acts, though they may seem tenuous
To you, give heart to us; whats more,
Bring new peace fodder to our door."

4.19

Speech strained and clarified by passion
--His S's remain S's still--
In unantagonistic fashion,
Eschewing escalation, Phil
Resumes: "John, take a look around us.
Imagine that the first bombs found us
Just as we are-- as here we stand
A glass of liquor in our hand.
There by the door is Van Gough's painting
Of Sunflowers. Here are all our friends.
And suddenly, our small world ends,
And our vile dust is swept up, tainting
The hills, the vineyards, and the seas
With irredemdiable disease.

4.20

"So tell me, how much will it please us
That mankind with its crazy ways
--Bach, Rembrandt, Socrates, and Jesus--
Will burn to ash and swivelizing haze?
Will it console us to be knowing
In the swift instant of our going
That Red Square, like our children's creche,
Will soon be charred or ulcerous flesh?
And then, when the soft radiation
Descends on what's not been destroyed
--Trees, whales, birds, wolves-- the birthless void--
Think how the crown of earth's creation
Will murder what which gave him birth,
Ripping out the slow womb of earth.


4.21

Is it just 'we' who feel this terror?
Do you think 'they' can't understand
What will come down through aim or error
Upon their great and fragile land?
We must stop--...(Caught by sudden sadness
He fumbles)...-if we can- this madness,
We common people of goodwill..."
A young man stands and stares as Phil
Says, "...Fallout can't tell Omsk from Reno..."
He stands there wordless, half in love,
Drinking Phil's speech, the image of
El Greco's Felix Paravicino:
The same pale, slender, passionate face,
Stregth and intensity and grace.

4.22

It's Ed. Now Liz has introduced him
(At his request). Ed, rarely short
Of words, finds Philip's have reduced him
To numbness. On the tennis court
Or with his advertising rabble
Ed spouts forth a distracting babble
Of witty entertaining trash
Till his companions long to smash
Their rackets on his simmering cranium
Or seal his lips with editing tape;
But two sure passwords for escape
Have been discovered: One's Uranium,
The other, God. All talk of these
Causes Ed's babbling brooke to freeze.

4.23

Now host and hostess, drawn by duty,
Have vanished, but-- to stay with Ed--
At twenty-three, though quite astute, he
Seems easily dispirited;
Although his energy's appealing,
It serves the function of concealing
Rifts of anxiety so deep
Some nights he finds it hard to sleep.
(Liz thinks this trait comes from their mother.)
Both Sue and Liz adore Ed: he's
Warmhearted, fun, and quick to pleace;
But neither understand their brother
When his designs and words are skewed
By what they term his godly mood.

4.24

Phil looks at Ed: intese, athletic,
Silent-- the sort of man whom he's
Uneasy with. But Ed's ascetic
Tension betrays his own unease;
And by now Phiil's free-floating status
(Bouyed by spiritiuous afflatus)
Projects goodwill on all mankind--
And so, in half an hour, we find the pair engaged in conversation,
Which now that he's gained his cool
And half slipped back to playing the fool,
Revolved round Ed's prolonged narration
Of how he happened to procure
A green iguana from the store.

[Phil and Ed continue a fun, light conversation before being interrupted by Jan. Jan, a college friend of Phil's ex-wife is not pleased with an off-handed comment about woman meant only in jest. Phil options to leave, and Ed offers him a place to crash in town so he doesn't have to drive home drunk. They arrive at Ed's.]

4.31

Phil looks around at Ed's housekeeping.
Ed yawns, and strips off shirt and shoes.
Silence outside. The iguana's sleeping.
This quiet grid of avenues
With red-flowered gum for decoration
Lies deep in slumber and sedation.
"It suits me, Phil. The flat's quite small,
But there's a garden, after all--
And a small pool for the iguana..."
Phil's bleary eyes rest on a bowl
Of fruit, a crucifix, a roll
Of film, a photograph of Lana
Turner, who smiles across the floor
At Holbein's sketch of Thomas More.

4.32

"My patron saint." "Which one?" Ed, grinning,
Says, "Go to sleep!" and turns to pray.
He asks forgiveness for his sinning,
Gives thanks for the expended day,
Consignxs his spirit to God's Charity...
Now Philip, with exiguous clairty
And some bewilderment, sees Ed
Cross himself twice, then come to bed.
Lights out. Phil mumbles, "What a party!
I really blew it then with Jan.
Ed, thanks a lot. I mean it, man--
I haven't yet met a Dorati
I didn't like... (Across the bed
He reaches out and touches Ed)...

4.33

... Good Night." Ed fears to answer. Trembling,
He moves his hand across the space
--What terrifying miles--assembling
His courage, touches Philip's face
And feels him tense up and go rigid.
"I'm sorry," Ed says, in a frigid,
Half-choking voice, "I thought you might--
I didn't mean-- I mean-- good night."
Taut with cateleptic tension
They lie, unspeaking. Phil thinks, "Why
Be so uptight? He's a great guy.
I've never bothers with convention.
God! It's a year that I've been chaste...,"
And puts his arm around Ed's waist"

4.34

Now, just as things were getting tenser,
And Ed and Phil were making love,
The imperial official censor
--Officious and imperious-- drove
His undscriminating panzer
Straight through the middle of my stanza.
Now, GentleReader, is it right
This swine should put my Muse to flight,
Rooting about among my pearly
Wisdom till he finds orts that he
Can gobble down with grunting glee?
Forgive me, Reader, if I'm surly
At having to replace the bliss
I'd hoped I could portray, with this.

The weekend wrapped itself up nicely, and that did nothing but lead to Monday classes. Things are goin' how they should be, so no worries gentle journal... though, one prof is worthy of mention today. Her name is Dr. Sparks, and blonde, tall, power-suited sexy-fierce chica that comes complete with a winnning smile and a vicious glare. Only the former has been fixed in my general direction, but for more reasons than just the latter her class may go down as the "Comm that Made Men Cry." Its a research methods course where the fail rate is almost the same as the actual passing rate.

Fear.

Little rumblings of better judgement be damned, I'm ready for it. Sometimes you get surprised: in a class of 250, one of my friends from Freshman year spotted me; Kumbi, ganked the seat next to me. She makes the wole class less intimidating... shes totally my african goddess. Imagine a study buddy who can dance like the wind, has mini dreads, leather earrings, and will kick your ass if you don't know the answer to question 47-C. That's my Kumbi.

I had plans with Ashley after we both got out of our classes, and seein' as how I was a little early, 6:50 instead of 7:10, I just stuck my head into her dorm and waited... then procced to wait and wait some more. I trusted in her to remember me, she's the type of girl that doesn't forget about appointments with folk, but it was starting to get a little later. 7:45 rolls around, and the dorm door flies up, with her bounding in shocked as hell to find a Mike in her house.

"I called your phone-- its off; I thought you forgot our plans!"
"Nope, been waiting here."
"Get your shoes on and get outside then, bitch!"

Who was out there? Lindsey and Omar! Ashley came back to her room because she had a strange gnaw in her gut-- I guess that was me gnawing! Lindsey came up to surprise folk, and Ashley dipped out on her class. Omar arrived in tow, with the announcement that Omar and Lindsey had decided to rekindle their relationship!

They may not get invitations to "Down With Love"-- but I'm really excited for them. I like the two of them together.

Such a fantastic evening commenced, filled with laughter, smokin', old jokes and new... su-fuckin'-perb. We go to get dinner and who should we run into at The JC but Puja, her old roomie Noukla, our friend May, Carriell, Carriell's roomie (and Dave's friend) Liz, and a host of their assorted friends. Huge reunion again.

Kismet. Unconditional Love.

w00t.

That night I slept at Carriel's, cuddled up, and Carriel taught me how to wrap my hair before bed. I can make the cutest little wrap now! Hehe! Just ya'll wait, you're gonna see me runnin' around with my lil scarf all tied up and talkin' bout my wrap... I can't wait.

Anywho, got up and drove to work, and did about 10 hours on the floor. Made just under 90, but had to give about 30 of it away for the Host/Hostess and for the 20 bucks I borrowed for shoes. Either way, its nice to have a few bones in my wallet again.

Work flew by, except for my last party of 6, which were old renn fair folk, so they tipped well, but ran the shit outta me. I told them I used to work their which may explain both the runnin' and the good tip. Le Shrug.

Speaking of work, I'm getting less shy around Dominick. Our friend Pam is heading to Colorodo for two weeks, and when Dom heard he looks at me and goes "You're stickin' around, right?" "Of course!" "Good-- someone I like'll still be here."

Look-at-me-now-mutha-fuckah! We've progressed into chatting about cars, conditions, cunts, and cuties. In a word, w00t. I still have a silly-stupid crush on the boy, but wordy-mc-word, I'm happy that he digs me and that I'm not just some quivering jello mold around him... just picture the floating fruit, and you'll know how incapacitated I felt around 'em. I don't know why it feels like a big accomplishment to get a boy to laugh, but it does/did. I'm not even interested in him in a sexual capacity, I know he's taken, but still, 'complishment stands. Now that I've loosened up, bein' shy was kinda momentarily neat.

Who knew I could get clamy?! ::grin::

I got to chat with Ashley about boys and their effects, including my silly crush on Dominick, and I got reassurance that for all the steps and stages I'm going through, she has as well, and that they're normal, cute, and healthy. I love Ash.

I was so tired when I got home (was it the 10 hours, or the boy?) that I kinda just tucked myself into bed around 11, and called it a day. Who am I, goin' to bed at 11? Ew.

Ahhh well, wash-rinse-repeat, I guess, 'cause here I go, gettin' back on the road to head to school again.

I made a friend today in my Comm 301 class. She's quite spiffy, her name's Emily, and she said I reminded her of one of her friends.

Comm 301 is interpersonal communications, and today we were talking about the different roles we fill, as well what roles we look for our potential mates to fill. She and I had a wonderful time ex-bashing.

Well, I asked her to introduce me to the aforementioned friend, and we ended up walking right into him when we got outta class. His name's Dan, and he's cute. I think I've seen him around before, but I'm not super sure. He looked pleased enough to make my acquantance, but who knows.

Do I even like boys again? Again, who knows.

I know that I think this boy in my Comm 380 class is worth a second look. He's a smarty who dresses well and I like that his responses in class always make me think a little. Via note-sending (how 8th grade am I?) with my friend Lauren, we've decided that its a 50/50 shot if he's gay or not. We've made and held eye contact a few times, but nothing more. I thought he winked, but lord knows, it could have been something in his eye.

Thats my luck.

"Attraction is the aggressive, sensual moment, independent of drama, that attacks or shocks the spectator into an awareness or emotion." -- Sergei Eisenstein

Word.

Not a bad trip to New York, I gotta say.

Dan and I finished up our classes last Monday and hopped onto the bus and made our way up north to DC to meet up with Lauren and Jess. The original plan was to just crash there for the night and get up way early to catch the $30 round-trip chinatown bus, but as it turned out, there was a bus that left at like 3:30 in the morning. What'd we do? We caught that one.

Why not, you know? As the bus approached the other chinatown, the sounds of mandolins and gongs could be heard playing through the busses sound system. We were the only white folk on the bus, so lest I make some sort of offhandedly offensive comment, let me just say my asian brethen on the bus didn't seem like the blithely happy beats, nor did it seem to make them any happier than they made me.

We got off the bus and meandered through china town, making our way down to Chelsea. Do you have any fuckin' clue how hard it is to find a coffeehouse in china town? Once we all had caffeine coursing through our veins, we treked through the lands of lore: The Village.

At 9:30 in the morning we were in a 24/hour pleasure store purchasing a Fuckuko that the old lady on oxygen recommended. Well, clearly Dan and I didn't purchase it, Lauren and Jess did. They also had Pussy Whip in the flavors of Blackberry Brandy and Strawberry Wine. Both were in fact flammable. Seein' as how I don't have a pussy, I didn't bother purchasing any. I don't think I want to put anything that has the potential to catch on fire near my junx, thanks.

After we rode the subway for a bit, we ran into Jess's only family member in the city: her cousin. She's like 45 or so, and really cool. How random is it that we just ran into her on the metro? I was pretty impressed. Also on that ride there was this black couple, who were singing really, really well. Lauren swapped them a dollar for a photo, and they invited us to a free show at the Cafe Vivaldi.

So, after the stint on the sub, we arrived in Times Square, where Jackie's folks were staying. They were staying in the Iroquois, in a 3 room suite that was habitated by James Dean from 1950-1953. How deliriously swank. And cool. James Dean was probably fucking his tricks in the room I slept in... that’s so fuckin' bitchin'. Mmmm...

We actually ended up going to the show at the Cafe and hearing Chocolate Thai and Jubilee sing. They cafe had plenty of seating, as it was an 'unannounced' show, but there were still a number of heads present. Throughout the show, CT and Jubilee kept referring to us as their "DC Friends." It was really sweet. After the show, we walked around the borough we were in smoking a joint and gabbing. As it turns out, they are going to be on Sesame Street! I need to make sure I'm paying attention so that I can tape it. I would love to see someone I smoked with chillin' with Grover.

I kinda absent mindedly just left out Dan's friend at NYU, Adrian. I'm annoyed with her, and was annoyed with him about her. Long stories short: She was supposed to be out of her class and call at 2:00. We put ourselves in Union Square to meet her. She never called. Dan called, and she didn't answer. Dan apparently didn't make super solid plans, but never made that clear. Then Jackie wanted us to pick her up a handle of Jim Bean. No big deal-- we asked Adrian when the store stopped sellin' liquor, and she told us midnight. The show finished at 10:30, and we asked where we should go to get some, and then she said that they were already closed. I don't know if she's just super-self-absorbed or what, but I'd rather not believe she purposefully lied to my friends and I. She also didn't really say a helluva lot to my friends which pissed me off. I realized Dan hadn't seen her in ages, but I'd never treat his friends the way she treated mine, or at least not without apologizing to Dan for it later. No such apology came. It wasn't even the apology from him that I wanted, it was an awareness that maybe he is some how accountable for his friends actions.

Accountability is a big issue for Dan. Whenever something happens, its the worlds fault, or someone elses. He also is aimless and has no direct ambition. He's totally inactive in any decision making process regarding his own life. It grates on me so badly because I know what it feels like to be there, in that space. I was in that space not so very long ago, and being around it now feels almost like a step backwards. I've talked about it with him, and I'm optimistic, but darn it, shape up.

I talked to Mara about it, and she gave good advice-- stick it out. Be a responsible, mature person, and watch it wear off. I guess she's right. My annoyance with it and my readiness to drop him immediately for it is nothing more than my own self defense mechanism showing up... but it is a valid issue, and one worth paying attention to.

Anyway, back to New York, since I've gotten that tangent out of my system. Adrian neglected to tell us that getting into NYUs buildings required a Driver's License and a Driver's License only; Lauren only had her passport, and thusly couldn't be admitted into the dorms. Jess and Lauren were rightly pissed at this point. Afterall, Jackie, one of the sweetest (don't tell her I said that) girls in the world had let us stay at her folks suite in NYC, and all she requested was some liquor. She requested it of Jess, and because of Dan's friend's flightiness, we couldn't get it.

Jackie was on her way down from midtown on the subway when we discovered our inability to enter the dorms, so we waited outside for her. I told Dan to stay behind and play with his friend. When Jackie found us in Union Square, we bought beer and hopped back on the metro.

At the hotel, Lauren and Jess quickly fell asleep. Jackie and I drank a beer or two and then diddybopped into Time Square. We walked around in the neoday that only Vegas and Time Square can seem to replicate. We wandered, talked, bonded, and fell into the almost sensuous serenity of being nearly native. The city envelopes, controls, and somehow still stays in the background... We felt like we belonged. We shared months worth of emotion and unlocked the emotional toolchest and got to work on one another, listening, wandering, talking, and bonding some more. I love Jackie. We finished off a few more back at the hotel, never getting drunk, and just talked until the sun was nearly ready to come up. The next morning we got a hold in Jackie's Chin, bought a bowl, had cream of asparagus soup, tried on sunglasses, and caught a china town bus home.

When we got back in the car, I was expecting Dan to mention his friend's behavior. It never came. I grew annoyed with my own thoughts, and wanted to sort them out, so I had planned on going home. Dan could see that something was pissing me off, so he asked what it was. I expressed to him my concern with his lack of awareness and lack of accountability. The discussion was short-lived, however, because bad news came. The bust for Pot that had occurred had managed to get Dan kicked off campus, though he had no official wrong-doing. His lack of grounding annoyed me even more after I worked really hard to get his police report released. I pretended to be Joel Kelly, of Billingsly and Snead, while talking on the phone with one Margaret Jones, from the Police records office. I convinced her that I was a paralegal, and was helping Mr. Snead work on a case where time was of the essence. It took convincing, but she agreed to release the records so that Dan could have them for his appeal... which had to be turned in literally two days after he got the notice of eviction.

Anyway, all I had to do was fax Ms. Jones the info she requested, which Dan had. Dan should have been just about ready to go to his next class when I called him to get him to fax the information over... but guess what? Instead of following through with any of the shit he needed to get done, he went to the mall, while his friend Meg and I helped prepare his stuff. We were both annoyed. My annoyance lasted a solid couple of days, and I told him to just go back to Delaware if he's not bettering himself here. He's just so friggin young in so many ways. Kelly calls 'em Boy years. She says he's not even a child in boy years, that hes still a baby, and in many ways I think she's right. Ahh, dual influence... Mara has validity and so does Kelly. I think they're both right in the words they've spoken. I need to watch out that I'm not dippin' out on this kid because of my defenses, and also not taking more than I should, as per Kelly.

Speaking of Kelly, she invited me to a fund-raiser/house party on Saturday night that was bein' held by a bunch of greenpeace-ers. It was up in NW, so I drove up from Colonial Beach and picked up Dan along the way. We grabbed Jess from her Cosi and checked into what will (hopefully soon) be my Cosi so that I could say Hola to e'rybahdy. We got to the house party without too much effort, and wouldn't you know it, the party was fuckin' hoppin'. Two kegs were going, the dancefloor was bein' held up beat-to-beat by one of the dudes from Thievery Corporation, and the ghanga was waftin' all through the top floor. We had a smoke session and Jess, who no longer smokes, caught herself a lovely-lovely contact high. So lovely, in fact, that as we were walkin' out the window to the rooftop area, Jess almost took a second face-plant of the month... this time over the roof. Luckily balance was caught, but whoooo booy, was it funny/scary/ridiculous.

For the Greenpeace party, I decided to make a pair of jeans. Well, not make, so much as modify, but anyway, I had these jeans from Gap that I slit up the side nearly to my midthigh on each side and on the inner side, up to my knee. For Madonnarama last year they were safety-pinned together and made into a neuvo-prince kinda look. Loved 'em. For this event, I attacked an old garter set, and made different sized strips tapering from shorter strips to longer, and stitched them into the slits. Then I took my mom's curtain decorating rope and fashioned a belt that does this in the front: //\ And comes around into the back and cups my ass really tightly. The jeans turned out to be a smashing hit, they got talked about in a positive light on a couple of occasions. This, of course, stroked my vanity like no other, and made me grin from ear to ear.

I mentioned earlier that I pretended to be Joel Kelly, of Billingsly and Snead. Well, I got to tell Caroline that I was pretending to be her father’s paralegal (Snead, get it) the other day. She and I took Anabell for a walk that was only supposed to be around the block, but ended up taking about two hours. I guess we had a lot to talk about. Caroline’s lookin’ well, and feelin’ better, too, from what I understand. They just readjusted her thyroid medication, so we’ll see what that brings. I told her that I was trying the Atkins Diet (which I am, btw) for a while, and she was totally supportive. Until she showed me this three layer dessert she made. It was so rich that even the enviable appetite of the Snead Family couldn’t finish the dish in one sitting. She told me to chew it up and spit it out, it was that good. I did. It was.

Also from the vaults of Caroline… she had found this stray a few months ago that she named Jake. He was a good puppy, but Papa Snead wouldn’t let ‘er keep it. Anabell was enough fur in his house as-was, so she hunted around to find a new owner. One of her bookclub buddies stepped up to the plate, and the puppy shipped off to Caroline County. Well, the dog got loose from the new owner. Its fine, no worries, but one of the neighbors called the police on the cute little beagle for dog vagrancy. She had to go to court for it and everything.

So, there this girl is, in court, when they announce the Honorable Charles Snead presiding. Andrea, the new dog’s owner, thinks to herself for a minute: Caroline’s last name is Snead. Caroline’s Dad is a judge. She sees the judge, and he’s a large man. Caroline’s Father is a large man.

Can you believe it? The man who turned away the vagrant dog to begin with is now presiding over the case. Poor Andrea is so honest that she didn’t mention it at the time to him, but Papa Snead got rid of the charges anyway. So, when Caroline told her daddy what happened, he about lost it with laughter. “Why didn’t she say somethin’?” he bellowed with laughter. “I liiive for letting people go for no good reason. All she had to do was say ‘Your honor, Caroline Snead gave me this dog, and I’ve just recently been learnin’ how to take the proper care this vagrant dog needs.’ And I would have said, ‘Of course! This dog has a history of vagrancy, one that I am very familiar with! There are extenuating circumstances! Dismissed!” I don’t know if Papa Snead would use that many exclamations, but I imagine that he would, so we’re gonna let ‘em stay.

Tomorrow's going to be a busy day... I'll discover whether or not I get my job at Cosi back fo' rizzle, I get a massage by Kelly, and then I get to take her out to lunch. Following that, fingers crossed, I get to go to work.

By the way, Alanis cut her hair. Love it.

A Picture of Dan and Me

Today has been a day of reflection unlike any I've had in recent memory. We celebrated Easter with the typical trappings of baskets and fake green grass that has been the tradition for every year I've been alive.

A lot of time has passed since 1996. Krista, Aric, Aunt Karin, Uncle Mark, Mom, Dad and I were reminded of it as we watched old movies of bygone holidays. We've grown up so much, we're so different, we're a million other cliches, but we're also very human; and thus, we're susceptible to a million more.

I taped over a part of Easter '97, which took place in Ohio, at some point. I'm an asshole. How was one episode of a stupid soap opera more important than my family's history? I guess I wanted to replace those years so badly that I not only removed the entries from my mind, I was cavalier about erasing them on tape, too. I didn't even think about who's feelings and memories it could hurt.

Such an asshole.

No grudges were held for my indiscretion with a tape. So little fear of retribution from my kin, in fact, that Krista was trusted with putting a hole in my body. A second cartilage piercing to match hers. Krista did it with a needle and an orange... my first new piercing since Trev, Matt, and I went and got my nipple pierced in July or August of 2001.

The hole in my nipple is still open, but no ring resides in it. I lost the metallic memory marker in a boy named Sebastian's apartment this summer. I met him in a dimly lit hotel party where a drag queen named Simone held court, and the party goers reveled, tweaked, and made complete asses of themselves, myself included. I swirled, passed out, and was taken care of by Sebastian at that gathering, one of the few times I needed Mike-sitting at a party. He kept the drag queen away from me, I reckon claiming me as his own in some sort of sick drug addict ritualistic way. I hadn't slept in 5 days.

We had hit it off earlier, I was taken by the glint his eyes displayed, though they were nearly covered by an angora kangol hat. He was the type of boy you weren't sure whether to hire to paint your fence or invite inside to paint the town, the kind who might use his knife for your defense or for worse. It didn't hardly much matter which you desired more, there was no short end to his stick. There's little question to those that know me why I was drawn in; He was a cup game, quick figure eights and tempestuous transition, daring your eyes to blink.

No, I should have known. I liked that he wrapped my mind up in wit, tied it up, and held it dear. I liked how the shadows ended before his lips began, leaving me with the anticipation of each well formed word. I wanted to listen, I wanted to taste.

He wanted me, too. My time in Sebastian's company in any capacity was around two months, and he led me to the social pools in which I nearly drowned. He himself proved to a horrible floatation device, one who preferred to sit at the bottom rather than rise to the top. He was a drug addict, with a far more ferocious addiction than my own.

He was also missing pieces of his soul that I could never repair; parents, best friends, a traitorous nature, and tina.

He left my life easily enough, an amputation necessary and grotesque for all the ways a mind can quiver and become weak for a drug that was flesh and blood.

I saw him online today. His bio said "4 Rnt."

There were rumors that got back to me almost as soon as I started speaking about him to others. All signs pointed to the fact that Sebastian had escorted previously. I checked my facts. They all pointed to prostitution, but I wanted to believe him when he told me they were untrue.

I can't make light of my own allowed delusions... I did, actually, believe him. I let myself be lied to. I let him meet my mother. I let him sleep in my bed, and told him he had a place to go if he needed to clean up. I wanted to believe I could help wash away the filth of addiction as easily as one wipes oil from the bridge of their nose. I wanted to believe that I wasn't feeling deep emotions for a liar and a whore.

I couldn't care less if he sold his body for money. I wish he hadn't sold his integrity. I wish he hadn't sold me out. I wish he hadn't lied to me.

I wish that holes in my body weren't reminders of holes in my soul. Holes in my own integrity. Holes in my own honesty.

I might have a thousand wishes, but I'll be damned if I'll rub a thousand lamps. Let him do that.

I can't tape over last year any more than I can erase myself. Let the sty in my third eye see skewed versions of myself, they can't be any worse than lies I believed or the lies I told myself and then repeated to others. Fuck Sebastian. I hope everytime he blows someone, he remembers blowing out the candles in my room before climbing to bed, remembers what my face looked like as I went down on Justin, and I hope he feels in his sleep, when he does sleep, what my lips felt like on his.

I hope he waits in anticipation for the taste of me. Let my only vengeance be my very lack of it.

Hit play.

I woke up this morning with red eyes. They're so irritated and pained that I think I scratcehd them last night. Well, not think, know. I know for sure I musta scratched 'em.

Last night I met up with Pam over at Cosi, and we hung out, chatted, had a drink and some food, then headed back to my place. We drank a bit here, danced for a while together, and then went across the street to the Playbill Cafe.

More drinks there, got food over at Yums, went back to Playbill, then went back to my place and smoked.

Then we decided to head down to some club in dupont. I, for the life of me, don't really know where we went. We danced out asses off, and I split my great pants right up the ass. Stupid bubble butt.

So, my eyes were killin' me last night, but i was tooooo drunk to really care, so Pam and I danced with Anthony and just enjoyed ourselves for a few more hours. At this point, I caught a cab home. I was too afraid of gettin' naughty things done to me with a pair of tight pants split convienently up the ass. So, cabbed it home and woke up this morning with ferocious eye pain. Totally an ocular infection due to a scratch I must have given myself with my contacts.

Now I gotta wait 'till tomorrow to go to the free doc at mason. Damn it damn it. Oh, and this is ostly bein' typed with my eyes closed, cause it hurts too bad to keep 'em open.

No more Cosi for me. There were many straws on this camel's back, but a shitty tipper with a good personality did me in. I called her out on it, told my boss about it. The district manager informed me that while individuality was once celebrated at Cosi, we're now a publicly traded corporation, and it's now frowned upon.

Yellow belts and shitty tippers. No more Cosi for me.

I've put my feelers back out into the Universe to bring me happiness. There are jobs out there waiting, and lots of options to persue. I've started the process. I have a part time job already lined up at Varsity Books... I'd be working with Sacha, and it's totally a make-your-own-hours type deal, which is cooler than cool.

Ice cold.

So, with that in mind, it leaves me open to find a resturant where my personality can be celebrated. It looks like Perry's in Adam's Morgan is a very viable option. Kelly's good friend Felicia (who asked me to model last valentine's day in her fashion show at Junction, if you'll recall) has a roommate who is the assitant GM. Looks like that establishment is a lock for employment. The average entree option is like $15-20, so I should make out okay there. And the hours are clearly much better. There's something to be said for gettin' outta work at 11 instead of 1.

I'm not really too upset about it. I'll miss my place of employment, but I had to do what I had to do. The GM has promised me a sparkling reference, so its not like he's holding a grudge against me. Most of my friends have left Cosi, sans Lauren and Jenny Lee (who's part time), so I figure its on to greener pastures. I've been talking about leaving for a while... just unhappy with mismanagment and the overall corporate sentiment-- Kelly said it best: "You put the energy out there, now's the time for you to go."

She's right. You can't be a coffee-sandwhich relationship broker for ever. Going at least a little higher end can't hurt. And, getting into the Adam's Morgan bartender scene is a good local scene to get into. I've made segueys into it with the help of Kelly and her friends, nows my own shot. I didn't have any street cred with them working corporate, and now I will. Its funny, but its true.

So, here comes the next big adventure. Financially, I'm still okay, emotionally I'm still okay. Stability is a mindset, and it's not something I'm gonna let get fucked up 🙂

Sun-drained and deeply tanned is how I'm spending this third of july. Krista and Crystal came down the day before yesterday to visit, and we went over to Playbill for drinks and for karokee. When we arrived, there was this amazing singer doing her rendition of "The Greatest Love" by Whitney. She rocked the fucking house. The next few singers were no less stunning.

Who knew that they were from two musicals over at the Kennedy Center? "Beehive" and "Sheer Madness" have been playing for a little while each over there, and I guess the principals made their way to my little dive bar for fun and laughs.

Poor Crystal, the one member of the family who can really sing didn't even get a chance to show her chops, since the Karokee machine broke half way into the evening. The other half of the evening was filled with acapella-ness.

We left, somewhat appropriatly, on "Empty Chairs" from Les Mis.

We had finished off my big ass bottle of Vodka before going across the street, so when we got back and danced in my apartment for an hour, it allowed us some sobering-up time. It also allowed for some hardcore emotional bonding... over the words and music of Dar Williams. We hugged, cried, and remembered why we were so glad to have each other.

LOVE them.

After the hour or two back at the apartment, we hopped our way over to Apex and did some dancing. A cute boy in a hat danced with Crystal, and Krista and I just rocked our shit. It was one of those nights where I wasn't feeling dance shy at all, so I grabbed the girls by the hand and led them to the up-stage area, and the crowd cleared for us. Its a satisfying feeling to watch people watch you, and know that they are making desirous looks. It feels good, its fucking empowering, and it makes me want to shake my dance shyness altogether. If Krista and Crystal are the antidotes for it, maybe they should just be around more often... just a thought. 😉

Anyway, we came down to the country the next morning, ending up at my folks bright and early; we left at 8:45, and made it here by like 11ish, including the stop at McDonald's.

We drank lovely frozen drinks and swam in the pool all day long. I'm a red-tastic light-burned thats going to fade into a gorgeous tanned, which is more than I can say for Ms. Crystal, who missed spots all over herself with the suntan lotion, and thusly looks like a bizarre picasso. No big thing. Its just funny shit.

We had been up for so long, drunken no less, that as soon as 10:30 rolled around, we were crawling into the tent to pass out.

Oh, ya, with so many heads in the house, we just pitched a tent in the back yard and pretending to be pioneers. It somewhat matches another portion of the day's activities... we decided to put go trapsing through the swamps around here like we did when we were little.

Muddy and yucky. Totally my childhood.

Right, so yeah, at 10:30 we were crawling into the tent, and being the person I am, I went ahead and checked my phone for messages. I had a text message from Bville Boy. Bville is an old coworker of mine, and someone I once considered a really good friend. When I cleaned up my addictions, I ended up losing my friendship with him.

He and his then-boyfriend were Lauren's roommates in the Holmead House, and they really sorta scewed over the member's of that home. Lauren, of course, is living with me now, but the reason she moved into the apartment with Jess in the first place had a lot to do with having to move out of the Holmead House-- when half of your roomates, Bville and BVEx, aren't paying, you sorta have to get the hell out.

So, Bville Boy revealed to me that he was at court for his eviction proceedings, and during the trial or whatever, he had a heart attack. A real, honest to god heart attack. He's fine, from what I can tell, but having his heart stops eems to be what he needed to kick start his quitting. BVEx has decided not to kick the habit, nor has his BVille's best friend... and to my shock, the ex and the best friend (who is a lesbian) are living with someone new... Justin...

I've mentioned Justin here previously. I hold massive distrust for anything/anyone associated with that boy, and damn it, I'm honestly thrown through a loop. How do you trust someone who is tied to the person you most intimatly tie in your head to your abuse?

Bville Boy was crying on the phone with me, and he told me he missed me. I'm the only person he knows who's actually cleaned themselves up, and he wasn't sure if he should contact me or not. Kate told him to. She said I'd be a good person to talk to about this... Kate. More old ties.

He informed me he's living with his parents, and I told him to stay there. I told him that's the best place to be (his parents are apparently helping him a ton, being supportive, etc). I promised we could get coffee, and that we could talk about anything he wanted to. He was grateful. He asked me how I did it, how I quit-- he said it was so hard. How did I quit? Because I had to! Because my life was called into question, and I chose togo on living... and to him I swore, swore on my life, that it was worth it.

I want to call Kate and fact check. We'd spoken fairly recently, had a real chat, and I think she's on the path to "un-broken." Even when we were both broken toys, we still had an underlying bond. I feel like I can talk to her about whats going on without there being any pretense of sketch.

Justin also makes me so paranoid, so fucking sketchy, that when Bville told me that his ex and his old favorite lesbianwere living with Justin, I immediatly thought that this was a trick, or that Justin was trying to somehow "get" me.

A well placed call to Tara calmed my fears and squelched the paranoia, thank goodness. She provided me a superb Crazy Check, bringing me back to reality. She pointed out what I needed to have repeated, and reiterated the arms-length embrace philosophy that I was already thinking about.

I want to know so much more about whats going on in this situation. I'm curious how Bville, BVEx and Justin could have crossed paths to the point that they'd be living together. I want to know how much Kate is involved with Justin. Argh. Nothing I can do from here. I know I need to not think about it... just calm the fuck down and just tan more. A good tan solves so much. And besides, if I'm gonna see Bville I wanna have a tan, just 'cause I'm vain.

Speaking of vain, I did have steak and crabs today for dinner... I'm going to get soooo fat visiting my parents. Just thinking about these associations from my past make me feel obese. Isn't that awful? I wish Krista and Crystal didn't have to work on the Fourth and could just be here tomorrow, too. They left tonight to go back up to their respective states, and somehow I don't mind bein' a True Fatty when they're here...

Okay, so Halo isn't at 14th and Mass, its at 14th and P.

Basically, the hip new spot that just opened Friday is seeable from my window. In fact, its only three doors down from me. Weird, right? I was really expecting it to be a straight bar, but apparently its far from it: totally 'mo. Its also really, really pretty with a wall-to-ceiling curve that makes it tunnelesque. The red and blue lights they use to illuminate the wall sets really nice fuckin' tone, and the frosted glass illuminated yellow for the bar area is gorgeous. It helps that the red and yellow used are my favorite colors.

Anywho, Sacha before coming over filled me up a sippy cup of Everclear and mixed it with a melted daquri that had been sitting in her fridge for about three days. I wasn't gonna be shy, so I drank the bitch.

Yummy Yummy. Drunk Drunk.

So, ya, after not being able to find the place when we went down to 14th and Mass we met up with Sacha's friend Sam at Playbill, got a cocktail, and the bar tender told us where to go. Had a nice time, caught up with Shaina, Sacha's friend. She was with her Michael... Sacha adn Shaina each have a Michael, though they both agree I'm the better one (giggle!). Okay, so Sacha thinks I'm the better, maybe Shania doesn't for sure, but Sacha DOES frequently yell at Other Michael the following: "Oh Yeah?! I've gotta Michael, too!"

She does this unprompted and loudly, as only she can get away with.

So, I was gonna go over to Sacha's friend Greggles, but ended up runnin' in to Lauren first. We ended up smokin' cigarettes and gabbin' and then just passin' the hell out.

So, this morning I was woken up oddly.

Lauren hears the door down stairs open, and then slam. She hears these loud *thud thud thuds* coming up the stairs, very assertively. Then she hears *pound pound pound* on the door. Of course she thinks I'm about to be arrested or evicted or some such, so she quickly throws on shorts and a shirt (we're naked a lot), and answers the door.

It's my Mom, who lives two hours from here. Weird.

Well, either way she asks if I'm here, and Lauren tells her yep, and then says that I'm in bed asleep, half naked, she's sure. Mom jokingly responds "Is he alone?" and heads for the door.

Pause.
Turns around.
"He is alone, right?"

So, ya, mom just dropped the hell on by, Dad in tow. They came to carnap my Blazer. After the homeless person took up residence in it, went through all of my things that I hadn't taken out, and stole my band aids, we knew it was time to go. Or it may have been after the gas was syphoned. Whichever. Either way, they came and took my car.
I was most certainly still a little drunk when my mom got me up, but either way, it was fantastic to see 'em just drop by. She even gave me money for clothes hangers.

Brunch today saw Lauren, Jenny Lee, Pam, Carter and I at Saint-Ex. Carter is the boy who works at Urban and has somehow just worked his way into my friendship circle by simply being wherever I am. Weird, I realize, but yeah, fun guy. The bartender even randomly poured us a couple of redheaded slus on the way out. That was after the car drove by and threw an egg out the window at us (we sat on Saint-Ex's patio). Who the fuck gets EGGED?! Us, apparently.

We did a little window shopping together and really had a fab fucking time. I really, really liked the group dynamic of us five. A LOT. I want more of that.

Anywho, had to clean up quickly for work while everyone else just gabbed in my living room, and then bounced off to my first day of actual server training at Perry's. I rode my bike this time, which made the commute a heckuvalot easier. 9 hours later, I'm about to bop into Dupont to go grab a beer with Pam and Lauren.

So, gotta go, but wanted to hammer this out before I ran outta time.

I couldn't walk down 14th Street this weekend without walking into a large, scary looking leather daddy, a slave sans ballgag, or a horrified tourist. Good Times. Yeah, the Mid Atlantic Leather Conference was in town, and I actually went on the "Meet the Meat" bar crawl this past friday. I knew that I could have gotten myself into real trouble, seein’ as how I dressed up like a gay 70’s teensploitation movie character. I was all sorts of varsity football jersey, shaggy hair, and rope handcuffs. Lets not forget the belt buckle in the back that Caitlin decided was just straight up “pornographic.”

Bitch was right, and I was hot.

Miss Meg came with me dressed in a sequened scoopy bra and leather pants. She looked hot as fucking hell, and honestly, the girl's body is ridiculous. I couldn't have asked for a better drinking buddy, seein' as how the minute we go to the Washington Plaza the straight bartenders were buying us rounds. We made one hell of a pair, tricked out football player and awry cheerleader.

We stayed at the Plaza long enough to get macked on by older gentle men, but no one of note decided I was the hotness, so we moved on. My fragile little ego needed to be stroked (yes, ego, not that) so we hit the Green Lantern and Titan, too. Lantern was excellent, and I made out with a boy for fun. Figures, he was the only one there who was clearly not there for the leather scene. He had gotten lost on his way from JRs, I imagine. Poor cute, tallboy.

I’m lame enough that the fact that his name was also the title of a Newbery award winning book made me want to make out with him even more. I suppose if I was going for the self-referential grade school sex look, a Newbury winner would be perfect.

Alas, bad kissers sometimes have great names, so it was back home and back to Yums for detox and rehashing. Meg made her way to the bathroom to relieve herself of a cocktail or two, and managed to sleep for a short bit on the bathroom floor. Yikes. I passed out somewhere between the Tivo and the radiator, with a jug of water next to me. I found it in the morning, but couldn’t find my voice. I reckon that’s why the slaves didn’t have ball gags, one night out, and even this loudmouth couldn’t talk the next morning.

One of the hot things about last night is that there were quite a few pictures taken of Meg and I, so somewhere someone is ogling us in posterity. Hot.

Some 28 year old college chica just got 18 months probation for selling faux Duff beer. She was forced to reimburse the purchasers, to the tune of nearly 2k. I wonder what beer she used to fake it? I guess it doesn't matter, aside from the 18 months, they're makin' the bitch see a shrink. I still think its a good idea-- whatever.

In real beer news, apparently Coors Light and Molson are thinking about merging. Don't fret, you didn't miss the memo, both are still lame. I mean, think of the list of beers that you get with this new SuperBrew company? Molson Canadian, Coors Light, Carling, Keystone, Aspen Edge, Zima, Rickard's and Kaiser... would you honestly wanna order any of those? Ugh, bring me a Chimay!

Coors, Miller Lite, Zimas... they all kinda fall into the same category in my mind, watery and cheap. Little Miss Smokey said it best: "I drink Miller Lite when I'm actually thirsty and at the bar. Its not like I'd order it if I ever wanted a beer." Word. It is drunk water as far as I'm concerned, but if I'm ever near an avalanchable area, I'm gonna be sure to bring plenty of one of the new SuperBrews. It could save my life-- over somewhere in Europe (where is the Slovakian Cock from, anyway? Czech Slovakia? Ugh, I'm dumb) a man drank 60 beers and pissed his way out of an avalanche that covered his car. Apparently he drank and pissed so much his liver and kidneys hurt.

Buddy, I know your pain. Hmmm, how can I work this into casual discourse? I gotta go melt the snow?

Remember all the bangs and bruises I had a few weeks ago? They told me that perhaps I should find a new passion, a new love.

Gin and I broke up last week.

Gin has hurt me too badly over the course of this year, the realtionship requiring more from each of us with each passing month. I can't do it anymore. The neighbors were going to begin to wonder who was beating me up so badly, and since I can't remember most of the time, I wind up having to fill in the blanks with partial information. You can't say that Gin did this to you. Domestic disturbances are soooo 1997 Lifetime movie.

Lifetime movie or no, after a long bit of thinking I've decided its best if Gin and I saw other people. She needs to get out there and live her life and make new friends. I need to do the same, so Bourbon and I are buddying up.

Bourbons a tough act. He's rougher around the edges than my girl Gin, but we seem to get along well. I can tell that we're having a good time together before I ruin it by spending tooo much time with him and making it all awful.

And, I can still wake up at 9:30 on my own after a good night out with him. How cool is that?

Caitlin: (15:19:15): that's a yes, prepare the bong bitches

Me, a week earlier: AGH! Lesbians on my TV!
Lauren, today: Finally! Fags on your TV!

Showtune for the evening:
From Mame, (go download it!!):

Bosom Buddies

We'll always be bosom buddies. Friends, sisters and pals
We'll always be bosom buddies
If life should reject you there's me to protect you
If I say that your tongue is vicious
If I call you uncouth it's simply that
who else but a bosom buddy will sit down and tell you the truth
Though now and again I'm aware that my candid opinion may sting
Though often my frank observation might scald,
I've been meaning to tell you for years you should keep your hair natural like mine.
if I kept my hair natural like yours Id be bald.
But darling
If I say that your sense of style's as far off as your youth, it's simply that
who else but a bosom buddy will tell you the whole stinking truth
Each time that a critic has written your voice is the voice of a frog, straight
to your side to defend you I rush.
You know that I'm there every time that the world makes an unkind remark, when
they say Vera Charles is the worlds greatest lush it hurts me
and if I say your fangs are showing Mame pull in your claws it's simply that
who else but a bosom buddy will notice the obvious flaws
I feel it's my duty to tell you it's time to adjust to your age, you try to be
pega my heart when your lady Macbeth.
Exactly how old are you Vera the truth
how old do you think
Oh, I'd say somewhere in between 40 and death
But sweetie
I'll always be Alice Tokeless if you'll be Gertrude Stein and though I'll admit
I've dished you, I've gossiped and gloated but I'm so devoted
And if I say that sex and guts made you into a star, remember that who else but
a bosom buddy will tell you how rotten you are
Just turn to your bosom buddy for age and affection for help and direction for
loyalty love and for soothe remember that who else but a bosom buddy will sit
down and level and give you the devil will, sit down and tell you the truth.

When the streetlights outside hit the trees, and the shadows reflect onto one my windows, sometimes it looks like a monster waving just inches from the pane. The trees on P Street really are comforting, both in the day and at night. I don't mind the monster waving at me-- its like an old friend saying "Hey."

The snow has melted quickly, though its not as if the inclimate weather made much of a dent on my weekend. I made it to the National Aquariam with Marky, and we saw some excellent fatty invertibrates. Petrochirus diogenes, apparently. Just a good long day with a friend who I haven't spent a helluvalot of time with in a while. We even made it up to Adams Morgan to attack Toledo Lounge, catching up with Jordan and the boys. Mark and I won bragging rights by guessing the most Oscar Winners correctly AND we also have the high score on Q-Shot and Wordster. Granted, we were playing against straight men, but whatever. We're winners.

Good stuff. I guess this has been a swimming week for good buddyness.

Hawaii in two days.

Sorry, princess, this is my house.

When I came home from vacation there were beer bottles on my coffee table, my pasta had been eaten, cocktails had been made and not cleaned up... my house was worst than how I left it (which is sayin' something, bitches).

Lee broke in through the fire escape and stayed the night one night. He cleaned up after himself and refilled ice trays. Exactly as I would have expected him to. The neighbor girls came over and watched TV another night. They drank a little, but came back to clean the next day. Exactly as I would expect them to.

When they arrived, windex and paper towels in hand, the door quickly locked-- deadbolt and doorframe. When they knocked, no one answered. Yet, obviously, someone had just run to the door to lock it! The neighbors yelled in "Lauren, it's just us! We're here to clean up our mess!"

After some presistance on my neighbors part, some asian bitch with short hair answered my door in a towel and wouldn't let them in. Wouldn't even open the door at first. She told them to go away, that she'd clean up. That she was a friend of Kelley's.

Kelley does not even have a key to my apartment.

Lauren left her keys with Kelley. Who then gave them to Amanda for god knows what reason. Amanda, the asian bitch with short hair, let herself into my apartment. Who knows for what reason or for how long. Fucking whore. I'm livid. Not only did she not clean when she left, she lied to Kelley (or I hope she lied, and that its not kelley doing the lying) about the way shit went down, and I feel kinda violated.

Clearly the amount of people in and out of my apartment, sans bitch, lends you to the notion that I'm really not super troubled by guests. I'm not. If you are welcome in my home and I gave you a key, and I happen to be in Hawaii, please let yourself in. If you don't have a key, you call and ask if you can come over while I'm gone, I'll put you in contact with someone who can let you in for whatever reason. Or I can say no. This stupid fucking slut of a human doesn't even know my last name and certainly doesn't even have my cell phone number to give me the courtesy of telling her hell the fuck no.

Hell, the person she said she was a friend of doesn't even have a key to my apartment! If you're breaking into my home and lying to my friends, please AT LEAST know who's key your using to break in! Being 4 degrees of separation away from me does not allow you into my personal spaces. Thanks.

She also didn't leave a note. You always leave a note!

The folks had their 23rd Wedding anniversery last night; it doesn't get more romantic than the first day of spring, ya'll. They're coming into the District this evening to hang out and have dinner and I'm really very excited, not having seen them in a few months and all. They should be here around 7:30, which means I am gonna miss happy hour on my only day off. I'll manage.

Puja is going to be returning my cell phone to me tonight after I go to dinner with the family. She's had it since February 26th-ish, so I'm really, really excited to have it back. I can't believe I went nearly a month without it, without killing myself.

I've spent most of my time with the improv kids, the neighbors, or the neighbors and the improv kids together, so its made the lack of phone calls much more tolerable. I know what its like to just go a knockin' on my friend's doors now. Its like the olden days!

Smarter boys would learn to watch what they type when posting to the interweb, but unfortunatly I'm sometimes a bit of a dim discoball. I referenced the Foggy Bottom Alcoholics Anonymous on here and had to explain to someone in real life that I wasn't in AA (not that I shouldn't be). Its a term I use for my friends who happen to go George Washington University, a lovely school in sunny, gorgeous Foggy Bottom).


Fucked up and funny, I can't claim to have coined the term. Last Halloween Julia, Cole, and a few others made T-Shirts that said FBAA and wore them out boozing. Fake names on the back, they took it the whole nine. A lot of people apparently missed the joke while they were out and proceeded to be ghastly offended.

I'm telling you, I could hear the story twelve times and still have beer come out my nose. Fantastic shit, ya'll.

Equally fanastic is the 14th Street Christian Youth Association moniker that we've got going for the neighbors and me. Sometime around the time of Bush's inauguration, the neighbors and I stumbled upon Nascar Poetry through Nill's. One of them even had a link so that we could request a free poem. We couldn't help ourselves:




Date: 1/23/2005
From:
Reply To:
To: qdesigns@islc.net
Subject: requesting free poem

Miss "Trish"-

My prayer group and I were inspired by your eloquent writing and wondering what poetic sentiment you could offer us directly after the auspicious re-inauguration of our wonderful president. Any inspired words you could offer us would be much appreciated!


Yours in Christ-
Michael Hall and the 14th Street Christian Youth Association
<><




So, thats that.

Celebrated Margarita Monday with Markie on the fire escape. We tended to the garden, which is just a' sproutin', and invited people over to partake in our tasty frozen libations. Mark's boyfriend Sean came over and played for a bit before we all went out seperate ways. Thats as sure a way to a friendship as any. He also turned me on to an online comic I'd never seen before: Alien Loves Predator. Word.

Remember that movie with Jude Law and the kid from the Sixth Sense? In it there was this bitchin' teddy bear that I wanted so badly, and now I think they're making something like it for real. It may even trump Clocky in the department of cute things I want now.

Check out this groovy article about robocats, and go to paragraph 7. Teddy Bear robots! Granted, the cats were described as "some come-alive stuffed animal from a high-end horror movie," but that really is fine with me. I doubt my teddy will come a knifin'.

I did go a knifin' last night at Skewers, though. I went with Geoff, my girl friend Meg's brother-- he's a logan circle hood rat, too, and we're buddying up. We smoked at his house before going down for grub, and I was handidly baked. No questions asked, no fuckin' around. The foods was good, and I was shocked that it had taken me so long to go there. Its right above Luna Cafe, so its not like i don't eat over there all the time anyway.

I wouldn't be surprised if every single post for the next few whiles starts with some adorable picture of Sebastian. Like the one above. We love Sebastian.

The Fourth of July festivities went off mostly hitchless, if not bitchless. Dana, Krista, Tabby, Cherese, Janine, Norma, Uncle Pappy, Uncle Mark and Aunt Karin, Aunt Debbie, and a few others came down, and everyone behaved exactly as they always do-- take it or leave it. For those who I'd rather leave, I cry bullocks. For those that I enjoy? Glorious.

On Friday, Julia called and asked if I wanted to get a little afternoon drunk. Duh. Well, afternoon drunk turned into a revolving door of people in and out of my house, killing off 3 cases of beer and eight bottles of wine. My friends rule. I was D-U-N done around 2:30am, but made it another hour. Woke up on my couch with a put away puppy, so the party counts as a complete success. 12 hours of solid drinking? I don't care if it was unplanned, that counts as a frickin success.

Works fucking sucks big wookie right now. I hope it turns around-- but in the meantime, I reckon I'm day job hunting. We'll see. I'm skeptical that things'll change, but I don't wanna jinx anything. I'd rather look at silver linings. Like yesterday, getting cut early from work because we only had 60 tickets sold, that was a blessing (though, I'm still really, really, really pissed about the whole thing). I got to take the puppy to his Uncle Geoff's to go play inside. He went totally nutball cornwallace crazy with all the new things to play with. He also tinkled on the rug TWICE. Puppies are not allowed at Geoff's anymore! Not until he's a big good boy (not just a little good boy).

I'm going a little bit batty. It's been five days since the marathon and I want to go running terribly. I'm craving a nice hour of pavement pounding, but unfortunately I could do real damage to myself if I were to actually go out and about. So, I'm just fantasizing about it.

Jon Jon sent me a pic of his Halloween costume, all black trenchcoat goodness, a sleek set of matching .9mm's, and black hockey mask goodness; an inspired Black Jason. Also in the email? A picture of Josh and me. Aside from the fact that I need to stop seein old pictures of the two of us, I also don't need to be reminded of how fat I had gotten then. I looked a bit muppety with the weight. Oh, sure, not Kirsty Alley fat, but I was definatly chunk-o. Another reason I want to get the turf under my stride sooner rather than later.

But, ya, Tuesday was a good Halloweenin'. I rummaged through my clothes bins and pulled out my ancient football practice jersey and threw on Chris's green track pants. A nice black line done with old halloween lipstick under each eye and I was set to go. Football player it was. Nothing for ol' Guinness's books, but when an intoxicated tommy-gun totting moll asked an inebriated me (on a drunk bus, no less) what team I was on, I screamed "YOU KNOW WHAT TEAM I PLAY FOR!"

Fun. Fun. Fun.

I'm not here to judge the happenstance drunkenss of others, but I think that Team Sketch did very well. Puja played shortly after noon until right around dusk, her in a football jersey with the same lines as I had under my eyes. We were adorable. After that, we ended up at Toledo Lounge with (roll call!) Jordan, Nelina (bartending), Geoffery, Chris, Jason Lemon (Geoff's friend), and Rose (also G's buddy). From there, Chris and I hit up Tonic (after some minor barhopping), catchin up with Steve and Lisa.

Copious consumption continued until I was face down on steve's bed-- the same place I awoke November 1st.

There will be pictures shortly, with any luck.

Oh, Trevis. If only I could apolgoize more. When your best friend died, all we could do was hold a moment in time for her. I was so selfish, I didn't get the gravity of losing a best friend, even one that had been so distant for so long. You lit some candles, and I couldn't comprehend your grief. We had been waiting for her to OD and die, or (barring that) some sort of other combination o' awfu. We all guesssed that it would eventually come, and none of us were shocked. And I thought my nontear stained face was okay.

And then my best friend died. And I've sobbed for her, but not in recent years.

But tonight I sobbed for Emily. Woe is the holidays, and I miss her. I'm gonna visit her grave for Christmas, I think, and I'll bring that bitch cookies. I never bake, but I will for her. I'll have Mark or Geoff supervise. I can't take it. I've never missed her more. I want to believe she'd be proud of the man I am.

Emily'd be so proud. She'd be angry that I ran a marathon, but share my bed nonetheless. Odds are good she'd wear the pajamapants she always wore (I haven't worn them out or thrown them away). I miss her so much. She'd call me out for days. She'd send me an awful IM.

I love the holidays, but, oh yes, I hate them too.

No posts in way too long.

Its winter, and not much is going on. The cold long months have been punctuated by trips to Florida for game show auditions, drunken adventures in the snow (Snow Day!), and driving through life with the cruise control activated. Its not the most exciting exsistance, but I'm enjoying it.

Anywho, I stole this stupid gay-get-to-know-you from someone else's blog. I've got time to kill before I head into the comedy coal mine, so....


1. have you ever had sex with the opposite sex? Yes
2. who is the first person you came out to? Robyn or Caroline. It was the same day.
3. are you out to your parents? Yep.
4. do you want kids? Not yet, if ever.
5. do you have more gay friends or straight friends? Straight, by far.
6. were you out in school? Out-ish.
7. is your best friend the same sex as you? I've got a couple, but, yeah, the one I see most often is.
8. if your best friend is the same sex, have you ever kissed them? Tried once, I was drunk and he's straight. It was one of those so-drunk-I-couldn't-stand type deals. It made a great, if mortifying, story the next day.
9. have you ever done crystal meth? yep
10. have you ever been in a sling? Unfortch, nope.
11. have you ever done a 3-way? Yes. I like they say "done" a three way. Something about that phrasing seems awkward and unexperienced.
12. have you ever dressed in drag? I've had a dress on but no make up. The side burns would ruin the mystique.
13. would you ever date a drag queen? Hahaha, only if we could do clown porn. I seriously can't see that happening. I like dudes.
14. are you a top/bottom or truly versatile? I don't know anymore. Lets say depends on the chemistry, but typically a bototm. Its a true as we're gonna get.
15. have you seen an uncircumcised thingy? Of course.
16. have you had sex with someone of a different race? Yes
17. have you ever barebacked? Yes
18. how many cher cds do you own? Who owns CDs? (I've got the greatest hits hiding in itunes somewhere)
19. name your first true love? Aww, Phoenix Robles.
20. do you still talk to them? When he's in town.
21. does size matter? I think bein' a big boy makes it easier to be better. But if you're a pro, and at least big enough to hit my prostate, my money's on no, that shit don't matter.
22. biggest turn on? Smart, sly eyes
23. biggest turn off? Fat.
24. ever been harassed because you are gay? Nothing so terrible that its ruined me as a person 🙂
25. worst gay stereotype that applies to you? Stupid question. I live up to a bunch of stereotypes. I <3 Madonna.
26. ever been to a pride rally? Yep.
27. would you marry if you could? Ugh. He'd have to be a real pick.
28. would you rather be rich and smart or young and beautiful? I'm already smart, young, and beautiful. I'm starting to think that this quiz was written by some queen troglodyte who got sick of eatting billy goats from under his bridge. Whateves, I'd still take cash if we're just givin' it out.
29. do you sculpt your eyebrows? Puja likes it when I do.
30. do you trim your body hair? Sometimes I shave in a landing strip from between my pecs down to my cock. Sometimes I'm a twink, sometimes I'm an otter! You never know what you're gonna get when I strip.
31. ever had sex with more than one person in a day? Yep.
32. ever been to an orgy? We didn't calll it that. Something about "orgy" screams "TACKY" and "STD." But, uh, yeah.
33. have you dated your best friends ex? Nope, but I have dated a best friend!
34. would you vote for hilary clinton if she ran for president? Vauge.
35. do you want monogamy in your relationship? It depends on the relationship. Some ships just aren't built like that. I want whats healthiest for me at the time.
36. do you believe in true love? Awww, sometimes. Sometimes, very much so.
37. do you have any tattoos? Yep
38. do you have any piercings? Yep.
39. would you date a smoker? Its not a deal breaker.
40. do you know anyone who has died from h.i.v.? Yep, though its not as though they've been in my inner circle or anything.
41. do you know what stonewall was? I feel like this troll penned quiz is veering into the lovely land of condecension.
42. wonder woman, xena, or the halliwell sisters? Am I a traitor to my dear, dear DC? Gimmie the Halliwels.
43. strangest place you have had sex? Ball pit at McDonalds?
44. strangest place you’ve woken up? Oh my god, really? A basement in Glover Park? My own fire escape? The roof of that art gallery?
45. are your best years behind or in front of you? It doesn't work like that.
46. favorite porn movie? An American in Prauge
47. are you in love now? Aww, if I am, its certainly not still healthy 🙂
48. ever been in love with a straight guy/girl? Nope, not a one.
49. did you ever have sex with them? I've got issues with turning the straights. It works to create a gay-tinged "black male rapist myth."
50. have you ever been to a nude beach? Can't wait.
51. have you ever been to a bath house? I can't quite bring myself to do it.
52. ever had sex in public? Superfun.

is so smitten with his old friends

is in Fredericksbug at his High School Reunion!

is home from the class reunion. SO. MUCH. FUN.

wants to wish all of his old friends and lovers a Happy Fattintine's Day

wants to wish all of his old friends and lovers a Happy Fattentine's Day

has the best friends pretty much ever and for always!

misses his best friend.

Lets see whats most revealing? I am tickled that "Donnie Darko" and "Catcher in the Rye" as well as Reading got such high marks amongst my friends.

The Radiohead is not unexpected. I am surprised, however, that I have so many gemini friends. Thats my sign 🙂

Today in CrossFit we worked on a lifting technique that’s familiar to a lot of my friends. Not because they participate in functional training, but because it’s a little like what happens on Friday nights. No, not getting drunk and losing your car. Think dance floor: droppin’ it like its hot. Back Squats, you see, are (at the most basic) lowering your hips with your knees a little out, the back extended, and a bunch of weight resting across the back of your shoulder. You may have seen something like it in a rap video.

This isn’t going to be a post about how to squat– talk to a trainer for that kind of info (seriously: real life is so much different than what a even a good youtube video can prep).

No, today I wanted to talk about being honest with yourself.

If you don’t take your hips lower than your knees in a squat, you’re cheating yourself out of a huge strength gaining opportunity (isn’t that why we lift weights?) and even have the potential to lose some of our range of motion. Why would we allow that to happen? Because going all the way is, without question, harder.

Like many little white lies we tell ourselves, its easier to do just a little less, such as going just shy of breaking parallel in our squat. It makes things easier, you work less hard– but ultimately, whats the point? Wasted energy, and on top of that, a little bit of dishonesty, too.

Dishonesty, it would seem, comes in degrees. I mean, you’ll be able to knock out more squats, but are you actually “doing the work”? When tempted to do less than your best, remind yourself that “this is not useful.”

Then work to cultivate the opposite.

Why?

The yoga sutras say that as truthfulness (satya) is achieved, the fruits of actions naturally result according to the will of the yogi. If you desire to be better, and you really want to get what you want– you know real gains and real improvement– you gotta be honest with yourself.

Eschew the aesthetic or the illusion and go for whats real. Cultivate the opposite of dishonesty, reminding yourself when prompted otherwise that “this is not useful” and let a natural flow of goodness into your life that will also bear fruit.

On the mat, under the bar, or at the bar.

Have you ever sucked in your gut to create that creepy too-big-rib-cage effect? Then odds are good you’ve used a muscle called the Transverse Abdominus. The TA is an important link in the deep kinetic chain of the body that allows for power from the low body to relate and transfer into power for the upper body (and vice versa) via increased stabilization in the pelvic girdle (and how it relates to the shoulder girdle).

As many of you know, I spend a ton of time throwing heavy stuff over my head– like, um, my body. If I want to improve, how do I go about it? Accessing the TA. It’ll seem obvious when I say this, but bear with; the more consolidated the core, the more control we have in all sorts of actions (olympic lifting, handbalancing, keg-standing).

Think about your core:

What do we have hiding underneath the skin?

First, the obvious:

• The big-sexy-six pack: aka the up-and-down rectus abdominus.
• The Side-abs: the external obliques.

These guys are all associate with torso flexion. They allow the body to “crunch.” Thats all well and good, but it doesn’t neccesarily speak to stablizing during the “crunch” or, heck, any other activity that might require you to not wobble (I think I can think of a few).

Much like my friendship networks of yore, the stable buddies can sometimes go less noticed in leiu of the louder (erm, less “stable”) friends.

Who handles the stabilization, then? The less obvious nonsuperficial muscle:

• The internal obliques: You can think of them as Patrick Swayze’s hands on Baby’s torso during the lift scenes. They function like that, cradling and lifting. The fibers of this muscle run perpendicular to their external brethren.
• The multifidus: Weaves along each disk of the back, and works to stabilize the joints at each segmental level. The stiffness and stability makes each vertebra work more effectively, and reduces the degeneration of the joint structures.
• The transverse abdominus: beneath those, we find a corset like muscle going around the bottommost portion of the spine (lumbar) and connecting all the way up to the low ribs.

When you draw the navel in towards the belly, you’re engaging your real core, your inner corset. The transverse abdominus contracts inwardly, bringing everything internal closer together. This is required for consolidated movement and efficient energy usage.

The multifidus is very small, but it has a unique design that lends stability to the spine , as well as working to keep you upright. When the multifidus is put on a stretch, as when you bend forward, it actually gets stronger. This is unlike most muscles which, when lengthened, lose their strength. The multifidus also brings space to the disks of the back, and brings the pelvis into a more powerful alignment for bigger (safer) actions.

The internal obliques are our same-side rotators. . It acts with the external oblique muscle of the opposite side to achieve this torsional movement of the trunk. For example, the right internal oblique and the left external oblique contract as the torso flexes and rotates to bring the left shoulder towards the right hip.

So how do we strengthen these good muscles and program ourselves to engage them regularly?

This method is super easy, but also not the most exciting thing in the world. Truth be told, at any given point, you can contract your transverse abdominus, internal obliques, and work your multifidus.

Egg Timer Method:

Draw in your innermost layer of abdominals without collapsing the chest. Draw up and in with the navel until the ribs splay, and then draw back in. Avoid slumping the shoulders. Imagine a zipper from the low back that goes to the navel, and zip it up, too. This will work the multifidus. Hold this contraction for 30 seconds. Repeat after a brief rest. Do this 5 times. Include one legged standing tilts (such as Warrior III in yoga). Repeat a few times a day. Next week make it 45 seconds. Third week? A minute.

String Method:

While drawing in the TA, tie a string around your midsection along the natural waist. For the rest of the day, every time you notice the belly flesh digging into the string, draw the belly back in. Do this consistently. Full disclosure: I haven’t done this yet.

The Benefits:

• a (dramatically) smaller waist line
• confidence in strength
• good balance
• safety in “big lifts” and “big jumps”
• decrease in low back pain

+ Best Friends + Grill = True Love

loves Chris Agne! Best friends forever!

woke up in bed with his four-legged best friend in his arms, no shoulder pain to speak of, and was able to take a deep breath sans pain. Happy Sunday, indeed!!!

Old friends (Pauline Kim) + New Friends ( Mike M + Alexandra E Anderson ) = Win!

is out on a school night celebrating the start of one of his best friend's (shhhhh!) 3rd decade-- here's lookin'atchu, Ms. Erica Martinson!

I swear to God, I fucking love my friends.

ziptruck and Matthew Eckert to the rescue. I get by with a little help from my friends 🙂

is drying up after a weekend of birthday hijinx. My friends are great 😉

Olympic lifts, metabolic conditioning, ashtanga asanas, and a great cause: skin cancer awareness. I love my friends-- and @[100063566111555:2048:Balance Gym].

practicing the rocket sequence at Balance Gym, then doing a metcon at CrossFit Balance. Then, of course, sharing some bendy-jumpy-floatiness with my friends from Mid City Yoga and Balance Gym. Come play!

Thank you, Big A. You've got a Thursday buddy.

Tears of Joy for equality. Tears of Sorrow for the loss of an old friend. Life is never without a balance. Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu.

To all my friends doing Fight Gone Bad today: Good Luck!!

Being the best man to my best friend is pretty much the best. All is full of love.

I'm super grateful for the help of my friends. Thank you so much Marky for being there for me in a pinch. I get to share pictures on my blog now because of Your Savvy. *hugs*

Signs of the times: I want to see "American Reunion" and "Titanic" in 3D.

I'm in love with my best friend, partner in crime, and roommate. He makes me one of the lucky ones. I love you, Michael Roike. I'm so glad you're mine 🙂

This weather + best friend chat = bliss

Happy Anniversary to my partner in crime, best friend, and favorite. xo.

Mysore Thanksgiving was a total treat. To my friends back home, embrace the attitude of gratitude... I know you'll forgive the platitude.

Missing debrief and over analysis time with old friends on this Saturday morning.

Time with my little buddy Kai and @_xingxing_

"Woof shop?"
"No, buddy. Workshop. On backbends."
"Hmf. I'll be here."

Retweeted Terms of Gemini (@GeminiTerms):

For #Gemini - God = Everything, Mom + Dad = Heroes, Best Friends = Happiness, You = Love.

Missing my little buddy today. #charliegram

Sebastian and Me.
Photo courtesy of @made_by_mara

#tbt with @conman3500

#FDR with @mroike

Friendship! With #pigpup #charliegram and @ladyhawkzuzu

Road dogs for life.

Oh man. Friends....
xx

Word. Ride or die. Road dog. Team Sketch.

Just had a tug on the heartstrings-- remembering getting snowed in with best friends. Enjoy for me, DC.

I've spent the last month getting called Mike. Feels. <3

Like Dolly says, "You can't make old friends."

Friends: An old friend in VA is locked up and being denied cancer treatment. Can anyone recommend a prison advocacy group or offer support?

Yoga, my friends, dogs, and this city. <3

My friend wrote a book--
with cats! and girls that love girls.
Buy your copy now!

Can't wait to see you, old friend!

"I'm gonna force them back into their countries," Donald Trump. Tell me how, buddy.

I liked "Sticks & Stones" (the second book in the cut & run series) even more than its predecessor. Taking the buddy cop/mystery/romance and shifting the setting made for compelling reading. Introducing a family that reminded me of mine added to the joy.

I'm having an incredible time, don't get me wrong... But I'm so ready to be home. I love and miss my friends and blood/yoga/work family. xxoo

One of the greatest things about a circle of lifelong best friends is that they will keep your darkest secret – – except from each other. In that case, you're just on blast

Dropped in on an old friends lovely class-- so glad Stonewall Yoga is creating safe space for exploring yoga. Thanks, Luke! Thanks, Craig! Thanks, Pasquale!

I love it when my friends make things.

One of the greatest joys ive had Is watching my dear friend Maggie grow from being my student, to my apprentice, to my friend, to my close council and cabal. Happy 30th-- Im so excited for 30 more.

Guys! My friend has 3 Beyonce & Jayz tickets to get rid of! They're $470 each (no upcharge!)! After my crazy Janelle Monae drama last week, I thought I'd pay it forward with a recommendation! Respond here if you want 'em!

My friend Evan Faber is teaching yoga for beginners today at Kali Yoga Studio! Check it out!

I love it when my best friends get married.

To all my friends and colleagues out there— stay strong. We will weather the storm. To those feeling a fiscal pinch and perservering, I see you. To those doing heavy lifting with emotional labor—thank you. The struggle is real, but we are resilient.

I worked at the improv during that impressionable 21-28 time frame. I am so grateful for that time. Night after night i got to watch masters hone their craft. Words, wit, and dynamic performance art... all at the same time. The relationships forged there— my friends, my own art, and with incredible artists... Wow. Please help if you can!

I'm goin' to Nashville (virtually!) to help YOU build a better wheel!! My buddy Cory is hosting me at his Shala since we can't be together in person... And I am stoked!

Here’s hoping my friends in Montana are out there in the (rural) streets.