MONAPILY

Run, Mona. RUN!

2012-02-09T17:21:00.001-08:00

(From 2/4/12)

On the podcast: Stuff You Missed in History Class-Secret Science: Alchemy

Public Transport: AM rush hour train

7:04am. I'm huffing and puffing after running, no, SPRINTING to catch the train. I even crossed under the "keep out" railroad arm. Fully illegal and everything. I'd tried doing once before and the soul-stained demon driving the train took off as I ran up the ramp in sweaty desperation. Bastage.

This morning, the conductor was a right noble guy. He saw me hurling all X# of pounds under those rails and he knew I meant business. Plus, I waved and smiled and mouthed THANK YOU (yes, I mouthed in all caps).

I run into the first car full, which is full but not Coachella-packed like I expected it to be. I squish myself into the first available seat, which is straight diagonal from the open door.

I almost don't even mind the sweating, but the heavy, open mouth breathing is kind of mortifying. Nothing screams LOOK AT THE FAT GIRL more than heavy, open mouth breathing. Now that I think about it, that might not be a bad thing. *wink* But at the time, I did not think my breathing evoked sexual virility. All I could think was:
Wow. My heart's beating really fast.
Wow. My lungs hurt. I didn't bring my inhaler. What if I have an asthma attack in front of all these people? How am I going to get to a hospital? I can't afford the ER! Oh Jesuschrist. It's been a minute. WHY HAVEN'T MY LUNGS STOPPED HURTING? What if they're bleeding?

And then: Shhh. My inner ZenMother voice kicks in. Count: In-two-three. Out-two-three. Take your time. You're in control. Breathe.

I taught myself to do this in college during a particularly aggressive asthma attack. I had to concnetrate on something besides my panic until I got to the hospital. I've found it works wonders in other situations, when the ole brain kicks into marathon mode.

I remember jogging on a treadmill, yoked-out trainer at my side, telling me to put my hands on the heart rate sensors, "You don't want your heart rate to get out of control when you're jogging. That's why we check to see how long it takes you to get back to a 'normal' rate. Give it a minute."

And then my inner PunkRockChola jumps in: : Breathe however the fuck you want! Yeah, so? Maybe you are out of shape? Whose fucking business is that? Everyone else here is breathing AND SMELLING however the fuck they want! Why can't you? How many pounds of crap do you have in that bag you're carrying? OKAY THEN. Breathe with your mouth open! Let all kinda flies get all up in there. SO WHAT?

And then, it was all over. Oh, I was glistening like roast duck, but I'D MADE THE MEFFIN TRAIN, Y'ALL!

-- Con el iPhone

Monapily's Third Annual "Mes Sin Coche" is on!

2012-02-02T20:28:00.000-08:00

I'd intended to write on this blog everyday beginning January first. Then it was, okay, I'll start with Chinese New Year. But here I am, Groundhog's Day, a month and a day exactly on time.

Its the end of the second day of my annual "Sans Car" month. For the past three years, I've taken at least one month out of the year to brave life without a car in the birthplace of gridlock.

[sidebar: I'm on the Red Line and someone sitting next to me smells like guacamole. Not just any guacamole, but my mom's. And it's not me.]

The first year, I was in a car wreck that totaled my car. I didn't think it was that big a deal until the guy at the tow place was all, "Wow. Are you okay? Was anyone hurt badly?" The front end was horribly smashed. That year I spent about two months without a car. I wasn't particularly looking forward to driving, but I was in a play at the time and taking buses from east of downtown to the beach was just not fun.

I...don't really like the bus all that much.

Hipster in a green hoodie is recording out the front window of the Red Line train. And he's wearing a painters mask.

Most of them are dirty and grimy and smell of ancient farts and stale booze.

The Red Line isn't much better comparatively speaking, depending on what car you get. It's kind of like a lottery. Most of the time I win. Sometimes I don't, but I've never seen anything abhorrent and life altering. It's not NYC or anything. Then again, I've never ridden the Blue Line...

At Union Station waiting for the Gold Line and I can smell the El Pato factory on the other side of the freeway. It's tomatoey, vinegary and picante. It smells just like the sauce but super fresh. I want to drink a vat of it while swimming in that vat.

I actually gain a sense of pride that the Gold Line is conveniently accessible to me. I feel special that I get to ride it rather than the Blue Line or the plain old bus. It's cleaner and newer and goes through beautiful neighborhoods. I'm sure some lines are nicer than others, but I have way too many childhood memories of foul odors, messy kids, broken a/c in the summer and the ever-present "Star of India." (My Nana lived t the heart of the 5-10-101 interchange, near General Hospital. There were -and still are- a healthy community of "winos." Every now and again, we would walk by a particularly wine-soaked individual passed out on the street baring a portion or all of his ass in a big fuck you to the world, my Nana would point and say, "Mira! The star of India!").

Thankfully, no bright shining stars on the Gold Line today - just nice, clean, mellow and on time.

A stop at the corner french restaurant for a glass of wine should wrap up the day quite nicely!

-- Con el iPhone

Living in CubeTaupeia*

2011-06-09T11:03:00.000-07:00

"So! What have you been up to?"

It's a harmless enough question. It's a bit of starter conversation you ask of someone you haven't seen in a while. But when you are the ask-ee, and the answer to the question is, "not as much as you," essentially, since the person who is asking you is building media empires from inside their re-purposed linen closet, that question becomes heavier than lead-infused elephant chorro. And scarier.

I work as a part-time Administrative Assistant at a "professional services company." I've been working there for exactly four years and, still only have a vague understanding of what that means. I make copies, I do some light editing, lots of data entry. But mostly, I wish to be doing other things. I fantasize about getting paid to write.

Living the Dream (2011) - RPG

It is fantasizing because I write, but I don't share. I don't submit. And why? Fear and lack of confidence. But that's an old, generic story. One I'm personally sick of hearing, as it plays on a loop in my head.

Charles Bukowski, celebrated patron saint of hipster intellectuals was a drunken sod who couldn't hold a job. Yet he wrote, he shared, he submitted and he was published.

I can finally hold a job. More accurately, I've chosen to. I've been working since I was 15 (officially) and have always been a bit of an occupational gypsy. I liked it that way! Always something new to learn with the intent to move on to something bigger and more experiential.

I have a small collection of humanities degrees and, yet, I work in a numbers-based business. The result of a temp job gone permanent. Ironic genius or brain-mutilating masochism? I exaggerate. The job is by no means "bad" and I work with very nice people who are at the top of their field. It's just that their field is not my field. As a result, there are times (days and weeks, really) when I drift into a beige-hued slumber, wishing myself away to the countries and cities I visited in my youth, when I could focus and save for a trip, when I didn't have to think about retirement and ailing parents and the descent back to earth.

"So what have you been up to?"

I remember those anxiety-driven conversations and friends' status updates – mentions of baby births, flying cross country or cross planet, playing music festivals, finding agents, publishing here and there – all kinds of exciting headlines. And I want those too. And I can have them. I have a writing degree. I just need to work on better copy for myself.

I will eschew the stereotypical trope that dictates corporate cube life is deathly pool of quicksand for the creative. I will find the gold flecks (fools gold is still shiny) and create my own CubeTaupeia*.

DT in the Distance (2008) - RPG

(* Thanks to Chicanoiresque for the catchy title)

Catching a Breath

2010-11-30T11:22:00.000-08:00

by Danesh Daryanani

I could say that my birthday week passed with barely a ripple. I got sick, so no big fanfare for the close of my Jesus year. I hadn't been feeling much of a push to celebrate anyway, lately. It's easy to forget, whilst living in the midst of things, that life operates in cycles. Not just seasons (yes, we do have them in LA. The seasons shift with a delicate touch, balancing out the unabashed boldness of its inhabitants), but years.

My second graduation (Graduate School) passed without much fanfare, much like my first graduation. All this push towards a better, educated future and then… Like spinning and spinning and stopping all of a sudden. It's disorienting. And it's actually kind of funny to expect anything different. When you're a kid, your whole goal in spinning is to get disoriented, to feel that change in perspective and consciousness. Kids don't spin to get clarity. Kids don't do anything to get clarity. They have it from the get go.

Ten years ago and ten pounds heavier, I was living at my mom's waiting for something to happen. I had my degree. The degree was supposed to be a magic document that, through metaphysical magnetism, would attract a glut of opportunities to me, thereby ensuring success. Ten years later and another degree under my belt, I find that I expected the same result from all the spinning I've been doing over the decade. Now that I think about it, the spinning had just reached its crescendo at the head of November. Then I got the flu, which exacerbated my first asthma attack in three years. To the month.

So, my birthday week (which I share with Thanksgiving) passed with barely a ripple because I stopped spinning to catch my breath.

2010-11-03T01:03:00.000-07:00

To the vagabonds and the wayward souls: se saludan, se adoran, se respeyan

-- Con el iPhone

One-inch Window

2010-10-28T11:23:00.000-07:00

Georgia O'Keefe and Orville Cox, Canyon de Chelly National Monument, Arizona, 1937 by Ansel Adams

The clouds are a terrible moody backdrop. The horizon is so low that the pair of them look like Titans: She with her impish, wrinkled smile and He, slightly shadowed by his big black hat looking down to Earth. It seems impossible but he's oblivious to her.

They match hats, stance and charcoal grey. Much as they must match wits.

****************

Exercise:

Write as much as you can see in a one inch picture frame. [This is one of the postcards that hangs on the wall directly in front of my desk.]

From:

Lamott, Anne. Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life. New York: Pantheon Books, 1994. (16-20)

Eastside Hipsters

2010-10-26T17:45:00.000-07:00

from the wall photos of Xokolatl Cafe

“Yes! Sweet drink!”

“They make the best coffees here, don’t they?” said Loli

“Yeah. Better than regular coffees though. These have raw cacao and chili powder, man. Like the kind my people used to drink. I feel all indigenous and shit. Like there’s a conch shell blowing in the breeze y un pinche Jaguar sitting on some desert bluff in the distance looking all regal and shit waiting for Quetzalcoatl. Like I’m getting all strong from the blood of my ancestors’ enemies y todo,” said Ana.

“Dang. Lemmi try that.” Loli takes a sip.

“I know, huh. I am undone,” said Ana. She took a sip of her thick-ass, weird looking coffee and closed her eyes, letting all the flavor sink in.

“What’s up with your friend right there?” The barista was looking at Ana all crazy and shit. So Loli had to laugh, you know?

“Nah, she’s cool,” Loli said. “It’s just, you know, we haven’t really tasted a mocha this raw before.”

“You guys are all Tezcatlipoca and smoking mirrors with this shit! Calling it coffee, but it’s like some tribal elixir and shit. You tricksters!”

The cashier and barista looked at each other. “Are you guys even from around here?”

Then Ana and Loli had to look at each other. “Yeah, we grew up around here. I’m from Boyle Heights,” Loli said.

They heard an “orale” in the distance from the dude washing the dishes in the back. He put his fist in the air as he was rinsing the bagel tray.

“I grew up in Alhambra,” Ana said. The cashier and barista just kinda nodded, like they were trying to hold in a laugh. Alhambra wasn’t all hardcore like Boyle Heights, but Ana didn’t care.

“Okay. Cool. You guys want anything to eat?”

“Ana, you wanna share the corn with fish?”

“Hell yah. That sounds fuckin' good.”

“Cool. 12 bucks.”

Ana and Loli got their number and sat at the table in the corner next to the big window that stretched out the length of the wall. They could see all up and down Huntington. They could see everyone coming and going in their cars, down the main artery of El Sereno. But no one really slowed down or stopped.

Ana and Loli were there drinking their café de la tierra when they noticed these two hipsters sitting there, looking at everything like they were at Disneyland and shit. Ana nodded to Loli.

“Mira. Pinche hipster vagabonds. Five bucks they’re mean from the Westside.”

Loli turned around and looked at them. She didn’t hide it or nothing. She’s not shy. She gave them the “what’s up” head nod with a smile.

Loli turned around and looked at them too. Then she looked back at Ana. And they remembered what had been said about the East.

“That’s a pretty badass mirror,” Loli said. “My nana had one just like it.”

*******************************
Exercise:
"Popol Vuh: Seven Random Bits" I just pulled the Popol Vuh off the shelf and found these seven random bits: 

~sweet drink! 
~Jaguar 
~undone 
~you tricksters! 
~And they remembered what had been said about the East.
~vagabonds 
~corn with fish

What can you write in five minutes that incorporates all of these?
From:
Mayo, C.M. "The Daily 5 Minute Writing Exercise - February 12: Popol Vuh". 12 February 2005. 26 October 2010 http://www.cmmayo.com/d5mwearchives.february.html
"Reprinted by permission of C.M. Mayo www.cmmayo.com/d5mwe.html "

Relationship Status

2010-10-08T08:54:00.000-07:00

DSC_0053 Organ Donor (2010)

(10/05/2010)

"What about love?"
What about it?
"Don't you want someone to care about you?"
Whatever.

"You don't desire love
with the deepest pockets of your dusty heart
to feel the electric buzz of a Facebook love?
Or public recognition that you exist,
to know that you're not
one of the Lonely People,
sad, rejected and untouchable?"

No. I'm good.
"Are you really?"

No dreams of the love that inspires sonnets,
terrible pop songs fueled by boyish
wishes for fame and glory -
hyperbolied lady at his side
silent support with her beauty (his prize)?

I'm good.
"Really!?"
Yes.
"Truly?"
Yes.
"Madly."
Stop.
Why?"

A century of Saturday nights
and Friday dawns
leave wasted Sunday mornings.
Elastic, plastic, ignorant youth
reaps empty, starving afternoons.
Do you see past your weekend bliss?

"But love is now!
First impulses true!"
Might it be just hormones, too?

What about love?
I'll climb a mountain while you
praise a greeting card.
Leave me in my mandala mode,
you broadcast Love's notes in code.
You spread your sparrow wings and capture
every shiny thing.
I'll raise my buzzard's head and feast on
carrion instead.

___________________________

Exercise from Poewar.com:
25. Write a poem in which every stanza either begins with a question or ends with a question.

Hewitt, J. C. "Write a Poem in Which Every Stanza Either Begins with a Question or Ends with a Question." Poetry at Poewar. 1 Sept. 2010. Web. 07 Oct. 2010.

Nineteen. Eighty. Two.

2010-10-07T17:34:00.000-07:00

Tina Modotti Untitled [Girl with Braids Writing], ca. 1926-1929 [from SFMOMA]

(10/04/2010)

Three. Five letters in three. Odd

imbalanced. Impartial. Indivisible.

To a point.

Five. Ten. Fifteen. Twenty. Twenty-five.

The first numbers I knew.

Tiny hands grasped the sing-song.

Thirsty to chew the wisdom

of magic numbers now lost.

2 now.

Either or.

Never both.

Never again.

_______________________________

Exercise from Poewar.com: 18. Write a poem that repeatedly uses numbers.

Hewitt, J. C. "Write a Poem That Repeatedly Uses Numbers." Poetry at Poewar. 1 Sept. 2010. Web. 07 Oct. 2010. .

* Tina Modotti, Untitled (Girl with Braids Writing), ca. 1926-29; gelatin silver print; 3 5/8 x 2 13/16 inches; Collection SFMOMA, purchased through a gift of the Art Supporting Foundation, John "Launny" Steffens, Sandra Lloyd, Shawn and Brook Byers, Mr. and Mrs. George F. Jewett Jr., and anonymous donorshttp://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/106238#

Hechicercita

2010-10-05T01:03:00.000-07:00

Catholic High School Student, ca. 1990

(10/03/2010)

Well I stand up next to a mountain
and chop it down with the edge of my hand.
Well, I pick up all the pieces and make an island
Might even raise a little sand. - Voodoo Child - Jimi Hendrix

A.

I can predict the weather.
I can make it rain.

I looked up at the sky, watched the clouds move slowly towards the West. No clouds at all besides the one piece of wisp, lingering.

"It's going to rain today to tomorrow."
"What? How do you know that? There's just that one sad-ass cloud out there."
"Watch"
"Stuuuupid!"

I smiled my bravado smile, the "neither here nor there" smile. The suggestive inferring smile that kept me in the thralls of excitement and eventful situations - kept things interesting for the four most important teen years.

I stood outside on the blacktop and looked east, a bit of gray in the distance.

Three times that Spring, I made it rain. No meteorological assistance. Just me, a youthful rampant will, and a dilettante's penchant for "occult" fiction. My source of rebellion at a Catholic school: knowing The Bible as well as The Vampire Chronicles.

"Are you a witch?"
"Yeah,"she replies with a smirk.

B.

"The cheese machine is broken! Again!"
"Are you serious? That's the only one left? I fucking served cold cheese on the nachos last night. That shit is nasty."
"I know!"
"Fuck, dude. NOTHING works around here."
"Did you tell...Hey! Mo! The cheese machine isn't working again!"
"Deal with it."
"You're the manager. You deal with it!"

Mo walked behind the concessions counter rolling his eyes in obvious irritation and put-outedness.
"Did you check the plug?"
"Dude. It's plugged in."

He picked it up, looked around it, adjusted the electrical cord and sighed. Loudly.

"Okay, well, we're out of nachos, then. We'll get a new one tomorrow." Mo left the concessions counter as disinterested as he was when he walked in.

But she could not accept defeat. She needed to fix the stupid cheese machine. If for no other reason so that she could eat cheese popcorn with jalapeño juice. during her break. She needed dinner.

"Fuck it. Imma fix this."
"It's broken."
"Yeah..."
"So what are you going to do?"
"Chant."
Her co worker snorted loudly.
"Fucking chant?"
"Fucking chant."

She took the cheese ladle and stirred it into the bright yellow gunk.
"Double, double toil and trouble. Fire burn and cauldron bubble."

Three times she chanted over the cheese pot, mixing and stirring, the entire time finishing with a maniacal cackle.

"Dude. Is that shit for real?"
"What?"
"That!"
"Nah. It's from some Shakespeare play."
"Diiiick! You're a fool!"
"I know, right?"

With a Mr. Miyagi hand slap, she rubbed her hands together and finished with the most powerful chant she knew.

"Sana sana colita de rana. Si no sana hoy, sanara mañana."

Just then, the two movie house workers noticed the power light on the machine was now shining a bright orange.

"Dude! That shit is on!"
"No way! I mean...that's right!!"

It could have been a switch that inadvertently switched back on, or a stray wire that wiggled back into place. It could have been the power of the witches chant and teenage electricity. It could have been anything. All she knew was that dinner had all the goopy, faux cheesy gloriousness she could handle.
__________________________

Exercise:

Write about a time you had magical powers; you may have to go back to childhood. Or write about dreams and wishes you've had for magical powers. Give those powers to yourself and write from that place.

Now write for ten minutes, without thinking, take a leap - who are your angels? Name them all. Go.

From:

Goldberg, Natalie. Wild Mind: Living the Writer's Life. New York, New York, Bantam. 1990. (166)

To the Storyteller on the Other Side of the Tree

2010-10-04T11:06:00.000-07:00

From Hidden Los Angeles

(For 10/2/10)

To the Storyteller on the other side of a big oak tree. A hypothetical, potentially mythical big, oak tree.

Here are five things I'd like to hear stories about:

1. The History of California - It's founding and the many people who have claimed it over the centuries. Not historical biography but narrative - new stories on old myths or new myths of the old country.
- 1. a. The same with New Mexico

2. Superheroine stories. I think they would still be stories about saving the universe, but not from good or evil or invasion. they would be more about enlightenment and the fight to put a skewed universe back into balance.

or

Hero's Journey / Quest narratives with female protagonists. Something like Lord of the Rings or Dune but with a female messiah...if women's stories even really include a messiah. I don't really think they need to). Somehow, I don't think a Heroine's Journey would have that end.

3. Modern Folk Tales - Transforming everyday banalities into lore. Mythologizing chisme.

4. Science fiction exposure - Turning everyday biological things we take for granted and narrativizing it. Example: conception and birth as a parasite host relationship.

5. Partnership stories - Bonnie & Clyde, Butch & Sundance, that sort of thing. Any type of story that doesn't revolve around the "One man, One world, One chance" type of literary cheesery.
_____________________________________________

Exercise:

Let Yourself Listen - Initiation Tool:

This tool encourages you to stop taking writing so seriously that it is frightening. Pretend that you are sitting under large tree with your back resting on its trunk. On the other side of the tree, a Storyteller sits also resting against the tree trunk. Take a sheet of paper and number from one to five. Tell the Storyteller five things you'd like to hear stories about.

From:

Cameron, Julia. The Right to Write. New York, New York, Penguin Putnam. 1998. Print. (12)

A Momentary Pause...Nothing More

2010-10-03T14:18:00.000-07:00

An overnight trip to Catalina on a 134 foot schooner for Buccanner Days prompted me to leave my computer at home. With no WiFi anticipated (there was no electricity on the ship), I saved the posts for today. One is up and the other two will follow. I'm so totally serious about the exercises.

One of Thirty

2010-10-01T14:49:00.000-07:00

__________________

Why does he get to do that? Grow into an electric enigmatic state of beauty the older he gets? I say beauty because I mean beauty. In the classic sense. The kind of beauty dropped from Olympus by the Gods to inspire envy and longing in us human wretches and put us in our places. A muse whose existence grows stronger with each adoring gaze.

Well, to you gods…to you of your precious progeny I say this: I see him fading. I do! He’s been here among us aging, fat, decomposing (and, horror!) ordinary people for so long, he’s melting in to one of us. I can tell. I who have been watching him for decades (decades that seem like miniscule breaths. Mere seconds and he’s gone from a painfully exquisite youth, an eclipse beaming down on us peons, to a man whose deep brown eyes stirred a vortex inside my adolescent being. An inhale and exhale and 20 years hence those eyes ignite me like a cyclone).

But I do see him fading. I see him transforming.

It seemed he could not outgrow the androgynous splendor of his youthful face. He almond eyes a vacuum, winsome and soulful. His mouth tense with a pout only served to force the gaze to his lips, planting the need to be near them. He needed you to need him – to watch him and wish to own him.

The structure of his face, sculpted from the red earth clay of his ancestors. Regal, strong, ethnic, evidence of a lost world whose only remnants rest defiantly under his skin.

They would say he’s exotic. They tried to say he was. It was the darkness that drew me in. the beauty and darkness – his dark eyes, brow and hair withonly a hint of pale on his skin.

His lips…I’ve seen him kiss. I’ve seen him linger over women, girls, all like delicacies, devouring each one slowly, definitely eyes closed enraptured in the moment.

A shameless charmer he is. Was.

I see him fading.

I see him falling into the belief that he is fading.

That a life of cigarettes and whisky, the life of a “man” has taken it’s masculine toll on his boyish skin.

“Pretty as a woman,” is no compliment for a man. The she he worked to destroy is dying and with her goes the dewy youth that gave him the power of desire.

The darkness of his eyes has seeped down beneath them, the once magnetic glowing orbs now hollowed like dead stars.

It’s not the age that makes him fade, but fear of the years and the tracks on his face.

He worked so hard to become one of us – faded obscure, growing fatter or maybe keeping slight. He would be happy to see us look away (at last) to a younger, brighter face. His joy would be to grow grey and sag and wrinkle (as long as his waif sprite woman never does).

Why does he get to do that?

__________________________________________

From:

Young, Sandra. "Tell It Slant | Creative Writing Exercises." Exercises for Fiction and Creative Nonfiction. McGraw-Hill. Web. 01 Oct. 2010. .

Exercise 10. Using fine detail, describe someone's face. You need not know the face you're describing, but you'll need to have time to watch this person.

30 Exercises - 30 Days

2010-10-01T14:37:00.000-07:00

Four months since I've written anything creative. I put it to partial fallout from having to mine my creative coffers for two years to meet deadlines for grades and evaluations. At any rate, like a runner taken out of the game by a sprained ankle (or any useful metaphor for burnout), I'm ready to train my way back to racing form.

For the next 30 days, I am committing to write and post one writing exercise per day. I'll put the origin of the exercise at the bottom of the post in case any of you following along at home want to get some exercise in. Hopefully at the end of 30 days, I'll feel like a writer again. Just in time to tackle NaNoWriMo.

I See Magic! Look! There it is!

2010-06-15T08:10:00.000-07:00

It's all relative.

It's all in perspective.

It's all up to you.

It's all in your hands. All of it. Right there. You're holding it. Can't you see it? Don't you feel the weight of it?

Your Future.

My only long term goal is to stick around and see what happens.

When one comes to the end of a cycle - graduation from graduate school, in my case - one runs the risk of becoming overly pensive and full of musings. "What does it all mean?" "What do I do now?" I find myself in new territory this time around. When I was younger I always had the future to look to. There was this understanding between Time and I that Age would bring profound clarity. By the time I hit my 30's, I would have a powerful wisdom that would melt fear and make obstacles magically disappear.

I guess now, at 33, about to attain my Master's degree, I can honestly say this is true. Things are pretty clear. It is clear that there is no one way to do things, but there are, in fact, multiple ways to build a life, a "career", earn money, have relationships, dress, breathe, paint my nails and eat for under $5 every day of the week in Los Angeles. I can see that there are an infinite number of obstacles and an infinite number of ways to resolve them. Each choice begets an epic amount of subsequent choices and just as much filing and paperwork.

"What does it all mean?" Whatever I want it to mean.
"What do I do now?" Whatever I want to do.

All this freedom, all these options, can be overwhelming. They are overwhelming. All the logic and clarity and grownup-edness can make it harder to unfocus and slip into the blurry, pre-formed streams of imagination. It's daunting when put up against the need to pay bills and eat and pay rent, at the very least. Which makes it that much more challenging to be a grown up artist. Hence the reason I chose to become a Master in Creative Writing. Why I will choose to become a Doctorate of Mythology. I have made it my grown up task to find a way to play for money. For real.

I didn't realize this until I hear Magic for the 8 millionth time this week.

It came out in 1980. The same year the Empire Strikes Back came out and the same year my parents separated. It moved into the realm of cheese after having been at the top of the Billboard charts for a month that year. I've known this song my whole life but didn't really listen to it until this Sunday. And just like that, everything fell into place.

How? And why?

I decided to heed advice from an 80's pop icon in a sequenced romper with monstrous shoulder pads and feathered hair, wearing a woven headband.

Check Yo' Hed

2010-01-27T08:54:00.000-08:00

from kickasstorrents.com

When I was learning to drive, So Watcha Want from the Beastie Boys’ Check Yo Head (1992) was the only piece of music that I could handle. Most of the time it was silence. There was so much to pay attention to: remembering rules so as not to get pulled over, trying to gage whether to slam on the breaks or fire on through a yellow light, trying to make sure that you were going fast enough to not get honked at and slow enough not to lose control of the 2 ton vehicle you were driving. I loved learning to drive, but I never thought I would get to the level of ease of everyone else who knew how to drive.

The silence carried over eve after I got my license (I scored 100 – WOOH! I still have the license. My smile was a mix of supreme joy, but slightly stifled in an effort to look cool). Once I started driving my older friends around (I owed them many, many rides), they started to give me shit about driving in silence, “I have to concentrate! I don’t want to die,” that I decided I had to at least try to put some music on. I was terrified to make a mistake, but I was 16 and, you know, who wants to be made fun of when they’re 16? Especially by your older, stick-shift driving guy friends?

Peer pressure’s not always a bad thing.

It started slow, driving back and forth on the small street that ran through our condo complex with the radio on low. Everything was distracting – the radio, the annoying ads, even my beloved Cure or Siouxsie couldn’t help. I don’t even remember exactly how it happened that Watcha Want came to be the one song. One moment, driving was full of hyper alertness and tension, then that song came on and everything was okay. Just that song. Nothing else on the whole album or any other album would work. I mean, it’s such a cruising song anyway, but what mattered more than anything was that, for three minutes and thirty seven seconds in a row, I was a real driver – competent, ready and secure. That song was the aural potion that convinced me that I could handle whatever obstacle came into my field of view.

That song doesn’t get a whole lot of airplay these days. Every now and then I’ll hear it on a radio station’s retro weekend or something. I actually heard it yesterday for the first time in MONTHS on my way to work. I’d spent most of the morning walking the line of freaking out and logical processing because I’d been given some information that meant that my life was going to change pretty dramatically within the next month. Obstacles and hiccups in life usually come along right when you’ve gotten comfortable. Two, maybe three years ago, I would have looked at a change like this and shaken my fist at the heavens because I had further proof that the gods had abandoned me, or that I was pre-selected to suffer and never find stable happiness. Admittedly, I had a slight penchant for the dramatic that I inherited from both sides of my family (yay). I was stressed out over “grown up” problems – rent, bills, money, money, money. I’m driving under a cloudy sky trying to figure out what to do when I hear the intro organ and “Just plug me in just like I was Eddie Harris…”

And, yeah…everything is all right. Everything is cool because I am the illest motherfucker from here to Gardena.

Baby, I'm For Real

2010-01-22T09:30:00.000-08:00

image by Organ Donor from TheStreetsAreCalling.com

The Streets Are Calling recently won an award from the LA Weekly for “Best Low Brow Art Blog. Owned by Village Voice Media, the LA Weekly (or, “The Weekly” as we affectionately call it) is the pinnacle of hipster culture in metropolitan Los Angeles. I’ll be fair. It’s just as much about arts, culture and politics in Los Angeles as it is about hipster art, culture and politics in Los Angeles. In short, it’s kind of a big deal. Organ Donor and his friend and co-blogger Rathandsome, (whom I have nicknamed James, as I kept calling him James rather than his name on the drunken night I met him) have been snapping photos of LA for almost as long as they’ve been here (Organ Donor returned from a stint up at Davis in 1999. James moved here from the Bay Area, I believe). James is a photographer by trade and Organ Donor, until now, has been mostly a photo hobbyist, but with the help of his friends has pushed past the galleys of dilettante into a burgeoning, legitimate artist.

Organ Donor and Rathandsome are part of this flickr community. Flickr’s been around forever, it seems, and they have been posting pics to each other on that platform for almost as long. Kata Leeeena of hey! where did you go? (on my blogrolll) is part of that crew, as are a handful of artists and friends I have met over the years here in LA.

It’s no secret that most successes are the result of nepotism. Not necessarily familial nepotism but through friends, colleagues, references, word of mouth, all of that. Nepotism has such a bad connotation. It seems elitist and wrong. Nepotism lends itself to the idea that one must be special, chosen, and worthy of success.

Community and community building, on the other hand, is the idea of people coming together in support of a common cause. Communities sprout up all over the place. With the advent of online, networking sites, community building can take place without regard for geographical distinctions. I am currently enrolled in a low-residency MFA program. This means that we meet ever 6 months to attend lectures, take care of paper work necessary for accreditation, select our mentors and workshop our writing. However, we only see our other classmates ever six months. Most of the people who entered the program at the same time as me graduated in December. However, we still communicate on Facebook and via email. I watched people get super close, and develop lifelong friendships primarily over email and phone calls. I guess what it comes down to is that when you’re a geek about something, when you have a passion for something that is so strong that it elevates you to a level of “weirdness” around people who don’t feel that passion, then you cherish the other people who do. That’s how Comic-con started. All the cons for that matter. Rocky Horror Picture Show, too. Finding a community that loves what you loves and loves that you love it is a super wonderful thing.

Artist communities are no different. In a culture that has a dysfunctional relationship with the arts (it praises something like Avatar, yet cuts public education and arts funding and derides those who would call themselves artists as delusional or lazy), artist communities are vital to the artists’ survival. There’s not that much money out there as it is, much less for something as seemingly flimsy and unimportant as art. People who network get themselves out there. They know how to propagate their art and keep themselves working. They know how to become colleagues with the right people. They pay attention. They understand that with art, everything in life is an opportunity. This doesn’t necessarily mean that they are all opportunists (although, they’re out there too. Less than I would have thought, however. But I’m not up in the big scenes…), but that they understand the importance of a support system and the positivity in mutual back scratching. A lot of that ability to even scratch a back comes from a belief in the work that they do. A modicum of confidence is paramount to getting your work out there. Perhaps, on some rare occasions, you can do some work and keep your hand close to your chest and it may catch someone’s eye, or a friend of a friend will spread the word. On the whole, however, it’s on the individual to believe enough in what they’re doing to let people know about it somehow. That’s another reason community is important, specifically smaller communities. They allow you to get your feet wet, to build confidence at your own pace without the pressure of impressing the big time.

For that past, wow, almost 10 years I have been doing theater and writing in Los Angeles. In a very specific community – The Latino Arts community. I never looked at it as such. I just started taking screenwriting classes and doing theater at this tiny spot in Boyle Heights to take my mind off of my dad who was slowly dying before my eyes, one of my best friends who was whacked out on meth (and the urge to follow her) and one of my other very close friends who was suicidal. Since then I’ve gone to Sundance, have done staged readings in Colorado, lived in Santa Barbara to do a play, and performed in a number of shows not 3 miles away from the famous Music Center. All without really trying too hard. All because of community and a dedication to keep learning. None of that would have happened without that community, without the word of mouth, without the support.

courtesy of LATaco.com

Some people do not recognize how important smaller community stuff actually is. They see something like the trendy “food trucks (association website)” and don’t realize those things have been alive and well all over LA County for years. But because it’s not an “association” truck, it’s not the real thing. Because it’s not The Taper, you don’t really produce, act or write. Because it’s not the LA Weekly, you’re not a legitimate artist.

Don’t get me wrong, mainstream success is awesome! It’s desirable! It’s what we are all working towards in some respect – a steady income doing not just what we love, but what we are driven to do, the same way that other people are.

And I am proud of my artist friends. I am proud of Organ Donor and Rathandsome and their award. I’m proud of Kata Leeena and her photo being selected for display at one of the LACMA galleries.

courtesy of Kata Leeena

I’m proud of Former Silverlake Resident Monsieur Artist Guy and his steady stream of success with his artwork. I’m proud of my friend and Tongue in Chíc*ana member MEZ and her shadow puppets that opened the well reviewed Pee Wee Herman Show. I’m proud of my actor friend Jeremiah and his director Kenneth Castillo whose film Drive By Chronicles: Ghostown was released on DVD this week. I am proud of my friend Alexis and her band Beatmo who have been blowing up around town this past year. I am proud of my friend Fanny who will be having the play she wrote directed by Mc Arthur grant recipient and epic playwright/director Luis Alfaro. I am just as proud of my friend Sasparella of Soap Design who runs her own very successful boutique design firm and continues to write. I am proud of my friend Miriam who is a tremendous talent and has been amazing in everything I’ve ever seen her perform, and has been with the same theater company as long as I have. I am also proud of my friend and co-founder of T.I.C Selene, who is the managing director for Cornerstone Theater Company, who creates, produces and directs one show a year, and is raising a 5 year old. I am proud of my friend Xochitl-Julisa who keeps the poet fire burning in a land of celluloid. I'm especially proud of the dynamic duo who keeps the urban superhero myths alive.

I am proud to know and have worked with these artists. Whether or not The Weekly or LA Times knows they exist, they are the real deal.

Radishing

2010-01-14T08:22:00.000-08:00

There was in Tsukushi a certain man, a constable of the peace, it would seem, who for many years had eaten two broiled radishes each morning under the impression that radishes were a sovereign remedy for all ailments. Once some enemy forces attacked and surrounded his constabulary, choosing a moment when the place was deserted. Just then, two soldiers rushed out of the building and engaged the enemy, fighting with no thought for their lives until they drove away all the enemy troops. The constable, greatly astonished, asked the two soldiers, "You have fought most gallantly, gentlemen, considering I have never seen you before. Might I ask who you are?" "We are the radishes you have faithfully eaten every morning for so many years.," they answered, and with these words they disappeared. So deep was his faith in radishes that even such a miracle could occur.

an excerpt from "In All Things I Yearn for the Past" by Yoshida Kenko out of The Lost Origins of the Essay edited by John D'Agata

from TeaandCookies.blogspot.com

New Leaves

2010-01-03T08:01:00.000-08:00

From GatewaytoSedona.com

Towards the end of last month/year there this big push to sum up not only the year but the entire decade (if nine years constitutes a decade nowadays). Yet, three days into the first month of 2010 and I have no desire to look back.

In some respects, it's good to look back if only to identify one's accomplishments. I can sum up my 2009 accomplishments in one word - stability. Nothing really "happened" in 2009. For the first time, probably EVER, there was no big, monumentous, life altering, earth shattering occurances to throw life into an upheaval. There was, however, a steady fountain of subtle celebratory moments that made it a fabulous, wonderful, light-sweater-in-a-waning-summer-sunset kind of a year. It ended with clear sense of what to do with 2010.

With the end of the "oughts" went the end of my 20's. A million thanks to all sentient deities out there. I thought adolescence was rough, but it was nothing compared to ages 22 through 30. Eight years of disillusionment and failures piled up on each other got me to where I am now, over the waterfall, coasting down the river, actually navigating.

But 2010 is a big one. I graduate in June. I figure out what to do with the rest of my life. I figure how how to start paying back my epic education debt that I've been deferring since 2000. Or, I get my PhD. Decisions, decisions, decisions.

What does the hedgehog cactus have to do with this post? I like cacti. Especially the flowering kind. Mostly because they're not known for their flowers, but so many of them have brilliant, gorgeous flowers in vibrant colors. And cacti don't really need much water to thrive.

Good Romance

2009-12-10T08:39:00.000-08:00

Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

A few days ago I woke up to an NPR commentary on Lady Gaga. I hadn't yet made up my mind on how to feel about her as I tend not to feel much about pop culture to begin with. (Although, I probably should. It is the opiate of the masses, after all...or was that religion... Not much difference at this point, but I digress...) I mean, you know, she cool. She dresses crazy. Her music is super catchy. She's 23 and writes her own music and is stupid successful. That's kind of badass to me, considering where I was at 23 (underneath a few rocks somewhere).

In her article, Shana Naomi Krochmal calls what Lady Gaga does "performance art." I've yet to see any of her performances, but performance art? I am intrigued. And then it all begins to make sense. Lady Gaga is like nouveau cabaret set to pop music forged on the dark side. It's actually pretty fun.

Okay, Gaga. You have my attention.

Anti-Pimp

2009-12-09T10:04:00.001-08:00

Nice. Nice is one of those words I tend to use in ironic hyperbole. It’s such an even-keeled, middle of the road, vanilla kind of word. Nice. The Miriam-Webster online dictionary has a few definitions along the lines of “particular”, “demanding great or excessive precision or delicacy,” “agreeable” or “pleasing.” The etymology of the word runs along the lines of “foolish” and “ignorant.” In short, nice is kind of foppish and doofus-y. There’s no fire or passion behind it. Nice is not dynamic. Nice, generally speaking, does not sweep you off your feet.

However, in a world, in a time, in a society marked by road rage, ridiculous celebrity marital scandals and wealthy people screwing over their entire country’s economy just to make a few more bucks, an act of plain old milk and cookies niceness rocks my world.

Moreover, selfless acts by Nice Guys, which have been popping out of the woodwork lately, have shaken me to the core. In a nice way.

About a year ago, my roommate and I got cable. (Trust. It was an exciting day indeed. It had been about 8 years since I had deigned to pay for cable. And cable series have gotten so good!). I had a huge 8,000 pound television in my room perched on top of my dresser. Roommate tops out about Five Feet (maybe). I’m about Five Four and a Half (and yes, that half does count). We’re both ladies, so, upper body strength…eh. We need to get this TV from my room to the living room – a total of maybe 20 steps.

Now, I grew up with Amazon; I was raised by a single mother and looked after by my paternal grandmother. In my world, women got shit done and men, well, bless their hearts, they just talked about things. A lot. And said things never quite materialized.

So, I stood there trying to determine the best way to move that thing by myself with as little damage to my back as possible (lift with the legs, yes). And I could have done it. It may have taken an hour, but it would have gotten done.
As I’m planning and strategizing, Roommate jumps on her phone and calls one of her guy BFF's - Monsieur Artist Guy - who lived in Silverlake at the time – easily about a 20-minute drive from where we live. This dude came over, moved the TV those 20 paces, had a glass of water and left. He stayed no longer than 10 minutes. It took him longer to drive here than the time he was actually here. All to move a TV.

Never in my life had I seen anything like this.

It was like finding out that unicorns or dragons exist. Guys don’t do shit like that without getting something in return. Why would they? They’re hard wired to be goal oriented and commodity-based. Women are the ones who instill harmony, who go to the ends of the earth to help people out, who do nice, courteous shit for no reason. (True, I am not one of these women, but I know a lot of them). But lo and behold, there it was, en vivo. I even offered to buy him McMuffins, but no, he had already eaten.

I thought about the dudes in my life and wondered, “would they move a TV for me” if I were to ask? Some probably would have, had I asked. Yet when I looked at the guy I was seeing at the time, I realized that he would not, and thus made the generalized assumption that guys were selfish, self-serving pricks and that MAG, and that whole TV-moving experience, were anomalies and promptly filed it away as an unlikely and rare occurrence. I haven’t thought too much about it until recently.

I don’t know what’s in the air, but I’m seeing more smiles and less body scans from the males. There’s been more opening of doors, waiting for me to enter and/or exit an elevator, walking on the outside of the street, courteous shit, man! And maybe that’s the thing. Maybe it’s the difference between men and guys, although, I don’t really like to generalize. All I’m saying is that little things like that – like getting your Administrative Assistant a box of chocolates for Christmas, or walking your friend to her car, even though you know she’s badass enough to take on any fool who would try to mess with her – are really, really nice. Especially when they’re done not because a guy is secretly in love with a girl (or thinks he is) and thinks if he becomes her lap dog, she’ll fall in love with him. (That’s manipulation and don’t let anyone tell you any different.)

So, thanks to the Nice Guys/Men popping up as of late. You are appreciated.

The Beige Liberation of 2009

2009-12-02T10:19:00.000-08:00

Routine is a soul-killer and liberating touchstone in my world. I rearranged my life and cut my income in half almost six months ago to make time for writing, graduate school, theater and myself. I was going to work everyday and sitting in a beige cube sucking up time and wasting company money waiting around for someone to give me financial reports to copy. I appreciated having an easy job – no huge responsibilities, no tedious brain work – just glide through and get through to the end of the day when I would have rehearsal or go to some lecture, workshop or other such thing.

It never quite worked out that way.

By the time 5:00 rolled around, after having been sitting in that cube since 8:00am, I was teeming with ennui, looking down the dismal hallway of my life, seeing no way out, no change possible, being locked down to that cube for as long as they would have me because I need insurance, I need to pay rent, to pay for everything. That is not a life I could handle. So, fortunately the place I work for was awesome enough to allow me to work part-time. (Well, it’s partially that they’re awesome and partially that they really don’t need me there full time. So, it was win-win.)

During the past six months, I started jogging. At least three times a week, I get out to say hello to the neighborhood. Preferably in the mornings before the gardeners get going. Grooming, a practice I’d left behind long ago in high school, has found its way back into my morning because I got sick of looking like a sad, fat person. I plan my breakfast and lunch for the day and have been eating exponentially healthier that I did when I worked full time. I’ve written a handful of short stories, started a novel, read something like 20 books and have performed in two plays. I’m almost living the dream.

Except for The Cube.

I wake up each morning elated, refreshed, renewed, looking forward to the jog, coffee and writing…and then I have to go to work. Five hours of sitting in The Cube trying to look busy. I phone it in. Everyone knows I phone it in. As much as I try to keep focused on the fact that I appreciate my job and the people and the free soda, every two weeks, like clockwork, my mind drops out and I can’t concentrate, I don’t focus and I stop caring, which is not professional.

When I went part-time I gave myself a six month deadline. Six months and then I would make a move. I would find another job I was more suited for, something that required me to use my mind, to write, that would engage me on a level beyond making copies.

And poof. All of a sudden it’s December. The economy’s bad. There’s a bunch of hiring freezes and competition is high. This is probably one of the worst times to be taking any risks when it comes to my own livelihood. I like these odds. And now I know, never bet on beige.

Thurrthreh!

2009-12-01T10:07:00.000-08:00

Thirty-three.

I always used to say that this was the age that Jesus was when he died. Which is true. But going further, Jesus*, was thirty three when, according to myth, he resurrected and ascended into the heavens. To go even further, he not only went through a massive gauntlet that lasted something like three days, he died, descended into hell to give Satan the old eff you, THEN popped up out of hell and ascended into heaven.

I’m not particularly Christian by any means. I love the myth behind religion and some of the stories, most of them, actually, are pretty interesting. Good stuff. This one in particular has resonance with me today considering that I have been thirty-three for exactly one week today.

Apotheosis is the part of the Hero’s Journey (Joseph Campbell’s monomyth) where there is a physical death and a period of repose following it. A pause before Act III begins and the hero pushes on with the rest of the journey. In the (needlessly gory) Passion of the Christ, there’s this part in the Gethsemane where Satan (played, of course, by a woman – thanks Mel Gibson) and Jesus have this conversation. Satan’s being very sympathetic and telling him not to go through with what was basically a suicide mission, that he really couldn’t handle it, that he wasn’t strong enough. It was a great illustration of all the insecurities and crap that one tells oneself. All those self doubts that hold us back from becoming the bigger better us that we think is lying just beneath the surface if only a, b or c would fall into place. And the metaphor goes that this guy battled society, died, battled his biggest fears (Satan), and handled his business. That’s good stuff! (Honestly, though, I don’t know about the whole Son of God thing. Of course a dude’s mom would think that. But I digress…)

I like the idea of Jesus as a Phoenix because there is an “after” following the pain and the suffering. I also like the metaphor of Jesus because he didn’t really get going in life until he was thirty. He may have been a child prodigy or just the son of a carpenter but he didn’t really hit his stride or find his “calling” (if you will) until he was thirty. The guy was a late bloomer. Completely disregarding any miracles he may or may not have performed, he came into his own in his thirties, which means he probably hadn’t quite figured out what to do with himself until then. Then he found his people and then they made their mark.

When I was in high school, I had this ridiculous idea that I wouldn’t live to be 17. I don’t know if it was adolescent melodrama or what, but I couldn’t imagine what my life would be like after that age. I couldn’t “see” any images of me with a family or in Europe or anywhere. Obviously I made it to 17 and beyond. Since that time, I have actually looked forward to being in my thirties, to thirty-three specifically, because I thought that by that time, I would have “it” finally figured out. “It” being the big L – life.

Thirty-three’s looking like a good business handling year.

* I used the Jesus metaphor because it’s the one I’m most familiar with (8 years of Lutheran school followed by 4 years of Catholic high school). But I’m on the lookout for a Big Bad Mama myth. Or else, I’ll just write one.

Sexual Suicide...

2009-10-02T18:57:00.000-07:00

...is the title of a book being read by a man with a red face traveling on the Gold Line heading east to Highland Park. It was an old copy. A harcover with the words "Sexual" and "Suicide" repeated, flowing into each other in bright, multi-colored text, like the title card for The Electric Company (and most TV shows from the late 70's).

I couldn't stop staring at the book or the red face that was reading it. Like magnets, my eyes were pulled back to the title emblazoned on the front of that book: SEXUAL SUICIDE.

Sure, I'm curious. Mostly, I'm wondering if reading a book about sexual suicide in public isn't actually a partial contributor to one's sexual suicide.

Guess that's why he needs the book.

-- Con el iPhone

Live Like I'm Alive

2009-10-01T09:42:00.000-07:00

(from the Metric / Phoenix show 9-15-09

Watching live shows is something else. It's one thing to hear the passion in someone's voice on a recording (which, yes, I can hear even through digitized recording, because, if the soul is there, nothing can strip it down), and a completely different thing to watch them do their thing live. I used to go to a lot of shows in the '90's and there were times when I was so disappointed. You love a band so much you'll save up your hard-earned allowance, orchestrate an entire production (including sleeping over at a friend's house whose mom works nights, along with getting your friends with cars to come pick you up, possibly waiting outside a convenience store asking some old dude to buy you a 5th of Cuervo) to see this band you've been worshipping and burning incense to, all to have them play a half-assed 30 minute set (thank you, Morrissey - the Hollywood Bowl show, not the Palladium with Phranc. that rawked.) or stand in place playing guitars for 45 minutes (Robert Smith and Black Francis, I'm looking at you). Super lame.

But a few weeks back I caught Metric who opened for Phoenix at the Greek Theater and, through the grace of Miss Hoolie, watched them from the pit. Like old times. Emily Haines, ladies and gentlemen! Wow. She looks like she's about as tall as stack of pancakes, but she pwned that stage! She didn't just play to us folks in the front, she made it work for everyone clear through to the back of the venue (which is pretty big for an outdoor amphitheater). I don't know that I've seen anyone work a keyboard quite like that - rockin' and boppin, and making that silver sequins shine. I was wowed by how excited she was to be there. If she was faking it, shoot, I'd like to see it when she means it. Yes, she was there to do a job, but doubt and fear read magnified in front of an audience, no joke. I saw nothing of it there, only someone who was massively stoked to be alive.

I find that same love of live in quite a few of the blogs I read. People post photos of things they love - people, clothing, outfits, pictures, gifs - almost daily. Which means they must be surrounded by things they love. Or they are able to love and appreciate the details of living, and filter through the not-so-exciting stuff. A part of me thinks they're sheltered or haven't lived a rough life, or have grown up in an environment free from the stress and anxiety that comes from economic strife. All this may be true. But I don't begrudge them their excitement about life or the fact that they had mothers who stayed home and showed them how to bake pies, how to hang decorate a room, or fathers who built them dollhouses. I appreciate that the things they share, the things they love, are most often found in the quiet places, the still moments, the in-between spots - all those places that can go unexplored in a commuter culture.

But even in a sprawling metropolis like Los Angeles, those quiet spots are as plentiful as freeway on-ramps, though, probably not so well advertised.

Eddie House, South Pasadena - photo by K. Hirai

Make Mine a Moustache

2009-09-28T07:04:00.000-07:00

Because sometimes, a 50 cent moustache from a greasy spoon diner is all you need.

Quotes from the Metro

2009-09-25T18:52:00.001-07:00

"I pray for Bush...but I never get ii." - Random Guy with a Do-rag and sunglasses listening to his mp3 player whilst singing along. Loudly. And very poorly.

"Tranquiiiiiiila. Tranqui...chiquis. Chiquis, chiquis, chiquis. Tranquilita chiquis." - Supertall Latino man talking on the phone. Loudly. (but he kinda had a sexsi voice...so...it's okay).

"The train's leaving, lady. Either you're in or you're out, but I gotta go." - Mr. Goldline Metro conductor.

Week two sans car. In the first massive heatwave of fall. It is ripe, and it is lively!

-- Del iPhone

A New Kind of Tired

2009-07-28T00:53:00.000-07:00

"695 - In Some Exhausted Reverie" by Josean Prado
This is a new kind of tired. This is a kind of tired I am unfamiliar with. It's not sleepy, per se, but my body aches. My legs remind me of their existence most of my waking hours whether I exercise or not. I rise after sitting immobile, focused on a dull, glowing screen for an hour and am disturbed to find that standing is becoming a two-step process. My muscles and joints grow stubborn and refuse to obey my command. It's almost as if I must fight my body to walk upright.

My neck, back and shoulders do not throb or sizzle with pain. They merely pass the time sore and dull and scoff at any sudden bold movements I have the audacity to think I might make.

My lungs chafe and crackle at the dust-ridden, heated air and they, too, slow me down.

Yet my mind, the huge organ that controls it all, is not interested in resting. In a horribly ironic turn of events, it wants to keep going, to work, to delve, absorb, discover, sing, dissect and it all but demands that my body go along.

Sitting and copying numbers can't possibly this taxing.

There is no fatigue so wearisome as that which comes from lack of work. (Charles Haddon Spurgeon)

I have a few friends who are the equivalent of creative sprinters. I don't know how they do it. Maybe it's training. Or maybe it's natural to them to follow through once an idea alights on their playing field. It's enviable to watch someone see a project through from start to finish, no holds barred, straight up fire all the way to the finish line. But I see how tired and loopy they get. Is that the secret to success: wring yourself dry, then wring some more, hopscotching the line between sanity and loopy fatigue?

Nothing is so exhausting as indecision, and nothing is so futile. (Bertrand Russell)

So much to do and I've barely scratched the surface. But it takes time to mine diamonds. Time, confidence and practice. Here's to the big picture:

The mind is but a barren soil – a soil which is soon exhausted, and will produce no crop, or only one, unless it be continually fertilized and enriched with foreign matter. (Sir Joshua Reynolds)

If, because of anxiety and self-doubt, you procrastinate and only think about working, you'll feel more exhausted than if you'd created for hours. (Eric Maisel)

Better to wear out than rust out. (Bishop Cumberland)

Isn't it Bromantic?

2009-07-22T22:37:00.000-07:00

From Kataleeeena's flickr

Monday was our wrap party for Month to Month (Team Aggroll's 48 hour film fest submission). In true Artsy Fartsy hipster fashion, we went to the lovely Cha Cha Lounge in Silverlake (pictured above). It used to be a Latino gay bar (in the tradition of most hipster bars in the Echo Park/Silverlake area). The owners kept most of the Spanish themed decor and added a few ironic kitsch elements - foos ball table, vending machine with individually packaged Spam, the "road ahead" mural that Organ Donor and Zahir are sitting in front of in the picture above. Hipsters and irony aside, it's actually a pretty cool spot. Decent music, which isn't played too loud, a photo booth, and plenty of space to lounge on the weekdays. On the weekends it gets sardine-iculous.

Unfortunately, not everyone from the cast and crew was able to make it. Chris aka Laquisha, declined at the last minute for reasons unbeknownst to me. He played a murder victim and the recipient of some very strange attention from Creepy Landlord Dusty played by...Dusty.

Dusty rolled up at about 10:30 fresh from acting class with two of his classmates. Dusty's about 6'4'' if not taller with an 80's valley boy haircut, the solid build of an athlete and the face of an avid comic book geek. But creepy as hell when he needs to be.

These guys were "guys", like, frat boy "guys." Not in a bad way, as it turns out. I was initially thrown off by the third friend (I'll call him Jeff because I can't remember his name). He was about 5'10'' and had medium brown hair that was threatening to secede from his hairline. We were introduced and shook hands. I was about to repeat his name so that I could remember it when he unleashed his uber man strength on my freakishly tiny hand. He gripped it like I had just challenged him to a dual. (Maybe I had. I've been known to piss people off without knowing it.) I wasn't sure whether to comment on the vise-like greeting or not. It caught me quite by surprise. But the grip was too full of brawn for me not to acknowledge it.

So I squeezed back.

"All right! That's a man's handshake right there! Nice grip, buddy!"

I held onto his band a bit longer and kept shaking it, mostly in disbelief. Who does that? I mean, to a woman? A lady? Une fille gentile? So I immediately dismissed him as an insensitive brute.

Pinoy Pete, the editor extraordinaire of Month to Month had assigned himself to task of getting Zahir to talk to this one "chick with glasses." She and her friend were sitting by the foos ball tables and Zahir was very shy about talking to her. Pinoy Pete tried all manner of trickery and instigation to get Zahir to talk to her, but alas, Zahir hid behind the badge of shyness and would not cross the uncrowded bar floor to talk to her.

Mr. Steel Grip overheard Pinoy Pete talking to Zahir about his lack of commitment and focus when it came to the females. SG, Dusty and Friend #2 stepped in to help Zahir make first contact. In fact, it was Mr. Steel Grip himself who volunteered as proxy to ask the lady and her friend to play a round of foos ball so that Zahir could be on the same team as The Chick with Glasses.

Mt. Steel Grip didn't know any of us except for Dusty. He had no reason to help Zahir do anything, much less talk to some chick. But they were invested, man - Pinoy Pete, Dusty, Mr. Steel Grip, Ubiquitous Friend #2 - all of them fully committed to get Zahir just to talk to this girl. They organized and had a game plan and everything.

My entire life, I haven't witnessed anything like that. It was completely non-predatory in nature. In fact, it was sweet. No other word will suffice. The goal was not to get Zahir laid (well, that may have been the super objective) but to help create a situation, an opening for a conversation (possibly number exchange) for Mr. Zahir, whom they didn't even know.

It warmed my heart a bit, I tell you what. Like a shot of tequila, it did.

Silbando Bossa Nova Para Confundir

2009-07-19T09:44:00.000-07:00

People die of fright and live of confidence" - Henry David Thoreau

Was it the power of the mind? The whole "you create your own reality" crap that pop psych/"spiritual" books like the The Secret sell? Is there such a thing as simply being really nervous just because?

I don't know. I simply don't know what happened. All I know is that when my moment came, and the torch was passed, I effing dropped it.

That's all I can think about today. How I dropped that effing torch in front of people who know me. (Actually, whether they know me or not doesn't really make a difference. I still effed up.) Which elicited, sympathy compliments rather than a round of genuine, bonafide, "well done"s.

Last night I sang backup for Diana. In Spanish. A language I understand much better than I speak or write. I read pretty well. At any rate, I got the songs last Sunday. A week ago today. There were two songs off of her album Luz Verde (Ay Corazoncito and Conmigo) which I was to sing back up on, and a cover of a Tony Avila song "Siblando Bossa Nova" which was to be a duet. I had her two songs down, the back up ones, no problem. I'd listened to them in the car, on the train, at work in the shower, all of that. The same with Silbando Bossa Nova, but the tempo was a bit fast and I was so concerned about saying the words correctly. We had a rehearsal on Thursday and that song in particular was a bit choppy. so I saturated myself in that song - the pronunciation, the meaning, the phrasing - I studied and worked at it as hard as I could for two days. By yesterday afternoon, I had it. I knew it.

Saturday night, after a divine home cooked Cuban meal with the band (the percussionist made picadillo, fried plantains, black beans and rice and flan for dessert), we practiced that song a few times. They were impressed by how much progress I'd made in two days. I was impressed! I had it down and we were set to perform at this birthday party.

We're introduced and I'm nervous now. Stage fright is no stranger to me, as the first few times I perform a new piece/play, I'm nervous to the point of shaking. But, you suck it up and git'er dun. The first two songs went fine and when we got to Silbando Bossa Nova, Diana made this introduction.

"I know a lot of you here know Ramona, but didn't know that she sings! she learned this song in two days which is amazing, so let's give her some applause now for that." (of course, I'm paraphrasing a bit)

In that moment the words flew out of my head. I didn't know what to think about or what to focus on - the succession of words, the tune, the guitar, my dry mouth, wondering how fat I looked in my dress - it all rushed in at the same time and completely flooded out the part of my brain that knew the damn words.

In short, I had two four lyric parts to sing. I flubbed the second lines in both of them. And since then, that song is all I can hear in my head. It's such a beautiful song, too. The lyrics fluttered around my head on the way home last night, in my dreams and woke me up this morning. Easy. Cool. Like feathers floating in the forest.

Next time, I warm the stage for myself (I'd never performed on that stage before). And next time, no matter what Diana says, I will have a cheat sheet on my hand.

Towards the end of the night Diana's roommate asked me how I felt about it, and all I could say was "I knew it in the car. I knew it in the car."
"You think you'll do it again?"
"Pfft. Yeah! In heartbeat! This cannot be the best I ever do."

Hell yes I will. It was to much fun not to.

Artsy Fartsy!

2009-07-17T17:46:00.000-07:00

Well, la tee da, y'all!

I'm singing back up for Latin pop singer Diana Mera tomorrow at a birthday party for one of my actor friends who is a company member at Company of Angels (which was founded in part by Mr. Leonard Nimoy).

Wednesday marked my second film festival debut in the 48 Hour Film Project in Team Aggroll inagural debut, "Month to Month" (and so did my gargantuan, beached whale of a body...but I'll not focus on that now). Big ups, seriously, to the entire crew for their patience and perserverence. They put together a short film, complete with sound, lighting, A and B cameras, DP, and FOUR actors in under 48 hours. And it was stupid hot in that basement, I tell you what. A lot of people "say" alot of things and have intentions to get stuff done, but they really did. I'm uber proud of them. So proud, in fact, I'll forgive that they didn't know the cardinal rule of taking pictures/filming the more zaftig woman (overhead lighting, high angles, and nothing larger than a medium shot). ;)

Tonight is rehearsal for the new El Verde show, and then writingwritingwriting to make my deadline for Sunday.

Imagine what I could do if I didn't have to spend 5 hours 5 days a week in a cubicle. The possibilities are mind-boggling. :D

Bye, Bye Blackbird

2009-07-01T16:50:00.000-07:00

(Image from PopCultureNerd)

I think it might be over between us.

It could be because I was actually tired last night, and I sincerely hope that's what it was, as I've never hoped for anything before. But, I'm beginning to think maybe, just maybe, the sun has set on my iconic faux love for Johnny Depp.

I know. It hurts just to type it. I love the fact that he has never let his looks get in the way of his career. It would have been so easy to go with the flow, the myth making machine that wanted him to be a pretty boy. Endless issues of Bop, Tiger Beat and Teen Beat are a testament to that. (Man. I had this one poster of JD from Bop! where his hair was all thrashed out with gel and he was in denim and wearing eyeliner. Ooo-wee! Set my little 12-year-old heart aflutter.) But he knew he was more than just a pretty face and wanted to be seen as such. He isn't afraid to be ugly or look stupid. Even when his face was falling off from syphilis in The Libertine, he was still hot. That is the irony of Johnny Depp.

However, last night I saw Public Enemies, and while virtually EVERYONE in the film was frikkin hot, (I think it may be the style of clothes. There's something about cleaned up, dressed up guys that is super sabroso), the film was just, eh.

Perhaps it was faulty/misguided marketing. I understand Mr. Depp is a huge draw (#2 Actor in the WORLD or something like that), but the film itself is not about Dillinger. It is not a biopic. It is a straight-up genre film. Which is awesome in and of itself. With genre film, like Film Noir, the objective was setting up a tone and hitting certain elements. The focus was not solely on character. I love character driven stories, but us TV Babies are a sophisticated bunch, able to devour and spit out simplistic plot development. One way to keep it interesting is to bring genre back, which may have been Mann's intention. However, that is not what happened.

After sitting (and falling asleep) through almost 2 hours of the film, we get to the climax scene, the height of tension - (no spoiler here) he's in a movie theater watching a gangster film. Right there, the film began to make sense. Just as it was about to end. It seemed to be about the power of celebrity/fame/icon during a time in the country when people had lost faith. Bank Robbers were stealing from the rich to give to themselves, but they were sticking it to the men who were robbing the country (wealthy bankers and politicians) and getting away with it, making them folk-heroes.

Or maybe I really wanted it to be less shallow than it was. In the words of my photog homie Kata, "It was all over the place. It was like he [Mann] couldn't decide what he wanted to do, so he just did everything." For rrl. And in so doing, Mann accomplished what I thought was impossible: He made me doubt my faith in Johnny.

I hope it was faulty direction, a watered down plot, and washed out cinematography that caused me to lose my interest enough to fall asleep more than thrice. Johnny has spent many a year on my pedestal and putting him on the shelf would be the end of an era and a sure-fire sign that I am getting older. But that's okay. I have a younger model standing by in the wings.

(Image from IESB.net)

The Radiator Lady is in my Mirror!

2009-06-23T08:02:00.000-07:00

The Lady in the Radiator from Eraserhead

This is how I feel.

Less so today than on Saturday or Sunday or even yesterday. My only mouth opens to a certain point before heavy soreness lets loose.

On Friday, I eleceted to enter a world of pain by submitting myself to having my wisdom teeth removed. Three of them. At once.

I was not "put under" as, thankfully(?), all four of my wisdom teeth had already crowned which meant that oral surgery was unnecessary. Yet, the idea of having my own teeth - teeth that have been biologically orchestrated to grow in my head throughout millions of years, teeth that have been inside my head for 32 years - ripped out of my skull, nerve tissue, viscera and all, was terrifying.

Generally, I like to think I face fear in the...face. There's not a whole lot that I'm "scared" of anymore. I licked my fear of the dark about 5 years ago. I stopped sucking my thumb in the 4th grade. I no longer believe in or fear a horned, cloven-hooved, demon that will rise to the surface and suck my soul out of my eye sockets if I do something that displeases some ubiquitous, arbitrary, white-bearded, ZZ-Top looking, "good old boy" type of deity figure. I have gone toe to toe with drunken frat boys and made them back down! I jaywalk! I mix colors and solids! I'm all kinds of fearless.

But for three days prior to this procedure, I had insomnia.

Before I went in to the procedure, I took a muscle relaxer.

The procedure itself was surreal and rough but overall not that bad. I should have asked to see the teeth, but I didn't. I was so concerned about not feeling pain that I kept my eyes closed most of the time. When they were open, I couldn't really see anything other than the DDS's and nurse's goggled faces. It reminded me a bit of Brazil for some reason. It was a clean, white office, with a flat screen TV on the wall facing the chair. There was a window looking into a plant-filled courtyard. It had a European vibe to it. I'd been watching the Food Network while waiting for the numbing shots to kick in and I could hear bits of Man vs. Food amidst the drilling and suctioning.

My godsend of a roommate picked me up and escorted me to fill my prescription. I was fine when we left, but a few hours later, after hours of changing bloody gauze and not being able to eat, I was in a world of hurt.

Why do they prescribe Vicodin for that sort of thing? Tylenol with Codeine makes much more sense - handle the pain and the swelling in one shot, but no. I got Vicodin, which, my digestive system is apparently no longer able to handle (blerf).

While in significantly less pain, my mouth is still sore and I thank the non-denominational universe for the theory and execution of healing and I look forward to soon, when I will be able to look in the mirror and not see the radiator lady.

Estoy en Viaje

2009-06-11T14:02:00.001-07:00

There is nothing better than being en route, traveling, getting out of the cube and exploring the everyday exotic and being reminded just how vast and varied home can be. I know u broke, but I love you, Cali!

-- Con el iPhone

Sartorial Inspiration

2009-06-10T15:12:00.000-07:00

This is a re-post from The Sartorialist's June 4th post.

One of the tricky parts of shooting a fashion blog is the temptation to always be looking for fashion with a capital 'F.'

Although I do shoot that a lot, especially at the shows, when I am "on the street" I shoot with a slightly different eye.

When I am in a neighborhood I'm not looking for the "next big trend" or a ground-breaking style statement, but just reacting when I see a person and thinking to myself "he/she looks nice."

"Looking nice" is truly underrated; the young lady I posted yesterday looked nice, very nice. Her dress was very simple, but simply wonderful.

The young lady in today's post is dressed very simply, and yet I couldn't help but notice her in the crowded cafe where she was sitting with a friend. She looked so elegant in her simple white summer dress with a colorful floral scarf wrapped high around her shoulders. Not groundbreaking, not earth shattering, but in its own way, a very glamorous way to live a simply nice life.

As I become more aware of people who literally see beauty in the world, I fall more and more in love with it.

Thank You, Interwebs

2009-05-22T09:20:00.001-07:00

If I may...

Walk with me here...

Don't get me wrong, I am stupendously, outrageously, hyperbolically grateful to have the job I have - it is minimally demanding, has very low responsibility and pays extremely well, considering. My main complaint is that this job happens when my brain waves are at their peak. Not doing anything overly engaging for 8 hours a day is draining, believe it or not. I could, as one mentor suggested, "steal that time like you would with a lover," but as I lack the adventurous bravado of my youth, I "feel guilty" spending so much time not doing something work related.

(I am at work right now, by the way. Guilt is an inconsistent, unpredictable kind of thing. Like a lover.)

And yet, sometimes during the lulls while I earnestly wait for someone to give me something to copy or print, I dip into the Internet's vast ocean of information. At an instant, I can be transported to ancient Mexico and read about how the Aztecs dealt with death (there were, apparently, three phases of death and multiple levels of the afterlife). Or read about Thomas Edison who was kicked out of elementary school for being "addled" (i.e. probably ADD or unable to focus because the schoolin was going too slow for his pulsing brain), then home schooled by his mother. Its a frikkin portal to other worlds, other dimensions, other realities.

So, thank you, Internet for reminding me that I still have a lot to do.

Rapunzel Rewrite

2009-05-21T09:28:00.000-07:00

If her hair was really that long, all she needed was a pair of scissors. Tie that hair to something solid and git yoself out o there, gurl! I mean, what did she do up there the whole time? That's a lot of years to sit in one place and not try to figure out how to get out. Considering that she was kidnapped by an Evil Witch at 12 years old(because her dad squelched on a deal), I guess there's a likelihood that Stockholm Syndrome would have set in.

How much more interesting would it have been if she had gotten herself out? What if she met the Prince while on the run from the Evil Witch who would have retribution at any cost? Ooooh. Sounds like a good way to occupy a lull in workflow.

(These are the thoughts that filter through my head as I walk into work and settle into my cube on the 35th floor. Might be time to unleash my golden braid of Epic Awesomeness.)

Workin Hard or Hardly Workin?

2009-05-18T13:39:00.000-07:00

At 1:35pm I received my first piece of work.

I get in at 8:00am.

What have I been doing this whole time? Working on my thesis paper that is due today.

I have not Facebooked or Twittered. I briefly checked a few blogs but otherwise me and my homies Brian Eno and Pandora have been locked down in overdrive mode, immersed in John Garnder's fictive dream.

Seriously. 1:35pm. And this task took me 3 minutes to complete. Gift or curse?

Time to eat.

Good Morning Sun

2009-05-15T09:25:00.000-07:00

(from NikosG's Flickr)

This morning, I made it to Kaldi (my local coffee shop)and spent some time reading, eating a bagel and drinking a magnificent Mexican Mocha. It was bliss. I was only there for 30 minutes, but it was enough to centered. There's usually some form of satellite music station playing at a nice, respectable level, but this morning, there was just silence. The sky was a bit grey, cloudy but not too cold. The shop had a few customers, mostly older gentlemen, drinking their coffee and reading the morning paper.

As I read my book and munched on my bagel, the Kaldi's morning life unfolded all around me.

Two young ladies in their early 20's came in all chatty, but a strangely soothing kind of chatty, like squirrels or pigeons.
"Yeah, I've been painting all night. I'm hoping we finish today."
"Oh, I'll get this, since you're helping me paint."
"I'll have the Chocolate Chip coffee cake."
"Omigawd! That's my favorite!"
"I know, it's so good."

An "older" (Quotations because they were probably in their mid to late 50's - not that old, but older than me) Latino couple came in decked out in walking gear - Red shirt and black shorts for the Lady, grey t-shirt and black shorts for the gentleman, complete with white socks and walking shoes. They each picked up a cup of straight up coffee and went on their way.

A young Latino man breezed in all kinds of smiling with his baseball cap and messenger bag slung over his shoulder, gracing the cashier with a bright "Good morning!" which was reciprocated. He got his coffee and tea and breezed right back out.

All of them came in briefly and left on their way to something more pressing - jobs, painting, walking. Kaldi was just a brief pause in the middle of their morning.

But I envy those regulars: the wispy haired men in their unaffected t-shirts, shorts and tennies in the midst of daily ritual, their morning meditation. I envy them their privilege of sitting still, slowly digesting the new day and breathing with the morning air.

Corporate Crank

2009-05-14T09:29:00.000-07:00

Confession: I'm at work and I just hung up on a travel agent for no reason other than she annoys me.

I am at an age where professionalism should reign supreme. I work at a large enough company where proper corporate etiquette is not only encouraged but expected. I am paid sufficiently to handle the mere idiosyncrasies of a travel agent. But, man, it's just this one. THIS ONE. She drives me effing batty.

45 minutes on the phone with this woman yesterday to try to rearrange one of my "Mero Mero's" flights (weather issues in Chi town). I tell her what he wants and she proceeds to tell me all the problems that can ensue if she does her job and makes the request happen. "Well, his ticket is "protected" so he may not get that "protection on another airline. And if I make that change than I'll have to re-do the entire ticket because it was purchased as one whole ticket. If I break up the ticket, there will be fee changes. I just want you to be aware of the consequences."

I'm like, "#1: It's airfare not an abortion. I'm 97% positive that no matter what changes we make here today, EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY. #2: I ain't footin' the bill. You ain't footin' the bill. If these corporate Muy Muys wanna drop a bunch of dough on changes, that's they business, not mine, and it shouldn't be yours. #3: Don't tell me what you can't do. Thanks to you I am WELL SCHOOLED in your inadequacies. Show me what you can do. Surprise me. I dare you."

For the love of Pete Seeger, this woman makes me CRAZY!

Of course, she probably has Caller ID.

Ridin on the Metro

2009-05-06T07:34:00.000-07:00

I keep seeing people wearing masks on the train. While i understand pandemics are frightening, i can't get behind this particular round of fear. It seems strangely timed- first the drug cartels are the biggest problem south of the border (immigration notwithstanding). Then come to find out the Cartels are getting their ammo from the US. A week later, swine flu. That's a lot of business coming out of Mexico. So, color me less than paranoid about the flu.

And then again...I think of 12 Monkeys.

In other train news:

This guy sitting next to me has a lingering whiskey hangover perfume to him.

However, in front of me is:

It ain't all bad..

-- Con el iPhone

Countdown: 18 Days

2009-05-05T16:19:00.000-07:00

18 Days until I go down to part-time status at work. Voluntarily. I'm going insane. Quasi-voluntarily.

I've been working, officially, since I was 15 1/2, unofficially since I was about 13 years old. In the past, jeez, almost 20 years, the longest I've been at any one job in any one position is 2 years. I am currently in that job and it feels like wearing a second-hand, polyester dress that is about a size too small and smells like old lady (uncomfortable). So why do it even part of the time? Closet's empty and I'm saving up to go shopping.

Which brings me to: Brilliant Life Plan - 2009

May 9th will be a momentous, benchmark day indeed.

First, I begin my mixology studies at the National Bartending School in "Hollywood" (it's actually K-town...but close enough. H-wood is down the street). The plan is to do the course in modern-day alchemical arts and pick up a part-time gig 1 or 2 days a week somewhere.

Also on May 9th: my first official "reading" of my own work - prose. I've written, co-written, produced (and directed - blech) my own theater work before, which is pretty strange since I'm not formally trained in playwriting. I'm actually formally trained in Media and Pop Culture analysis. So essays are kind of a dynamic analysis of a sort. At any rate, I'm pretty excited and terrified.

On one hand, I feel kind of sangrona, like I should be grateful to even have a job considering the state of the economy...and the economy of the state. On the other hand, not living up to my potential has finally caught up with me and I don't want to waste any more time droning away, wasting my good brain cell years and hours making copies. The older I get, the more I get concerned about actually losing those lucid hours.

Life is challenging enough to begin with, but there's always been something in me that implores me to kick it up a notch. Could be good.

Post-show glow

2009-03-04T08:58:00.000-08:00

It's over.

The second Tongue in Chicana show, Heart on a Wire, closed weekend before last and was, hands down, the best artistic experience of my life. I quite literally was taken with and fell in love with every member of the cast and crew. The whole cycle of creation was pretty amazing.

It was a gestation period of about 9 months from taking the concept and germinating the seed, developing each individual story (there were three vignettes and two puppet transitions that explored "Love" through the filters of the colors black, white and red), taking words on pages and bringing them to life. All three of us: (MEZ through her seriously whimsical puppet magic, Mz. S with her directorial skills, and me doing my best to inhabit a character, literally brought our ideas to life. It's such an amazing, challenging and utterly terrifying thing (for me, anyway), to metaphorically and literally mine the contents of one's heart, attempt to fashion something beautiful from it, then put it up for display, not knowing how people will react, working through doubts of "is this right?" "do I even know what I'm doing?", "what if Im fooling myself and wasting my time"? With this cast and crew, however, there was such a good energy of wanting to bring their best to be apart of this creation. I don't know if I've never paid attention before, but for some reason, this time around, that supportive energy was saliently sanguine.

The three of us conjured some wonderfully lovely people. And I re-fell in love with love. Two weeks hance and I'm still feeling the afterglow. Lovely, lovely, lovely.

What's Black & White and Red all over?

2009-02-09T08:43:00.000-08:00

Our new show opened this weekend.

First weekend down.

It's been about an 8 month process of workshopping the scripts, then rehearsal. It's such a surreal thing to be focused on a project for so long, then to have it up and run it. My favorite part of the entire process is rehearsal - the getting to know other people, mining myself for those nuggets I can draw on to try to make a two dimensional character come to life, striving each and every time to improve, get better. Although, after these past few years of doing this, I have yet to feel like I really "brought" it. But if I felt like I "had it down" I would probably stop writing and performing as the challenge would be gone.

Rainy days in LA this weekend, but the houses were healthy. At least 30 people (which isn't bad for a 55-60 seater black box theater).

The real joy for me, though, is listening to my piece. The one I wrote. The thing that sucks is I'll never get to see it. The irony of writing and performing. But it's so awesome for me to hear the elements and performances, and even though it doesn't necessarily sound like it did in my head, it's got a completely other life. That's what I love about it. Truly love. Hearing the words being brought to life. Hearing the performers make it personal and live that moment. That's the rush that keeps me coming back.

Mexico

2009-01-10T11:15:00.000-08:00

They still spoke a thousand language - Spanish, too, to be sure, but also a thicket of songs and grammars. mexico - the sound of wind in the ruins. Mexico - the waves rushing the shore. Mexico - the sand dunes, the snowfields, the steam of sleeping Popcatepetl. Mexico - across marijuana fields, tomato plants, avocado trees, the agave in the village of Tequila.

Mexico. . . .

from The Hummingbird's Daughter by Luis Alberto Urrea

43 Things

2009-01-07T09:17:00.000-08:00

Well, looky here:

I took the 43 Things Personality Quiz and found out I'm a

Lifelong Learning Money Managing Builder

Color me shocked.

It's Over! It's Over!

2009-01-02T09:35:00.000-08:00

Leesepea had a monthly summary of 2008 posted. Seemed like a good idea so I sat down and tried to think of the major highlights by month, but as it stands, I can't really remember a whole lot. 2008 was a gigantic blur. I remember it in quarters.

Q1 (January - March) 2008 - Had a run of El Verde wherein I played evil genius La Quinceanera! Had a right ridiculous blast and was recognized in a Downtown hipster bar. A blur of rehearsal (After El Verde, performances, work and stressing (and occasionally working on) grad school readings and writings. Fell in love with Blood Oranges.

Q2 (April - June) 2008 - Went to Denver to do a staged reading of Sunsets and Margaritas written by the illustrious Jose Cruz Gonzalez at the Denver Center Theater for a week in May. It was pretty momentous and although only lasted for a week, was a core shaker of an experience. While there, I saw their production of Doubt which left me speechless. No prancing and preening, just good quality theater.

Q3 - (July - September) 2008
Hoop Girls ensured during the summer! Written by my lovely, talented soul sistah Sasparella it was a bunch of hard, hard work - primarily because CASA 0101 in the summer is absolutely. not. fun. at. all. It was exponentially hot this summer anyway, but couple that with very little ventillation in the theater and being up close and personal with searing theater lights, it was borderline unbearable. I developed heat rash. But all that challenge was well worth it. Hoop Girls has taken on a life of its own and traveled east! Big ups to La Sassy. Reached the end of Hoop Girls, almost burned out but auditioned and was cast for another show - For All Time. Exhausted at the end of Hoop Girls, I ran right into rehearsals for this show. Little did I know what 6 day-a-week rehearsal actually meant. Rehearsal for this show was like an additional part time job. I had 12-14 hour days for the better part of 2 months.

Q4 - (October - December) 2008

For All Time was an amazing experience. I got to work with people on many sides of the Criminal Justice system. For the first time ever, I was complimented on my professionality, something I do not take lightly. Since I love to try new things, I might hold on to that one and develop it a little further.

The end of November marked the end of my first full year of grad school. There were at least two times I considered dropping out, but pushed through with my bare minimum. Half-assing things has been my thing for a really long time. Just getting by had never been a problem before. But now, because of maturity, age or boredom, giivng my minimal best feels restrictive, clausterphobic, and deadening like gangrene. The thought that I could die at any moment and never know how far I could have gone, never know how high I could have flown is utterly depressing. Unlike racism, poverty, the waning environment and war, I can actually do something about that. I can practice and give my best energy to things that are right in front of me, hone skills and whatnot.

And so 2009 will be about focus, study, practice, Athenian respect for craft, and jumping whenever possible with the knowledge that I can, in fact, fly.

I believe in the Magical. Really.

2008-12-22T14:00:00.000-08:00

I just completed my second residency at school. One year complete. It's astounding how fast the time has gone and I haven't really felt it. I've been busy meandering through acting, meandering through grad school and meandering through work, unable to fully be present at any given time. Last week was pretty rainy here in LA and I was literally in the car almost as much as I slept (4-6 hours/day).

Going into my third "project period" (aka semester. I forget why they have different lingo for the same amount of time), I'm excited again! It's so hard to maintain the desire to produce/create when one has to grasp at "free time", then withstand/dissolve the guilt of creating/resting/absorbing rather than doing something more "substantial" with my time, using it "wisely". But I'm switching things up this term and I'm jumping genres. I'll be going from Creative Nonfiction to Fiction this term and I could not be happier. On the (slightly) downside, I have to complete my 25+ page critical paper this period and don't really get to write any fiction until that is complete. However, as academic writing has always been my safe house, I'm actually energized by the opportunity to do my most favorite thing: research!

I'm still a bit unclear as to what my topic will be, but I'm doing some preliminary research today...at work...:p. There's something about Magical Realism and Speculative Fiction as similar literary movements that really sparks my fire. The difficult part will be to narrow my focus and decide what my angle will be. But, right now, I feel inspired.

In a bit of research I stumbled upon another literary "movement" called McOndo, that has (apparantly) surfaced as a response to Magical Realism and the restictions placed on newer Latin American writers who are told to "add some folklore and a dash of tropical heat and come back later," when submitting pieces. It seems to be an old guard vs. new guard thing happening in Latin American literature in the light of modernization and globalization. Pretty interesting stuff.

I heard a Rumor

2008-12-11T14:31:00.000-08:00

I heard a rumor at work that there was a new position open.

In my department.

I know my co-worker (the other Admin Assistant) has not put in her notice.

I also know that I have not.

This has given me much pause.

It's okay. I didn't really like them anyway.

:P

And how are you today?

2008-12-04T12:09:00.000-08:00

Well...a little like this:

And now, to cleanse the pallate:

The stress...is not the best... ;)

Overwhelmed with Dullness

2008-12-01T16:35:00.000-08:00

Beige cubes, gray floors, illuminated by flourescent lights.

Hours fade into days, fades into haze as shapeless, khaki forms with varied steps trapse around muted taupe hallways.

By 4pm, I can't see, can't focus. Saturated with this light-brown view, numbed by ergonomics the intermittent HUMM. BUZZ. WHIRR. The electric soundtrack background noise to drones droning on and on and on and...

But sometimes I am reminded that color exists in a world outside the cube. A world I am destined for very, very soon.

And, now for something completely unrelated:

I Say It's My Birthday!

2008-11-25T14:09:00.000-08:00

a sexy cake for a sexy laydee (me! ;)

Yay yesterday!

Transfixed by the Twilight

2008-11-13T08:34:00.000-08:00

Crap. I have to watch it now, don't I?

For school, and "work", I have volumes and volumes of literature to be read and write and new works (theater-wise) to create (my group Tongue in Chic*ana has a show coming up in February! Stay tuned!). Plus, there's this whole NaNoWriMo thing I'm working on (well, trying to get up on. I'm WAY behind, but the month is still young), so I haven't spent much time with my first love, my endless love - movies.

And then this whole Twilight thing happens.

At first, resisting the urge to read the books was none too difficult. I would see them while making my bi-annual trip to the young adult section at Vroman's just to see what's up and around with the kids these days. I saw Twilight and thought the cover art was awesome.
I read the back, saw that it was a vampire high school romance. Meh. I think I actually said that out loud, "meh."

And yet, there is something about this movie and it's HIGHLY unattractive lead vampire (Interviw with the Vampire, anyone?) that compels me to watch it. I'm curious to see where they go with the outsider metaphor in this one. And, as I am not a purist, I have no problems reading the book after watching the movie. Plus, as vampire lore is inherently fascinating and cool, I must witness how Ms. Catherine Hardwicke et. al saturate this film with bubbly, melted cheese.

So, I have to go see it. As bad as the trailers look and as the soundtrack is (Paramour?? BLECH!!), there's the bit of childlike naivete that hopes that there is something salvagable and "good" about it. If not, I'm sure my inner adolescent could use a good chortle.

Hail to the Geek!

2008-11-11T14:23:00.000-08:00

Was just perusing the Huffington Post when, lo and behold, I see this lede:

OBAMA COLLECTS COMICS: 50 things You Might Not Know About the President Elect

It is indeed a momentus year. Comic con sells out in advance for the first time in its 39-year history and the President Elect of the United States of America collects comics.

It's almost official - geeks rule.

Fourteen...and a wake up! For All Time is OPEN!

2008-11-07T11:21:00.000-08:00

For All time opened! This is the show I've been working on since September 16th and marks the first time I'm working with the esteemed Cornerstone Theater. For All Time is the third play of their 6 play justice cycle. The writer - the AMAZING KJ Sanchez (and I say amazing because she has been evolving this piece over the course of several months, and, after the first table read, she chucked the script she had, which included a lot of references to the Oresteia and created a brand new one in less than a week!) - considers the play more of a collage, as she took the several hundred interviews conducted by herself and some of the Cornerstone staff, and fashioned a play.

To put it simply, For All Time is about the effects of the Justice/Prison system, crime, punishment and retribution, on society at large as told by the people who have been directly affected in some way. The cast is comprised of professional actors and non-professional community members (very De Sica but for theater...with a bit of Boal thrown in).

This whole process from beginning to middle (the run of the show is like Act II of a Three Act process as a performer: Act I - rehearsal; Act II - the actual show; Act III - the few weeks after closing, the denouement and processing of the experience) has been a trip. The script has been like a living breathing thing, evolving during the rehearsal process, adapting to performers abilities and skills. That's one of the great things about doing "new work", it's kind of like coutoure - tailor made for that particular cast.

This is day three of the "official" run (previews were last weekend). While I love doing the shows and look forward to each performance, I'm VERY EXCITED about having my weekend days back (to some extent). The rehearsal schedule was pretty rigorous (Tue - Fri: 7:00 - 10:00; Sat-Sun 10:00am - 5:00pm) but it's been super cool to work with a company like Cornerstone.

It runs 11/6/08 - 11/23 at Shakespeare LA.

A few articles:
A reporter from the LA Times came to one of the rehearsal nights to cover the play.

Article II from the LA Times.

From The Smiling Spider Blog

Stage view from the Catwalk.

Playing Hooky (kind of)

2008-10-30T10:47:00.000-07:00

I DON'T FEEL GOOD! *whiiiiiiiiine*

Man, these allergies are something else, I tell you what. It's so strange. I haven't had allergies this bad (twice within the span of a month) since I was living in Davis, which I would expect, it being a farm-y type cow town and all (literally. The mascot for UC Davis was a cow before some misguided charlatans changed it to a *eye roll* mustang. Why does UC Santa Cruz get the only cool mascot in the state?!?! But I digress). But come on! LA?! Allergies in L.A. My only guess is all the fires and the Santa Ana winds got together to make our lives a sneezing misery (as my roomate sneezes in her room).

And, joy of joys, my new show opens tonight. Well, it's not my show, it's Cornerstone Theater's show. And it's not really opening. It's previews. But I still have to muster up the energy to emote and stay on track with cues and transitions and alla that. So, missing a day of work to a) try to feel better and b) prepare and rest up for the big opening doesn't seem like hookey too much.

Seriously, allergies. Seriously

2008-10-28T17:01:00.000-07:00

From Thriftcandy.blogspot.com*

Awoke this morning to the post pain of nocturnal post nasal drip - yummy. For some reason, I continue to be susceptible to airborne toxic avengers (see what I did there?? eh? eh?). What blows most about being swarmed and affected by allegens (aside from my nose...constantly), is that I am worn the eff out. I have rehearsal until 11pm again tonight and the rest of this week, essentially, as previews open on Thursday. I tried Claritin, but that don't work. I could try Benadryl, but that would only incite me to sleep and this, as of today, I cannot do before midnight.

On the upside, I've finally entered the world of the interwebs. Man alive is there some interesting stuff happening! Mind you, I've been tooling around in cyberspace since before there was "web", when everything was chat rooms, bbs's, and IRC, I tell you. But that was lo, many years ago in the 90's, and I hadn't really explored it since. There are SO MANY really cool people out there blogging about really cool, artsy fartsy stuff and I love it! My inner adolescent is thrilled, to say the least. Especially because we used most of my work day discovering the long dormant territory of the internet.

*The photo is from one of the blogs I hit upon today. SO EFFING COOL!

12 Hour Daze

2008-10-27T12:05:00.001-07:00

Two. 12. Hour. Days. In. Rehearsal.

This is getting serious.

On my feet for most of those 12 hours = 24 hours of my weekend. Standing, waiting around to setup and run a two minute scene. Running around to get ready for entrances and exits. Repeating, reviewing over and over.

At around 10:00pm my energy tapped out - both nights.

I've been waking up an hour earlier to review my script or write my pieces and its been quite the thing, you know, to be a bonafide artist.

Now, if only I could find a way to get out of this beige cubicle where I waste my alive, focused hours...

* Calling on Athena! Drop out yo daddy's head and spit some knowledge on meh, gurl!"

Sweet and Sexy

2008-03-28T16:06:00.000-07:00

Blood Oranges. Deep, delicious, luscious and totally weird looking. A fruit after my own heart.

I've been doing bit of research in the way of "sexy" food. Not pornographic, but actually, more alluding to the senses than anything else. Take the blood orange versus the regular citrus orange, for example. Regular orange has a bright rind, which can have a range of yellow-orange (lemon yellow or sunshine yellow) to a mid-grade orange (marigold or pumpkin) to a heartier, more pigmented dark orange. Occasionally they're fragrant. For the most part, their fragrance persists if they are freshly picked from a tree. Even the organic oranges have lost their luster by the time they get to the super market.

Every now and then, in the dead of winter, and straight out of the fridge, Valencia oranges, at perfect ripitude, are reminiscent of those few minutes of bright sun peaking out from behind clouds on a cold and windy San Francisco afternoon, or that first warm breeze in spring that hugs and lifts you out of winter to whisper promises of summer. But it only happens for a few wedges until the sting of citrus takes over and then it's just - inhale for juice purposes and Vitamin C qualities.

Then there's the blood orange. First off, the name wins. The rind has a range of colors from regular orange and fades into brownish orange mottled rust blood color, almost as if the fruit has been in a fight the night before and has a gnarly bruise forming on its skin. I can think of very few fruits that encourage anthropomorphizing in this way. Except for peaches...but I'm saving that for peach season...

The skin of a room temperature blood orange smells like citrus with a hint of perfume, like when the smell of perfume fades from the wrist.

Peeling it open is the COOLEST! Every time it s such a surprise to see dark purple flesh that has the familiar citrus scent that has said "orange" your whole life. Each fruit is different. Sometimes you get a starburst or orange/pink (like a grapefruit) to deep, crushed velvet purple in the same slice. Other times, it's a range of beautiful, rich magenta. This fruit is as moody as any evil Disney queen could hope to use to entice some virginal (dumb) naive ingenue.

I seem to remember most orange slices having a very firm, crisp texture - a precursor for the burst of happy citrus goodness. Blood oranges, however, have the pliability, smoothness and softness of the palms of baby hands - wrinkles, crevices and all.

Blood orange juice may not really be thicker than regular juice, but for the sake of the experience, I imagine it is. I imagine the little pockets of maroon bursting open as teeth go crushing down with each mastication, spilling the juice into my mouth. It does have a citrus-y sort of flavor, and after the chewed up pulp has passed on, the fragrance lingers - in the mouth an don exhale through the nose, lightly caressing the olfactory organ as it leaves.

COME ON! That's what I'm talking about! Food you can e-x-p-e-r-i-e-n-c-e, shiaow!

So, regular oranges get a sexy quotient of 6.5. Blood Oranges, 8.75. **Right now it's just out of ten until I think of some other more creative way to gage the sexy food quotient.

Happy feasting!

Back on the Train

2008-03-09T18:11:00.000-07:00

Them peoples is serious about time.

I've never run so much in my life. My 2 ton silver bag slung over my shoulder, I ran from the Gold Line stop off at Union Station and ran over to the Metrolink, expecting to find a ticket dispensor. NOPE. So I run back to the Gold Line entrance and the vending machine won't take my card. I happen to have cash so I pop a 5 in and run back to the Metrolink train to San Bernardino with about a minute to spare to find out after the train rolls out, that IT'S THE WRONG TICKET. Fortunately the conductor guy (yes, they check your ticket on the Metrolink...blast!) could tell i had no idea what was going on and let me slide with an ALL DAY PASS for the metro rail.

All this takes place in the span of 8 minutes.

I really should start planning ahead in more detail.

From the Pomona Metrolink stop to my mother's house is about a 15 minute walk.

The BEST train music so far is, hands down, Tom Waits. It's definitely not what I expected, but it feels very American - U.S. American - to listen to that Craggly voices singing his craggly blues while riding on a train, especially to Pomona (where Tom Waits is from).

Riding the train to the outer east of L.A. County feels very American culturally speaking. The history of the steam engine and how trains factored into the development of the west coast and the Industrial Revolution is fading. Amtrak and other passenger liners cost the same as taking a plane and take twice as long. Riding through the San Gabriel Valley did not match the glory of riding through Highland Park in the morning. It's pretty ugly near the train tracks out in the cuts.

The Pomona train stop could have been anywhere along Route 66 or any other rural farm community. There were train tracks, some benches and a ticket vending kiosk near the parking lot. That's it. No brick and mortar building, no fancy platform and nothing but industrial buildings and rock-lined train tracks in either direction.

Best song for getting off at a train stop that feels like the middle of nowhere - Crosses by Jose Gonzalez

And that's it. It takes longer than a car, but I think it's the amount of space there is that makes it worthwhile, that, and actually being able to look out the window and see everything on a warm, sunny, luscious, breezy day like today.

Beautiful.

2008-02-11T23:20:00.000-08:00

There was an art store (one of many, I'm sure) on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley. It was pretty close to campus at the top of that long-ass street. Me and my friend Amalia walked in because she saw a Rothko print she wanted to buy. I had never seen a rothko before, but I'd already had pre-formed ideas about abstract art: It was pretentious and lazy. I went on and on about it to her, a fan, for a good five minutes. Needless to say, she wasn't really paying attention and I don't blame her. In retrospect, I had no oidea what i was talking about. Of course, everyone is entitled to their opinion, but knowing what i know now, it was definitely youthful ignorance and bravado.

Eventually I saw an actual real life Rothko some 8 years, 400 miles and a minor in Art Studio later, in context, at an art gallery and actively tried to understand it logcially - break down form, color, texture and really analyze the "why" about it. I just kept getting pissed off, so I stopped. I looked around at the other paintings hanging nearby, even walked into different parts of the gallery. I kept coming back to the Rothko and i was instantly soothed. I'd look at other pieces of art and get frantic or agitate or feel nothing at all. But rothkos, with the big swatches of color, imperfect, not inside the lines and splotchy made it safe to stand still and take deep breaths.

Positively 4th Street

2008-02-10T22:07:00.000-08:00

Productivity is crazy bitchin'.

Resolved to not get any more behind on my grad school work than I am, I decided to pick a topic of which I am pretty knowledgeable AND of which experts on the topic are easily and readily accessible. No, I am not writing a piece on the epic glories of retirement benefit valuation reports. I am developing a piece on the burgeoning Eastside (LA) Latino theater scene. I knocked out 2 interviews this weekend, plus was privileged to attend a theater colloquim comprised primarily of people who do theater on the Eastside, or whose work has benefitted or been spawned from the work of the Eastside Latino theater community. and it was crazy bitchin'

lots and lots to process. looming deadlines and tons to read, must format/outline piece and decide on a scope. academic papers are so much easier. You're assigned a topic and given parameters. Setting them for myself is so much more difficult, but probably because I don't have a lot of practice at it. Education is primarily trying to figure out and do what someone else wants from you - which, incidentally, i've never been good at. But now, with this, I can make the scope as random and crazy as I want, as long as it's engaging and makes a decent amount of sense to someone.

Being busy and having tons of shit to do to keep my brains engaged keeps the neurosis at bay. Like, productivity is the fire breathing dragon that keeps the seedy, money grubbing knights at bay. LOVE IT. No wonder work drains me so much. Pero, YA!

It's Quince, Bitch.

2008-02-08T08:18:00.000-08:00

For the past seven or so years, I've been tooling around the Eastside theater scene. Actually, I witnessed the "scene" happen. It's a trip. I remember going to Casa 0101 for a show that Josefina was going to put on, but was cancelled the day of. I drove all the way out to Pomona and no one was there. Fall of 2001, before Real Women Have Curves was even finished shooting. Last weekend closed the third El Verde show after a two weekend run. The houses were pretty much full the first weekend and outright packed the second weekend. We had full houses in the rain. THE RAIN. First street was even flooded one of those days.

There was a basic amount of marketing - usual myspace, websites, faxes of press releases and the like.

So much has changed. The theater's changed managerial hands 3 times and this last time really seems to have taken off. But I guess with most businesses, it takes at least 5 years to really get going. I don't know, I heard that somewhere.

This past Monday an Esteemed Theater Colleague invited me to a staged reading at the Taper Annex (mira que muy muy soy!)presented by the Sundance Institute Theater Lab. The play was an interesting look at the debate on the war and Hollywood's role in the discussion.

After the reading, there were snacks and wine and I walked around with ETC while she spoke with other mero meros in the LA theater scene. As it turned out, I knew as many people as she did and some she didn't know. It was a huge shock to me for some reason. These are professional theater people who know even more professional theater people and this is taking place in one of the biggest theater (annexes) in LA. How the hell did that happen? My next thought was, "Aw shit, have any of them seen me drunk?" To which I immediately realized, probably. And if so, they were probably drunk as well.

While being amongst esos movers y chakers was definitely a high point in the week, it pales in comparison to what happened at the Broadway Bar

This is my first time at the Broadway Bar and it's pretty cool. Definitely has an old, "jazzy" LA kind of feel. The lighting's pretty dark, so I imagine it obscures how "old" the bar actually looks, but the vibe was pretty cool. The bartenders (2 dudes) work behind this small, circular bar. There was a good crowd, not really packed, but full. Even so, it took about 15 minutes to get served, and I was there with a chick baring cleavage...which leads me to believe that these were the kind of dudes for whom cleavage holds no sway(nahmean?).

The drinks were ok. However, they have a whole Champagne Cocktail menu that I didn't notice until about 15 minutes before last call, which was still enough time to sample the Kir Royales (muy yummies!).

Nice smoking patio. Just enough room for the relatively small population of smokers. Met some people from Detroit and Georgia, respectively. (Everyone around here is from out of town - love it!)

I wander around, talk to people, and then, it's about that time to hit the bathroom. I'm washing my hands and futzing with my hair when all of a sudden I hear, "Aren't you...You're the Quinceanera!!!"

That's right. I got reconized at a hipster, downtown bar, where hipster celebrities like Mo Gaffney, the bassist from Seawolf and other young, hipster professional imports hang out. AND I was recognized by a chicana hipster at that!

That's right. It's Quince, Bitch. :P

Me! Me! Meme!

2008-02-07T10:11:00.000-08:00

Music meme, swiped from Leesepea. I heart mooseek

Reminds you of an ex-lover: Silly by Deneice Williams

Reminds you of an ex-friend: Anything by Air Supply

Makes you cry: Drops of Jupiter by Train, Goodnight Irene by Leadbelly and Swan Lake: Act 1: No. 9. Finale: Sujet: Andante

Makes you laugh: Painkiller by Judas Priest

You never want to hear again: Smells Like Teen Spirit by Nirvana and anything by Paula Abdul.

Sums up your teenage years: Monitor by Siouxsie and the Banshees :)

You want to get married to: Man, it always changes. Right now it's a cross between As by Stevie Wonder, Sea of Love by Tom Waits,

You like to wake up to: Rock me again and again and again and again and again and again by James Brown with Lynn Collins

You like out of your parents collection: La Media Vuelta by Eydie Gorme and Trio los Panchos

Wouldn’t know about if it weren’t for a friend: Fugazi

You want at your funeral: Xanadu by Olivia Newton John and Fantasy by Earth, Wind and Fire

Did Someone Say Demise...?

2008-01-19T10:36:00.000-08:00

We are going into the final week of rehearsals for the new EL VERDE!!! show.

It's ridiculous fun this time around. I'm usually very nervous and stressed and intimidated. I work with a bunch of really funny and talented people who feel comfortable enough to try stuff out regardless of whether the idea is shut down or praised. The whole process is trial and error and each time around there's a different nuance, an added element of some sort. It is super tough not to laugh in the midst of all that giddiness.

And the 11:00 pm show, good lord, it just gets bawdy. Well, it has at any rate.

Rehearsal this time around has been overwhlemingly silly and by the end of hte three hours, I am severely worn out.

I am enjoying the process this time around. I am happy to report that after five years of performing, starting off with very little training, I am finally feeling comfortable enough to have fun instead of stressing over whether or not I'm doing it right.

AJUA!

La Quinceanera

14 La Muerte - La muerte tilica y flaca

2008-01-16T11:12:00.000-08:00

Las Santas Animas (2004) by Laurie Lipton

Went to a funeral for my friend's father yesterday.

A few friends who know her and didn't go asked how it "was".

How does one answer that question?

It was in a church. Theywere catholic so there was a lot of chanting going on with the rosary and whatnot. Alot of standing up and sitting down. A couple of large, beautiful flower arrangements.

The people selected to read parts of the rosary and "mysteries" read well and were engaging enough to keep me from drifting off into self reflection too much.

Lots of black.

Moderate crying.

My friend and her brothers gave extremely moving speeches about their father. They repeated that he was the kind of man who wanted to see his children happy.

That's really what stayed with me, how they remembered their father was as a man who moved to a different country in an effort to make life better for them, for them not to worry and for them to be happy.

Not a whole lot of show or bombast. As my friend Rocky put it, everyone who spoke, including the preist, was "genuine".

After funeral party included coffee, hot chocolate and champurrado, with some donuts and regular nuts.

If there was any family drama or tension, I didn't see it at all.

* * *

A few of the people I told about La Sabrosita's (nickname) father's passing didn't know what to do. There was a lot of "should I call?" "Should I wait?" and "Oh wow. That sucks." I understood the apprehension. I had been on that side before. But now I'm on the other side and I think, out of all the things that are going on in her world right now, someone calling to say hi can only be a positive thing.

I understand there's an aversion to thinking about death and dying because it brings the focus back on one's own pending loss of family and friends. But as my mom says, "no one's getting out of here alive."

Loss sucks. It hurts, then it heals. Getting stuck in the hurt because, for whatever reason, one can't let go...I don't yet know how to finish that sentence.

EL VERDE!!!

2008-01-15T20:18:00.000-08:00

Currently on location at the infamous (which means really, really famous) Casa 0101 in the Boyle Heights. One of my castmates kicked and punched a fridge earlier today and is trying to realign his toe while waiting to go on for our scene. He actually just told me to say hi to whomever is reading this right now, so, everyone, Jeremiah says hello.

On stage - Luke is dancing to an Elvis song with a tambourine and dancing like Elvis.

I got here at &;00pm and probably won't get onstage until about 9:00, after which I must go home and study, then write for my grad school writing packet which is due this Sunday. I then have to go home and try to make some room in my room amongst all the boxes that i haven't unpacked yet (I moved exactly a month ago today) because I don't have space to put everything away.

One of my other castmates just walked by and gave me the homie "chht chht" cat call.

The stage manager was zoned out and reciting some of the lines of the guy on stage. She caught me watching her and we busted out laughing.

The writer/creator of El Verde heard me typing and said, "You're just like Doogie Hauser."

I'm drinking instant Nescafe out of a styrofoam cup.

Yes, for this, for this I drone away in a beige cubicle to fund my theater habit. And it's worth it today.

One day, I hope my theater/film/writing.performing/singing habits will fund my zoning out habit wherein I get to sit around and look out the window and think.

Oh happy day!

East Meets Hive

2008-01-11T11:05:00.000-08:00

My roommate is a right bad-ass budding photog.

She came to see my show back in November and took this photo while waiting in line for the bathroom:

It was entered, by her very good friend Jason Shawn Alexander to the Hive Gallery's January show. Hers was the only photo in the entire exhibition full of paintins, drawings and a few sculptures.

There's been a lot of artistic movement downtown during the past few years. Lofts are jumping in development and they are full, full, full, of hipster artists, many of them from out of town, coming to LA to make their artists dreams come true.

And then there we are, CASA 0101, the little Latino theater that could, nesteled between neighborhood "market" and a pet store on 1st street in Boyle Heights, most of whose administrative staff was raised in Boyle Heights.

I'm supposed to be working right now, so I unfortunately don't have the time for elucidation that I'd like, but something about the fact that my roommate, Cheburey (nickname),who is from Salinas in the San Joaquin Valley(the area where my mom is from), took a photo of the theater that was featured in an artsy-fartsy downtown art show is, well, for lack of a better word, cool.

I was in a play nearly a year ago, Black Butterfly, Jaguar Girl, Pinata Woman and other Super Hero Girls Like Me with East Los Angeles Repertory Theater Company. The AD is friends with a bunch of downtown artist types and a couple of her friends painted the sets for that show, one of whom is a resident artist at The Hive.

It's just pretty awesome to see collaboration happen. Homies and Hipsters Unite! ;)

All is Quiet on New Year's Day

2008-01-02T08:53:00.000-08:00

Spent New Year's Eve at a lovely north pasadena home Wii'ing it up. A musician friend invited me to his friends house and bowling ensued. Bowling is seriously exhilarating and breathtaking. Motion sensor video games are an amazing concept. He and I met in this awesome acting class my friend taught and it turns out that we both want to be rock stars. He's got the advantage since he's already been one, however, we've met once to "jam" as it were, and, well, I believe in starts.

Followed the amazing Wii session up with a trip to the theater - Casa. there was a small, yet vibrant nye fest going on wherein I had the most amazing meatballs. Quite literally. Amazing meatballs.

And that was about it this year. Mellow, contained and uninterestingly not dangerous.

And, then, there was the impromptu rave...

Epifanias - Epipheries

2007-10-17T09:49:00.000-07:00

is this part of the process? is it part of the process to come to a point when one tires of sorting through beans figuring out who they aren't and why they aren't like everyone else and really starts to focus on who they are and that they just aren't like everyone else.

there's this restlessness, this burning underneath my skin to move. i've called it wanderlust in the past - that thing that took me 350 miles and 18 million worlds away from home to school, that pushed me to Europe twice, Mexico once. it's this push to leave everyone and everything i know to go out into the wilderness and be reborn. rather than just jump into it and suffer the financial repercussions later, i want so much to understand it. everyone around me seems so content staying put. how is that possible? it's not even something that i desire for myself, but something i feel like i should want in order to be considered (here's that word again) normal.

* * * 5:15pm * * *

i get the impression i'm not fooling anyone with this ruse of trying to be "normal". for example, in my current show - Carnivale of the Unassuming - I play a gypsy. Part of my costume is this henna eye with design on my hand. I work at a corporatE, C-O-R-P-O-R-A-T-E office. People have noticed. A few have commented. Well, today, one of the analysts in another department noticed and started talking to me about it. He's pretty dreamy and makes me nervous so, I blacked out and can't really remember what he was said. What I do remember is (and he always looks you in the eye when he speaks) that I was explaining the design (which is fading) and he said, "that's okay. I know you're weird. No big deal."

I don't know that I've had more than a 5 minute conversation with this guy. But apparently it's transparent. I am weird. Or maybe it's just what I'm comfortable with. At any rate, it was funny to realize that all these years (I've lost count - at least 10) of trying to be what I consider "normal" and agreeable and whatnot, I haven't convinced one person. I've been a fake, a fraud. I've apparently been bullshitting everyone around me and they knew. That's frikkin weird.

Del dicho al hecho, hay mucho trecho

2007-07-23T13:16:00.000-07:00

Image from the Tongue in Chíc*ana MySpace "site."

Serious. Time to put the money where the mouth is. I've all of a sudden got this ticking in my head. This sense of urgency and need to not waste time. But this is not the baby clock or even the wedding clock. Or maybe it is the baby clock but not the one I thought it would be.

Literally, as each day passes and I work here (at a job where I am TOTALLY safe and appreciated), I am less and less able to push this thought out of my mind: How much longer?

I've been putting things off for as long as I can remember. Maybe on account of laziness, but mostly due to the belief that I did/do not know enough to make my way as a writer/performer. Plus, I live in LA and a dime a dozen is being way too generous. But really, that hasn't been the factor. I just needed to know more, have more life experience, more preparation, more more more so that I wouldn't fall on my face and look like an ass. Because, of course, looking like an ass (in my world) means everyone in said industry will talk about me and my "antics" will prohibit any possibility of my ever getting a job ever again.

Now, this may seem a bit paranoid. However, I wonder if any industry or "professional" field has broken free from the rumor mill. I doubt it. For some reason people spend a whole lot of time talking about other people. Some people spend a lot of time listening and passing that stuff on. Others never do anything because they are deathly afraid that they will be the one's spoke about. And lastly, the proud, the few, continue to do what they do knowing people will probably talk about them and don't give a shit. In fact, at times they invite it.

Is there a way to be blissfully taupe? Perhaps. If taupe were warranted. But I'm getting the distinct impression that taupe, while soothing, isn't gonna cut it.

I just realized my blog post background and blog background are various degrees of taupe.

So, here goes: Tongue in Chíc*ana is a multi-media theatre group that blends elements of the turn of the century carnivales, carpa, vaudville, German Expressionism (and so much more) of which I am a founding member/writer/performer. A bit more info is available on the Myspace page.

We have our first show coming up in October of which I am the main writer. I have never written (and presented) anything longer than a 10 minute sketch. This will be (hopefully) a 60 to 70 minute show.

More info will be forthcoming. But, at this point, I don't think I'm going to get much better than where I am right now, so might as well dive it. Besides, if nothing else, I've got a whole lot of practice looking like an ass, but not much practice looking like a professional writer. I'll try that one on for size.

Hogareño, Hogareña, Haciendo Hogar

2007-07-17T16:42:00.000-07:00

Image from The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Unwritten Literature of the Hopi
by Hattie Greene Lockett

I wonder about domesticity sometimes. The choice to engage in building a home and/or a life with someone. More often than not it seems to be a reactionary choice - fall into a pattern or socially acceptable role to find meaning and purpose after you've run out of doing everything else you're supposed to do (i.e. school, etc). Or hooking up with someone who says yes because you think no one else will, or no one better will come along, or you can't think of anything better to do. Or stave off lonliness. That one I get. The fear of being alone is pretty powerful. As are most fears. It's not that I have a jaded view of marriage or anything. As a matter of fact, I love weddings. It's just that, that whole scene - marriage, family, house = HUGE bill and being locked down to a job to afford house payments - I don't get it.

Granted, I am 30 years old and have only recently begun to understand how important health benefits are in a job or just in general. And maybe marriage and family just aren't for me. As a matter of fact, I've stopped believing in "the one" and that each relationship is just a precursor to some overwhelming happiness that will rock my core. In fact, I can't even really imagine what living a life with someone else must be like. It sounds nice, but what for? I guess, I don't really get the whole concept.

So what then? How then do I gauge maturity in relationships when all roads lead to forever? There's got to be a loophole in that. Why do all roads lead to forever? Is there something I don't know? Do the stakes get higher? (The tax breaks for married couples with kids are exponentially larger than for single people who don't own.) Does the prospect of death, dying and sickness propel one into maddening visions of expiring alone in a dilapidated apartment hotel where no one finds you until your rotting, bloated body begins to smell (or the landlord comes looking for rent?)

Big fat kudos to those for whom this makes sense and have committed to that lifestyle.

Then again, maybe the whole thing is a lot more flexible than it sounds. Eh. Who knows? Lunch is over.

La Locura (the Protagonist)

2007-06-13T12:41:00.000-07:00

Image: Caterpillar Dream (oil on canvas) by Lori Early

It has come to my attention, yet again, that the first impression I give off is: bitch.

It has also come to my attention that I have a face that stays long after the first impression that also says: bitch.

I'd been okay with that for a while, made my piece with it and accepted the fact that in some people's language, all that surface stuff is jarring to them for whatever reason. Also, I'd rather be seen, initially anyway, as a bitch. Then, once people get to know me, they understand that those are just moments, parts and not the entire pie(lar). It's better than giving off a deceptive, sweet , "nice" vibe and end up turning a knife in someone's back.

Which brings me to crazy. I've been reading Veronika Decides to Die, about a wmoan who tries to kill herself and ends up in an insane asylum with only a few days left to live, as her heart was damaged in her suicide attempt. The subtitle says it's a novel about redemption, but I haven't yet discovered why.

At any rate, the bitch thing. it isn't me. It's a mask, as it were. unfortunately, it's the mask i wear when trying to be normal, acceptable, pliant. yet, when i have my honest moments, it's like setting off fireworks in a lampstore. or, when the honest moments are quiet and serene and vulnerable, there's some outside lawnmower or weedwacker coming through to trounce all over it.

is this the theater post pardem? this lack of meaning and purpose and refocus on everything that's wrong with me according to other people? how do i find these people anyway?

i've almost given up on the possibility of anything else beyond black and white and sometimes gray. everything worth doing is done with trepidation. everything that is better left untouched is manifested with great fanfare and flourish and embellishment. That is crazy. it's not even bold or courageous, but cowardly and reactionary. yes. going through life as a ping pong ball is cowardly indeed.

somehow i must find a way to resurrect the anima that supported all that. to be crazy enough to try on a mask other than fooch face.

Y...que?

2007-06-07T01:32:00.000-07:00

So what now?

"After the love has gone what used to be right is wrong."

So what happens when you wake up and you're on the top of a pillar of stone, you have no idea how you got there or how to get off? Do you jump to the next rock formation near you? Do you set up camp and hope for a rescue? Do you find a way to climb back down? What/

Is there some point when trying to "figure it out" falls away to silence, release and communion? Is it that simple? Release the grip on what has been and fall, floating, trusting that what will be will be the net that breaks the fall?

Don't know. but there is always some kind of net. Always.

"..Y Me Ire con el Sol..."

2007-04-12T16:30:00.000-07:00

Loss is a fact of life. So is, I might add, loss of life. Yet, why is it still so difficult to process? Death doesn't scare me. It never really has, but I used to be intrigued by it, still am, kind of…but it doesn't hold the detached fascination it used to. It's become attached to my emotions so being around it conjures pretty difficult emotional memories, but at least I know that they're memories.

The other thing with death is that, in most cases, people don't choose to leave you. It's just their time (obviously suicide excepted, but maybe not…more on that later). However, the idea that someone can just decide, sometimes on a whim, that you are no longer worth being around is terrifying.

I understand there are people who don't worry about it so much or come to terms with the idea. (well done you guys) Logically, it makes sense – someone or something leaves, there will be something else to take its place. It the nature of nature to balance things out, if something is lacking, an organism adapts to get what it needs. But for some reason, the ridiculously weak and faulty human mind can't seem to absorb that one to good affect. The fear of loss of emotional investment keeps any deeper kind of connection at bay. The fear of loss and future lack keeps the human organism from adapting to get what it needs. Pride jumps in. "I'm not gonna beg for your attention." "I'm not gonna chase after you. You either want to be with me or you don't." It's true, one should be aware that one is too good to be taking scraps rather than full meals when it comes to emotional investment. But then again, who's to say that one's scraps aren't another's 9 course meal?

**Addendum**

What twists and turns is not so much that someone will leave or does leave. It's that anticipation. And then the post effects, that there's someone out there who carries poison in them when they think of you. None of this is in your control. The only thing that is, is the approach, the outlook, the view of the situation you develop.

Mejor Sola que Mal Acompanada

2007-02-06T13:18:00.000-08:00

Young Woman in a Red Bodice Holding a Mandolin, 1868-70

Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot
French, 1796-1875
Oil on panel
18-1/4 x 14-1/2 in. (46.4 x 36.8 cm)
Norton Simon Art Foundation
M.1975.13.1.P
© 2002 Norton Simon Art Foundation

Mejor sola que mal acompanada – rough translation: better to be alone than in bad company.

When I would come home from grade school crying because my “friends” had made fun of me, called me names or done that whole exclusionary clique thing that young girls do for some reason, this was the warm piece of advice my mother would give me. That and “just ignore them”, which, incidentally, never works on 5-11 year olds who have nothing but time to annoy on their side. What I, in my youthful ignorance and naïveté took that to mean was: I must eat as much shit as I can to fit in and hope it buys me acceptance or I can be utterly alone.

Fortunately, I caught the tale end of Generation X and the universe sent me Pee Wee’s Big Adventure and The Breakfast Club, respectively, where I learned about being a loner. They were way more badass and got to roll with colorful people (Pee Wee and the Satan’s Helpers…hey, nice name for a lounge band). So I made the decision not to be “alone” as such, but to be “a loner”, mysterious, a loose cannon, a maverick whose crazy, screwball antics no one could predict…NO ONE!!!

Of course, that got a bit lonely. In my quest to protect myself from assholes, I had pretty much kept everyone at bay, my personality serving as bane, or as one person colorfully put it, “your personality is your birth control.”

So I have been conducting a life experiment of sorts (unbeknownst to myself until now), in an effort to determine how open it is safe to be. Sort of in the vein of the mythical groundhog searching for his shadow. In doing so, I have discovered something I never even knew – I can totally handle this.

Someone not liking me for all my faults (or my fabulousness) doesn’t have to affect me. It hurts when someone close to me (in love or friendship) decides I’m not good enough to waste time on. But hurt is nothing anymore. Hurt is not the end of the world. Hurt is a building block for learning, and fortunately, the lessons are spaced out more and more, now that I understand that they are lessons.

I still think that phrase, mejor sola que mal acompanada is true. It is better to be alone than in bad company. But there is so much more out there than ennui encrusted solitude and stank-ass bitches.

The Tempter

2006-12-26T15:31:00.000-08:00

From Dictionary.com
2. The desire to have or do something that you know you should avoid; "he felt the temptation and his will power weakened"
3. The act of influencing by exciting hope or desire; "his enticements were shameless

Temptation is a trick, tricky thing. I chose the previous definitions particularly because they seem to be indicative of the yin and yang aspects of temptation itself. I had no idea it was so nuanced. On one hand, temptation is determined by resistance to desire. On the other, it is determined by inducing desire in another.

But how is it that one knows whether they're tempting or being tempted? I am speaking particularly of being enticed, allured, and/or tempted by other people. Does responding or not responding to enticement make one a victim of a tempter? Or if someone responds to you a certain way, does that mean you have tempted them, whether intentionally or not?

I imagine it depends of the level of responsibility one wants to take in any given tempting situation. As a grown-ass adult(ish) person with experience, one knows what one is doing most of the time, whether or not variables (like alcohol, jealousy, boredom) get in the way.

Is temptation even bad? Why can't it be a signal, letting one know what needs are not being met? Just because this person sprang up in your life at this moment, and they are off limits, doesn't make them the answer to your problems, the plug for your void. Maybe the universe threw this person onto your lap (or you onto theirs) for the sole purpose of waking you up! To remind you that you have a pulse and you need some stimulatin'! Not necessarily to throw you, that person, their significant other or your significant other into a realm of utter chaos and despair.

Moreover, one can actually give intot he idea of temptation without actually going there. It can be much safer, less stressful, and can destroy the illusion altogether. The trend of late seems to be to take the good and positive in one's life and dissect until it becomes a shredded, pulpy mess. Why not take this wonderful ability and apply it to the debaucherous relationship one has built up in one's head?

The ridiculous downside to this is if nothing ever happens, one delves too much into the "what if's" and the entire friendship or acquaintenceship becomes awkward and eventually dissipates. You would have had all the drama and none of the payoff.

Unless, of course, the charming, seductive hellion in you feeds off of the adrenaline of longing, guilt, excitement, regret and despair. In which case, beware.

Image from:7 Deadly Sinners

Creation

2006-11-29T10:19:00.000-08:00

Creator by Jose Ramirez

There are theories that this existence is a series of creation and demise, life and death constantly rolling into each other. Only recently is this theory beginning to make more sense to me. I'd had this belief that life was just the one cycle - birth, life and death. But I think there is more than just the one life. This existance, to make the most of it, is an amalgam of several lives, some lasting longer than others. I mention that thinking of adolescence.

It was such a painful, wretched time, but I go back there for strength. Even if bravado is false, it was a propellent that got me away from home and dumped me in the middle of farm country, for better or worse. The cool thing is, I don't have to leave it behind. I thought I did in order to grow, but that's ridiculous, Everything in the past informs the present and has bearing on the future. The trick is not to indulge so much and maybe to create a life of prism colors using those initial pigments.

Meme for Me

2006-11-15T14:54:00.000-08:00

This is how hard core I am...watch:

Wanna play? It's simple. Copy, paste and if you've done it, bold it.

Have You Ever...

01. Bought everyone in the bar a drink(yes. All 3 of us!)
02. Swam with wild dolphins
03. Climbed a mountain
04. Taken a Ferrari for a test drive
05. Been inside the Great Pyramid
06. Held a tarantula
07. Taken a candlelit bath with someone
08. Said “I love you” and meant it
09. Hugged a tree
10. Bungee jumped
11. Visited Paris
12. Watched a lightning storm at sea
13. Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise
14. Seen the Northern Lights
15. Gone to a huge sports game
16. Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa
17. Grown and eaten your own vegetables(kind of...I helped water them)
18. Touched an iceberg
19. Slept under the stars
20. Changed a baby’s diaper
21. Taken a trip in a hot air balloon
22. Watched a meteor shower
23. Gotten drunk on champagne
24. Given more than you can afford to charity
25. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope
26. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment
27. Had a food fight
28. Bet on a winning horse
29. Asked out a stranger
30. Had a snowball fight
31. Screamed as loudly as you possibly can
32. Held a lamb
33. Seen a total eclipse
34. Ridden a roller coaster
35. Hit a home run
36. Danced like a fool and not cared who was looking
37. Adopted an accent for an entire day
38. Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment
39. Had two hard drives for your computer
40. Visited all 50 states
41. Taken care of someone who was drunk(PLIS!)
42. Had amazing friends
43. Danced with a stranger in a foreign country
44. Watched wild whales
45. Stolen a sign
46. Backpacked in Europe
47. Taken a road-trip
48. Gone rock climbing
49. Midnight walk on the beach
50. Gone sky diving
51. Visited Ireland
52. Been heartbroken longer than you were actually in love(Gah. all the time)
53. In a restaurant, sat at a stranger’s table and had a meal with them
54. Visited Japan
55. Milked a cow
56. Alphabetized your CDs
57. Pretended to be a superhero
58. Sung karaoke
59. Lounged around in bed all day
60. Played touch football
61. Gone scuba diving
62. Kissed in the rain
63. Played in the mud
64. Played in the rain
65. Gone to a drive-in theater
66. Visited the Great Wall of China
67. Started a business
68. Fallen in love and not had your heart broken
69. Toured ancient sites
70. Taken a martial arts class
71. Played D&D for more than 6 hours straight
72. Gotten married
73. Been in a movie
74. Crashed a party
75. Gotten divorced
76. Gone without food for 5 days
77. Made cookies from scratch
78. Won first prize in a costume contest
79. Ridden a gondola in Venice
80. Gotten a tattoo
81. Rafted the Snake River
82. Been on television news programs as an “expert”
83. Got flowers for no reason
84. Performed on stage
85. Been to Las Vegas
86. Recorded music
87. Eaten shark
88. Kissed on the first date
89. Gone to Thailand
90. Bought a house
91. Been in a combat zone
92. Buried one/both of your parents
93. Been on a cruise ship
94. Spoken more than one language fluently
95. Performed in Rocky Horror
96. Raised children
97. Followed your favorite band/singer on tour
99. Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country
100. Picked up and moved to another city to just start over
101. Walked the Golden Gate Bridge
102. Sang loudly in the car, and didn’t stop when you knew someone was looking
103. Had plastic surgery
104. Survived an accident that you shouldn’t have survived
105. Wrote articles for a large publication
106. Lost over 100 pounds
107. Held someone while they were having a flashback
108. Piloted an airplane
109. Touched a stingray
110. Broken someone’s heart
111. Helped an animal give birth
112. Won money on a T.V. game show
113. Broken a bone
114. Gone on an African photo safari
115. Had a facial part pierced other than your ears(my ears aren't on my face, but whatever...)
116. Fired a rifle, shotgun, or pistol
117. Eaten mushrooms that were gathered in the wild
118. Ridden a horse
119. Had major surgery
120. Had a snake as a pet
121. Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
122. Slept for more than 30 hours over the course of 48 hours
123. Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states
124. Visited all 7 continents
125. Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than 2 days
126. Eaten kangaroo meat
127. Eaten sushi
128. Had your picture in the newspaper
129. Changed someone’s mind about something you care deeply about
130. Gone back to school
131. Parasailed
132. Touched a cockroach
133. Eaten fried green tomatoes
134. Read The Iliad - and the Odyssey
135. Selected one “important” author who you missed in school, and read
136. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
137. Skipped all your school reunions
138. Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language
139. Been elected to public office
140. Written your own computer language
141. Thought to yourself that you’re living your dream
142. Had to put someone you love into hospice care
143. Built your own PC from parts
144. Sold your own artwork to someone who didn’t know you
145. Had a booth at a street fair
146. Dyed your hair
147. Been a DJ
148. Shaved your head
149. Caused a car accident
150. Saved someone’s life

Mentors

2006-10-12T11:36:00.000-07:00

The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind. ~Kahlil Gibran

The Mentor by Lora Craig-Gaddis

My grandmother doesn't eat ice. She apparantly had asthma quite a number of years ago. She says she used to have to try to sleep sitting up with the window open because she couldn't breathe. She eventually went to some fancy doctor in Pasadena (whom she took the streetcar to see) and he told her to stop taking ice with beverages. She swears that this is what cleared up her asthma. As a person with asthma my occaisional flare ups have more to do with allergens (dust, dog dander, cigarette smoke) or stress. Asthma, as well as allergies, have also been linked to emotional stress. My grandmother was under extreme emotional stress, with a festering wart of a husband (according to her, he was always cool with me), but no! It was the ICE because that's what the DOCTOR said.

Reverence can really do a number on one's head. Maybe the ice thing was just a placebo. Who knows if the doctor was able to detect bruises or fear. I have no idea. There are so many things one does in deference to "knowledge."

I could dismiss my grandmother's adherence to something so seemingly lame as ignorance. However, my subservience to intellectual authority runs deep.

When your a kid, everyone older than you knows everything. At some point that illusions dissolves. What becomes important is not so much the knowledge but the dissemination of knowledge and that manner that one shares or doesn't share what one knows. Essentially, it comes down to communication.

If, as a mentor, your only goal is to convice a group of people that your outlook on said subject and the world is the only way, then you are not a mentor. You are seeking to be a cult leader with a throng of followers.

I am guilty of having drunk various forms of kool-aid because I thought someone with more "authoritative knowledge" knew more than I about my capacity for creativity. Very recently it has dawned on me that I am a grown-ass woman. (yeah, seriously, like within the past few days. 29 does some crazy things, man). What this means (to me, right now) is that I have a good 20 years of experience and memory to draw on when it comes to creation. I know what inspires me (or doesn't) and more importantly, why. What I do or say or create, even how I dress may not work for some people. But what matters most is follow through, completion, closure, product, focus. Yes. focus. focus. focus. on the locus.

From CGJung.net

Out of the Blue

2006-10-02T22:49:00.000-07:00

Art by David Grigg

Born and raised on TV and catholic tinged mythology, I have developed and nurtured a belief in fate and connectivity, that all things happen for a reason, even if that reason is no reason at all. This, combined with a slightly obsessive and occasionally over-analytical need to find meaning in things that gets me stuck chewing events like cud over and over in my mind.

But receiving contact from certain people "from the past" can give one cause to wonder. And for someone like me, it gives me cause to obsess a little and try to figure out what it "means". Why now, cosmically speaking? Is it a nudge from the universe to clear out the cobwebbed corridors of that section of my heart? Is it time to look at my close (and sometimes embarrassing) relationship with this old friend and put it into perspective? Because I don't believe the intent is to reconnect, nor do I think it should be. As devoted as I have been to my unavailable crushes, I can imagine I'd be a good contact to boost the ego.

Or possibly it's time to just let go. Let go of the longing and wondering why I wasn't enough (or why I was just too much. The time is nigh to let go of this template I created that made him every bit of man that is too good for me: focused, driven, responsible and silly. Perhaps it is time to dislodge myself out of the swamp of sorrow and ennui I have been moping around in for the past few years. I can take this momentary message meted out for my benefit and use it as yet another cause for a rebirth to a new way of looking at the world, sans crap-colored glasses.

Or he just wanted to say hi.

Either way, good times ;)

Vendiendo Imagenes

2006-09-20T11:18:00.000-07:00

Previews started for Simply Maria and Los Vendidos. I'm actually in Simply Maria. At Casa 0101 in Boyle Heights.

20 years ago a 17 year-old girl from the BH neighborhood joined a writing workshop called the Playwright's Project. In that workshop, she developed this play, "Simply Maria or the American Dream", which eventually became an Emmy award-winning PBS special and began the career of one of the first Chicana writers to hit mainstream audiences. Two years after penning Simply Maria, she wrote another award-winning play which became the film Real Women Have Curves.

It is easy to dismiss what is familiar, to look with a critical eye on one's surroundings and covet what someone else appears to have. I can see the multiple spots in my carpet, yet see how yours as an intriguing landscape of mottled, textured browns. It's all a matter of perspective and how one chooses what to see.

I have, unfortunately, a tendency to take things for granted, to assume that if something easily comes my way, it must not be very worthwhile. Unless I stress, the value is less (NYCE!), which is, incidentally, a pretty unglorious approach to life.

So now, I do it all for the glory of love!

Married? Yes, Married.

2006-09-08T00:10:00.000-07:00

Weddings, marriage, relationships, OH MY! It's all coming closer and closer. I actually have to think about it more often. Last weekend (I think it was) I hit two weddings - a lovely Friday afternoon affair in the foothills of Rancho CUC-among a, and then a Saturday wedding in Sin City (that I incidentally don't remember a whole lot of...)

And I'm in rehearsals for a play wherein I play a mother and a wife - two roles I have never wished to play. I remember saying it a few times when I was a kid "oh, I wanna be a mommy when I grow up." Yet, I distinctly remember saying it because everyone else was. I thought it was something a girl was supposed to want. Then I started thinking about it and that whole vibe never really appealed to me.

It's possible, since I never saw anyone enjoy either one of those roles while I was growing up, that the mother and wife roles, like a big fat Tiffany rock or Johnny Depp, are slightly out of my reach. But then that's not entirely accurate. It's not "out of reach" as much as "out of concept." Like lychee used to be. I had no idea what a lychee was, so I couldn't really say whether or not I liked them. It's that sort of thing.

And now I have to "pretend" to be in love with this guy who isn't the least bit interested in my character, doesn't want to marry her, really and is just kind of a selfish guy. And I feel myself getting all kinds of frustrated because I don't know how to behave or react. I mean, I don't know what goes through the mind of a woman who ran away from her family at age 18 to be with a married man from who she got pregnant and who didn't' marry her until a few months after the baby was born. I'm like, I would never do that kind of complicated shit to my life. No...not THAT kind anyway.

But this whole situation has brought domesticity to the table. Maybe it's because 30's creepin up. Maybe it's just that time of the season. Or maybe I'm ready to at least entertain the idea of relationships as an extended hangout session rather than immersion into a non-verbal agreement wherein it is assumed that I change and become more quiescent or different.

Unless, of course, I've completely missed the point. T'wouldn't be the first time.

Gah! The pressure!

2006-08-22T23:38:00.000-07:00

So, I alpse in the blogging because I don't have anything interesting or profound to say.

Which leads me to "who the fuck do I think I am" that I gotta be interesting 24/7? I mean, for real, people get boring and lack insight all the time. Why should I hold myself to higher standards?

Why should I be above the life of a Quality Analysis Data Entry Clerk? Answer: I shouldn't! I've been doing that for the past two days and may be doing it for a few months. Is it thrilling? No. But does the sun rise and set on whether or not I remember to do something? Not sure, but I'm thinking no. The job is blessedly low pro. Boring? A bit. But I'm sure when I'm fully trained...well...in truth, I'll probably get bored and move on. But by that time I'll probably be done. And I'm still looking out for more. But now is just nice.

plus I have a few episodes of CSI:NY and the Ghost Whisperer under my belt that I managed to get done in down time *wink*...as an extra...yeah. EXTRA SPECIAL! :P and I'm gettin my play on too.

but yeah, the company I work for makes slot machines. I look at blueprints all day. LIFE IS GOOD!

:)

Hey World - Check Me Out!

2006-08-15T22:27:00.000-07:00

It can be pretty easy to forget the glories of the public library once one surpasses the age of, well, I guess 5 or something. Video games and really bad cartoons take over. Or else, by that time, one has been indoctrinated to the idea that owning things is better than not, so the quest becomes to own things - toys, games, stickers, and sometimes books. Since you have to give books back to the library, the thrill is gone...until now.

Being the struggling artist type, I have recently had to find ways to get as much of my free on as I can.

So, today I was harassed at the local bookstore for allegedly trying to steal Corduroy by Don Freeman. The thing is, the bookstore has magazines outside and books inside. I wasn't informed that you had to leave the unpurchased books inside while looking at magazines outside - completely inconvenient. At any rate, I spared the young dude my tirade and simply informed him that if I had wanted to steal something, I would not hover around the scene of the crime. I would so have taken off. And I would have gotten away with it. :P It did cross my mind that I should ask, but I decided to take a chance to see what happened. The funny thing is, in my younger, more rebellious days, I did steal books from bookstores. Yeah, how hardcore was I? I stole books and office supplies and the occasional bit of cheap makeup. Oh yeah, and tapes. And jewelry. Dang! I was a bit of a scamp, wasn't I? Wow. It didn't seem that terrible at the time. I guess the bookstore folks could smell the history on me.

Anyway, following that whole ordeal, I went to what I now like to call the last bastion of the PEOPLE - the public library. Now, it pains me greatly to see how some city libraries have fallen into ruin. My whole familiarity and affinity for computers came about because I was able to use them for free at the public library when they first came out in the early 80's.

The Pasadena Public Library, however is effing marvelous. It's so huge and well staffed! Now, Pasadena is a bit of a fufu-rufu area, so I'm sure them city tax payer dollars help out a great deal...and I say THANK YOU. If for no other reason - free wireless internet. Having been without a computer for a couple of weeks, I have a friend who was GRACIOUS enough to let me borrow hers for the day and, yes, free wireless for as long as the doors are open. Otherwise, to use their computers, you only get one hour per day for free, which isn't a whole lot if you roll deep.

But, yes, a whole lot of random words to sing the praises of the public library. I'm actually surprised the powers that be haven't thought to get rid of that yet. Or have I spoke too soon? (knockin on wood over heah!)

It's Tomorrow - Do you still love me?

2006-08-07T19:23:00.000-07:00

When in high school I had a bunch of posters on the wall, mostly of Robert Smith. Not the entire Cure, but just him. And some other musicians as well. They had to meet the guidelines of making music about unrequited love and being lonely in a world full of "normal" people. Heh. Actually, most of the Cure's later stuff is mostly love songs, albeit torturous love songs, but love songs nonetheless.

In my very wildly active imagination, I had this whole scenario dreamt up where I would go to England and meet him and well, eventually end up with his love child and be forced to work as a maid and nanny to support myself and this English-Mexican child. I was never actually going to do any of those things, but it was what kept my brain occupied during class (man, I needed to be challeged - but I digress).

One of the things I used to love to do was put on the Shirelles "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" and sing to these posters of him. Well, one in particular. I think I still have it at home. It's a black and white of him with purple accents. I don't know why I fixated on it but I did.

But man, I was so transfixed by unrequited love. Addicted to the lack, to the act of wanting and never getting. Some adolescent concept of what love was and it's so hard to shake. But to be honest, love is even too much right now. I would go for slightly more than like. It's like I haven't been in the ocean since I almost drowned, I'm not trying to go cliff diving. Even a pool looks too dangerous. I'm looking for a 3 foot kiddie pool but where in the hell do I find one? And at this age, what grown person goes into a kiddie pool without a kid? Woah, this metaphor just got kind of weird.

At any rate, I forget what teen book it was, maybe Forever, probably Forever, where it says something to the effect of not being able to go back to holding hands once, ahem, "consummation" has occurred. I had a boyfriend who concurred. My first boyfriend in fact (who has since found Jesus...Um, yeah). And I used to believe it to, but now I'm kind of hoping that's not true. Just because I rushed to the front of the buffet line doesn't have to mean that I'm not allowed into a 5 star restaurant for a 7 course meal that can take as long as I want it to, does it? NO!

Gah. I'm STARVING. ;)

Book Werm

2006-08-01T07:56:00.000-07:00

Tagged by Leesepea who was tagged by someone else. SO AWESOME. I finally feel back in the loop. I'm on a campus computer (can you believe it?!?!?!? - my effing hard drive is ded. Meh)

1. One book that changed your life:
Ramona by Helen Hunt Jackson - It is the reason I have the name Ramona and not Sara (which was a huge follow up - thanks Hall and Oats)

2. One book that you’ve read more than once:
On Writing by Steven King - It is the only book of his I have ever read. I was fully judgemental of this man until I read this and now I bow at the altar of the King! Totally demystifies and humanizes the writing experience for me.

3. One book you’d want on a desert island:
Lord of the Flies by William Golding or The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho - LotF just to freak myself out and The Alchemist for persepective with the whole higher purpose and possibility thing.

4. One book that made you laugh:
Blood and Gold by Anne Rice - I have yet to finish it, but damn, dude. I had to stop and start a few times. Oh the cry of the maudlin undead! Makes me realize the necessity of editors. :)

5. One book that made you cry:
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte - Talk about your gothic, unrequited love stories! It was FANTASTIC! So I read it in high school, big deal! :)[close second - The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte. Got to LOVE them Brontes.]

6. One book that you wish had been written:
Resumes and Cover Letters for the Creative Mind: Risks are O.K.

7. One book that you wish had never been written:
Lolita by Nabokov or the like.

8. The book you are currently reading:
The Hummingbird's Daughter by Luis Alberto Urrea

9. One book you’ve been meaning to read:
Stealing Fire from the Gods: A Dynamic New Story Model for Writers and Filmmakers by James Bonnet

10. Now tag five people:
Man, if 5 people read this thing, I will be estoked!

Ode to Dorothy Parker

2006-07-25T16:41:00.000-07:00

It is EFFING HOT

2006-07-23T12:05:00.000-07:00

Photo by Monapily

With the heat reaching 106 yesterday in this area, it is disgustingly hot. I am, in fact, melting as evidenced by this self portrait.

There are electrical storms to the east, tornados to the northeast, fires to the west, north and east, war in the far east, and no signs of this global heat lessening anytime soon.

The bough appears about to break and I am hoping baby has a better support system than a bunch of random ass people just watching it happen.

That and the resume has yet to write iteself. I've given it a few days off to collect its thoughts and find inspiration, a muse or something of that sort. But time, she is nothing if not consistent and this resume needs to jump on the ball.

Enough time has been given to its incubation. Ya es tiempo para DAR LA LUZ!!!

Here's to dar-ing the luz!

ResuME? No...ResuYOU!

2006-07-20T16:42:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia.com

I can't believe it. The past 2 hours have been dedicated to my ATTEMPT to write a resume for a simple telephone sales job I'm totally qualified (if not over-qualified) for. Why can't I do this? Give me a 10 page paper to write on the significance of Betty La Fea coming to the ABC network during a time of anti-immigrant sentiment. I CAN DO THAT!! Ask me to write an 8 inch column story on broadcast journalists visitation to a community college class - done and done. Ask me to write YOUR EFFING RESUME and I can DO IT. But, for some reason, the ability to reduce the last 13 working years of my life to convenient bullet points and "buzzwords" and I say BUZZ YOU!

It's like there's this secret code that hiring people have and if you don't fit it, then you are not deemed worthy. Man, get me into a room and I can tell you why I am qualified to call people to tell them why they NEED season tickets to one of the oldest theaters in California. Shit. Let me write copy to sell seats, subscriptions, EFFING BOOZE IN THE LOBBY, but don't make me repeat the same damn shit to you 3 different ways.

I just don't get it.

Am I making this more difficult than it has to be? Probably, but then I don't see how it is so simple. How does one even get a sense of a person from a list of "power words?" I mean, seriously.

I can't even pinpoint what exactly it is that I have a problem with. I guess because EVERY SINGLE EFFING TIME I write one of these and show it to someone, they ALWAYS have some suggestion: do this; no don't do that. no one's doing that anymore; why did you put this here?; yeah, that doesn't look good.

it's like, WHAT IS THE POINT if something about it is not going to be right? i have been trying to write these fucking things for the past 6 years. If I can't get it right after 6 years, maybe I just shouldn't be doing it. Maybe there is something to those resume services. Because, honestly, I would rather pay someone else to do this. In fact, I would now. But the thing is, when I am in a position to be writing these things it is because I am IN NEED OF A JOB. I can't afford to outsource.

GAH!

Freedom!

2006-07-06T17:11:00.000-07:00

It's amazing to see life as a blank landscape as opposed to a series of cause and effect events - one fuck up and the rest of the thing is dashed to pieces.

I don't actually know what happened. All I know is that I feel free, and it feels kind of wrong

Can quitting a job be that big a deal? Sure, if it's more than just a job. When it's living a life for other people, trying to fit (or not fit) their vision of you, then yes it is a big deal.

I took this Friend's quiz once (probably on Quizilla) and it turned out I was most like Phoebe. I never thought so.I thought she was kind of random and kind of a bitch. Whatever. I never really thought about Friends too much to begin with. A few nights back I saw this episode where she go works for Chandler. In the beginning of the show she applies for a job as drill operator. That got me to thinking about all the random jobs she's had. And how weird everyone thinks she is. And how she doesn't think so. And well, I conneccted to this blonde, euro-american, fabricated construct.

It's not as though I don't think about what I'm going to do next. I have a freelance bookkeeping gig which starts tuesday and will last a few weeks. But 40 or more hours a week enclosed inside a building, looking into the face of a computer screen for hours day in and day out just doesn't do it for me. I now refuse to believe that there are no other options, that freelance means lazy, that I can piece together a living without submerging myself in work, that piecing together a living means that I will be low on funds forever. I have been trying to evoke bravado from under the burnt ashes of dramatic, overstated humility. That way of humbling oneself before anyone else has a chance to do it. I'm not fighting against anything anymore. It can be just as simple as choosing.

And what do the chinese communist showgirls have to do with all this? They're singing "Don't Stop Believing." And they're holding on to that feeling. oh yeah

Nostalgia - Sweet Honey and Cheese

2006-06-15T11:44:00.000-07:00

Just cuz I'm feeling reflective on the high school bravado. Life was a bit easier (but way messier) when you couldn't see over the edge. These are just a selection from 5 glorious years of disaffected moping (it all started in Jr. High).

Thirteen maudlin anthems from High School

1. Last Dance - The Cure A woman now standing where once there was only a girl
2. But Not Tonight – Depeche Mode I haven’t felt so alive in years
3. Summertime Rolls – Jane’s Addiction …and disappeared among the shady blades
4. Monitor – Siouxsie and the Banshees Sit back and enjoy the real McCoy God bless random lyrics
5. November Spawned a Monster – Morrissey One November spawned a monster in the shape of this child
6. Shoplifters of the World – The Smiths Unite and take over!
7. Bloodletting – Concrete Blonde You were a vampire and, baby, I’m the walking dead
8. Blood and Tears – Danzig Since I’ve been gone, I hear you’ve been crying blood and tears
9. Slice of Life – Bauhaus I am your slice of life!
10. The Spanglemaker – Cocteau Twins Yeah…Cocteau Twins…lyrics…
11. Pluto Drive – Creatures Let’s go to Pluto. Let’s live on the dot
12. Gone Daddy Gone – Violent Femmes Beautiful girl lovely dress. High school smiles, oh yes
13. Blood Sugar Sex Magick – Red Hot Chili Peppers I mingle with the gods, I mingle with divinity - damn straight you do.

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In the Name of Love

2006-06-08T12:52:00.000-07:00

In honor of Ms. Leesepea and her James, who joined the throngs of my friends who are getting married (not to be confused with the throngs of my friends who are separating or divorcing). Ah yes, l'amour.

13 of My Favorite Films about Love

1. Moonstruck - because who doesn't love sweating, brooding, opera-loving, breadmakers?
2. Dracula - I mean, who DOESN'T want to be the devil's concubine. Ha ha hey.
3. Some Kind of Wonderful - Obligatory John Hughes (this one is my FAVORITE!)
4. Dirty Dancing - I have the time of my life watching Baby get pulled out of the corner.
5. Shakespeare in Love - Seriously, no idea. I'm not a big fan of Gwyneth, but it's just SO GOOD!
6. Ever After - Yes. I still believe in the myth that a hot guy could fall for intellect and a free spirit.
7. Breakfast at Tiffany's - Two drifters off to see the world...
8. Dogfight - Frumpy, chubby girl opens the heart of a jocky jarhead. LOVE IT.
9. Cinema Paradiso - first loves, man. so good
10. Don Juan de Marco - I want to be Johnny in that movie, but me.
11. Like Water for Chocolate - Food = love. Nuff sed. 12. Chocolat - chocolate + Johnny Depp = bliss.
13. Eat Drink Man Woman - chinese food = love.

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Just Watch Me Burn

2006-06-08T00:29:00.000-07:00

Image from Lin's Domain

Wow. A week and a half out of practice and I'm back to doubting myself again, analyzing this whole venture - "who really gives a fuck about what I have to say about anything?" says the dormant writer. A three-week notice seemed so far away a week and a half ago. I've jumped into the unknown with a seemingly not-so-solid plan. I have about 2 weeks to find something else. Actually, that's not the issue. The issue is fear of looking back over the past 5 years and finding that I haven't accomplished much. I mean, it's all been important to me - spiritual and artistic development and whatnot – but how to package a dilettante's experience? Is there a solid, consistent job where creative analysis and a will to understand are valued? Dunno, but I'm taking a gamble and hoping PCC will be letting me know. I've signed up for an intro Journalism class. Finally, an outlet for my slanted, marginally researched opinions!. A six-week course will get me started on a portfolio and help me realize what I already know. Not only that, but career counselors are part of the deal.

Sure, I'm almost 30 and thinking a JC can help, but it's school. It's the only thing I know how to do really well. I should. I have 18 years experience at it.

Some people move gradually and safely, planning one secure move to the next. I envy those people. I envy anyone who has been able to let illogical dreams die. I'm supposed to be practical. I should be practical, taking into consideration the sacrifices my parents made. I should be pursuing things that will keep my mom from worrying. Yet at the same time, it's that thinking that has brought me to this point. I've kept the huge interests, my "passions" if you will, at bay, on the fringes, in an effort to do the practical thing and keep my mom appeased, and because I don't want to seem like a flake to people. Because everyone knows flakes get no respect.

But that whole thing needs to be over. Enough now. I've been holding back for a while now. I have no idea why. It feels like the steps I've taken in these post collegiate years have led up to this point. I can stay quite, easy and safe, play psychic, and let continue to let what other people think guide my life decisions. Or I can thank the cynic who's been with me for so long, for keeping me awake and ready for those tennis balls thrown at my head, for occasionally correctly assessing unhealthy situations (and people) and for many other things. I can set that bird aflame - no matter how painful or frightening it is – and watch it burn out.

Or, I can quit my yappin and just git 'er dun.

Really, it's okay.

2006-05-25T23:50:00.000-07:00

Since leaving security for (temporary) instability is so difficult, these are 13 reason to convince those on the edge that it is, in fact, okay to give notice.

Thirteen Reasons to LEAVE YOUR JOB

1. You don't really like your supervisor - sure, you may feel like a terrible person, but say lah vee.
2. You don't really get your job - For example, you overhear your boss describe your position to an intern interviewee as "the glue who hold everything together", and you don't remember reading it in the job description. So you look it up and, yes, there it is on the list, right after trash matron.
3. Your bosses don't trust you...and let you know - If they have to arrange theri vacation time so that you are not alone in the office...well...It may be time to hop on the first trolley outta theah.
4. Traffic - It may not be worth 3.30/gal to brace the mystified looks the supervisor throws out as she's trying to telepathically communicate with you...rather than trying to do it with plain old vocal chords and mouth movements.
5. More time to work on that novel - seriously. Because, man, it will SELL (i'm serious. it will.)
6. Lack of Telepathy - How could you be so stupid as to not be able to read minds?
7. 10am reruns of the TYRA BANK'S SHOW immediately followed by AMBUSH MAKEOVER! - nuff sed
8. Bryman College commercials - Because, seriously, what is more fun than sitting on the couch, in the throes of a post collegiate, existential quandary, and learning it all would have been better if you just went to Bryman.
9. You could be underpaid somewhere more fun Like a movie theater. Hm. Health insurance or free movies. It's a tough call...although, they cost about the same.
10. Cleaning up after yourself i guess this doesn't really apply to mothers, but, man, come on. If the boss is over 16, they can pick up their own trash.
11. Johnny Depp doesn't work there - So why should you?
12. More time to bond with the cat - "So, you're a cat, huh?" "Meowr." "How's that working out for you?" "Maowr".
13. BECAUSE I'M AN ARTIST, DAMMIT. I'M AN ARTIST

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1. Geggie
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Thursday Thirteen

2006-05-18T10:05:00.000-07:00

Thirteen Reasons Why I *HEART* America's Next Top Model

1. It makes info-mercials look good! (Gotta love that sponsorship product placement).
2. Miss J. Alexander for transforming the freakish into fabulous!
3. De-mystifying beauty. We could all be that hot with professional make-up and a lighting crew.
4. Bitchy confessionals (I'm lookin at you Jade).
5. Plain old vicarious living. Because I don't know the next time I'll be in Thailand or England or Tokyo or Pasadena.
6.Learning the tricks of the trade - I loved the episode on enhancing your flaws from Cycle 5.
7. I'm down for anything that gives retirees life after work (ahem, Janis...Twiggy...Nigel...)
8. Glam-moore!
9. What can I say, I get a kick out of watching skinny, vapid chicks rail on each other.
10. Watching Tyra get all serious before she calls people's names. She swears she's curing cancer. Well, she's doing something much more important - curing low self esteem.
11. Learning about all the things I should be ashamed of - like the fact that I'm short, rrround and over 25 (HEAVENS NO!)
12. Gettin my weekly fix of runway techno.
13. To Quote this cycle's winner (formerly gap-toothed) Danielle (YAY!!!) - It ain't over until Tyra doesn't call your name."

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1. Wendy's Whimsies
2. Chana
3. Margie Mix
4. Elle
5. Norma
6. Jana
7. Karen
8. Susan

Authority Swan Song

2006-05-18T00:50:00.000-07:00

Image from AK Press

Time goes by so quickly when multi-living.

The non-profit arts management scene is growing on me. A very Honored Friend shed light on a problem I have been having my entire life – my problem with authority.

Children are oft regarded as unworthy of respect or as little villains whose sole goal in life is to make "adults" crazy. What I wonder is when the switch happens? (When does one stop regarding oneself as "youth" and take it upon themselves to condescend as an adult?). At any rate, my relationships with adult "authority" has consistently been rocky. However, now that I am a grown-ass woman, the need to defend and/or protect myself from said authority has dissipated. I found myself in a space where I knew "they" weren't against me, but still did not know how to be. The need to protect myself has been so great, ground into my muscles and emotions since before I can remember. Kids are not nice to other kids. Adults are not nice to kids. It is a trying time to say the least and I don't EVER wax nostalgic about childhood.

So, this Honored Friend suggests that my approach, obviously hindering my growth potential, can be shifted. "These women can be your friends, if you let them." My response is to list the ways that I am so different from these women who are closer to my mother's age than my own. I acknowledge that I can't have been very easy to work with since I don't exactly value the work the way they do. That job is not my life. My life is still in it's molten state and I don't exactly know what shape it will take. Honored Friend tells me to imagine they are my friends, and would I behave this way with my friends. In all honesty, I probably do, but right then a screw broke loose and it all made sense. Unfortunately I don't have the words to accurately describe the light, but it was bright.

I am always down to help my friends out any way I can. It never occurred to me that once authority moved to the side, there was an actual person who really needs my help as much as I need their money.

It also occurred to me today that I was chosen. Out of a group of candidates I was chosen to perform these duties. Regardless of the reasons, it is nice to be chosen.

Must sleep – full day of work and full night of rehearsals. And the hits just keep on comin.

I am MAKATO

2006-05-10T16:51:00.000-07:00

It's Wednesday - Why the hell not?

Which Characteristic From the Samurai Code Matches You Best? (You may find out your best trait)

Complete sincerity: You believe in being straightforward with others, and you expect the same from them. People would consider you a good listener, and one who is calm and mostly serious.
Take this quiz!

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Burroughs + Waits + Wilson = BWWHAA?

2006-05-08T00:04:00.000-07:00

"…some of these bullets are for me, and some are for thee."

Robert Wilson directed the current production of The Black Rider at the Ahmanson Theater in LA. This same guy directed a version of Parsifal which I saw earlier this year. And man, I have never felt time like I did that day, sitting and watching a 4+ hour, 3 act Wagner opera presented in minimalist, german expressionist style, ala the Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.

The crowd was a welcome mix of snobbery: from westside theater elite to the artsy fartsy, floating dandelion seeds of Silverlake. And goths. Don't forget - where thar be Tom Waits, thar be goths a-waitin'.

It was fascinating, rich, creepy and boring all at the same time. A bit long at 3+ hours, the make-up, facial and body contortions more than made up for it.

The music was very Waits-ian, as the singers did their best to emulate his whiskey-drenched, gravel sound. The dialogue was all TOO Burroughs with its random vocal inflections sped up and slowed down for what purpose, I have not a clue.

Rush tickets are the BEST. For 20 bux we were able to get orchestra seats only partially obscured by the speakers. Fortunately for us, the theater relics with season tickets made haste after the first act, freeing the way for us more determined folks. We would not be dismayed by lengthy, laborious butoh influence movement across the stage.

What impressed me most was the performers' ability to be so stiff and to hold stance for so long. Fluid, natural movement can be draining enough, but to be standing, performing, sometimes singing, in perpetual rigid stance and frozen grimace was amazing to watch.

I had a front row at the freakshow and felt completely at home. I wish my bed was a huge black pylon that rose out of fog, awash in bright light amidst the darkness of the room...so like my soul.

***Addendum - 5-10-06***
This write up in the LA Weekly pretty much says it all. Gawd bless the weirdos...

Por El Camino

2006-05-03T00:57:00.000-07:00

Interesting. I set out for this march (May 1, 2006 - International Worker's Day and "The Great American Strike" Day) from Pasadena, CA. I've recently started reading On the Road. So I'm on the Metro Gold Line reading this book and I work myself up to a virutal froth, totally envious of Kerouac for his adventures, his ability to hitchike without the fear of being raped or plundered, his overall freedom and the fact that he claimed his writership - and I'm distracted by a line of white shirts and jeans passing by me. I look up and around - the entire car is full of white shirted latinos. I hear the coversation fo cameraderie, solidarity for this march buzzing back and forth, in English and Spanish.

So I put the book away and open my ears - click click of Aztec ankle rattles from the lady by the door in full Aztec regalia, complete with baby in a stroller - and my eyes - more brown faces, more white shirts - and I feel something I don't immediately recognize: a sense of belonging. It's sort of reminiscent of the way I used to feel when I was in a mosh pit. Everyone was on the same page (more or less). We were all in it together and we were taking our chances with the thing. However, the unspoken rule was, if you fell, there would be strong hands and arms to pick you back up again. It also reminded me of the way that smokers relate to each other. People can be complete strangers, but smokers, when they find each other, united by a common cause, become immediate friends. That was what I felt on the metro. And I thank Kerouac. I have my own adventures, experiences and people to observe. I don't need to be envious of his white, male, post-war 1947 adventures when I live the reality of chicana life in 2006, and that is something.