Those fish need spring water and a bigger tank.

I live in a very tiny building with only six apartments in it. As a result, I know all of my neighbors. Now, my landlords try to avoid renting to undergraduates, so everyone around me is either a professional or in grad school. For the most part it’s hardly noticeable that I am by far the youngest person (read: the only one without a college degree and at least some career-oriented job experience) living here. We all get along and visit and feed each other’s cats. We are good neighbors.

Today I have my door open and am sitting in the middle of my living room. My neighbor Steve walks by. He is in his mid-thirties and the only one of my neighbors I am not very close to. As in, we say hello, but I could not tell you his last name.

“Hey, thanks for the free coffee yesterday.” (I gave him a free coffee yesterday) “And, by the way, your cat is coming around the corner with a bird in his mouth.”

On cue, Kitty comes around the corner and spits out a baby bird. I run out and toss him inside so he can press his face against the screen door and hate me for it. On the concrete, the little bird is struggling to balance with one wing spread out at a pained angle.

“What do I do?” Suddenly I am 10 years old with a fish on the end of my line and a metal hook through his eye. I am looking at Steve.

“He’s going to die.” Steve states the obvious, while we both stall for decision-making time.

“I mean, he can’t survive.” He is looking at the bird and I am looking at him. He looks up and says very slowly, “I can take care of it if you need me to.” This is the longest conversation I have ever had with Steve.

“I can’t do it.” I tell him, because I can’t. Last year this happened and I just took the little bird to a bush and walked away. It was a month before I could pass by that area again. I wanted to be absolutely sure I would not see a single feather or a bitty skull.

He grabs a glove and carries the little thing to the back dumpsters. I feel like I did when I was 17 and left for crew practice after making my dad promise to take my cat to the vet; promise to have her gone and euthanized before I got back.

Steve comes back with nothing but the glove and we joke a little about all the crazy things our cats drag in before he heads upstairs and I leave for In N Out.

Five Guys trumps all

I finally made it to the new In N Out.


It's like McDonalds, but 15% better.

Oh Canada

I just got the hospital bill from being sick over spring break. I remember when I was younger and finding out that doctors and hospitals cost money. I was so shocked. I still don't think it has completly sunk in that people need to pay money to get well.

In Guns We Trust

It was slow this morning so I made this at work.





It's in response to Bush's unwavering stance on gun control post VA Tech.

"The president believes that there is a right for people to bear arms, but that all laws must be followed." Perino (press sec) right after the shooting.

(sigh of relief core supporters)

Anyway, these are the best responses:

One guy asked if it was in response to the new dollar coin. Confusing.

A girl asked me if they were making these now. I said yes, the treasury department is surprisingly partisan. "Wow, that's so crazy!" She shook her head and walked away.

The woman who always asks me to break a dollar (so she can leave a quarter tip) LOVED it. I've never seen her more lively than when she told me how excited she was to see someone taking an active political interest in current affairs. She left $.50 today.

There was another woman I didn't recognize. She looked at the bill (both sides), but only gave me a weak smile.

"It's in response to the shooting at Virginia Tech."

"Oh!" She got it suddenly and looked very grave.
"Yeah, if only those kids would have been able to protect themselves."

Strange things always seem to happen in the used VHS section

Some guy gave me a hug at the thrift store today. I pushed him away really hard and walked away all huffy-like because there was no warning. He just pointed to a picture of Jesus and wrapped his arms around me.


I know he was crazy and probably homeless, but, later on, I was still pretty mad at one of the saleswomen when I saw her patiently showing him how to use a telescope from the antique and collectible cases.


She was smiling.

Pets or meat?

What I love most about this note (besides the fact it's an anonymous letter I found stuck to the outside of my door and it's telling me I'm beautiful) is that whoever left it was brilliant enough to glue these letters onto the back of this flier:





Oh, and that the picture in the corner seems to be hinting at some kind of threesome activity.

CP - 1... Carina - 0

At the café yesterday all my little coffee card stamps kept missing their mark. One even hit the counter. Now, as it is, I’m a little ball of stress right now and missing those coffee bean numbers over and over was making me quite anxious. It actually got to the point were every time I was off-mark I’d apologize to whoever bought the drink. I got fidgety.

While fiddling with the stamper I happened to flip it over and catch a glimpse of the rubber cutout inside. Instead of being in the middle where it usually sits, it had migrated all the way off to one of the corners. I was pretty mad and spent a good deal of time trying to pick it off and reposition it, but it was stuck pretty solid.




Anyway, I had to adjust.

High Noise Floor

David Sherman, the new film professor, told me a few weeks ago that when he visited the “Thomas Jefferson Museum” his docent said that Thomas Jefferson believed dried apples released a chemical that, when one gets thought blocked while working, could free up his thinking and actually make him smarter. Apparently TJ kept a few of these shrively guys stashed in the top drawer of his office desk. When he got frustrated or bored he would simply slide the drawer open and take a few breaths of apple air.

Anyway, I’m from Virginia and carry my annual pass to Mount Vernon in my wallet at all times (GW and I are tight too) so naturally, anything Jefferson says/thinks/does, I’m a believer. I am also naturally, constantly searching for ways to make my life easier. A miracle thinking apple seemed like a good idea.

First thing I did the next day was steal an apple from the café and set to drying.

A few weeks have now past and here we are:





My thinking apple’s head is half caved in and there is a festering furry spot right in the middle. Instead of drying properly and emitting a fine perfume of brain fumes, he seems instead to be turning into rot.

I don’t think rot makes you smarter.

I finally had enough time to clean my apartment today

1. 8mm projector with manikin head picture cut out and pasted on reel
2. DV tapes with raw footage of personal doc and ethnographic observation of Bev Sec's (Doc prof) cd release party
3. handpainted film
4. picture of Inch wearing a mask holding a worried kitty
5. flowers from Alana that made my day
6. camera batteries
7. CP 16mm camera
8. CP magazine (not attached cause it is too hard to load... everyone was right.)
9. secret art porn stash
10. india ink and glass paint for handpainting film (see 3)



close up of 9

Today was a good day for receiving mail that was not intended for me.

Joseph P. Woods, formally of Joseph P. Woods-your-poetry-has-been-rejected fame, is now Joseph P. Woods-have-people-told-your-book-should-be-a-movie?.

And for only $650 the Air Leaf company of Indiana will do just that apparently. (Cause when I think Hollywood opportunity I always start with Martinsville Indiana)

On a sadder note Jacob Nikrasch, dear taxpayer, the following amounts have been deducted from your Arizona income tax refund for the tax year 2006 to be applied to debt(s) for the listed agency(s) or court(s).

$83.00 Tucson City Court

Poor Jacob, perhaps this was for him too:




I think he could probably use a little guidance from this purple-sheeted mystery man.

Postsecret: I skimmed a half hour off the recommended time between my last dose and the most recent

So, being me right now is a little like being drunk, all the time. And addicted to crack… or pain killers (er…I don’t know these things, think pills and fixes). Anyway, when I left Tucson I had some kind of cold that has since turned into a pretty bad sinus infection (gross I know and I’m sorry, I really tried to tell this whole story without once using the word sinus(2)). So, I get on an airplane and we travel X-many hundreds of feet up and I’m doing fine. Then we start going down and suddenly everything from my shoulders up (including something very mysterious inside my neck) starts trying to disconnect itself from the thing next to it. There I am in my window seat writhing around doing everything in my power not to burst into tears while one row over some woman holds her 10 month old baby as he squeals in delight at every little bump and rumble of airplane turbulence. Hate.

When we finally do land nothing inside of me goes back to normal. This is where I am now, five days later:

I have a dull yet persistent headache, I can only breathe at half capacity which means I’m constantly out of breath, I’m popping Tylenol decongestant like they’re candy (seriously though, these things are sugar coated and come in different flavors, my drug of choice just happens to be cool burst mint). Because one of my ears is still doing that weird air pressure thing, I can’t hear anything properly. I spend every conversation leaning really close to the person talking to me and concentrating on each individual word rather than coming up with responses. By the end the best I can do is a little laugh or smile and a pathetic look of please-for-the-love-of-God-don’t-ask-me-any-follow-up-questions. I also can’t hear anything behind me which means every time I see something back there it’s a big fucking surprise and scares the shit out of me. It’s like having a hundred little heart attacks a day. I think the worst thing, though, is that because only one ear is weird, it’s messing with my balance. I can be standing perfectly still and suddenly I’m listing off to the side and scrambling to keep myself upright. So I have basically spent the first half of my spring break under this veil of pain, confusion, and unsteadiness.

I figure at this rate I’ll just tack on depression and be the most cost-efficient alcoholic ever.





These are sinuses. They have a gross name and are most likely unnecessary for life sustaining. And I hate them.

Dear White Blood Cells,

Where are you guys this week?






Save me Ms. Frizzle.

Raising Arizona

I've been feeling anxious lately. Impending uprootings have the tendency to do that to a person. So, naturally, in an effort to take a little pressure off myself I have been finding ways to manifest my own anxieties into other areas of my life. Kitty happens to be one of these areas.

I am going to be taking my cat and my car to Iowa at the same time. That, obviously, means a multi-day road trip for my (very firmly) homebound cat. Well, he did fly home once, but he was still a kitten then and you can basically do anything to a kitten and he's not really going to know what's going on. So, I've gotten into the habit of worrying about him and how he's going to react to the move. In the long process of worrying I actually come to some kind of a decision. I am going to acclimate Kitty to riding in the car. I am going to have a car buddy.

So the other day I am dicking around on the computer and Kitty is sound asleep next to me.

"Perfect," I think, "sleepy cats don't squirm much."

So I grab the cat and a film I need to take back to Casa and toss them both in the car. Kitty looks quite annoyed but that's about it. This is such a good idea.

So I start the car and suddenly his entire body goes jellibones. He turns into a soupy, shaky, orangy blob in the passenger seat of the car. Ok, so it's going to take a little getting used to. I pull out.

Kitty doesn't move besides the steady body quaking all the way to Casa. I am starting to feel a bit bad. We make it and I leave him in the car. He just needs to be alone with it for a while. He'll explore.

I get back to a kitty in the exact same state. I am a jerk.

We head home and about halfway there I take my hand off his back to shift after a stop light. Without looking up, Kitty moves one little paw over his eyes and actually starts to hyperventilate.


I AM A MONSTER.

All I want to do is pull the car over, scoop him into my arms right then and there and sob while I apologize profusely and promise him he'll never have to see the inside of a car again and we'll never have to leave Tucson ever ever. EVER.

But I keep driving and he keeps making that little huffing noise and when we get home it takes me five minutes to coax him out of the car and back onto the familiar gravel. He finally regains his footing and begins a hasty retreat in the direction of my neighbors open door while I began a pretty profound dread of preschool and Daisy Scouts.

Bert-day

I remember the first birthday I ever had that wasn’t held at a McDonalds Playplace. I was in Kindergarten and we had just moved back to Springfield after a year in Norfolk. I know I had a whole group of friends there, yet I cannot remember a single guest, hold Michael. He won the drawing contest that my sister judged even though his work was clearly the most underdeveloped. He was also the only boy invited.

In third grade I begged my mother for a sleepover. She was against the idea but told me I could either have a normal three-hour-day-party with as many guests as I wanted or I could have my sleepover and only invite one friend. I chose the sleepover because the present situation did not occur to me at the time. I would not have another birthday sleepover for a very long time.

In fourth grade I cried and told my mother it was all her fault. “You always make me cry at my birthday!” I can remember exactly where in the VA Beach house she and I were standing (on the little two step stairs between the kitchen and the family room, I was one step down into the other room and she was still in the kitchen), but cannot for the life of me remember what had started me crying.

In sixth grade I had a themed party: Garfield. I had a Garfield cake and wore a sweatshirt with a picture of the cat and his name embroidered on it. When I planned to have a Garfield themed party, however, I didn’t realized what a strong influence the theme would have on my guests. I still have an Odie t-shirt, countless Garfield comic books, a few action figures (go figure), and two of those plush Garfields that suction-cup to the side window of your car (unused please note).

Anyway, today is my Birthday.

Hindsight...

UAPD sent out an email today.

According to their new "Watch Your Car" Program "any person verified by a UAPD Officer as a victim of vehicle theft or attempted vehicle theft while on U of A property qualifies to receive a steering wheel lock courtesy of the Arizona Automobile Theft Authority (AATA) and the UAPD."

What a sad life I would have to be living for this

I just got an email from my cat's Virginia veterinarian. The subject line reads:

"Celebrate your pet's dental health with Burke Animal Clinic!"




Clearly there is not enough celebration going on as my life stands now.

It's raining in Tucson

which means it's going to be one of those nights

Y, C, C, Crab, Shark, 7, and a Broken Necklace... Go

I'm learning how to read tea leaves. No question will ever go unexplored in my life again.






I expect to be at peace within the week.

Utah,

I love you.