livin' on a prayer

i had a dream last night that the tattoo i have on my shoulder was not a tattoo of matilda lying on her stomach reading a book, but a tattoo of matilda sitting next to a washing machine. she was sitting on a stool looking kind of dejected and i was staring at my tattoo in the mirror, my head craned around to see, and feeling very, very confused about how on earth i'd had a tattoo for 4 years and all this time i thought it was matilda reading a book, and there it was, matilda sitting by a washing machine.

none of the incredibly scientific dream dictionaries that i consulted online had an entry for "washing machine." as for "tattoo," i got:

" To dream that you have tattoos, represents individuality and the desire to stand out in a crowd. You want to be unique and different from everybody else, particularly if you do not have any tattoos in real life. Consider also what the tattoo is."

well, i do have tattoos in real life, and i'd love to consider what the tattoo is, but you won't tell me what "washing machine" means so i'm a little stuck.

also, i once had a dream that i had a portrait tattoo of all of the members of bon jovi on my arm. someone please write a dream dictionary where i can enter "tattooo washing machine bon jovi."

thank you.

how i spent my summer vacation

i can't really account for most of the last 2 weeks since school ended. what the hell have i been doing? there was/is unpacking to do (and yet, after 2 weeks with no job, how am i still not finished? i blame you, bottomless pile of craft shit--i'm such a friggin' pack rat). i have also been consuming even more media than usual.

i discovered recently that i am even nerdier than i thought: i totally love sci-fi novels. my little brother (who is 22 and lives in my mom's basement and plays world of warcraft all day) lists ender's game as one of his all-time favorite books, and while i used to be skeptical of him, he also turned me onto the his dark materials trilogy and he was totally right, so i trusted him again and damn it if my basement-dwelling little brother doesn't have really good taste in books.

sweet jesus, watching maria full of grace is stressful. i'm not sure i need movies that stress me out these days. remind me to never be a drug mule.

i remember watching the first year with my mom when i was home on break from college, when i was a 2nd-year film-studies major. her reaction to the documentary was "oh my god, i don't know how anyone does that." i secretly thought it might be a good idea. 4 years later i had a teaching degree and this documentary is about as close as most people have gotten to showing what my job is like, except they carefully edit down the most frustrating parts, emphasizing the relationships that the teachers built with their most difficult kids. they actually never bothered to really show what the obnoxious kids do during class. i would have had a lot more respect for this whole thing if they'd actually shown a kid slapping someone/mouthing off to the teacher. instead they just showed a lot of parent-teacher conferences, which are always horrible and uncomfortable for EVERYONE. not how i want to spend my summer vacation. someday i will edit this together with scenes from the 4th season of the wire and show it to all the kids applying to teach for america just to warn them.

maybe this week i will actually finish unpacking and watch a movie that doesn't stress me out.

breakfast

breakfast

i was going to post about how much i love summer, then realized i had absolutely nothing new or interesting to say on the subject and was basically just going to go "woooooo!!!! summer!!!" for, like, 3 paragraphs.

there is one thing i didn't really anticipate loving about summer: breakfast. i am not a breakfast person. i enjoy a bite of pancakes or french toast, and i like a poached egg as much as the next guy, but i prefer the lunch and dinner items and often lean towards the lunchy side of brunch (except when peer pressured, by which i mean any time i go out for brunch in chicago where brunch just means late breakfast, not breakfast-lunch hybrid). however, in the last few days, i've found myself totally excited to eat an actual breakfast.

this might be because i spend 75% of the year eating breakfast in my car with a bagel on my lap and a juice box in the cup holder. (one day earlier this school year i was trying to figure out how i could get juice into the car to eat breakfast en route and said to myself "gosh, i wish there was, like, a portable juice container... like a little bottle or something." what's up, it's called a juice box. duh.) i wake up absolutely as late as i possibly can in order to still get myself to work on time, so breakfast is not a sit-down kind of thing. now, most days, i have nowhere to be, and i have a brand-new kitchen table to boot, so i've started eating an actual breakfast.

breakfast for the last week has been vanilla yogurt, granola, strawberries, and blueberries. oh holy jesus is it delicious. other awesome thing about summer: the availability of fresh berries. i could eat this shit all day. also, look at me being all healthy! yogurt? granola? fresh fruit? i'm like a friggin' nutritionist over here.

alright, back to lying around it is (actually, i might clean up a bit--we'll see.)

come pick me up

hello hawk.

"that was what happiness sounds like." -me

i took advantage of not having to wake up at 6am to herd 9-year-olds by spending the night at the superchunk show grinning ear to ear. i haven't been that giddy at a show since i was 15, seeing sonic youth at the newport musical hall my myself, staring non-stop at kim gordon. i might not have been as giddy if i'd had to sit through the mountain goats and ponys sets, but i discovered the best not-at-all-a-secret about shows at the metro: sit out all of the opening bands in the smart bar in the basement, pay your $2 for pbrs instead of $5 for whatever shit is upstairs, listen to black flag, and go upstairs after people have stopped screaming for more nerd rock. i am late to this boat, but those of you who are even later than me, take note: you don't have to stand up there paying too much money for beer while you listen to music you don't want to listen to. if only i'd known this sooner we all would have been spared a lot of snarky comments.

makin' friendz

b'nocular and a'postrophe are sisters. they have lived together every minute since they were born. so when i couldn't cram both of them into the cat carrier at once and had to ferry them over to the new place one at a time, i was worried. posse got over the initial fear of the new place first and began to claim it as her own. then, when she noticed b'nox had shown up too, she got all hissy. what the shit?! that's your sister! stop bein' a bitch! this kept up for a whole day before they both finally gave in and realized they were still stuck together. now they's friends again. man, my cats are awesome.

they're chillin' in my new bedroom, which is the first room that i have actually put everything away in. there's nothing on the walls, but clothes are put away, shoes are neatly placed on my new favorite thing, "shoewall," and new bed is made and fancy-looking. now i just need to find something to use as a closet door and something to cover the window so the people on the deck right behind my building don't get a free show every day.

at first i thought i'd order fancy fabric and sew it into curtains:

then i realized it's way easier, and actually cheaper, to just go to urban outfitters:

so, easier and cheaper it is! thanks urban outfitters, sorry i always act all ashamed when i tell people where i bought your things. but no, i'm not wearing that retarded t-shirt.

summer!

the first official day of summer vacation* was spent moving. i'd been in my old apartment for nearly 2 years. it was fine. it was unbelievably cheap. it was "cozy" and it had "vintage charm." it was only when i moved that i realized i'd spent the last 2 years living in a dank-ass cave.

oh, look, cute! except that that is the couch which is next to the bookcase which is next to the nightstand which is next to the bed which is next to the wall. (and oh, on the outside of the right frame there? a wall.)

see how dark that is? that's not just 'cause i didn't use a flash. or because it was nighttime. that was how that place ALWAYS looked. 9:00 am? dark. 3:00 pm? dark. see that curtain behind me? that's a window! but don't get your hopes up yet, that window looks out onto a decrepit, dirty, enclosed porch. also, that's me sitting on a chair in front of my computer, which is chilling on top of my record player, which is between my dresser (that i couldn't open all the way because the bed was in the way) and the t.v.

holy crap, 2 years in a dark, dark hole!

so i spent my first day of summer break moving here:

what's that? windows?! natural light?! the bed isn't in the same room as the couch? who knew these places existed?

ok, it kinda looks like crap now, but i moved in yesterday. you've seen boys' apartments. at least i plan on putting stuff away. and buying a new couch.

the downside: i actually had to move. the physical act left me with an impressive collection of bruises and cuts (the cats weren't too happy to be moving at first--they came 'round when they realized they could sit in windows, run around, and sit on the edge of the tub while i showered again).

what's up summer?

*by "first official day" i mean the first day that i would have had to go to work but DIDN'T.