Acupuncture college.

I've hardly any idea whether Charles is alive or dead right now. More probably he's angry at me, though for what I cannot possibly imagine. More likely still, he's just coccooned again.

In the spirit of "there's a last time for everything", I did go out with him last night. The Ranch, of course, it being Friday. Did not black out this time and rather enjoyed the evening 'til of course he picks up or is picked up or whatever. Last call rolls 'round and he's going home with his new freind, ok, great, so I don't have to drive him. Get home call his house leave an I'm ok hope you are too message plug in the phone and go to bed. Next morning there's a message from him that the the guy he went with "took a swing" at him. Have since called back a time or two and left a message but haven't heard a thing. I think he did get home, at any rate, but I'm not sure. His message to me -- 2h51am -- is hardly clear on that, but the timing makes better sense that way.

Went to Southwest Acupuncture College today for their open house. I'm absolutely going to do this. I don't care what it takes, if I have to get a few hours out of the way at TVI before getting admitted or if I have to take out a student loan and spend the next ten yeasrs paying it back it absolutely doesn't matter. Before I'm thirty-five I *will* be a Doctor of Oriental Medicine working with HIV patients in the State of New Mexico. If I still need a few hours, I will make them Chinese, Chinese, Chinese. Language, history, cooking, whatever. Just get the hours and begin to immerse myself. The Botany and Anatomy I'll take at SWAC. If I need to work part time and go to school I can, but no job -- no job is more important than learning the healing art of the needles. Hoping Foxes wants me working there half as much as I want to work there, still think I'd be good at and enjoy it; still giving it 'til after the weekend before calling them back, letting a few other applications around town sit a few days before calling them back, too. I won't work graveyard. Just plain out of the question. I have to sleep at the right time for human beings to do so and will not undermine my health like that again for any reason.

I've quit smoking, as of this morning. It doesn't make any sense anymore. Strange how it's like waking from a dream.

Went to the Erna Ferguson Library yesterday --- the nice one -- and checked out four DVDs and two boooks. Yes booooks. It's just like going out to buy things except it doesn't cost you anything. I must remember that trick, especially until I get some cash flow.

I'll make one hell of a good doctor.

Oddly enough I want to sleep right now.

Good night.

Craigslist.

I am having a perfectly dreadful time right now.

I will not go into details.

Yet.

Suffice to say the ground has shifted yet again beneath me and I'm none too certain what to do about it.

I'm OK. A little dizzy, maybe. Don't get me wrong. In a word, or two: simple money anxieties. Not life or death, by any means. But still, I hate it, hate it, hate it. Did exacerbate things to some degree but not causatively: also seems the whole world's out to screw me in the rattrap all at once right now as suddenly out of a few very short weeks' developments come a couple of separate series of broken promises and personal and professional betrayals (all of which by this point I should simply expect, always) interweaving to synergistically advance my apparently imminent demise. I find myself effectively right back where I started when I moved out here eighteen months ago and did some very stewpid things and wound up starting from scratch, which wasn't such a bad thing maybe for me at the time. But I'm not twenty-something anymore and I'm getting sick and tired of these loopy games where I seem to get ahead, fall back, get ahead, fall farther back in endless cycles. Bloody samsaric. Built myself up over the hardest and most downright brutal year of my life to where I'd never managed to go before and now find myself after a few good months right back where I started, if not actually further behind. Got to put in some more job applications tomorrow. Already applied at Foxes but that's not going to support me by itself right off the bat, assuming that it even does go through. The way things are right now I wouldn't be surprised to be turned down by the down and out old drag queens' bar. Tomorrow I apply here -- my immigrant grandfather's trick: "work where there's food" -- and at a great big independent bookstore. And who knows where else, besides. One step forward, two steps back, it seems.

Felix be with me.

(To top off all my current misery, they're playing this dreadful muzackish reggae thing right now. I fucking hate reggae -- with a very few exceptions. guh-bumpa-bumpa-bumpa-bumpa-bumpa-duh-duh. bigots.)

Have a couple of posts about the whole situation I've written out at home and am waiting for things to resolve one way or the other before posting them. They are both pretty scathing and I don't want to go too far, too soon. Don't want to say anything I might regret. Don't want to tell it like it is if there's still any way for me to wriggle out with the slightest shred of dignity before I become the fiercely righteous Palden Lhamo on the back of a flaming tiger, diamond thunderbolt in hand, 'cause once that happens there ain't no turnin' back no how. Don't want to burn my bridges 'til I'm sure there's nothing worthwhile left behind me.

No one gets badmouthed by me who doesn't truly deserve it.

The good news, what there is of it, is that craigslist finally has made its way to albuquerque. Good. Good job listings. Good other listings. Put in a couple of applications for jobs listed there.

Apologies to my imaginary freinds -- the only ones on whom I can ever count for anything -- for ignoring you ever so dreadfully these past few days. Weasel sent a package. Thank you for whatever's in it -- I haven't even opened it, it came either yesterday or day before. I'm still waiting for the *really* dark moment to descend on me when I'll need a package to open to cheer me up. I have coccooned. I'm going to stay a bit coccooned likely until I have dependable employment. I have to concentrate with all my being at this moment. I have to break some few remaining bad habits. Please do not take my ignoring your kindnesses for these few days personally. I have to put all of my energy into some sort of transformation. Hard to explain. You'd have to be me to understand it. I have to be extremely focused.

Be well.

An idea takes hold.

Monday morning. At Flying Star. Finally made it here. Ordered two blueberry pancakes and coffee. I must remember to come here at least as often as I go out drinking. I enjoy it way more, spend far less money, and have nothing like the same dreadful consequences to deal with the next day. Besides all of which it keeps me properly civilised.

So there's this advertisement at the back of the weekly "Alibi", which is sort of Albuquerque's equivalent to "LA Weekly" or Seattle's "The Stranger": "Alternative Lifestyles Bar" hiring, "AM/PM Shifts Avail., Serious Inquiries Only", and a phone number. It's been there from time to time. Most of the ads in their employment section strike me as specious -- you know, of the "make $10,000,000,000.00+/wk. licking envelopes at home in two hours a day of your spare time" variety. Besides which: "alternative lifestyles"? Didn't that idea fall definitively into disrepute at least as early as the '70s? What kind of pathetic loser would ever actually look for a job in the Alibi? Of course, I am curious. I've toyed with the idea of working at Foxes since about when I moved here. What a place to gather material for my novel. Live and work on Central. It's also where all the really good bartenders seem to start, a sort of "rite of passage"/"baptism by fire" kind of place before they get to work the AMC on Thursday nights. In an all-too-typically negative frame of mind I just assume it's either Exhale -- the (presumably strictly) lesbian bar out on Fourth St., or the twink bar neither I nor any other self-respecting homosexual of actual legal age can stand to set foot in. Finally on a hunch, while turning the idea of working at Foxes over in my mind, I look up the number in the Phone Book.

Whaddaya know. It's none other than Foxes itself.

Of course it's a freakshow place, everyone says. Can't be worse than Frontier at graveyard, which is the final clearinghouse for all of Albuquerque's various freakshows as the concerts let out and then all the bars all close, when you get waves and waves of people coming in, nonstop, for six hours at a time from progressively further east and west on Central, more than a few of them quite armed and many more than that just dangerous. Besides which, by now I actually have a pretty good sense who belongs in the bar and who doesn't: one bad experience is more than enough to teach for good the difference between a straight man who's just there because it's in his neighbourhood and he wants a cold beer with conversation and a straight man who's got "issues" with gays and is there to sell drugs to or otherwise harm us. Of course, depending who you ask, the clientele is "low class", "down and out", or just plain "desperate". Repeat my last comment about Frontier. Of course, the tips are bad. Tips at Frontier were downright nonexistent.

So I'm gonna call Charles in a little bit here. I call him around nine thirty and usually he's ready to start working by eleven or noon. I've been up since 5h30 AM. I've already watered my own plants, before the sun rose -- you know, when it actually makes sense to water. The gentlemanly hour I can handle -- but honestly, there are times it just makes sense not to wait 'til afternoon to start working in the garden -- like today, when it's gonna get up to a hundred. When it's over ninety you can get pretty wiped out in one hour flat. Love him, love the job, wouldn't have done anything differently, but I've just gotta make the rent this month and then make something else happen that I can count on for a steady paycheck.

As for Gertrude's, well, the pay ain't half of what I get for gardening. And I kind of get the impression I was hired because of Charles, because they didn't want to lose me as a prospective employee even though they didn't really need me then and there. Oh look, here's a guy who really knows antiques, who can get all the clocks actually running on time, whose heart is in it, who can maintain a freindship with Charles despite his being Charles, but who probably couldn't sell a bulletproof vest in Iraq if he tried. Well, maybe he does have potential, but it's nowhere near busy enough to justify having him around every day just to dust things. So while I do remain on payroll there I remain essentially "on call". When they get busy, I will hear from them. And not before. OK.

I think I'l go ahead and post this. Then call Charles. Then check some online classifieds to see what other jobs might be available. Or maybe not: the Foxes idea has hold of me now, quite firmly. I could call that number, but better still to just go by. Especially if Sid is there. I believe he makes all the hiring decisions, and we already get on quite well, at least in terms of server/customer. I think he knows my interest in the place goes far beyond its being "a convenient place to get sloshed" from our conversations regarding the history of the various bars and bartenders in Albuquerque and my observation that he should interview for the Pride archives. Hell -- if I work there, I have a double-legitimate "in" to interviewing all the best-loved bartenders in town as a whole independent project. It probably pays minimum wage -- but if I get enough hours, and update my best Starbucks acts for the tips, I can scrape by somehow.

Just called Charles. He's still asleep. Forget the classifieds. It's almost ten. Foxes opens at ten. I can go home, shave a bit, plug my computer in to charge, run a couple of errands, and probably be at Foxes before Charles even wakes up.

Later!

The aftermath.

My car was not, in fact, at Charles' house.

It was at the Ranch. Way out on Central.

As I discovered after walking the three miles back to Charles' house.

Curtis drove us home. I don't remember meeting Curtis. In fact, I don't remember anything from the time I ordered a drink around 1h15 in the leather bar 'til I found myself walking home walking home from Charles' at around 3 or 4 AM. Two hours: total blank. Extremely scary. I absolutely don't remember spending the last of my money, nor the fight in the parking lot (which thankfully I was not a part of), nor Charles asking whether I had my laptop in my car, nor getting into Curtis' car, nor riding home. I just remember being at Charles' and not wanting to sleep in the parlour because of the mice and my preference not to contract hantavirus and walking home shortly thereafter.

Needless to say, I spent most of yesterday walking and chasing the bus. Never a terribly pleasant way to spend a hot summer day when you're wearing all black. Utterly ridiculous.

So: what was the mistake? Several. Started out too early -- we were at the Ranch by nine. Of course Charles never leaves 'til after last call, so that's five hours instead of a mere two or three you'll want to be standing around with a drink in your hand. The place was extremely busy. Started out with too many red bulls already in me. Then drank a couple more with vodka, and finally switched to martinis with gin. Any time I wind up at the Ranch drinking martinis it seems I wind up spending the next day retrieving my car. Ridiculous. But they're actually pretty damn good martinis. Way better than you should ever expect to find in a cowboy bar in Albuquerque. But of course you have to drink them pretty fast while still keeping something in your hands, and -- bingo. Disaster.

High on red bull.

A very good day today.

Put in two hours, mostly deadheading roses, at McMansion. Winds up it isn't half as bad as I'd expected.

Then to Sissy's to get paid. Woohoo.

Then to the Manor to check the plants out front. They're moist enough we don't bother watering them again. Woohoo.

Then to Gertrude's to get paid -- again. Woohoo.

I've got a little money now. Not much but I can go out tonight and eat tomorrow and know I'm getting paid again next week and not have to worry. Also didn't cash the check so even if I drink a wee bit more than I should tonight I'll still have cash at hand when I need it.

Came home and bathed and dressed. All black. Black dress shirt, pants, suspenders, socks, shoes, hell, even black underwear. Not that I expect anyone to notice that, of course, but It's not everyday I can successfully pull off the all black thing. Tonight, I absolutely dare to do it. Oh -- one thing isn't black: my thin red matador tie, which if anyone asks was last worn -- indfeed, the very knot tied -- by Manolete himself. I daresay I am drop-dead gorgeous, for one who flatly refuses to be ruled by the fickle dictates of fashion.

Charles won't be ready for me to pick him up 'til eight so I head out to Talin Market -- the incredible indoor Chinatown type market for Albuquerque with the huge seafood section. I'm looking for "Red Ice", imported by the Mon Chong Loong Corporation in Maspeth, New York from Thailand. I swear it's Red Bull minus the fizzy water. Comes in little cough syrup type bottles and costs 79 cents each (with tax) instead of over two dollars (without). Usually, they're out. I can't imagine why. I bought all nine they had. Exactly the same list of ingredients and taste, but much more potent per millilitre since it hasn't been dilluted. I'm on my third right now. I haven't even hit the bars yet. I am gonna be insane tonight.

New property manager came by. I signed a lease. Woohoo! Finally I'm off month-to-month and have my rent locked in for one year at three hundred bucks a month. A steal. And I don't have to depend on the kindness of my fellow queer landlord anymore to not raise the rent. Woohoo!

Charles just called. He's drying his hair. Time for me to drink one more red bull and head out.

Whoa.

What a night.

I got promoted to the second order of the black eagle. I think my car is at Charles' house. I hope so, anyhow, since it sure ain't here. Hm.

An idea.

Got up around 95F today. Worked at the Manor, out around the gate, replacing the gold violas I ripped out yesterday with scarlet verbenas.

To give you some idea how big this estate is: in order to get water to the plants at the front gate at the end of the long gravel driveway, we had to hook six fifty foot hoses together, starting at the house, and it was only barely long enough. Being so very hot I only put in three hours there before tiring out and coming home. Of course I thought we were going out later, so I wanted to freshen up and all. But really would prefer these days I think just to stay out on the job since when I get home it's going to be just about as hot, only without the sun, and I won't be making any money lazing around the house.

I must remember sunscreen for tomorrow.

Charles wanted to go out tonight but thank god it didn't work out that way. Not that I wouldn't have enjoyed it. But who wants to live in bars? We both wound up worn out. Last thing I need is to spend more than one night a week in the bars, even if I am drinking in relative moderation. We went to Foxes last night, had some really good conversations with Sid (the manager) and a bunch of other guys who go way back. Unless I work there, of course. Which maybe I will. I'd love to work at Foxes. Might just find myself actually enjoying the work and might even wind up being passably good at it. Drinks in bars are outrageously pricey. Of course you're not just paying for the drink when you go there. I guess maybe as the month wears on he's worried where his own rent's coming from, because we're finally starting to get back into the swing of things. Only a matter of a few days 'til I get enough money to pay my rent and bills and maybe even eat for a few days, I suspect. I've got to get some other steady income going, just to be fair to me and him and everybody all around. Maybe Foxes. Why not? I'd be as glad to work in the oldest gay bar in the southwest as any normal person would be I dunno I guess to work at a really well-established bank. Plus it'd be high energy, which I honestly enjoy more than the steady rhythms of planting in the ground, which seems to me a pleasant way to spend a day off, but maybe not so great a way to work.

Tomorrow morning we go to McMansion. Of course the owner's throwing another big pool party for 300 people and is panicking because she hasn't watered anything, so everything we planted last month will be dead and we'll just have to pull the same stunt we did last time: plant a ton of annuals in containers timed to look good in a few days' time before the heat destroys them utterly. Must be nice to be rich enough to be able to afford to be so dumb. Pay the faggots an outrageous sum to cover your ass, you breeder imbeciles; you know we are the only ones on earth who can pull off the impossible time and again. Then again, this is the attorney/shoplifter so I shouldn't be surprised. (Speaking of which -- the heat, not the shoplifter -- you should see what the sun did to my rosebush and fennel and yarrow and cardoon and petunias out front. I missed a single day of watering them sixteen times a day and they just all got flattened out just like a steamroller had rolled right over 'em.) Then at some point in the next few days we're going to have to work on the irrigation at the manor, since the plants around the gate are drying up. And by then Sissy should be back in town and there'll be work to be done there.

Have I confessed that I love Church's Chicken? Because I do. I know, it's a chain. Of course because of that it's been ages since I've eaten in one. But I was out late just now with precious little money when nothing else was open and there was Church's. Three dark pieces and a nifty little biscuit for 2.66. Yeah. Super fresh, so hot I had to wait 'til I got home to eat it. I love fried chicken. Plus I get to leave the bones out for the feral cats. Everybody's happy.

Yay.

EIA: nonreactive.

No way.

Where's the Western Blot?

They only do the Western Blot when EIA turns up reactive, silly.

This is good news. A big relief. Nothing left to do now but go to Mr. Peepers -- you know, the cruisy bookstore in the warehouse district -- late at night by myself and . . . what else? hand out condoms to all the semi-randomized vectors. Why not? That's where this damn disease is getting spread. That and the tearooms and the barrooms and the -- well, you get the idea. I did fill out a volunteer application, now that I can dedicate some time to that without having to worry about dying the next time I get the sniffles.

Uh. The Aquabas is likely out for me this evening. It's in an hour and fifteen minutes and costs $12(USD) to get in. Thanks but no thanks. I'd love to see 'em but honestly I am so worn out right now you wouldn't believe, and shouldn't spend twelve bucks on anything. Last thing I want to do is go to an all-ages show and be the oldest person in the room. Apologies, Flem. I'm still enough in your debt for having gotten me into looking at that U-238 decay chain. Consider the upcoming donation to Los Alamos Study Group to be made in your honour.

Speaking of which, the NRC came out with a report today predicting "only" seven cancer deaths resulting from the proposed Uranium enrichment plant near Eunice. So much for "the sanctity of life". Imagine that. "Collateral damage", anyone? I'm sure LES/URENCO is happy. Good for them. Alas, if only someone would hold us to the same high standards under NPT to which we arrogate to hold Iran and North Korea.

Worked today. Finally. I think even Charles understands the coming of the end of the month. Got paid -- finally -- for the work at the Manor I did while Charles was in New York. So I'm at Annapurna Ayurvedic Chai House on this half-off Wednesday night. Not really my crowd (like I have one), but a great deal on food I just can't pass up. Charles says he's going to need me tomorrow. I assume -- I hope not foolhardily -- that I will actually work a good full day with him tomorrow and get paid for it before the end of the month. Ideally, before the end of the week. We'll see.

But the big monster problem I was facing is no longer a big monster problem. Everything else is capable of being handled.

Anxiety City.

This is ridiculous.

After the moxibustion, and whether because of it, or my giving enough of a damn whether he wants to live or die to visit him, or his eventually successful final meeting with Marco, or any conceivable combination of the above, Charles is in excellent mood, but still sleeping late. Still hasn't done the billing for the Manor or the place in Santa Fe, not that either would bring in more than enough for me to live on for three or four days, at the most. Which means what precious little cash I have coming is not coming in any time soon. With only sixteen days left in the month, I might have to do something drastic if I hope to pay my rent and utilities on time.

I've got twenty-seven bucks left 'til payday, whenever that is (tomorrow? next month? never?) and I fully intend to spend between five and ten to see the Aquabats tomorrow at Launchpad, come hell or high water. (After over 18 months here I think I'm entitled to see one show by a band I've heard nothing but good things about.)

Called Gertrude's this morning; they said they didn't need me today, no big deal, but I sure would like to know when they will need me. No telling though whether I've done something horribly wrong without knowing it and am out of a job on that front, as well.

Called NMAS (New Mexico AIDS Services) twice about my results. First left a message with the guy who tested me this last time for my six month confirmation. Then spoke with the guy at the front desk where they said they're literally sorting through the mail right now, and can I call back in a couple of hours? Sure.

Eventually the guy who tested me calls back right as I'm getting ready to call them, and yeah, he thinks he may have written the wrong date on my card, even though he does have my results today, and would I mind terribly coming in tomorrow when they're normally scheduled to give out results? It would be awfully helpful. Sure.

After six months of living like a goddamn monk, what's another 24 hours of gut-wrenching suspense?

Whether it's "just" in my mind or not, I don't honestly know: but I didn't like the tone in his voice one little bit. Not that he was the least bit discourteous. But it sure seems likely to me that the test results will not be what I'm hoping for. At all.

Heh. Just as long as it's not yet another false positive. That would pretty surely knock me off whatever's left of my already rickety rocker.

Then who should call and leave a voicemail message but Mr. K. F. Montoya, my drug-addicted stalker freind from all those months ago? Poor guy. I do believe he means no harm, but damned if I can ever see or talk to him again. We bring out the absolute worst in eachother, if you know what I mean. Where I stand there's simply no controlling him -- let alone his three distinct personalities.

Things seem, to put it bluntly, on the verge of falling apart for me completely and absolutely. Worst case scenario? I cannot possibly imagine. I suppose I wind up testing positive, defaulting on my rent, having utilities shut off, losing two jobs, depending on charity for bread and water, and having the lunatic drug-addled psychopath re-enter my life, ready or not.

Then again, I could always go back to working graveyard at Frontier.

Right.

What I'd rather do than that I leave to your imagination.

I just checked my mail, on the off chance that my 1888 Brinsmead "History of the Pianoforte" book's arrived from England. Of course not, since I didn't pay the extra two pounds sterling for airmail. Did get two bills though, for the cellphone and electricity. In the words of the immortal one: Oh joy.

At least the cats still tolerate my presence.

Damn close to disappearing. Quite completely. Yep. Again. Heh. Done it before. Hate to do it. Always wind up having to start fresh from scratch it seems. Can make the short stories of my life work out OK. But not the novel. Where to go? Damned if I know. What to do? Likewise, I'm sure. Thank god I've got this computer and my car and two pretty good bicycles. Thank my mother is more like it. My escape hatches if things get all that bad. Which well they might. Indeed. (I'll give it one week from today. Must know my test results first, and see if I get paid.) Sell all I can for whatever I can get for it and cut clear out of town never to be heard from or seen again. Never to show my face again here. Just disapppear without a word, without a trace. Shake the dust of this place from my feet behind me. Without looking back. Set myself up in some new tenement in some new town in some new shit job nobody else wants which I'll hate until I just start to make good and fall behind again, and then have to move on yet again. No freinds, hell, no acquaintances even from any such move yet remaining.

This is what I get for living on Central? To live like the Okies?

When I was 19, 20 this was not such a big deal. (Hell, it was sort of an adventure.) I'm 30, now, and it is. This is ridiculous. I'm getting tired. I wouldn't mind so much I guess if I just knew even roughly how many more such attempts it would take for me to really find my place. I was born in the wrong time and place is the best I can figure. I don't belong here. This isn't my world, not by a long shot. In my world the men all wear high starched collars and when not dancing to live music have to wind up the Victrola.

Great. I need a break from this mindset and tune in to KUNM expecting to hear a half hour of inane, inept, east-coast elitist reporting about nothing from NPR. Instead it's an hourlong reading from "Closing the Charts", a book about and by a dying doctor and his wife excoriating the medical industry for its lack of compassion for the dying. Whee. The absolute last thing I wanted to hear right at this moment.

I suppose I should be grateful for not having the money to go to the internet cafe and post this right now, since it might still prove quite embarassing, should things wind up working out somehow. Heh. I doubt it. Too much going too wrong all at once out of nowhere. How to pull it all together? No idea. Seems every time I take a little tiny carefully calculated risk I just sink deeper and deeper.

If I stop posting don't worry. I'll survive somehow. How I don't know, but I will manage. Somehow. If I stop posting it means I've just stopped posting. Nothing more.

Wish I had someone to talk to. Heh. Right.

So Amy Goodman says the number of confirmed HIV cases in the US has hit one million, today. The same day my results arrive back from the lab. Always said I was one in a million because of my false positive, reported as a positive positive, six months ago.

This is one one in a million I don't want to wind up a part of.

Pride: the happy ending.

I call Charles last night and he's coccooned. OK, I figure, nothing wrong with that, we all do that from time to time, especially after little three-day drunken binges like the one we had. I agree to call him back on Monday morning as usual to see what's lined up for work.

I call back this morning at 9h15. He's half asleep, says he'll call back when he wakes up. It's always been within the hour. OK, no problem. We'll still get a couple of hours in and get paid for some work from a few weeks ago.

Noon passes and I start to get worried, honestly more for my own sake since a deposit was held up at the bank and I can't get out money to eat. Eventually he calls and winds up he's sort of sunk into a pretty deep depression with bad anxiety thrown in for good measure. Besides which he is physically sick from cigarettes. Dry unproductive hacking cough. Hasn't left the house in over two days, hasn't talked to anyone, not even his roommate. We talk for an hour before I offer to go over with some chinese medicines I think might help him with the anxiety and cough and general yuckiness. I apply maybe 26 moxa cones to what strike me as appropriate points and give him some basic, utterly harmless herbs. He gets to feeling better and start getting up and doing domesticities he should have done these past two days but wound up sleeping through. He calls Marco, who goes back to New York today. I sit with him a little while after but leave soon after that. Winds up he goes to see Marco and (not to say that I was right, but I was right) his anxiety over having been rejected is in his mind more than in reality. Understandable, of course. He's just sort of gone into the letdown mode that follows anything like this and let it take him over personally. I did a bit the same myself. Marco takes his picture and the two part on excellent terms.

Charles pulls up to my apartment in his '72 Mercedes about 6h30 at night to tell me how it's all worked out. Whether the medicines helped or will help him I don't know, but I know they won't hurt him. All very over-the-counter stuff, including one of Chang Chung Ching's classic formulations from the Shang Han Lun. He drank a beer with me and offered more if I would visit him, which I may, or may not -- nothing against him, but tomorrow is a big day for me, and I need to be in my right mind for it, whatever happens.

If he ever figures out I'm writing about him he will kill me. Oh well. I only write about him 'cause I love him. Muhah.

Now on to some correspondence. It seems EST has emerged.

Albuquerque Pride MMV.

So here roughly is my recounting of the last several day's happenings. All of which you may file under "Gay Pride MMV". This year's official theme: "Equal Rights: No More, No Less". Which is a big part of why I felt legitimately a part of it this year and wound up so sorely disappointed at almost having missed the march with Mr. Hay eastbound on Central. This year's unofficial, personal theme: "The Drunken Binge, or, an Introduction to bitchy queeniness for those likewise inclined".

Thursday: big night at Albuquerque Mining Company. You know, AMC, the place with three bars in one, the best dance floors, the best music, the best patios, the best bartenders. Just a smattering of breeders here and there for us to taunt mercilessly lest they dare forget their place, and invade our space a bit too far because after all, everyone knows (a) we do have the best music and lights (b) we do know how to dance and (c) already oppressed females can dance with us quite safely.

Thursday's the last night I wrote about. Thursday night, I had actually wanted to go out more than Charles did; and while I won't say I exactly "dragged" him away from the eiderdown mattresses and comforters of his Art Nouveau bed, he started out downright morose. Charles wound up going home with a very kind and handsome young Pueto Rican fellow from New York who took quite a liking to Charles -- and nowhere near last call, I might point out -- making his day by picking him up after he'd started out all in a funk at being "fat", "ugly", and "old". (I assure you, he is none of these things.) They got on quite well and I was genuinely happy for them both as I drove them home, vastly less drunk than either one, though truthfully not thrilled at bouncing off the walls alone all night from all the red bulls that I drank, not that I can blame anyone for that but me. Besides which I couldn't possibly have hit the high notes in "Ave Maria" at four AM like Charles does so very naturally, should I have chosen to to play the Bach prelude at home at such an hour.

The next day Charles and I worked at Sissy's. One day working after one practically sleepless night has surely never killed me yet. But men are pigs. All men.

On this occasion, true to the form of all men, Charles was about as close to a perfect boor as our kind are capable of producing. Yes, wholly worthy of a straight man's locker room. Gloating about his prowess in the barroom. I'll be so kind to you, dear reader, as to spare you the details he refrained from sparing me regarding what passed between these two young men that night. Of course with not one word of thanks to me for having taken him out against his "better" judgment. Just worrying for hours over whether Marco would call back, or whether he wasn't in fact ignoring his own "next morning" call while busily engaged in some wild orgy in the Sauna at the gym, alternating with moments of gleefully rolling about in the grass as I tried to dig holes through the buried grass for impossible, hopeless transplants. Which is fine by me, we're all a bunch of self-absorbed bastards in our own ways and have to live with eachother, if only on these few days every year surrounding the annual Christopher Street Celebrations.

What put it over the top for me was his insistence -- his decree, his dictat (his words) -- that I go with him out drinking Friday night as well -- not that I wouldn't have anyway, if given half a chance to rest a bit beforehand. If he'd just been self-centered, and hadn't explicitly threatened not just my job but my employability I wouldn't have minded a bit, although I knew it wasn't wise to go but did want to go out again regardless on this final night before Pride which wouldn't roll 'round for another still shortening year, if only to stand at the bar at Foxes and reverentially utter the magical phrase at the magical hour. I had to work at Gertrude's the following morning, and didn't want to be out long past midnight. But basically, when I asked half-jokingly "what if I'm asleep when next you call me?" he responded that he would slander me telling everyone everything he knew about whatever he pretends to understand about my bathhouse stories and how I apparently "stole" a restaurant towel and kept it "hidden" in the backseat of my car, where I throw everything I wind up with at the car not needing. So basically not just a slut am I, but an untrustworthy slut who deliberately steals valuables from his employers. Whether he was serious or not I honestly don't know. (I doubt it, now, in retrospect.)

In other words: he threatened me with slander in the same exact historic vein of stereotypes you'll encounter upon reading the "examples in context" section of the Oxford English Dictionary's definitions of such hotly disputed terms as "gay" and "queer". (Worse things could happen.) Briefly: avaricious, oversexed and dandified effeminate young city men intent on self-advancement at all costs. Next, no doubt, comes Lillian Gish upon the train tracks. Too bad my moustache's not long enough to twirl yet.

Very interesting, linguisticallly, or from a "history of ideas" type perspective. But the height of arrogance in my sorely sleep-deprived eyes, and a near-perfect example of what people mean when they say "there is no gay community" because at times we're at eachother's throats more visciously than any dogs.

What a perfect ending to it all. Just now from my front door, and through the lovely stained glass window that I bought today, fireworks. The most beautiful that I have ever seen. For me. Can you believe it?

So of course he dresses in Barney's cashmere, hoping to outdo me in my little working class, 50 Franc shirt from the market outside the Roman Colliseum in Nimes at the time of Feria. One adequately well-timed "Barney Rubble" comment quite suffices so that not only doesn't he insist that all passerby feel his vest, but I'm not asked to explain the cotton weave "de Nimes". Fine with me.

I'd been forced to wear it after a long conversation using 78 precious daytime minutes when I'd tried, again half jokingly, to say I couldn't go out because I had no idea what colour I should wear. I was, at this point, becoming just as bitchy in my own way as Charles can be in his. Thus began the conversational equivalent of trench warfare, or attrition, which started out something like this.

Charles: "Whatever you wear, don't wear black."

Myself: "Why not?"

Charles: "Because I'm wearing black."

Myself: "What if I wear black?"

Charles: "Then I'll wear taupe."

Myself: "What if I wear taupe?"

Charles: "Then I'll wear black."

Myself: "What it I wear black underneath a taupe sweater?"

Charles: "Then I'll have to wear taupe under black."

Myself: "And if I do the same?"

And so on until I get him to recommend I wear chartreuse and crimson, by which time I know he's mostly cornered and fishing for the impossible. Actually I have some rather wonderful red shirts I would have worn, but he specifically said that if I wore anything even remotely red he'd tell everyone within earshot that I was a slut. (As we were drinking red bulls in a remarkable drink known as "the redheaded slut", I thought it would be an appropriate coordination.) I of course demand a range of wavelength readings from the spectrograph so that I know what he considers say a brownish red as opposed to a reddish brown. Poor man, I think I wore him out before we even started out. At any rate, the only colours we had not discussed were blue and yellow, so I wore my blue Provencal shirt with the honeybees print.

I take him right off the bat to Foxes, actually "Foxes Booze 'n' Cruise", as it's best known by its famed sign overlooking Central, into which attached bar we both walk quite outrageously overdressed. I explain why I love this particular place. The casual, conversational atmosphere. The institutional memory. Glass glasses, even on very busy nights. The total, absolute lack of pretense on anyone's part. You've never heard of Harry Hay? Let me tell you a story. Yes, he walked down this very same street in the very same times that this same business existed right here where you're sitting. Quite possibly he sat at this very same bar. Then without finishing the story I practicaly insist that he leave before he's quite done with his drink. Yes, how terribly rude of me; but he wants to go bar hopping? OK, it's time to hop! We simply must get to AMC, to have one of Bill's redheaded sluts. He started at Foxes. As did every single other bartender you love in this town. By this time the poor man's practically speechless. Unheard of.

Then to AMC where we indeed get Bill's drink and tip not well enough (it being quite impossible to tip Bill well enough). Then to sit in on Chip's quieter bar (no dancefloor) without so much as tipping him for having taken up his space and leaving him two glasses to clean up. No wonder he's cynical! People walk in with drinks from outside and don't tip. But still he tends the bar and is courteous to all. Why? I'd love to know. I do admire him.

Then to the obscenely popular twink bar (which shall go without naming, though pseudonymically it might be reasonably called "strobe/fewsha", so absurd is its actual name and supposed colour scheme) which is positively overrun with predatory breeders pretending to be us in order to prey on young women who do not yet know enough to know which ear piercing means what -- much less the people pretending to be us, apparently. Pay five bucks cover just to earn the right to pay $6.75 for really big drinks made almost entirely of ice. Not to mention enough chicken to keep a busy soulfood restaurant and its attached tearoom overstocked for half a year. We wind up at the Bubble Lounge, the newlly opened hookah bar on Central. (Only in Albuquerque could this happen.) He and his out of town freind and his own freinds.

It's turning east from where we'd parked onto Central from Seventh that I feel it. Hay is with me. Not long this time, but he's definitely there. I'm about to have my moment. Two blocks, maybe. Probably less.

The little middle-eastern restaurant is delightful, although the young, presumably Muslim men working themselves thin are clearly less than thrilled at having to serve a whole bevy of drunken homosexuals at 3am. (Quoth the oak stick tortilla guy: who can blame 'em?) The food, the tea, the hookahs, everything's amazing. The New Yorkers say they can get better hookahs back home, which of course I don't dispute. I tip the bellydancers a measly two bucks for their skill and grace. I find the place very relaxing, very pleasant, so aparently does everybbody else. The others pay the bill, "forget" to tip the badly overworked waiter they've chosen none too kindly to dub "Mr. Nasty" (ahhem -- racism, anyone?); I run back in to tip generously -- I do expect to go back there, since they have wireless internet service late into the night.

Then up at 9am to work at Gertrude's starting at ten. Dusting furniture, answering the door. Helping to move the occasional table and whatnot. Cleaning mirrors and blown-glass paperweights, arranging them to catch the sunlight brilliantly. Help to sell a thousand dollar dining room table. Get into a conversation with the scientist husband of the purchaser about Biedermeyer period furniture, the grain of wood, and the differing molecular structures of glass and crystal. Fascinating, and I would never have dared do it but for Charles' influence on me.

Long story short I was OK with having to work that day and wound up rather getting into it. Got another clock running that hadn't been. But Charles did manage to work me up into such an emotional froth over the whole thing in the days leading up to Pride that I can quite understand why he says he loses freinds. Next time he asks me "what's wrong with the gays in this town, or is it just me?" I'll have an intelligent and compassionate answer. Not that he's responsible for my emotional state these few days of the year, but he didn't exactly go out of his way to make it any easier on me, at least until it was practically over. I haven't spoken to him since early Saturday morning, when while getting out of my car he admitted he'd probably have more enjoyed staying at Foxes.

Business in the antique store is slow on that day so they let me go at about 3h30. I drive over to the state fairgrounds and get into the Pridefest to see all the exhibits before they're taken down. Lots of booths, some selling things, others trying to convince passerby of the rightness of their cause, whether it be gay square dancing, AIDS services, log cabinism, christianity, or leather. The Delmas Howe exhibit is the most profoundly moving part of the whole thing for me this year. Religious iconography in the renaisance vein recast into a series of queer stations of the cross upon the Christopher Street piers. On my way out I spy a stained glass window worthy of Mr. Wright. The flag colours neatly inset into bevelled, prismatic crystals, just the perfect size for that bottom horizontal panel of the casement window in my living room which the blood-stained venetian blinds (which I fished out of a dumpster at a notorious crackhouse on the eastside of town last year) don't descend to cover, leaving me quite exposed to traffic when going between bed and bath. It's either that or new venetian blinds, I figure, so I go with the window. Good thing for me the man made only two or three, for this particular event. I'd love to know who else got one.

So: two nights out on the town at the very tail end of my six months of living like a monk did not kill me, nor anybody else, apparently. I had one hell of a good time. Of course it's over now, like anytime you gather thousands of people in the streets. The dragon has gone back to sleep, for now, and nothing remains but to live this next year.

One year ago it took all of my courage just to go. This year I could not be kept away though heaven and earth conspired to make it anything but so. Last year I had to go between graveyard shifts with no sleep. This year I worked a properly gentlemanly shift at the antique store between the various celebrations. Last year I was terrified I was dressed wrong ("how *could* I have worn this tan shirt? they're all going to think I'm some sort of nazi."), or would run into the crazed stalker who had already hounded me for months. This year I turned heads wearing just what I had on, and encountered nobody the least bit unpleasant. Last year I had to listen to the comments of coworkers; prove them wrong, at every turn. Do the imppossible, each and every night. Outdo yourself the next night. Make them have to play catch-up. I was getting sucked very deeply into living far beyond my real means by virtue of a job that paid quite well, but demanded every bit of my energy. This year I was in the crowd being turned out at 2am when they called out "to the Frontier!", a desperate battle cry. I didn't have to be there for my shift and so I didn't go to stand in line, get checked for weapons, stand in line again and pay for food. I do need to go in Wednesday or Thursday, though, to clear up my last paycheck. Back to the day-to-day world.

Friday morning.

So I worked a good five hours yesterday with Charles. Drove up to Santa Fe to an outrageously expensive new development -- real Country Club type place. Nice house, nice garden. Owners had maybe ten or twelve big plastic pots they needed filled with colour. We did it and got out pretty quick; we were in superb good form. The gardener had emptied the pots of soil from last year so we had to scoop up what we could salvage of it from the pile out back. Fun with all the dust devils whipping through the pinons.

I do have to go into Gertrude's on Saturday, so likely no Stonewall commemoration march this year. Oh well. They always say it's more important to live it day to day than to show up one day a year for the party. Just exactly like Christmas, when everybody goes to church only to get lectured by the parson about showing up just once a year and gets so turned off by it that they stay away another year. I've missed so many at this point, I suspect I will survive missing one more. It is one day a year and I aim to see many more of those same days before I leave this place if I wind up have to get up on the bar and make it happen at the same exact hour, on the exact anniversary. A sort of local Passion Play by the bitchy old queens. No, I get to be her this time. You did it last time, and were positively wretched. Last year was was so profoundly moving. I suspect this year will be as well, regardless. I feel I've actually earned the day's festivities this year, what with actually getting very marginally involved with the whole state contract rights thing, which if you hear me tell it only became an issue in this state because of a chance meeting I had before I moved here with a 1960s movie star my freind knew. (Hint: c.f. amphiboly.) Then again, they made this possible, let them enjoy it too, in their way. Then again, it's not like I'm missing it in order to work in a paper hat in the middle of the night making tortillas for the drunks. I get to be a faggot 24 hours a day in my new job. It is almost expected. Should I deviate from that it brings attention, though I have to do it all in my own way. So I suppose some sort of progress has been made.

I want to rotate that Chandelier 360 degrees on the horizontal. It's a two person, or one person, one vice job.

If anything in what I'm doing it's an asset. I'm considered fairly safe to go into people's homes and not deliberately or maliciously disturb their things, let alone seduce or ravage their housemaids and daughters. At the same time it's a process of earning the trust of those you work with. I should always have coiled the hose better, silly me. As for water, you simply don't waste a drop. You don't leave it lying around where it doesn't belong any more than you'd dirt. It's as simple as that. You maintain the space, true to its intended function, regardless. Insofar as possible you likewise maintain objects true to their own. With teapots, you serve tea. Four o'clock sharp. Black or Green? Very good. Cream? Sugar? Say when. There you are. Perhaps you'd like lemon? Of course. Pewter or Silver determined beforehand, obviously. Lighting preset, insofar as practicable. Nice china, but not terribly rare -- usually.

Lonely night. Oh well. Had a few of those before. Who hasn't? Bless him, he's got a powerful falsetto that could shatter glass set up correctly. Could likely not crack wood. Was a bassoonist, and a good one. Wound up on red bulls. Wide awake, 10.6.5 3h43a. Mistake to crowd a space beyond a certain point, whatever comfort it may seem to bring. Don't have too many things -- including people. Ever. Just enough. Little more, ok. Not much. Functions collide where people walk and rest their bodies, any part of them: hands, feet, backs, buttocks, eyes. Follow traffic flow always. Guide it when absolutely necessary only, in such a way it's hardly noticed, if at all. Nothing at outside corners. Nothing. Set back from is OK. Damn it I always have to be soo fucking ethical. I don't walk off with things. I don't deliberately use bad language. Or try not to. Such as here, writing in sentence fragments. Hepburn's influencing me badly. She writes of the scenes in her life as though she's ADD, viewing her moments in memory in the daily rushes of the different takes. There. That's the best one. Go with that. Next.

I wish them nothing but the very best. I hope he'll be ok tomorrow morning. It's late. Four o'clock. Sharp. Whoever comes in closest to four precisely gets served tea. Why not? Will cost pennies for water and tea. Nickels for service. Don't demand anything, just give them tea and let them look around if they don't want to talk to you right now.

Pride got twenty bucks from me. I threw it at the big eight-colour flag after hearing the speakers' presentations. I believe I hit orange. Good for me. Good for them. Good for us. All of us.

I belong in nonprofit.

Be well.

Sleep.

Morning.

At Flying Star in my usual seat. Not drinking red bulls in the bars anymore. Drinking on a budget works just fine for me (Kudzu, people, Kudzu), but the whole wide awake for twelve hours thing's not always terribly desirable, especially when the person you're with gets picked up by a charming young man from New York and you both have to work tomorrow. Oh well. He is alive, thank god, finally awake and ready to go, apparently with nothing missing from his rooms. He probably thinks I'm angry at him for having met a new and interesting person. Why should I be? He went to meet people, I went to observe humankind. We both got what we wanted. I'm going as soon as I get this done with. How is it anything and everything I touch becomes suffused with irony? Perhaps it's in my blood. One final cup of coffee cooling now before I can head out. Can't pour it dwn my throat all scalding hot, now can I? I think not. But I need it. Thunderstorms predicted later in the day. Today at Sissy's and the Manor. Will be a welcome change to be someplace both gorgeous and familiar once again. Gertrude's is getting more familiar, which means it's easier to talk about things to people there. A good thing. Today: out in the sun, the unreal clouds infinitely beyond architectural in their glory and scale in distance.

Remembering the palacers.

So the bastard did it.

Yep. Weasel the supposedly unmotivated's gone and graduated, gotten himself a degree. Yeah, in art, with a specialization in digital media. Bastard. Don't think for a minute that I'm not insanely jealous -- however hard it might be to find a job right off the bat with such credentials.

For those of you who may be reading and give a damn, Weasel (as I know him) is this fellow who came into the chat room I scripted for the studio that in better times had created the Ren & Stimpy Show, during that studio's lean years, in the period shortly after I'd moved to North North Hollywood. He's also to date the only person I know of to have read, let alone commented on this "blog", though heaven help me I've always replied to his comments by email, lest I appear to give a damn publicly whether anyone's reading or not. He always got along with everyone, including those whose attitudes towards him might be considered just a trifle condescending. With the very difficult, he always at least was polite. Always a mediator, never making any real worthwhile enemies. With the downright insulting he was never anything short of patient to the point that a person starts to wonder whether maybe he's just pretending to be a bitchy "holier than thou" queen while in reality being some sort of truly superiour being. Some sort of bastard bodhisattva, if you will.

Bastard.

The jerk even dared to send me an engraved invitation through the mails -- envelope in envelope, all very proper, I assure you (though I would personally have used a wholly different kind of paper, ink, and process) -- to his commencement ceremony. Can you believe it? How dare he! What next? They'll be asking me to officiate weddings. Not that I haven't.

I only wish that I could go. I'd love to go. I'd miss Pride this weekend to go, if I didn't already have to miss it just to work the first job that I've ever had where I don't have to hide who I am just to feel safe in order to have enough money to eat for the week. Damn it.

Oh well! The question now is what to give him for his graduation. He's hinted none too subtly (he's a straight man, I believe, at least mostly, and thus knows not that much of subtlety, though for a probably more-or-less straight man, he's not a bad man, though he not just hear but work with wind) that he would like a tent. (Yes, there are a few breeders out there worthy of the title "human", who may even be worthy of gifts commemorating major life accomplishments. He's no kind of apple at all, nor any insect in a hive, nor any other part of any cell structure I know of). Well, sir, what sort of tent? A single sleeper you can sling onto the back of a bicycle? A five-room portable mansion into which you can comfortably fit an early Biedermeyer sideboard? And of course -- good god -- what colour? I've no idea whatsoever.

Yes, I admit it, I'm into Walnut and Maple, but mostly Walnut, at the moment. Maple complements Walnut quite admirably, in any ambient light. Walnut darkens a room. Deeply. Carved walnut casts interesting shadows in lamp or candlelight. Ideally any cloth backing should serve not to absorb but to reflect light. In a room with natural sunlight wood catches and transforms sunlight, either through glass or through diirect optical contact.

I suppose a gift certificate might be in order. Alas, I'm liiterally struggling to find the money to eat at the moment, let alone pay the rent. Then to rebuild my savings to the point I'm not living so day by day that if the new owners of this building sell it out from under me on short notice I find myself out on the streets, Brinsmead piano, Hammond organ, steamer trunk 4625 and all. Might have to have a killer moving sale if they did.

God help me just about all I can offer him now is my very best wishes. Worth every penny he pays for it, I assure you. I can't offer much more to LASG but I owe them as well. Of course if he qualifies for 501(c)3 not-for-profit status everything changes: I can at least offer some sort of service in kind. Perhaps he needs a flyer designed or copywritten or translated into excellent Spanish. Who knows?

The guy's kept me in music these last 18 months. May sound like nothing in this day of the ipod; I assure you it isn't. I sent him through the mail an easel a while back, which apparently served him well for about five minutes. Since then he's practically showered me with countless hours of music on CDs I would never have been exposed to otherwise, much of which has gone on to become *the* thing I listen to when driving, much of which I've gone on to seek out for my collection of vinyl.

Enough of embarassing Weasel. Time will come when these entries are studied with such precocious care as are were the more complex satires of Juvenal, if I'm very lucky, and entire generations of scholars comfortably support themselves and their families by agreeing to endlessly argue with one another over whom I really refer to when speaking of such-and-such screenname, person, or Proper Noun in general (e.g., "John Milton").

There's also EST of course, whom I seem to have permanently alienated by a shameful lapse in judgment at having twice successively left him hanging in the Palace. I loved him dearly as did many others, treasured his presence; he's one of a kind; and if that bugs him, oh well, I guess it hardly matters, seeing as he never really existed, or something, and having never existed, never inspired me to greater acts than those of which I ever thought my old little self capable.

There's also Flem, to whom I almost never spoke (he flat out scared me), until he got me seriously engaged in nuclear issues, which have since become as good as any reason to go on living when I need one. If you're out there now, I'm going to see the Aquabats this coming 15th day of June at Launchpad: try and stop me. I dare you.

As for 3d Mike my god has he got talent in anything he undertakes to do, whatever his (to me, confusing) political leanings may be. A man may disagree tremendously on their views regarding public policy. As long as dialogue is possible, todo es possible. No one -- and I mean no one can make Escher prints into red-blue separations one hundredth as perfectly as he can. And precious few have the genuine, hard-earned sense of *real* "family values" he has earned, on his own terms. He's also one hell of a musician -- making 7/5 time sound good.

Then there's the long stream of cartoon people with whom I never speak these days at all, to whom I'm basically dead. Milton, Steve, please forgive me. My life was not your life, much as I'd liked to have made either of yours my own, had only I been born fifty years earlier than I was.

Tooner, I wish my word had one tenth of the integrity of yours. Last I checked your place was still up. Bless you, whatever your funny but truly beautiful ideas about who should be granted the dread "wizard" access and who shouldn't, whatever problems arose, however we perceived and addressed them finally leaving it in your lap. Thank you for taking us old school southparkers in when we got overrun without once making us feel the least bit unwelcome. I'm sorry that we didn't bring in members, but who wants to pay to be advertised to in each room? Spumco made some dreadful colour decisions, but they worked, in the 216 colour proprietary grid. I wish I could take credit for the graphics. Without them there'd have been nothing. But without my navigation the place wouldn't have made sense. The problem was, it was a cul de sac. You went in through the front door, complete with a slamming screen door as you entered into the living room, stage left. Click stage right into the sounds and animation trophy room. maybe eight or nine scripts in it. Clicking heads brought the sounds of the animals up on the walls. Click on George and he flashes he belly at you. Says something. Clich SR into the kitchen, then through the door (with slamming screen) into the backyard, in which is kept a Chicken Coop into which you may enter through the Chicken's Port of Entry into the AV shack, where by a script you could retrieve and one of something like fourteen male and female cartoon characters. The best, of course, were always custom made and never shared, with EST the undisputed master of the art form. We still use the place from time to time. Bizarre that we should. And yet there's those 14 lines of code, within which: Interactive animation with sound. Not complex scripting. Haphazard, really. Could be pared down to one operation, with optical, not digital, Sound. One registration.

True randomness.

Scavenging.

OK! I worked and actually got paid in cash today at Gertrude's. Four hours brought in 28 bucks. I hated to have to ask for payment in cash but seriously I had none, and beyond feeding myself have a car to keep full of Nigerian slave labour and Iraqui blood because I'm too lazy or scared to walk anywhere most of the time, plus cat food to buy so I don't lose any more kittens (not that the one I did lose was lost through any fault of my own). Jane's incredibly accomodating, I know she didn't have much in the till. Got a burrito from Stufy's because I was famished, then decided against the watermelon because it was "too expensive". Go figure: $3.10 for a greasy delicious carne adobada burrito with fried potatoes and cheese that'll put something in me right away's not too much. But having eaten one, a $3.99 watermelon (the size and weight of maybe ten burritos) that can feed me for two days and restore my precious enzyme balance is.

I like the rhythms of the day. The night is mine to do with what I will. I water every morning before going out, then again before going to bed. I clean the catbox once a day each morning. I wake up with the sun instead of fighting it for sleep. I spend my days in gardens or surrounded by antiques and find the time -- quite ample time -- to do things like the laundry. (Now all I need's the motiivation to actually get it done.) I eat what I want when I want, as opposed to what's available when I can, even when I am low on cash. I meet new people every day. I look people straight in the eye and don't apologise too much.

Tomorow's Wednesday, so I need to leave the house with the computer, because after I get off at Gertrude's I'm heading straight to that nifty little vegetarian restaurant where everything's half off on Wednesday evenings and I can go online besides. I will probably eat twice as much, and with any luck still have enough for a watermelon for Thursday, and maybe Friday. Or I could eat something cheap at Flying Star on Thursday and just assume I'll get paid on Friday. If Charles wants to go out Saturday, so will I -- but I think I'll have the good sense this time not to: even if I only spend twenty bucks that's two days' food, and right now, that's far more important than red bulls and whatever other poison they put into the drinks. Saturday's Pride, but if I have to work at Gertrude's that's OK. I'll just skip it this year and not even head over to the dance tent or whatever they've set up at the fairgrounds after working hours, because again, I need that money just to live, and I'm far more interested in the historic aspects of the event besides.

Lucky me, I found a box of Graham crackers I'd bought some months ago knowing the day would come when I'd be hungry and rooting through the cabinets for something both edible and appetizing. They were delicious. And I've still got more left over. Also got a can of stuffed eggplant and another of stuffed zucchini I may break into. I'd love to cook some beans and rice or something but it's eleven at night now and I don't think I really want to be starting the stove at this hour, only to either eat in the middle of the night or else fall asleep and nearly set the house on fire. I need to clean out the drawers of the steamer trunk so I can get the back end of my laundry operation going; I washed some stuff yesterday but have no place to put it at the moment; until I do, I won't wash anything else.

Potential slight conflict of interest brewing as it seems they're going to need me down at Gertrude's since Luis is sick, but Charles may have some landscape work lined up as well. I'd rather get paid fifteen an hour for him on the one hand, but don't want to flake on Gertrude my third day on the job, either. Hm! I'm sure I'l figure something out, somehow.

Went to Frontier today to talk with the owner about the shirt situation. Joe, the day manager, said I need to come back when Gabby's there, which I knew would happen, but at least there's now a trail of managers on all three shifts who know I'm not taking a paycheck with 13 shirts deducted from it which I never had. I don't think they're trying to screw me over, even though they are notoriously cheap, it's just a pain in the ass honest mistake I should have gotten all cleared up some weeks ago. Oh well!

Am finishing this post at Flying Star seven blocks from Gertrude's and will be heading over there to work around 12h45. I work inside today, thank god, got sunburned a bit filling up fountains yesterday. More later on since I have money to eat tonight --- not much, but just enough for half off at Annapurna. Yes, bit by bit I'm getting my various acts together. Ciao.

Clocks & steamer trunks.

Just got back from Frontier -- the 24 hour restaurant at which I made between a quarter and a half million tortillas over the course of a very long year -- and couldn't pick up my last paycheck because I was returning six shirts and they say they have notes out on 13. Lucky number, that. Of course nobody but the owners is sufficiently trusted to make the determination that I'm not lying, or trying to steal the precious grease-stained white uniform shirts. I think what happened is I just never saw it put into my file when I returned shirts, and then it fell way low on the priority list of the various managers on duty when I did it. So now I have to go back in the daytime, and I can't tomorrow, and Gabby's on vacation for another week, so I may not even get my last check for another month. It's quite substantial, too. Oh well!

So heh heh in commemoration of World Hunger Day this seventh day of June Two-thousand-five I think I'll fast. Yep. That low on money. Low enough to pretend a matter over which I've no control is in fact a high-minded action based on the depths of my conscience. Yeeh. Charles says he's billing Sissy and the Lady of the Manor Friday. I hope he does, and hope it all works out, because if not then I will very likely starve indeed. No, I won't. But I will have to cook rice and beans for several days running as it is, and likely get a few vegetables and things besides. And cat food. Heh. Again: oh well. I wanted to live this way, I thought, so now's the time to see how I actually like it when I've got no other choice. Fair enough, I guess, since probably it's no one's choice to live like that who do. Or very few, at any rate.

Enough of the Don Schraeder wannabe personality just trying to back himself into a corner to find expression. Now on to the Charles wannabe personality, who needs no invitation, and who invites the evil eye by risking making people jealous of the nifty things he has.

After I posted yesterday's "blog" (dreadful word, but it seems to have stuck) I went out to the indoor flea market on San Mateo. I don't know what possessed me to do it, but I did. With a credit card -- big mistake. I think buying that Brinsmead book online sort of got me started on a little credit spree. I do that from time to time.

It's over. For this go-around, at least.

Anyhow, of course it's on the day I have no money and just want to kill some time, the place is full of clocks. Most aren't anything special. One of those that's nothing terribly special is sufficiently underpriced that I take a closer look at it, getting the key from the front desk in the honest belief I can sell it for twice what they're asking if I can wait 'til they're not full of clocks. I put it back the minute I find the gorgeous little turn of the century black enamelled Waterbury mantel clock with the delicate pinstripe linework cut into the golden next layer down of enamel that apparently actually runs and despite a handful of very minor hardware "fixes" remains largely (98+%) original and has a good clean face and would look just so perfect on top of my piano and isn't half what I've seen other far worse clocks actually sell for around town. I fiddle with it at the front, after making the owner open the case for me to get the pendulum and key.

Then in another booth there are some excellent wooden clothes hangers. Since I've just gotten a whole new wardrobe full of very high end designer stuff made of excellent fabrics from various thrift stores for pennies on the dollar, I figure this is something I can use. (i.e., a "justifiable" expense). The fact that these hangers are not "standard" clothes hangers I can just use in my closet does not deter me for a moment, for surrounding them is the waist-high circa 1920s (maybe earlier -- definitely not later) riveted steamer wardrobe trunk to which they properly belong. And what a truly ingenious design. When open, it affords some privacy, at least of private parts from those not looking for such specifically, and when closed keeps out the various cats. The whole thing's literally hidden in a corner of this one little booth with nothing else any good. The drawers accomodate one pair of shoes laid side to side.

It's got four shirt hangers, two pants hangers, all the original drawers and linings (inside and out). Beat up from use and some neglect, but not from abuse. Two stickers on it, very old, no new ones, tell me it likely belonged at some point to someone travelling with Loyola's track team. The rails on which the hanger tracks run fold in to lock the sidetop when it folds down, complete with original bluebird blue velvet cushion into which tietacks, lapel pins, medals and the like were definitely meant to be placed for protected transport. The bottom's worn from being moved and from storage, but the trunk's not in bad shape. The leather handle -- marked 4625, I believe, is still quite functional. It is missing two locks (probaly from someone having lost the key after its having been in storage for many years), and has some rust and water damage to the exterior. No big deal. They're still not asking near enough for this. I have to have it. Yes, here's my charge card, burn in hell, thank you so very much, have a marvellous day. Be well.

I honestly need to sell some of this shit. It's got zero sentimental value to me beyond the bragging rights of being able to turn around and say "look how clever I am in thrift stores". Then it sits in my apartment for a few days and I become attached to it; "oh I could never, would never sell that". Charles wants to open an antique store of his own someday and so do I. Maybe we can do it together, if we're both very disciplined and get our respective acts together before we both get very old and die. He desires to especialize in European antiquities since no one else seems to do so within Albuquerque. I'd have to talk him into softening a bit on that, if any but a small handfull of my stuff is to ever go into the store.

Well, I do take consolation in the fact that he is "worse" than I am in this, by some fairly important measures. He bought -- and today we transported to his home from Gertrude's warehouse -- a huge -- eight foot tall -- armoire. The shippers could have saved a lot if they knew how it came apart like Charles did: with what amounts to four screws (each handmade), each piece fitting together into the others like a puzzle and quite capable of being moved by one unaided person, if in twelve separate trips. That is the genius of truly great furniture design. Maybe that's a part of why pianos are so cheap: because they can't be disassembled, reassembled just like that, and always seem to need at least two people to move. At any rate, his armoire wound up getting shipped from Paris in one piece. Duh. Driving up the price for Gertrude, driving up the price for Charles. We marvel at how cheap antiques can be had for in Europe, yet we never stop to think maybe they're just avoidably expensive here. Hmm.

After that went to the distinguished Victorian brick home (National Register of Historic Places, New Mexico Historic Landmark) of a quite well known lady around Albuquerque. Deadheading roses. Hundreds of bushes probably, thousands of flowers definitely. Worked two hours there and got heatstroked and wanted to get home to listen to Amy Goodman and the local news on KUNM. Collected enough rosehips to make rosehip tea for the entire Cossak army, but still have a bunch more to do if the powers that be will allow me. The owner's reputedly crazy son, who lives across the street in a sort of hovel, came over and asked me if Charles and I were related. I suppose this was his typically amateurish way of finding out whether I'm queer. I said nope (we're not related) and dropped it like a rock into the depths of his mind. He asked if I was watering, or just doing what I was doing then, which was deadheading a floribunda by the front door. I said "just deadheading roses, I believe", assuming he was the person responsible for watering (everything was well watered) and hoping to get out of the chore for one day by asking the newbie gardener around the house if it was his responsibility. He left shortly after that, no further words between us passing.

Must call Gertrude's antique store first thing tomorrow (tenish) to find out when they'll want me in. Can't actually post this tomorrow since I'm observing world hunger day. Tuesday. Used to be payday. Interesting. Yes indeed.

One month, one day ago today I would have worked eight hours: before midnight 'til after sunrise. I would have had money in the bank and in savings, and yet known that neither my day nor my night was entirely mine, even though I was entirely awake most of that time. If I wasn't then sleeping from about ten to four, I had to pretend to be sleeping in order to be able to sleep between two and five hours on the two or three days I could actually sleep at all. I couldn't go out in daytime without looking like a zombie. My days off -- nights off -- were nights the day people considered worknights. Their best offtime was my best worktime -- had to be. My whole week was literally flipped in addition to the flipped twenty-four hour thing.

Doubleflip. Flip the Frog.

Now I work ten to four. In the day. Sun on my back, wind at my shoulders. Stand windward when cutting climbing roses. Right-handed pruners don't work for me, period. Yes there was ham in the hallway. Yes, I ate three pieces. "'h'orde'vres", we call them, or something preposterous like that. It's ok ham for 11 pm storebought I guess. As opposed to the handfuls I took when I worked for you, plus bought burritos every night without fail. Yeah they were very tasty, and I'd buy 'em again in a minute at that hour with my money if I could get hold of it. So what if I feel the lashes of the master on my back when standing leeward. The wind's a kind taskmaster. You just have to learn to work with it.

I am living. I do not have to lie. I do not have to pretend to be what I am not just to feel minimally safe. Though I have only worked these new jobs for a month, I have not once had my tyres slashed while working. I have not become so challenged forcing down such violently homophobic ignorance borne of inexperience notwithstanding paternalist goodwill in the interests of my self and my own people as to have to repeatedly do the impossible, without fail. If I just have to make do with a little bit less money, so be it.

O for a 24-hour internet cafe! O for some slight semblance of human society at this awful hour. Wherever can a person find good food or reasonable companionship at this god-forsaken time of night? Right. The Aquarium. Or Library. at 1h46am. I don't think so. Too old for that.

"Last Call!" Two words in this state bartenders will never utter. By law. Turn up, or down, the lights. Drink up! if they say anything. Best not to let them. They've been at least polite to you all night, it's the least you can do in return. Don't leave 'em stuff to wash after close or messes to clean up. If you don't tip, don't make a big deal out of it; but if you do, don't make a big deal out of it. Tip's between you and him. Thanks man, enjoyed the night or at least thanks for trying, dude; good luck, best wishes. worst comes to worst good day.

Yeah it bugs me not tipping that not quite rude girl at the doghouse. Too bad we don't live in such times that change fer tip means anything but "fuck you". If i can ever show my face in there again I'l tip two bucks. Three people make your order? Tip a dollar each. One helps you, another makes your order, a third brings it to you, or manages the whole store? Three bucks. Thank you. Enjoy your coffee. Go away. Don't leave a mess. Hello. How are you? Excellent, thank you. What can we get for you today? Excellent choice. Superb. Delicious. (N.B.: custom drinkers absolutely hate that: it means you know their drink too well; these people get the shit end of the stick and pass it on to you: you're not expected to know what it tastes like.) Anything else? (Gesture as needed.) (Repeat, as necessary.) (perfect eye contact throughout) That's going to be/comes to/amounts to/ought to come to/ought to come to roughly [amount USD (e.g.: "threesixtyfive")]. Thank you. So much. Thankyousomuch. Thanksamuch. Thank ye. Thankyuh. Thanky. Merci beaucoup. Hai, arigato gozaimatsu. Au'jourd'hui. Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Good day. Grazie. Enjoy.

Thoughts following my 1st day at Gertrude's.

I thought it went exceedingly well. I show up about ten minutes early and wind up getting paid for it. My job: walk around with a clean dustrag and dust things. Hold the key and answer the front door when clients arrive. Show them out when they leave and lock up behind them. Be charming and welcoming and kind of keep an unobtrusive eye on people. Be chatty but avoid getting sucked too deeply into the inane forced conversations of clueless breeder husbands trying to indulge their wives by going out to antique stores instead of sitting at home watching whatever sport's in season on TV. Try not to laugh too noticably at the people who think a reproduction 17th Century painting is an original even though they're not thinking of buying it. Arrange things invitingly, especially after they get moved for whatever reasons. Help get a mahogany table out of a hard to get at corner so these two very nice but incredibly thorough lesbians can crawl around with flashlights underneath it for twenty minutes before deciding it's just not for them. Ask leading questions and send people back towards the garden. Unwrap a huge gilt mirror and wipe it clean of a hundred years of grimy soot from whatever Left Bank bordello from which it doubtless came.

Eventually I get two or three of the clocks running, even though I've not been asked to, and not only do I not get yelled at for showing that little bit of initiative, they seem positively happy that I've "fixed" them, especially the late 18th century French grandmother clock in the chapel room that wouldn't run and whose bell didn't even sound like a bell 'til I tinkered with it a bit. Of course I'm sure when I go in next they'll all have stopped running again, most old clocks being filled with gremlins, fine with me, something to do. Two more quite nice French clocks just need a proper hanging. Before I'm done with that place everything'll ring at the same time in every room every half hour. One weird little Dutch clock makes no sense whatsoever. Got paid in cash for the day and was asked to come back Tuesday, probably to do some basic wiring of chandeliers and whatnot.

Promptly spent the day's take on a little spree at the bars with Charles -- not smart exactly, but neither entirely unjustifiable nor unenjoyable. Red bulls and various sorts of alcohol. Then back to Charles' where we noodle around on a piano, a pump organ, and an accordion about half drunk and wide awake. He sings "Ave Maria" in a booming falsetto over what I always thought was the Well Temperd Clavier's First Prelude at 4am; I wonder what his neighbours must think -- doubtless that we're insane. People don't get drunk and play music and sing in this town, they get drunk and shoot their relatives and lovers, or lacking either, total strangers. Before we went out we listened to a couple of hours of amazing Berlin jazz from the '20s. Moneywise I've still got just exactly enough to eat on until I work again, although I may go slightly bonkers until then if I can't contrive some sort of money-free means to get out of the house. What's that? I could go for a walk, or a bicycle ride? Hm.

As for sales? We sold a lot. I didn't do much selling, really, but it looks to be pretty easy -- pleasant, even -- and none too unethical the way they do it. Just make the customer feel right about what they already feel right about. Yes, that's a lovely piece. Just in. From Paris. Of course it's maple. I've never seen another like it before, either. Late 19th century. Of course, we do have a matching piece in back. At worst any objection I could raise to having to engage in that sort of banter is aesthetic, not ethical, because some of the clients do in fact have dreadful tastes. The best of them know it and openly solicit assistance; first step is recognizing you have a problem, they always say. Like that poor, clueless woman with the sample piece of cloth.

I guess something about me screams out "faggot" because this poor woman practically threw herself down before me, weeping inconsolably, despairing to match this uterly baffling colour we discerning queers have agreed, over years of debate and extensive discourse, to call "white". Yes, I'm serious. She didn't recognize it or know how to match it, very possibly she's colourblind. Which I wouldn't make light of except she also never thought to match any of the other colours in the sample, and thought nothing about seeking out even remotely complementary styles. It was a sort of kilim pillowcase, but clearly new, as in probably a Chinese reproduction. She was looking at brand new, super-foofy gilt stuff for a long time, which was definitely the wrong way to go. She wanted two chairs, no, one couch, no, two different chairs, no, finally those two chairs I point out right in front of her, yes, they're absolutely perfect, how could I ever have missed them, oh no, thirty-nine-ninety-five is out of my range for two chairs, even if they are 18th century Spanish, of course we have layaway, maybe those first two chairs again, maybe if we add a marbletopped table, no, that's all wrong, maybe that couch, maybe those second two chairs, but that third pair's so perfect, practicaly museum pieces, amazing how well they actually match, no no they're far too expensive, I'll think about it probably be back thank you have a nice day.

Can it be that she was genuinely that confused? I wonder what her house looks like. I'm guessing something like that fantasic Thai restaurant in North Hollywood that Steve referred to just as "Pattern Hell": bricks on the floor, florals on the booth seats, imitation tartans on the booth backs, stripes on the chair seats, checkerboard plaid tablecloths, polka dots on the wallpaper, imitation woodgrain wainscoting (sp?), paisley curtains, and so forth. Best pickled pigs tongues on earth. How I miss California.

So I ran around from the front of the store to the register room and back with the keys to the front door and a handful of clocks in my hand and I felt like the king of the world. I could see myself living the life I've been destined to live ever since I chose this human incarnation in the bardo state on having glimpsed that Greta Garbo/Jimmy Stewart movie in which the Nazis are taking over Prague and putting out the workers of this charming little department store with an overstock of music boxes and decided that's the life I want to live, or as close as I can to it, minus the getting pushed around by the Nazis bit, if possible.

I may miss Pride this year since I seem to increasingly be living it every day, and have a new job allowing me to do exactly that (i.e., simply be myself) where I'll likely be working Saturday. A little disappointed, but I'll live. It's infinitely more important to live it than to go walk in the parade/festival it has become, then go back into protective colouration for the other 364 days of the year. Besides, we'll probably get lots of people in the store from all over the state and country in town for Pride specifically; so what the hell, as long as they're all coming into town I'd just as soon selectively run into those with lots of money who are interested in old stuff. The events will probably go on into the night, though as for the Eastbound march on Central in commemoration of the uprising I may have to get a bit creative. Maybe I'll stand on the bar at Foxes and see how many times I can shout "out of the bars, into the streets" before I get beaten to a bloody pulp. Maybe I'll walk the seven miles down to the fairgrounds after getting off at Gertrude's. Hm! That might be fitting. I must wear my red tie.

Cat hospice.

After going to bed as soon as I get home and sleeping soundly 'til about 4 am, I wake up to the sounds of Kitten D positively screaming like the banshee. Poor little guy seems to have completely lost control of his body. He can't move, pretty much, except to wail and scream. When I'd gone to bed he was at least strong enough to walk around and climb the bedspread to get up with me and the others. Now when he tries to sit up or roll over he just shakes uncontrollably. I mix a batch of formula and Kitten A spills it. I mix another and feed it to D. He's pretty powerless to resist but seems willing enough to eat, after having eaten only maybe two or three eyedropperfuls per feeding these last couple of days. All the other cats are on solid food now. I make him about as comfortable as I can on his feeding towel and feel certain at this point that sometime later on today it will become his shroud. For the most part I just get him settled in and leave him alone. I go over and pet him about as gently as I can at one point, try to give him just a little stimulation, but it makes him miserable and he starts screaming again. I shift him into a more comfortable position and leave him yet again. Even after feeding he seems not to have regained motor function, just to have filled up.

All the other kittens know he's dying, you can see it in their eyes, and they all handle it differently. Kitten C -- D's independent, healthy, and vivacious brother (or is it sister?) -- when I left was nuzzling close to him after having spent all morning with the other healthy cats up on the bed. Kitten B, the tricolour tortoiseshell calico who just seems always to want my attention, mostly I can't figure out for what, sort of nips at D, as if to say "you dead yet?". When I was feeding him the formula this morning B was an absolute nightmare, going for the eyedropper even though he's already on solid food and just trampling his ailing brother beneath him. Ruthless. (I do believe he's a republican.) A just sort of stays away for the most part, and seems more than anything else to be comforting me through this little ordeal. D's body just keeps getting colder and more rigid, his breathing more shallow, his pulse weaker. I think he's more or less ready to die at this point. Hard to explain but I think you can tell looking into his eyes -- early this morning it was abject terror, then later he seems more or less at peace with whatever he's going through, as if to tell me I can just let him go now. I do believe I've done everything I can at this point -- when I found him both his eyes were closed and he's needed constant care these past few weeks and I've done about the best I could without being a cat myself. Cat A -- the black and white feral adult male who's so amazing, who's come into my home and basically taken over nursing all the kittens in the absence of their various mothers has taken to grooming D (an utterly disgusting job, for which he has my highest admiration) and sleeping with him in my absence.

So now I have to put all of that out of mind as I go in to Gertrude Zachary Antiques in just about an hour to start my new life selling antiques. Spent that part of the morning not spent nursing cats trying on most of the clothes I got yesterday -- so far everything fits well, if not always perfectly -- and choosing which colours are most appropriate to the setting and the fact of it being my first day. Went for the dusty plum and charcoal look in the hopes there's just barely subtle enough a hint of maroon in it to visually set me very slightly apart from all the old deeply burnished wood furniture. Wearing some sort of military dress uniform shoes, which while rather dreadful (all synthetic) have just the right mirrored look to maybe fool some people into thinking that I actually shine my shoes.

Time to go. Am really really really low on cash so may or may not post later tonight. Will if I just have to get out of the house, which I well may if there's a corpse to be buried when I return, or drama next door with Harold and his freshly minted Bench Warrant, or who knows what else might come up from the ether. Otherwise I'll hope to stretch what precious little I've got left a few more days, a few more days 'til I get paid. Feast or famine, always.

Another new occupation.

I call Charles he calls me back this morning as seems to be our more or less daily routine. He's down and out with a sinus headache and has to work at Gertrude's and there's really nothing I can do gardenwise by myself at the moment so it's not the week for landscaping, plus he's bought a new armoire and has to move a piano to make space for it. Next week promises to be busy though as more work needs to be done at the Manor and several other places besides. We chat for a good 45 minutes. I enjoy it thoroughly but am sufficiently freaked out about having used so many daytime minutes that it takes me a good half hour to build up the courage to pick up the phone to retrieve a message from a new number.

Good thing I do -- it was Jane from Gertrude's. Seems they want me to come in on Saturday -- that would be tomorrow -- and work in the store. You know, answer the door and the telephone, be charming, surveil customers in a very polite, low-key way, look for the sparkle in their eyes and thus generally sell antiques. Good heavens. How this happened I have no idea, but I'm thrilled. Called her back, I would love to come in I said, she picked up then and there. Can it be that I am on the verge of actually doing a job I've wanted to do most of my life? Seems basically I'm going to be a sort of underbutler who sells antiques to visitors.

Since Kitten D -- who won't groom or eat without almost being forced -- had a diarrhea fest on my laundry pile this morning I still have a mess I've just begun to clean up. Since I start a new job tomorrow in a really nice place I need some really nice clothes. My mother's thrilled to hear the news and says go ahead and charge a couple of pairs of pants if I need them. So I go out to Savers and get some marvellous things for not a lot of money. Then to Goodwill to round out my wardrobe. Good thing I'm distracted on clothing and someone else buys the fully functional spinet Pianola out from under me. I do not need another player piano, though this one would have been worth it: it works, and it's small. It was also incredibly ugly and being a spinet is utterly inferior in every technical way to even a slightly problematic upright or grand. Bought fruits and vegetables. Just ate an eggplant parmagiana sandwich -- perfectly cooked and flavoured, but too, too much food for a sandwich. I'm stuffed and tempted to go home now even though it's only seven and go straight to bed. I think I'll do just that.

St. Francis of the dumpster.

So I get home and clean the catbox and take the boxful of fecal specimens to the dumpster. The dumpster's been emptied that morning so it's pretty clean. I throw in the feline nastiness and what do I see lying at the bottom of the mostly empty dumpster but a charming little birdfeeder, handmade, very simple in design, built around a little plastic St. Francis covered in glow-in-the-dark birds, possibly radium-painted. Score! Excuse me, make that "it must be a miracle, a sign from god". (When in New Mexico do as New Mexicans.) The birdfeeder just had one problem with it -- a split in the wood on its roof easily fixed with a three-dollar glue gun I'd bought weeks before just not knowing when I'd need it but knowing it was a handy thing to have around the house.

How did I switch into half-width Katakana midsentence? Last thing I knew I had to get a cat off the kitchen countertop, then when I came back to finish the sentence I was typing gibberish in Japanese. Apparently there's a keyboard shortcut to change input methods. If and when I get good enough with Chinese to actually use it I must remember that. Another reason Macintosh is the greatest computer since the IBM mainframe (not to say the Jacquard loom).

An interview dropped in my lap.

Didn't work today but Charles called and said if I was interested Gertrude was looking for a part time person to work down at her antique store. Went down and they were out of applications but I went ahead and interviewed with the manager. It went quite well, the lady said she could tell my "heart was in it"; I guess this was the first time I'd ever been asked the "are you looking for something short term or long term" question and didn't have to lie, and could go on and on about how I'd love to work in antiques but know I'd just lose money if I rented a booth at some antique mall and just transported my apartment's contents in for inventory. There is another employee interested in the job from Gertrude's jewelry store (two blocks from where I live), so it may or may not happen, but we'll see. No hard feelings if it doesn't, of course; I know it sucks to get passed over when you're trying to move around or up in a company from within only to have some newbie come in and start throwing their weight around. Needless to say I'm happy about this potential development. If it happens, it'll mean a steady income, though not a huge one (since it's part time); so at least I'd know exactly how much was coming in when and could budget much more easily for things like rent and utilities.

Am at Annapurna Chai House again tonight. I love this place. Some of the staff strike me as a little spacy, but hey, this is the University district. Then again, I am decidedly not the most laid-back type person. The food is incredibly fresh and incredibly simple while the flavours within it are decidedly complex. Tonight I had the Idli Sambhar. Weird little presentation. Delicious. I'm not promising I'll go back to being vegan anytime soon but if I eat here enough it might just sort of happen on its own. Got a great window seat overlooking Silver St. and the Mennonite church across the way. Only in Albuquerque.

Loooks like a big storm brewing, blowing in from the West. That'd be nice, get some precipitation, so I won't have to water my petunias and rose and fennel and yarrow and cardoon, which Charles thinks is an artichoke.

A new record.

Three posts in one day! And I managed to spend today, making those three posts, as much money as it would have cost me to make one a week ago! I'm so excited I could end every single sentence with an exclamation point!

Don't worry, I won't.

So anyhow I've got my PDF copies, hot off the presses, of the two-volume first draft of the City of Albuquerque Office of Emergency Management's recently revised "Strategic Guide to the City-Wide Response to and Recovery From Major Emergencies and Disasters". Yeh, a little light reading. Local group at www.stopthewarmachine.org is responsible for even getting it revised; appparently it hadn't been in something like three decades, listing the possibility of a nuclear war with the Soviet Union as the likeliest reason for its eventual implementation and such.

Haven't read it yet but listening to people who have it seems to have more than its fair share of holes and faulty logic in dealing with the eventuality of any number of (or combination of) potential accidents, terrorist attacks, natural disasters, or wars which would result in the release of unknown quantities of highly radioactive material from the roughly 2510 nuclear warheads currently tucked awayy (there's that key repeat rate thing again) under a mere six feet of concrete in 53 storage bays at Kirtland Air Force Base about a mile Southeast of where the two runways of the Albuquerque aeroport cross, necessitating the immediate evacuation of an estimated 465,912 persons from Albuquerque and environs before the fallout spread. Without disparaging the intent or ability of the plan's authors, it seems to rely a bit too heavily on law enforcement personnel (who are stretched thin enough as it is in this town on a "normal" day) and electronic/telephonic/radio communications, which could all conceivably go down from a single electromagnetic pulse following a nuclear blast. Forcing us to use what for communications -- homing pigeons? feral cats? runners with knotted cords?

Of course key sections of the plan are basically blanked out; and to hear them tell it City Council wants to adopt the revisions as quickly and as quietly as possible, though to be fair in these times they're to be lauded for approaching this at all, even with a tremulous trepidation tending toward opacity. Next step seems to be to try to get the City Council President Brad Winter convinced the public needs to have the opportunity to review and comment on the plan before it is adopted. I've promised to help with copywriting and editing and typography and layout on a flyer or brochure. I just hope they call me on it, I'd enjoy the challenge of reading the equuivalent of a ream of paper printed out, finding all the holes in it, then summarizing the main issues and pressure points in a one-sided, three-fold flyer: one-sided so the other side could be translated into Spanish.

A worthy challenge, yes indeed. Not that transplanting roses without gloves isn't a bit tricky, but really -- that's not even in the same league; my mind craves stimulation. I love this stuff. I must keep a certain mix of it in my daily diet. When everything is plants and flowers and mansions and antiques and furniture and colour and light what can I say, life gets oh just a little boring, if admittedly more beautiful to live. God help me should I ever have the look of boredom that I saw today on someone's face at having just spent a mere $35,000 on a whole truckload of magnificent antiques from Paris. Once again, all in perspective. Yes, compared to some things, it is a somewhat boring everyday affair to assemble the estates from which the great museums spring, cobbling together this and that in pleasing ways because it's pleasing.

The joy in living from the sublime to the ridiculous and back is not knowing for certain which domain you're in at any given time. Each has some element of the other at its very core so that neither bliss nor despair, perfection nor absurdity can ever be complete and final in itself. All's in a constant state of change, of evermoving flux. The grotesque magnitude and utter urgency of any given issue lends it frivolity or makes it farce; meanwhile style's fickle dictates somehow succeed in making the barren earth bloom forth anew each day.

So. I must strive to be a stylish activist and a dedicated gardener.

Of course right now I smell. I need to take a bath. Speaking of smell -- I went to Foxes on my own last night. There is a certain fascination with the place; it's so down and out it's indestructible. (Perhaps if I am lucky I'll be there, not near my fallout shelter, when the bombs start going off.) But I do hate -- and I mean *hate* the flattery I get when walking into such a place, because I'm "young". Not terribly unlike the way breeder men talk at women, the whole madonna/whore complex. We should be better than to replicate their own repressive ways of doing things in our world. (The way those people live leads to divorce and child abuse and crime and violence and famine and ecological disaster. Not just disgusting, but downright immoral.) I don't tell my cats they're beautiful (although they are). Perhaps it's meant well but it strikes me as disingenuous to the point of spiteful. Those older than me say enjoy it while it lasts. I can't. There are uses of the language I will positively never sanction. Bloody sad, really. No, I'll stick to my odd little circle of freinds, thank you so very much. I should have turned into a bitchy old queen years ago.