Interesting time reviewing my former literary attempts on Mom and Dad's old computer tonight. Underneath all of that morbid overdramatic brainwashed life-or-death bullshit, I saw real potential. Not, oh goddess, the new feminist literary genius! but something real. One of my later poems was really interesting, and even some of my earlier melodrama had the makings of something groovy, if caught in incestuous self-mutilation. (Any wonder I was so depressed?)

This is fortuitous timing, considering I was thinking back on a concept I wrote about in high school. It's straightforward (haha), the premise being simply what it would be like to be persecuted for being straight rather than gay. Just to let the breeders dip their toes a little deeper into our pond. I thought about the reasoning behind that (the world is immensely overpopulated, and the government had decreed some sort of halt on all breeding except government-sanctified attempts--a little borrowing from The Handmaiden and my dirty hippie environmentalist on that acccount), and why that would fuel people's prejudices much like the religious reasons; a blind hatred of something the fictional gays felt would destroy them. Just something I'm thinking about. It could be this really cool, organic piece, or regurgitated preaching. Who knows! (p.s. to nobody who reads this: I am aware this is intellectual property and if you should somehow make money off it I will of course claim it as my own, for I am a poor college student with a working knowledge of the law.)

I'm also thinking of meditation, working on my chi. For reasons that were brought up as I searched through my old folders on the computer today, I have Deep Issues with the concept of chi, but hopefully simplifying it to just that will be good for my sanity. Just Meditation. Self.

Mom and Dad are coming back home in a few minutes, and I have sucessfully cleaned the entire mess I have made since arriving. I don't know why I am in this sudden funk of not cleaning up after myself, but God help the grime when people come to visit. I will laze about in filth for days and weeks, but the second I know someone is coming (and especially when they actually are present in my living space) I become an unstoppable cleaning freak. The nasty dishes and resulting stains from banana peels and strawberries were scrubbed away as I chatted to Ashley.

Must learn how to channel this passion in the absence of company.

It's day three of staying at my parents' house, and I've had a really great time. Thursday night I hung out with my parents for a little while until they headed off to catch their plane, and then my siblings and I got to spend some time together. Michelle drove and we went to the gas station, Target, Whole Foods, and had dinner at Las Palmas. Then Ian and I watched part of A Bug's Life. He went to bed and Michelle and I watched Sweeney Todd.

On Friday, I woke up early and took Ian to the YMCA. (Michelle left at six in the morning to go to her Jesus camp.) I had a great time in spin class (in no small part owing to the fact I could see myself in the mirror from the side--very cool when I am contracting all of my muscles on a bike ride--and also because at this YMCA we pedal towards the kiddie pool instead of a mirror). Ian said he had a good time with the Y kids, and I took him to Starbucks, where he bought a marble loaf. We headed to Kroger to stock up on vegan food (of which there is a pronounced lack in this house), and then saw Wall E, which was adorable. We came back and watched Mr. Magnorium's Emporium, and went to sleep.

Saturday, we chilled out and watched a lot of Star Wars and I napped. That evening, we ate at Moe's and checked out some books at Borders. I think I found what I am going to give Ian for his birthday there. Mom said that she had a lot of fun at the concert, but her stomach is acting up. She is about to go through menopause and apparently that is not treating her well. Also, Mom and Dad have been walking quite a lot around Vegas, and neither one of them are used to moving around that much. Dad's phone went swimming in the toilet the first night they got there, so a large chunk of their Friday was spent perusing phones at the AT&T store. Apparently we are all of the end of our two year contracts, and Mom, Dad and I all got new phones. Also, the woman that was helping them said the reason why I can never transfer data on my phone (get pictures, download ringtones, etc) is because my SIM card was really old and didn't support those functions. So now I can get much better ringtones, which is pretty exciting.

Today was another low-key day. Ian and I lounged around until noon, when Ashley got here. My cousin grew up in Atlanta and has since moved to Nashville, and as such, she has a very different view of what transpired after her mom moved away from Memphis. I learned some disturbing dirty-laundry stuff about our family that I sort of want to ask my parents about; they've hinted at it, but I thought their hints meant it didn't really happen. Now I think they just didn't want to eleborate. But other than that, we had really good conversations about her experiences in college and how her wreck helped her to grow up and take responsibilty for her life. I finally got to tell her about being attracted to women, which always makes me feel more comfortable because I don't have to change pronouns or make up stuff, which I really hate doing for obvious reasons. She was pretty cool about it (I talked about my sex life in my previous relationship) despite saying that she wasn't totally comfortable with homosexuality. We talked about relationships, our parents, where we want to be, with whom we want to be, our freshman years in college, all kinds of stuff. Now that I've moved out, I kinda feel like we're on similar levels in our life. She's twenty-six and has experienced more life than I have, but I think we've both grown a lot from the experiences we have had. We talked about Matthew, my brother who died after my mom carried him for six months, and it was interesting to see how that had affected the other part of my family as well.

I won't be too disappointed if I don't return home for a few days. I've been living off my parents' money and seeing lots of family and friends. I am pretty happy here.

I am typing this with Candace in my lap. She is licking my arm and hands. Apparently I am delicious.

I am also lonely and glad she is here. Lottie headed out to Athfest this weekend and left me all alone. I am starting to suck at being a single person, something I never have worried about before. I guess with my family in a different state and my friends flung out over the city and busy with their own lives, I just wish there were someone always available for me. I don't have a best friend, another sort of foreign concept to me.

I had to take Candace to adoptions today, and she went right into her carrier (courtesy of advice from Kim, the trainer at work), and then proceeded to cry most of the way to PetSmart, and then shake when I put her in the cage so people could see her and adopt her. I felt like a devil bitch dropping off her first child at kindergarten. Luckily Candace forgave me, and she is being much more touchy feely than she usually is. Poor baby. I want to adopt her so badly. I would also like a permanent place to live, but I haven't figured out where that is yet, so no cats or bulky furniture.

Next weekend I am going to Nashville to take care of Ian, my baby brother, and I am super excited about that. I asked him what he wanted to do while I was there, and he promptly responded, "Go to Starbucks!" The kid is addicted. It won't be my money that pays for his three dollar drink, though, so I said sure. I am going to live on the tofu created by the people who work at the Asian place near my parents' house. It is super food.

In other news, I bought V for Vendetta and have been pigging out since Thursday. Hopefully I will drag my ass to spin class tomorrow.

I have decided that I will never live alone.

Last night RM and I looked up llamas, dogs, and alpacas on the web. Candace was not happy at the prospect of a foster sister (we don't have penises in our house, not until Chris and Trevor come in the fall, anyway), and ignored us. Most of the animals we looked at were friggin' adorable. There was one Great Dane/boxer mix that I wanted to adopt, regardless. So cute.

In other news, I'm heading to my parents' house next weekend to babysit my brother. The RM is leaving for a festival in her hometown this weekend, which will be sad. I've been missing LW, which is bad news bears.

I looked at Portland personals today (not Craigslist) and have decided to move there. At least until I find the San Francisco personals and decide to move there instead.

Someone knocked off their right SUV mirror on our neighbor's mailbox yesterday night and didn't even slow down. We found it in our yard this morning.

I made cookies last night from a box. Bad fuckin' idea. They forced me to eat another one when I woke up. I think I will throw them away when I return home, which will be very late since I am covering for Doofus from six to ten.

Oh money.

Lately I have been obsessing over tattoos.

True Colors Tour

...was incredible! Definitely my favorite concert so far, not that I've been to a lot of them. We had wonderful seats (with a table!) on the left side of the amphitheater, probably less than two hundred feet from the stage. It was awesome. RM, LW, RG, KB, and my friend AP from work came and it was a wonderful experience. First the Cliks played. I had never heard of them before, but the lead singer had this amazing deep voice and all of the band members were smokin' hot. Then Tegan and Sara played, and they did "Living Room" and "Nineteen." The former is my favorite song of theirs, and the latter was sort of awkward because it was sort of me and LW's song, but it was still very cool to see Tegan and Sara live; I have been trying to do that ever since I missed their November concert with Northern State last year.

Roise O'Donnell was fucking amazing, although I wish she hadn't talked about her dead mom so much; it wasn't her usual stand-up fare and it also sounded a little rehearsed (not that the emotion wasn't there, it definitely was). But I got to see her in person! Also Carson Kressley, who hosted, was two rows down from us at one point, and we could see this small wave of people running from the center and right parts of the theater to go mob him. Fun times!

One of the most amusing things was the table in front of us. There were four gay men and a straight woman (who I dubbed Grace). Carson was talking about how all the gay men brought their tablecloths and flowers and candles--which they definitely did--and how the dykes did not--we definitely did not. (While he was saying this, the gay men in front of us jokingly put their flowers on our empty table.) We brought a grocery bag of chips and a pink cooler with a breast cancer sticker on it, full of hard cider, water, gucamole, and celery. The people in front of us brought, in addition to their candles, flowers, and tablecloth, a five course meal, complete with shrimp, rich people crackers, coleslaw, salad, this stuff that looked disturbingly like raw chicken meat. For dessert, they had brownies and strawberries with expensive liquor. They consumed the latter right before the B52's got going, and then proceeded to dance like crazy people, especially the Asian man in striped shorts. These were definitely executive homosexuals.

I wondered why Tegan and Sara and the Cliks didn't get more applause until I looked around and realized that we were some of the youngest people in attendance. Props to my dad for all of the really great music we listened to growing up.

Anyway, the B-52's were fucking incredible. I think everyone really came to see them; again with the older generation. But everyone at the table (except LW and KB, who left after Tegan and Sara, the bitches, they couldn't handle not smoking) loved them. RM looked a little tired, but she still said she had fun. AP was bouncing out of her seat, and RG and I just sort of swayed in our seats.

Also, BM, my employer, went to the concert. I had thought that she was much more conservative than she actually is; she actually liked Rosie. And gay events are, well, REALLY GAY. And I quite enjoy that about them. There's something really cool about being with an enormous group of gay people.

In conclusion, the Cliks are my new favorite band and I would like to have sex with their lead singer, Lucas.

What a fuckin' weird night.

My roommate (RM) decided that she wanted to go to this 18 and up indie dance night at a music venue downtown. I was tired and therefore opted to take a nap before we went, which proved to the be smartest decision I made all night.

We used my GPS to take us to the club, which was a problem, because it thought that we wanted to go to a different road with the same name. It took us seven exits south of where we actually needed to go, and led us through a sketchy crack neighborhood straight into a dead end behind a warehouse. Luckily we were not shot, and luckily I waited until today to put my HRC sticker on my hatchback, a fact RM pointed out with no small amount of relief. She thought the people milling around outside at midnight would have thought processes somewhat like, "Mm, lesbians. Let's kill 'em."

So we went back on the interstate and got off at the exit I had looked up on Google Maps earlier. This time, we were able to somewhat successfully navigate to the club, park, and go inside.

I will preface the rest of this post by mentioning two important things: I gave RM my keys, and left my money and cellphone inside my car. This proved to be the stupidest move I made all night. Also, this was a scenester/indie night, and there were no gay girls to be found. I mean, there were girls dancing together, but I'm pretty sure the actual lesbian population (ALP) was about two. (The other one set off my gaydar like crazy but wasn't my type.) Also I spent a lot of the night wishing my ex were there.

She did make somewhat of an appearance. RM found this cute little boy to dance with, and she appeared to be having a great time as a result of the music and the hard cider she consumed. Then I lost her for about two hours, and totally flipped my shit The DJ came off the stage to ask me if I was okay and bought me a water and called for her to come on the stage (and hugged me, I think to feel my boobs, but I wasn't going to turn down help). I asked the outside bouncer if I could go search the parking lot. Nothing. I checked the women's bathroom twice, wandered around outside, and by 2:45 (15 minutes before the club closed), I was officially freaked out. I thought that she might be getting raped, because she's not really the kind of girl to have sex with someone an hour after meeting them, and I was sure that she would have told me if she were going outside.

So eventually, after turning over a million scenerios in my head about what I could do if I couldn't find RM, I found a nice guy willing to let me use his cellphone, and called my ex, LW. She was the only person whose number I had memorized, and I'd be damned if I called my mother at two in the morning to ask her for a number. I had been holding it together, but when I called her, I flipped out. I woke her up, but she was calm and told me that she would call RM and ask her to go to the front of the club. I hung up and sort of trembled, then LW called me back and assured me that RM was coming and everything was groovy.

RM told me that she had forgotten I didn't have my phone was with me, and the guy turned out to be a skeeze who just wanted to fuck her. She was in the parking lot, and she said that she kept telling him she needed to go back in the club because she left me there by myself. (I agreed.) "I couldn't figure out why you weren't calling me!" she said, looking embarrassed. "And he was a total douchebag."

We got home at four, I made a flowchart about the kind of people we should date, and we went to sleep watching 10 Things I Hate About You.

Today the sweethearts at the water company turned off our water again. RM thinks this is because when we got it turned on when they did this last week, we didn't wait for them to turn it on. Instead, we utilized our handy-dandy neighbors. I think this was far more efficient, but they obviously disagreed. Whatever. I can shower at the Y. We still have power (but no Internet, which actually does suck. Given the choice, I would rather go without water than Internet. Both at the same time is just cruel.)

We had Not-Grey's last night (the replacement for Grey's Thursdays). We watched Some Like It Hot and I fell in love with Marilyn Monroe. Not really. I wanted to give her a copy of Cunt or something. My ex, LW, showed up, for about two hours. I responded this to getting pretty tipsy on hard cider and being way too honest in our follow-up seeing-each-other text messaging session. I'm pretty sure you have to spend most of your waking hours not thinking about your ex to actually be over them. I'm working up to it. My friend KB came, too, and it was good to see her. AR brought a cookie cake and a bag of tootsie rolls, which are now at the bottom of our pantry. RM and I were going to H&M today, big opening and such, before the water incident. On our message board in the kitchen, I told her how excited I was that we were going. She responded by asking me if we could bring Jesus and wtf we were going to do with the (non vegan, non gluten free) tootsie rolls of which we are now in charge. We are planning on thrusting them at the next non vegan who walks in the door.

Holy shit we have internet AND water.

I am one spoiled girl.


A is for your age:
19

B is for your burger of choice:
Gucamole veggie burger from Hudson's Grille. Orgasm. In. My. Mouth. Though it would probably make me sick now.

C is for the car that you drive:
Scion xA.

D is for dog's name:
You must mean cat. Her name is Candace and she is my foster kitty and I am falling in love with her.

E is for an essential item you use each day:
Baby 2.0, my iPod. If I had to drive around all day without her, I would cry.

F is for your favorite television show:
Grey's Anatomy, currently airing. Best show of all time is, of course, Buffy.

G is for favorite game:
Hitting Candace's quiet button (located on the top of her head, used to make her stop meowing at us).

H is for hometown:
Memphis, TN.

I is for instruments played:
Piano and guitar. I played the first for six years and the second for maybe three months. I am equally horrible at both of them.

J is for favorite juice:
Kale and apple juice. Delicious and nutritious.

K is for what you'd like to kick:
My water company for turning off my water again.

L is for last restaurant you dined at:
I am a vegan college student... I think J. Alexander's, where my parents paid for my veggie burger. (Incidentally my second-favorite veggie burger, but you didn't ask that.)

M is for your favorite muppet:
Whichever one has long hair and looks really stoned. I may be making it up, or possibly talking about all of them.

N is for number of piercings you have:
Eight.

O is for overnight hospital stays:
Never. It's 'pensive.

P is for people you were with today:
Mary, Michelle, Michelle's friend, various people at Kroger, Target, Suntrust, and Blockbuster, Lottiekins.

Q is for what you do in quiet times:
Spend it on the internet, of course. If people are coming over, I will morph into a cleaner demon.

R is for regrets:
Christ. Being so horrible to my family when I was depressed and deluded.
Picking bad situations (not necessarily people) for my relationships.
Cassie.
However, I feel that all of these experiences have made me into who I am today, and I am pretty groovy with myself.

S is for status:
Single, recently out of a relationship.

T is for time you woke up today:
7:45, to pick up Mary. I fell asleep on the couch (purposefully) after drinking a hard cider and getting rather tipsy.

U is for what you consider unique:
Good paranormal novels. Go to the shelves at Borders. You'll know what I mean.

V is for favorite vegetable:
Mmm veggies in my mouth. Kale if it's in apple juice, baby greens when they are in a delicious salad, Lottie's dehydrated squash... the list goes on.

W is for your worst habit:
Committing to do something I have absolutely no intention of doing. (I consulted my mother in my head before writing this.)

X is for x-rays you have had:
Nary a one, unless you count teeth x-rays. I would guess under 10.

Y is for yummy food you ate today:
Yummy granola and soy yogurt, yummy blueberry bagel with butter, Zen soy banana pudding. Huh. Tonight I should eat something non-processed. But they were all yummy, indeed.

Z is for zodiac sign:
Capricorn. Which always makes me think of candy corn.

I'm at home alone, and it's starting to storm. Candace is lying on the loveseat, watching the cars speed by. The Be Good Tanyas are singing their awesome mellow love songs. My tummy is happy with frozen banana/chocolate soy milk pseudo-ice cream. I need to go get Mary from Lovett in about an hour, but otherwise, I'm relaxed. RM, my lovely hippie raw foodist housemate, is either babysitting or in a bookstore.

I feel like this summer is going to be one I really enjoy and want to remember, hence the beginning of this blog.

I love living on my own as a young adult. I was always the kid who wanted to be older, and now I'm trying to slow down and appreciate where I am.

Green smoothies.
Comfy, $75 Goodwill couches.
Foster kitty.
Little broken house.
Being single.
Having awesome friends.
Living with an amazing housemate.
Spin class.
Making $425 a week as a nanny for teens.
Queer as Folk marathons.
Birds in the chimney.

It's going by so quickly.