Okay, right, also

Sarah yesterday was all, "you should take pictures of what you can see from your window!" And I was all, "whatever."

But then, today, I'm looking out my window and -- well, backstory.

So, there is this big green space across the street from me. I understand it used to be a highway onramp, or something, that was subsequently destroyed in the last big earthquake. Anyway, it's this green space the city owns and has been debating for ages about how to develop. It's a weird wild spot in the middle of a pretty dense urban environment. It's completely untended, there are fences and locks all around it. Generally, it's empty, but today I looked out and saw that some crazy homeless guy had broken into the space and was, like, living in the wilderness over there. Rocking a lot and looking around himself in a mentally-ill sort of way. Creepy!

So, I took a picture of that. You really can't see him, which is disappointing, but, still:

Dude, I must be high.

So, thanks to Casey, now everyone keeps saying that I'm living on vacation.

Which, kind of, I am -- but it's more like a super intense business trip. Lots of work, lately, so much less time to write about adventures. Or, kind of? To have them. Anyway, so, right -- here's my random photos from my Sunday evening walk.





Today, I walked through the Castro, back through Noe Valley and the Haight.

It's a foggy evening, which is welcome enough after a solid two weeks of dazzling sunshine, crisp, clean, blue-skied days. The type of day where the air is cool, there is a vast temperature difference between sunny spots and shady spots. The type of day where the light pops every little detail into focus, highlights the texture of the walls, creates perfect, sharp, clean lines along the rooftops. Those days are especially dazzling in a place where all the architecture is washed with bright colors, pastels, whites -- the streets become traps for the light, it bursts from every surface except where there are sudden sharp shadows, expanses of dark sidewalk you squint into, stepping back into coolness.

Not, though, this evening -- when the fog rolls over the hills and through the streets, dense billows made up of millions of fine droplets of water, blown by the breeze from the ocean, trapped in the trees and pouring from alleyways, long hills plunge into clouds beneath you, towering peaks above you create whirling vortexes.

It feels like a cool mist on your skin, it creates a sense of sweet melancholy, a sense you can enjoy because you recognize it as just a moment.

It smells like water, and salt, and pungent, sappy green, like sharp eucalyptus, like pot smoke, like grilled meats. It smells like rotting vegetables, some sweet floral smell that evokes my grandmother's Maryland garden. It looks like. . .

well, I guess it looks like this --

Native?

This morning I went outside and thought, "It is so damn cold."

It was 55 degrees.

It's only been a few weeks.

Um. . . what?

I'm still recovering a little too hard from my night at the most amazing Karaoke bar in the Castro. . . words seem hard. Therefore, I give you Pictures. No, they are not drunken Karaoke pictures, fuck, I didn't get those. They're OMG IT IS BEAUTIFUL OUT pictures.

And this, this must be Daddy:

The Inevitable

All throughout the whole moving process I've been quite purposeful and organized, also resolved and at peace with my decision. This has been good -- I had a couple of moments -- one in which I called my friend Susan and just sort of sobbed on the phone in a hysterical, stressed out way and then immediately felt better (while she, I suspect, felt worse. Sorry, friend)-- but mostly kept my cool. Surprisingly.

There has also been the need to put on the good face -- for all the people in my life who are not super happy with this decision. I mean, they'd all say (sincerely, might I add), they're happy for ME, but in a purely selfish way, yeah, it sucks. A friend is leaving. It sucks for me, too, but if I admit that, then I get sad, and if I do that for one person, I'm doing it for all you suckers, and suddenly I'm all morose and moping around and then everyone's like, "aren't you leaving already?? Jeeze! Get a grip!"

ANYHOW, so, the last couple of days, my first days at work, I've been struck with a melancholy of missing people.

Which co-exists with the peace about a good decision thing, but still kind of sucks, because -- d'uh -- I miss my friends.

I also have these moments of missing my comfort zone, even though I am happy to be out of it, it's a good thing, but the neurotic perfectionist in me seriously hates starting a new job. I have this irrational idea that I should know EVERYTHING IMMEDIATELY. And I stress when I don't.

Which, I know, is stupid.

I guess all this is to say -- huh. I kind of have no pithy recap. Just, I suppose, feeling human today.

But still super happy to be here -- it's effing beautiful and my job is cool and the people there are great.

Will go back to donning my super-human suit tomorrow.

GO ME!

For BSG Dorks

OMG, guys look who I saw on the train --



Right now he's totally either:
a. having invisible mind-sex with a cylon mind chip
b. formulating his memiors designed to rile up the working class
c. betraying the human race
d. riding the N Judah
e. all of the above

(seriously, though, compare and contrast:

You're right. Baltar is way better dressed. I also don't think he rides public transportation. If he wasn't in the brig, I mean.

pink and sparkly

On my way to the library on Sunday I suddenly found myself amid the most amazing parade of little girls in fluffy dresses and sparkly shoes.

Hundreds of little girls. All in little dresses, many looking as if they themselves had picked out the ensemble (think tutu and red cowboy boots).

Turns out the ballet is on the way to the library.

One little girl was pushing a giant teddy bear in a stroller.

This was one block away from a corner where it seriously smelled like a giant cat had pissed, daily, for years.

That's variety for you.

OMG SUSAN!

This is right down the street from me.

It's totally a sign.

I mean, yeah, literally, it's a sign, but I meant that in a more metaphysical way -- you know what I'm saying.

Rattle and Roll

Thursday night I was super exhausted from my busy unemployed existence. Seriously. Phew.

So, I snuck into bed early, cozy with my book. I thought maybe the cat was jumping on the bed in a clumsy-boozy-er way than usual, as there was a little shimmy. That lasted longer than it should have.

A couple of thoughts flashed through my head -- starting with that scene in The Exorcist where Regan insists that her bed is shaking. Someone (Dad, I'm looking at YOU) let me see that movie at an outrageously early age, and the idea that I might get possessed by a demon was central in my early phobic period. I remember lying in my bed in the scary dark really trying to make sure that my bed wasn't shaking, a sure-fire early sign of demon possession. Anyway, I dismissed that idea pretty quickly and moved on to the realization that, hot-damn, it's an earthquake! Sweet!

There is a real sense of being in the moment at times like this, when you're feeling the escalation of the quake, a little jumpy and vaguely threatening, like the ground is growling, warning you that it might strike or it might just sit there and eye you warily, but you better just be still, bitch. There was rattling in the kitchen, I thought of things that might fall from shelves and walls.

It lasted forever. Slow shimmy in the quiet.

The phone rang, when it subsided. I ran to answer, and Anne said, "I was just calling to ask IF YOU FELT THAT EARTHQUAKE?"

I was sort of gleeful about the whole thing. It kind of felt punk rock to me.

The whole concept still -- even the ads on the busses for this site, complete with its friendly icons for potential distasters -- CLICK HERE FOR TSUNAMIS -- gives me a sort of dreadful thrill. I kind of want to clap at the insistence that I “DROP, COVER AND HOLD ON.”

I'm aware that this is probably a completely inappropriate reaction, but I'm cool with that. I suspect it's better than being terrified all the time. And, I suppose I'll get a couple of jugs of water and some canned soup or something, just in case.

Just in case the ground goes all PUNK ROCK on me again! EFF YEAH!

This Guy Is Clearly Crazy.

I saw him RUN UP THE STAIRS from the Muni. Like, hree straight flights. Full on running. Fast.

Also, I had an Irish Car Bomb last night. Did I mention that? Did you know that when you drop the Baileys into the Guiness it curdles? I drank something curdled.

And this guy is running up stairs.

Crazy.

Local Flavor -- Now with very expensive polyester glitter.*

I don't start my new job until Monday.

My stuff came on Friday, which kicked off a three-day unpacking-and-organizing one woman show -- I might have been a little intense during that time. I emerged, blinking and dust-covered on Monday morning thinking, "What now?"

I've been a little task oriented. I think that behavior is something about staving off anxiety (WTF HAVE I DONE?) and other such unpleasantness.

So, this week has been spent, much of the time, going on Adventures, studying my map and plotting public transportation routes with a vengeance.

Yesterday I took a walk down Market Street, which, as it turns out, is both a main byway that bisects the city and a teeming petri dish of crazy. I'm not exactly a stranger to crazy -- Chicago has crazy, they do, I just think, much like kudzu, it's tempered by the harsh winters. In San Francisco, the mild climate and rich fertilizer of liberal leanings and general Bay Area-ness leads to a hearty and varigated display of fully actualized crazy.

Crazy mills about quietly, crowds of crazies act as a general groundcover and a few bloom from the crowd like lovely strange blossoms.

Like this chick:



(Forgive the poor image quality -- it's best to photograph them from behind a cell phone, so you can perpatrate like you are texting)

So, here's what's happening there:

This lady is snappily dressed in leather pants, a fierce leather jacket, and a studded belt. She is wearing white cotton gloves. She is arranging and rearranging the mattresses that fill this dumpster and then yelling down at the milling crowd of groundcover crazies, who are summarily ignoring her. She is yelling: "NOW! PRETTY NOW, YES!" She's a little yoda-like in her grammatical construction, which is a nice touch.

This chick:



Note the bright hues -- the yellow hair, the fushia leggings. I caught this snap of her as she was striding indignantly away from a bank of pay phones(very rare!), where she had been yelling and gesturing wildly into a reciever.

These were the only two lucky shots I got -- later, I went to the Museum of Modern Art, where I actually heard a woman say, as she contemplated a painting, "Nice use of color."

Crazy.


*The local news is covering the upcoming Chinese New Year parade, and the floatmaster just told the intrepid reporter that they used nearly 600 pounds of glitter in the construction of the OVER TWELVE FLOATS -- including these lovely coins, hand-etched out of foam rubber, and covered in "very expensive polyester glitter. The best in the world." Only the best for you, people.

Always Something There To Remind Me

I swear I'm not doing this on purpose, but, again -- Skahen, chekkit: