So Yeah, WE DID. (See our Planet Harlem Obama Party in VIDEO). You Lose Some, You Oughta Win Some!

Last night = obvs a historic occasion. Not only did I slice my leg open (re: your questions in the comments -- that's defo not the blood dripping down, I literally did get sliced from knee to ankle) but Barack Obama WON the election AND -- inspired by these events and vodka, I willingly traveled TOWARDS, rather than away from, a large mass of human beings congregated in one small space. Not only this, but said human congregation was at the intersection of 125th & Adam Clayton Powell, in New York, NY, one block from my old apartment. We made you a video about it! [below] And it was beautiful, so fucking amazing, there's no place on earth I would've rather been. A jubilant & incredibly diverse crowd -- our collective joy broke into blossom, turned into amber waves of grain, and will now fed our hearts and souls forevs and evs. We did it!

I've really enjoyed, deep in the little embers of my ever-loving heart, reading your comments last night and today. You're all so special and warm my heart, seriously, you've all said such amazing things.

You know when you can't help but SMILE? I hear this happens to other people all the time, but I am a tin-man/vampire, so.

OMG! How many "omgkfasjdaklj" texts did you send last night? OMG, i KNOW! Me too!!!

As for Prop 8 -- the fight isn't over. That's all I can talk about right now, as I don't think I can handle any bittersweet in my sweet today. I'll deal with it, I'm not gonna block it out like I did with other childhood traumas, a psychological coping mechanism that made me into the batshit crazy person I am today. I'm gonna deal with it like later on tonight or this week. Tegan & Sara, btw, are leading a prop 8 protest rally in WeHo tonight. That's amazing. I love America!

Also, nice job Palin. You are so over, we need a new word for over.

Every now and then, there comes an event so magical, and so huge, that I don't feel I can do it justice in any way except to run around the streets and scream with people. Mostly, I feel you've probs read enough of my words and the words of others today. C'mon, you know how I feel my feelings today, obvs.

So I've made you a video. We took the camera last night but weren't that good at filming important stuff, but you know how I like to turn straw into gold. And by gold I mean "goldplated" but it's the thought that counts.

It's a little corny, I have some of Obama's speech in Grant Park there as well as footage from our jaunt, which you witnessed in writing last night as I live-blogged. A;ex and I went next door (our friends are my neighbors!), got Chase & Ang, and went right to Planet. Obvs. Among other amazing things I overheard was "Who's house is it?" "THE BLACK HOUSE!"

Also, this guy walked past me and said "You need some change, right?" in a burst of enthusiasm and I was confused, as was Alex, I was like "is he saying that I'm gonna be the poor one now? If he is, that's kind of amazing and awesome, but why is he offering me change? Is it my outfit?" and then I realized he was talking about the other kind of change. You know, THE CHANGE WE NEED.

[Great article about Rachel Maddow in New York Magazine, P.S.]

You can see some of last night's brill insanity. Wheeee!!!!!


Also, an update on my leg -- it still looks pretty much the same, perhaps slightly worse, but is beginning to scab. Stay tuned for more updates!!!

We've Got Trees We've Yet to VLOG In With Semicolon: Half-Blog, Half-Vlog ... Are You Ready For Spring?

3/25: So Natalie got me this Lenny Kravitz t-shirt -- it was free. I don't care one way or the other about Lenny Kravitz, his music, or going his way ... but the shirt's delightful. I should make friends and then invite people over to look. I just turned on this magical box in our living room, it's fantastic. I was having trouble writing, then reading, then email and so here I am! This happened Monday night too: the deaf girl from The L Word was good in the dance show. I think I need to see Nim's Island, there seems to be a treehouse involved. The Office is funny.

3/26: Sometimes when I can't sleep I just look at photographs. Like Alex just told me about typeish.com, and I like the nerve photo galleries or photo blogs 'cause they get really ace photographers there, and mostly I can link out to good photographer websites and then follow links all through the night. Or I like her famed good looks and rion.nu and achtung baby.

So I was going to do a Top Ten called "Who DOES That"? You know that expression? Some questions I might typically include have, over time, answered themselves: Who reads Reader's Digest? My grandmother. Who listens to Michael Bolton? My grandfather. Who does crack? The people in my neighborhood. Who watches World's Wildest Police Chases? Matty, it was his favorite show, he LOL'ed: "Look how stupid those motherfuckers are! Isn't it funny?"

Like -- Who eats at Long John Silver's? I've seen advertisements. I've seen the yellow-and-blue shacks peddling fried seafood -- buttered lobster bites, jumbo fried shrimp, fried fish with hush-puppies, fries, you name the artery, it's got a product designed to clog it right up. According to its website, there's 12,000 LJS ... yet in the informal survey I've been conducting for the last few years, I don't know anyone who will admit to eating there. I'd also ask about White Castle, but my Mom used to wax nostalgic about her childhood and teenaged trips to the joint and former love for its burgers. But that was like a hundred years ago.

3/27: So, since I couldn't seem to pull together the actual blog I've been trying to write for today, I've decided to keep the good parts of it (about one paragraph total) as a springboard towards an even better blog later this week. So instead, for today, I made a vloggity vlog with Alex/Semicolon/A;ex!! Once upon a time, Alex Vega won the comment contest ... and now she's all grown up. It just goes to show you kids that if you dream it you can do it!

This vlog includes a discussion of many spicy topics, includin: Alex's suspiciously frequent visits to the dentist, a Katlitter tribute, drumsticks/cucumbers, RuPaul, alcohol, balls, flying lesbians, the meaning of life and Semicolon's famous comment which won her the comment contest back in October 2007. Special appearances via vintage clips of Haviland and Lozo.

And Her Heart Grew Three Sizes That Day

As you may or may not know, I'm not into holidays, as they almost always require seeing other humans or being in crowded spaces with other humans. Until recently, most holidays required me serving food to massive amounts of other humans for measly holiday tips (everyone eats out on holidays, not just typical eater-outers (do with that what you will), so the tips are generally lower than usual). I think I made a joke that "celebrating every National Holiday to its fullest" is my New Year's Resolution, but I've changed that resolution to "eat more ice cream," and I just did, so that's that. Also, when I said that, I wasn't referring to things like the 4th of July or Halloween, but rather to obscure less-celebrated holidays, like Arbor Day. Because who doesn't like trees? That's right, no-one. Everyone likes trees, 'cause of shade, and paper.

Anyhow, much like what I imagined your initial reaction would be to the political endorsement I made a few days ago, I feel you might think "I wouldn't necessarily go to Riese for advice on any holiday-related topics." But look how good I did on the Obama thing. I read so much that I even convinced myself. That "ho-hum, la-di-da" I added to the end of my up-'til-then impassioned endorsement was meant to be said in a voice of self-loathing, not in an actual "la-di-da" voice. P.S.

However! Now that I understand how primaries work, I feel like less of an asshat for not registering to vote in the New York primaries -- I always (always=the last two elections for which I've been old enough to vote) vote absentee in Michigan, 'cause it's a swing state, and I can't do primaries here and the general election there, and apparently Michigan had no primaries this year, or something, which makes me feel slightly less guilty than I did on Monday when I realized I'd fallen full-tilt in love with Obama and could do nothing about it besides spout off opinions, as I so often do with political causes of all shapes, sizes, colors and genders.

So ... for those of you who aren't old enough to be irresponsible citizens yet, I speak to you from a place of experience and knowledge: being an irresponsible citizen feels like crap. Don't make the same mistakes I did. I rarely say that, so I must be serious. Usually I endorse my own mistakes, obvs, I'd like you to probs participate in them with me ideally. Register.

So speaking of ... I was speaking of something, right? OMG it's almost Valentine's Day! What are you going to get for your beloved? I'm getting Lozo socks and a tie and a super bowl. I have this theory (cue Juliana Hatfield, Jordan Catalano-style) that the less I feel I know what's going on in my own life (in general, this is totally un V-Day-related), the more I feel comfortable telling other people what to do with theirs. Thus this three-peat streak of blog entries in which I tell y'all what to do.

Obvs the best thing to do for any holiday is to show your special someone that you pay attention to them when they talk and that you care about their likes and dislikes. For example, back in the 90's, we used to make mix tapes. You can't do that anymore, because now they've become iconic as a hipster-memento, over-nostalgia-ized/fetishized and can no longer be given without irony. Also no one has tape players anymore. Well, I do. But I don't know about you kids who were born on the internet, you've got all kinds of things going on, a lot of feelings.

You can make a mix CD though, that's still cool. It helps also to name the tracks on the CD so they don't get lost in Track-13-Ville down at the bottom of your itunes post-import. Also really, you should just make collages with poems on them for everyone you love, everyone! Collages, poems and CDs for everyone, I say! Everyone you love!

So if your girlfriend (or boyfriend, if he's feminine enough to enjoy this list) reads Auto-Win (which's statistically unlikely, as I seem to regularly hear from readers who say their girlfriend doesn't read my blog but they do), they'd probs like a gift that would reflect their deep love for this particular corner of the WWW, which's why I feel I can give you advice.

Thursday Top Eight What to Get For Your Auto-Win/Auto-Straddle Fan For V-Day

8. Vodka

This is an easy one. Even if your girlfriend doesn't want to engage in penetrative activities with the bottle, she'll probs drink it, and drunk girls are easy. JK. I mean, they are -- but the point is -- if you mix vodka with cranberry juice, you can barely taste it. If you mix vodka with tonic, you're one of us. Also if you need to get her drunk in order to inspire loooovee, you should probs break up.

7. A Nice Smell

Nothing can ruin a friendship or budding romance like someone who smells bad. Has anyone ever complemented you on your smell? If the answer is no, then you probs smell bad. I'd like to suggest Burberry Brit and/or Victoria's Secret Very Sexy. Also Tommy Girl is always a classic, though now I'm too old I think to wear it. As for boys, I like Hugo Boss and Burberry, but that's just me. Obviously I'm no longer a boy expert.

6. Peanut Butter Crackers

This is just for those of you who'd like to seduce Carly. As it was explained in this vlog, the way to Carly's heart is via peanut butter crackers. There's a lot of ins and outs to PB crackers. The hands-down tastiest variety are the cheese-and-pb crackers, which I have in bulk. Howevs, the cheese often gets stuck in your teeth, and it's orange, and that's not hot. The Ritz-and-PB crackers, then, are a close second.

5. The L Word Season One on DVD

Some of you may be lucky enough to be lesbians/bisexuals with straight girlfriends. You know, that straight girl that you hang out with all the time -- maybe she's even your roommate -- and you act like she's your girlfriend 'cause you're in denial that she's straight and she kinda wants you to act like that (around certain company), and she enables your denial by making sweet love to you on occasion and flirting with you in public. If you get her Season One of 'The L Word,' she'll probs relate to Jenny, think lesbians are cool and want to be one ... and you can probably do it a few more times before never speaking to each other again. But now's the time, because February can be very cold/lonely, people do crazy things in February. Also some of you are straight men with straight girlfriends who want your girlfriend to consider the pleasures of a threesome, this is also for you, gents.

4. Books

As we're all aware now, I love books. Perhaps you could get your wife a book. I think Valentine's Day is a hot time for books that are somehow sexy. I'd recommend randomized erotica books I've been in, but this post is about procrastinating my actual work by writing a blog post, it's not about selling things. Why would I want to sell things, I'm not a traveling salesman or anything, like Jenny's assistant Adele's father is allegedly.

So, moreso than any explicit erotica, I think there's a lot of contemporary authors who do a good sex scene. They do more than just that, obvs, but when sex comes up, they do it right. Some examples include Maggie Estep's Soft Maniacs or anything by Mary Gaitskill -- if you liked "The Secretary," you oughta know it was based on a short story from Bad Behavior. Also, there's always poetry. You should write a poem, or you can go to poets.org, find a poem, and then copy it and say you wrote it. If you do like straight-up erotica though and you're a homo, bi OR hetero lady, you should check out Cleis, they sell good stuff. Also my hero RKB has edited about 500 erotica anthologies, and Susie Bright is basically the godmother of the whole thing, and therefore, her a-store is a good place to go.

3. Auto-Apparel

Clearly this is what we're coming back around to. We'd really wanted to get the merch out by Christmas, because obvs Auto-Apparel makes a great gift. But we didn't. However, there's been a noticeable increase in orders over the past week and I think it's 'cause of V-Day. So ... since I'm gonna be going to the post office anyhow, why not make it really worth my while --

If you order any auto-apparel or stickers before Valentine's Day, you'll receive a Very Special V-Day Auto-Win CD FREE with your order. You can kinda imagine this is like one of those ads they had on the teevee for loooveee songs, maybe they still sell CDs like that? I dunno, it's probs an imix now. This is sort of like mix tapes, that I talked about earlier. This CD will feature much of the music I talk about here on Auto-Win, with a special emphasis on lurrrveee in all it's many forms.

Anyhow, why should you buy Auto-Apparel right now? Here's why:
a). MUSIC: Because you'll get a new CD. If you don't like songs about good relationships, then email me after placing your order and I can send you a copy of "the fuck you breakup playlist,'" which I made in 2003. Actually, no, I wouldn't do that to you, a girl can only handle so much Fiona Apple. I'd make an updated version, with all new songs on it, but the same title.
b) TZEDAKAH: As you may or may not know, the logo that the ridiculously talented Alex 'Semicolon' Vega used for the Auto-Win/Straddle logo comes from a photograph by Layla Love. In fact, most of the photos I do come from Layla. Right now she's trying to raise money for the treatment of her mother's MS (multiple sclerosis) through the Jenny Love Angel Fund she's created (you can read more about the fund and her fundraising efforts on her blog, here). Anyhow, if you buy auto-gear now, 50% of the proceeds will go to her fund ... and that's the kind of holiday spirit I actually do believe in, regardless of my other Grinch-esque qualities.
c) SEX: Auto-straddle boy briefs are very sexy. They say 'straddle' on the back. You know what I like about other languages, e.g., Spanish & Hebrew (the only languges aside from English I've ever known)? Commands. We don't have "commands" as a tense of verbs like other languages do. If we did, we might have a straddle command.
d) TIMING: Okey-dokey so if you order by Monday or Tuesday, you'll get it before Valentine's Day, unless you live in Europe or Australia, in which case, there's still a chance. Also I don't think you have Valentine's Day over there in Guatemala, do you? I don't know.

1. Ella-Ella-Ella-Ella

Every once in a million years, something really spectacular happens in the world -- stars and galaxies collide, universes burst forth with the fruit of their loins, and children dance in the street in color-coordinated outfits, singing sweet & clever songs towards the clean cloudless sky. OMG speaking of clouds ...

The beautiful song that got me through so many months that would've otherwise been spent in raincloud-esque heartache ... ella ... ella ... ella ....

UMBRELLA. Rhianna. Is peddling UMBRELLAS. Guess where? TOTES. This could quickly become a "who's on first" situation, so let me be perfectly clear: TOTES the company is selling UMBRELLAS by Rhianna who sang the song that I love UMBRELLA. I don't actually think you should buy one -- although they aren't that expensive, probs no better or worse than a normal umbrella (which let's be honest, I'm sure you left someplace the last time it rained) -- I just wanted to tell you about it, because I think it's funny. Because ... well ... I love you! Not like that, but you know what I mean.

My Number One Feeling is Sunshine

[Photos by Alex Vega]
On Monday we decided to go to Florida, so on Tuesday we went to the Newark airport to fly to Florida. Our flight was delayed and thus, over variations on salad at the JetBlue terminal's Chili's Express, I subjected my traveling companions to about an hour of my favorite conversation topic: "What should I do for a Top Ten?!". We considered some of yours, some of ours. Some I've done. Where We Are Going and Where We Have Been. We may or may not've spent the next four days throwing out ideas for "Top Ten Critters" at random, which ultimately we realised would have to be an extended feature, like those predictable yet annual "sexiest women ever" lists run in men's magazines -- the ones where Angelina Jolie & Halle Berry always make the top ten. They won't make ours. They may be sexy, but they are not critters.

I try to make Top Tens relevant to that week's activities and said as much, and so we tried to think of things that have been happening lately. One of our Top Ten phrases of the moment is "I have a lot of feelings" (and variations on that), so someone suggested "Top Ten Feelings." Now, our new favorite phrase is: "My number one feeling is [INSERT NOUN OR VERB]." Really, it's hard to keep up with us, we're like Juno. Anyhow, so, as I dipped my lettuce & crisp-bread into my ramiken of ranch, we brainstormed my Top Ten Feelings. It was very educational, I learned a lot about what my friends think of me. I'm not going to go into explaining the list formed in the box in the upper-right, you can make of that what you will. Also, usually my handwriting is way neater, but I was eating and writing all at once:

This list seemed depressing, especially since most people wouldn't understand that "impatient" can be a good thing. That box became a new brainstorm that led to the actual Tuesday Top Eight. Also: clearly kidding about loving animals, which I think I named as my number one feeling. Howevs, I changed my tune re: animals later on in the week ... and when I say that, I'm not talking about Alex leaping over lawn-chairs/tables and torpedoing into the pool (much to the surprise of our compatriots) or our primitive fondness for wrestling like children/monkeys (that's not a veiled sexual reference, I'm quite serious about our wrestling). I'm talking about Tinkerbell, obvs, my new dog (see left, and more on this later).

So, I will get back to this about lists of feelings in a bit. Firstly: a Tuesday night JetBlue fight from Newark, New Jersey, to Ft.Lauderdale, Florida, is essentially a retired Jew-train. If you were to loot the Sunday return flight, you'd establish a healthy supply of Juicy separates and fancy sunglasses, as well as a number of screaming children who I wanted to kill with my bare hands, but Tuesday is 95% peoples in their golden years. Cait was seated next to and thus became besties with a couple she called "my grandparents." Grandma read the news-ticker on her back-of-the-seat teevee out loud to her husband, 'cause old people like to read everything they see out loud to each other, e.g., street signs, newspaper headlines, the titles of other people's books, slogans on other people's shirts, etc. (Imagine aging Jew accent: Gpa-"Big bellies cause DIABETES!" [pause] Gma-"I KNOW!")
*
Here's the thing about Key Biscayne: we were steps from the beach, there were even hammocks available should someone care for certain degrees of relaxation. Palm trees and perfect temperate weather. Food without washing dishes, drinks without consequences. Freedom. From our balcony we could see two large glassy blue pools and their respective hot-tubs, and the paths and green space between them. Night-time is quiet and therefore belonged to us. The humidity mutes out to a perfect 75-degree-cool. There's that ocean. There's the possibility of wine delivered to a hot tub, and of being with friends who make you laugh more than just about anyone. That's an advantage to meeting people on the webbernets via bloggetry: they've already got your sense of humor and basic belief system mostly.

I don't like Miami the city 'cause the people are made of plastic and they all have shiny cars that intimidate me and believe in strange things, but I wouldn't mind visiting Key Biscayne every week or so. Also I don't like Republicans generally.

*

So Alex decided she only has five feelings, but then -- later and drunk, she couldn't remember all five, only: hunger, happy and "dancing."
Dancing isn't a feeling, Vega, Cait & I told her.
It is, she said. And also, she said, my number four feeling is music, and my number five feeling is RuPaul.
We told her RuPaul and Music are also not feelings, but nouns,
but she said, no, RuPaul is a feeling.
Okay Alex, we said, if you want dancing to be your number one feeling, then you go for it. You dance.

*

Also: back to loving animals. We got Tinkerbell from the gift-shop downstairs -- one of many places within the resort who found our presence alarming/interesting -- Tinkerbell also doubles as a purse 'cause you can zip open her back and insert things in it, like illegal drugs, tampons, money and condoms for straight people. Last night (Monday) I brought Tinkerbell to Carly's party and spoke on Tinkerbell's behalf ("Tinkerbell would like a vodka-tonic." "Tinkerbell is very cold.") but Carly told me I had to cut it out and put that shit away. That's fine, I don't expect anyone to understand Tinkerbell like I do. Tinkerbell is a woman's best friend.

*

We spent heaps of time in the elevator -- traveling from our room to the ground floor and subsequently to the outdoors or traveling from our room to the food room upstairs, where we attempted to identify mysterious wrap sandwiches that'd later reappear as salads or mini-desserts the next day. Alex and I ate a lot of sourdough bread and Haviland had a lot of lettuce and Cait dropped her food off the balcony onto the lawn below, which was awesome, our heads exploded along with the lavash.

I tried to tell everyone on the Vlog about this woman who came out of the elevator super-stressed while Cait & I were upstairs waiting on it. She wore a business suit and a nametag and looked like she'd just been to hell in back, and said urgently: I'VE BEEN STUCK IN THERE FOR FIVE MINUTES. Cait & I waited about two minutes for the other lift to arrive before hopping right onto the allegedly damaged elevator. Someone else in the elevator car asked 'isn't this the broken elevator?' which seemed dumb, we were all in an elevator we thought we might never leave, which says a lot about our desires to move from floor to floor. This was funnier later when we tried to re-tell the story than it was at the time. This happens often to us.

I'm not good at being around other people for numerous consecutive hours and also I had a recap to write, so one afternoon the girls left me alone. I tried to go to the food floor alone but all the elevators kept going down and I wanted to go up, which's why I'd pressed the "down" button. It happened like six times, so I started hiding when the lift would stop for me (but not really at all for me) by pressing my back against the button-containing wall when the elevator doors opened, 'cause every time it did all its passengers would look at me like I'd just ruined their lives by making them stop on my floor when I wanted to go up and they wanted to go down. So once I was pressed against the wall being quiet like a mouse and a guy goes "What's this? Another false alarm," and I was like, "Sucker!"

Also there was a tropical windstorm so I went outside and tried to stand as still as possible and let the wind blow my hair around and took photos where Hav says I look like a fetus. Then everyone came back and I told them that housekeeping had come to fix the safe and so now I had the contents of the safe, how exciting! I assumed Cait had called housekeeping to tell them that she couldn't get anything out of the safe. But she HADN'T. They just KNEW. Our sense that we were communicating telepathically with the resort increased when Vega answered the door to a nice hotel worker lady and then told us the lady had asked if we wanted room service. Which's odd, as we'd just been discussing that very thing. Then we realised that the lady had said "TURN-DOWN service," not room service, but Vega didn't know what that is. I do, 'cause they did it on the cruise, that was when they brought the free chocolates and gay t-shirts.

*

Before Saturday, the resort was almost exclusively populated by attendees of a mysterious "Circle of Excellence" convention (appeared Midwestern or Southern, most of them, a lot of capri pants) and very old white people. Perhaps it was because we were dressed like bums or perhaps it was our youth & beauty, but we got famous super-quick, and it seemed everyone in the resort knew about us 'cause everywhere we went alone we were asked "where are the rest of the girls?" I decided they probs thought we were rockstars, 'cause who else would dare to be so foxy and also so bummily dressed? The man at the gym kept really close tabs on us and said weird things about Heath Ledger and the economy (he liked to watch the teevee too, like the woman on the plane, and read out loud to me), it kinda made me uncomfortable but who cares, it was also comedy gold and I got a great workout!

On Saturday, the herds arrived -- neatly tanned middle-aged women with taut stomachs and lipo'ed thighs and their fleshy hairy husbands &  cherubic hypnotized children, and some young couples & groups of pretty thirtysomething girls reading Janet Evanovich novels at poolside in overpriced sarongs -- but by then we'd settled in and we would've stayed forever, even with all the people. All of 'em! I'd never loved this kind of thing so much in my life.

*

When we went to the spa to get massages, during which Alex bff'ed her masseuse due to shared heritage and Cait got her masseuse to reconsider her stance on gay marriage and I got pummeled by some dude, they gave us these robes that totally swallowed Alex and we thought that was high-larious too. Cait took a photo with her phone, it's one of the strangest photos ever, we're like Samurai warriors. I cut off my head in this photo 'cause I look silly in it but you can see I'm preparing for Zen. Alex looks silly too, but I put it up anyway, 'cause it's precious:

*

Though Cait and I didn't want to go out (other people, crowded rooms), the going-out-to-a-lesbo-bar idea was proposed every night. But the last night we decided to get really crazy, which always means that Riese has to drink a lot and then do something really crazy no one else would want to do like get a tattoo. Holla! So I did, we went to Miami Ink, which apparently is famous amongst people who watch television. It was AWESOME. Here it is:

It's Ancient Hebrew for yud, which means "hand." It's here.

I'm so tough! I didn't flinch, I was like, I feel no pain, I am Yoda.

Then we went out and did crazy things I can't talk about, they're just too crazy. But the best part was when we got home and I took a swig of the Dasani water and it turned out to actually be one of many water bottles we'd filled with vodka on the food floor because we're very Savvy. Then I tried to make everyone talk to Tinkerbell but no one wanted to for some reason. She's very soft. Then I got sick, obvs, 'cause that swig of vodka was an unwelcome visitor. Seriously I drank A LOT of it on accident. Also I wasn't the one who put it in the Dasani bottle, the "girls" did that, I was in the room writing my L Word recap like a weirdo.

Mostly we just laughed a lot, like A LOT, and like about everything. It was breezy and beautiful and everything I needed right now. I'm not entirely sure what we talked about but somehow we moved effortlessly and everything was funny and sunshine. I can't really explain it I guess, but it was the most fun. I wanted to stay but instead we're home again. The problem with home is that Key Biscayne was significantly better than home. That's okay. Maybe we'll go back soon. I'm also looking into a Walden Pond-esque situation, let me know if you have any leads. JK. I would never miss the Super Bowl.

When You Get So Into your VLOG

I am 95% sure that today is my Mom's birthday. It is, right? Mom? Actually, 'cause you have dialup, by the time your computer finishes loading this page it might not be your birthday anymore. Anyhoo, watching this vlog might make you question your success as a parent -- I've been editing clips of myself for the last hour and I've subsequently discovered that I'm really irritating. Also: I say "you guys" and "like" way too often, the lighting in the Halloween blog was the most flattering for both of us, rock bottom is super-fly, gold pants save the day every time, and I nearly have a full body seizure every time I laugh. Also, I obvs need to lay off the smack, because crack is whack.

Looking back on my life so far I'd like to say that my mother has always been there. From day one, she's been around or relatively available via telephone. For that reason and many others, including love, warmth and caring, I'd like to say, Shalom! That means "hello," "peace," and "goodbye" in Hebrew, which is way more than any one English word means, which is why the Jews are the chosen people. My Mom is Jewish, coincidentally. If you're not Jewish, that's cool, we can still be friends, even more than friends if you're cute and I love you. That's not related to my Mom, this is a tangent now.

You guys, I love editing Vlogs. It's like, a bad habit. Almost like a drug, except I don't have to find a dealer that'll deliver to West Harlem, like I do when I want a pizza or a pretty girl or a bottle of Hypnotiq.

I wrote deep things the other day, now I am a monkey with feta cheese for brains. I wanted to clear out my hard drive from all the un-used random footage that's accumulated from unfulfilled "to be continued ..."s, so, this VLOG has got clips running the gamut from A to Z and beyond, all NEVER BEFORE SEEN ON TEEVEE OR THE WEB. We reference a lot of stuff from other Vlogs so you should probs watch them all again, just to be sure you're up on it. I find that re-watching my Vlogs is very soothing, like warm milk or a similarly temperated bath on a summer's day, in the poppies.

The Night Starts Here: In the Flesh, Hustler Club, Shot of Love, Favor Club

I wrote this blog in pieces, subsequently demanding that y'all refresh 'til I finished 'cause I like to keep you on your toes, you know? Also, occasionally I like to keep you on the heels/balls of your feet, just to switch it up. Sometimes, I like you on your knees. Sometimes, I like you up against a wall, or bent over ... JK. Mostly, I like you right where you are: reading my blog.

So anyhow I've actually finished it now, and organised it in a way which is more aesthetically comfortable. Last night (Tuesday), I didn't finish it on account of being a monkey with Jell-O Pudding for Brains. I also said "I think I just took an Ambien but I'm not sure," and, in case you're wondering, and I know you are: I did.

I feel like "secrets" are the new "sex." Like how last week I said "lame" was the new "badass"? Y'know, the overload of sexual content in the media, which isn't bad for children or anything, it just takes away a lot of the mystery & discovery that makes sex interesting to begin with --- real secrets, naked humans, love, etc. [Pot, meet Kettle, Hi Pot.] I was thinking about that 'cause I was like, wow, this whole post is going to be sort of "sex-themed," I wonder if that'll inspire increased traffic and then I was like, "Nah, I doubt it, not like secrets do!"

Another cool part of secrets being the new sex is that sex used to be a secret. Simmer on that.

Topic: In the Flesh Reading.

Anyhow, speaking of speaking of sex, the video from the "In the Flesh" reading is now on RKB's YouTube channel! I clearly didn't locate the microphone until about 30 seconds in, so if at first you think you can't hear very well, stick with it, it gets better, I promise. Also, I think I get better as the reading goes on. Yup.

So, here's the links, it's in two parts:
Part One: New York I, New Jersey, Westchester, Astoria, the start of Williamsburg
Part Two: end of Williamsburg, East Village, Greenwich Village, Chelsea & The Meatpacking District, New York II

Topic: Our Trip to the Strip Club

Stef's recap is in CARTOONS, and hence far better than anything you'll read here. E.g., here's her picture of Lozo's lap dance. Note my facial expression. Srsly, something this amazing doesn't come along every day.
Also, now Lozo's written his recap, and honestly, I'm not lying, I LOLed like, way harder than I've LOLed at any blog entry I've ever read before.

12:36 P.M. , Monday, October 8th.

Lozo: I need to take a shower.
me: Yeah, so do I.
Lozo: I smell like stripper and subway
me: I feel covered in stripper.
me: JINX

Those are the matchbooks I took from the Hustler Club. Notice I'm wearing hangover shirt. Seriously,
I am ready to light the world on fire. Who's WITH ME?

i. I Can Jump Ship and Swim

So, on a scale of one to ten, my stomach totally hated me on Monday morning. It was like, "Really Riese, really?!!" One of the cute things I like to do in my eternal pursuit of Dying Young is pre-party. Like in college, when it usually involved more than one person, e.g., Natalie and I doing shots of Raspberry Stoli [out of coffee mugs cause no one'd done the dishes in 30 years], employing orange slices as chasers because not one of the 8 girls we lived with consumed liquid calories. Soooo anyway [I love the way Jonathan Ames says "anyway" when he's reading his audiobook. Seriously, it's the cutest thing ever, it makes me wanna be his wife or live-in companion of some sort], when I got home Sunday night @4 A.M., totes ready for dinner, I opened the fridge and found a 35% full wine bottle, implying that I'd consumed 65% of the bottle (more than "one drink") prior to departure. I was like "oh, fuck."


Anyway [anyway!, aw, Jonathan Ames], that's fine. Luckily I'm very smooth/slick, or else I've developed quite a tolerance, as I still felt relatively sober when I arrived at THE HAWAIIAN TROPIC ZONE, where Lozo & Stef were already enjoying some pre-party drinks.

ii. In the Zone

If Lozo'd been standing up, I woulda come up behind him and tried to pull his pants off, just to set it up right away that we're all friends here who can jokingly remove each other's clothing if they want to. Unfortunately, he was sitting.

Sidenote: I'm not lying when I say I've been a little weird/agoraphobic lately ... I've been staying in lately and I felt like a Brave New Girl going out into the world, like Britney. I had a discussion with Shy, one of our strip-club compadres, re: What a Hot Album That Is, especially for working out. Anyway [hmmm ... ], I've gotta say that this place defo made me feel good about re-entering the world. I mean, Times Square, that's the center of New York City and the capital of the world! [Innermost circle of hell] I LOVE people, seriously.

So, I know what you're all wondering. What's Lozo like in 3-D?


That picture isn't from Sunday night, I just found it on Lozo's myspace.

Well, let me tell you this: he has a very nice shoulder. Also, he informed me within ten minutes of my arrival that his latest blog post, when he left home, had amassed 47 comments and would possibly exceed 50 that same evening.

Also, he watches sports both on his blog and in 3-D. Luckily for his sports-fan contingency, television monitors displaying various sporting events graced the walls of all our testosterone-oriented establishments, including the Hawaiian Tropic Zone. If naked ladies aren't enough for you, there is also The Yankees. So he didn't miss a thing, like Aeorosmith.

The uniforms at HTZ: bikini tops and tiny skirts. That made me uncomfortable for them, which was a bit disheartening re: how I'd handle the rest of the night.

Michele, a.k.a. RocketDyke, and her friend Shy, [Sounds like a stripper name kinda, yeah? Well, he's not a stripper, the strippers are later in this story] joined us at HTZ. Anyhow, Shy wasn't shy, he & Michele were both awesome. Before their arrival, I'd said: "No rocket scientist jokes, you guys," 'cause of her commenter-name, rocketdyke. I thought that was pretty clever. See, I was clearly sober.

Then, skies opened up, lights flashed, and girls in bikinis began parading on an above-bar catwalk: AMAZING apparently there's a nighty beauty pagaent at HTZ. We had a plethora of laughs at their expense--the only hot girl was #13. She was dumb though, she said "I'm lucky number 13!" which isn't true, 13 is an UNlucky number. All the girls had tattoos and bellybutton rings. So do I, but less slutty. Not that there's anything wrong with sluts, there totes isn't, I'm just explaining that I have a different "look," so to speak.

I enjoyed an overpriced glass of tonic water, topped off with a small splash of vodka.

iii. Some Conversation Topics I Remember:

1. Someone asked why Lozo used the name Lozo on his blog and I was like, "Because that's his last name," and everyone was like "NOOOO it isn't." It isn't, "LOZO" stands for Legend Of Zelda Online, actually. JK. It's his last name. One of the evening's finest running jokes was that 'Lozo' is short for Lozostien or Lozo'grady or something. Get it? Funny, right? I know. We're funny in 3-D too. I'm bad at recapping actual events in my life, can I make a list or something, or tell you what happened on the teevee? [UPDATE: This is now a list.]

2. I feel like I kept referencing The Office, 'cause I hadn't sat down & watched it 'til Saturday night, when Jim & Pam made me believe in love. It's such a funny show, seriously. Very smart.

3. Lozo wanted to know how to pronounce the word "obvs," and wanted to hear me use "probs'll" in conversation.

4. Someone asked: "Is this weird?" Personally, I didn't feel weird at all. I dunno, maybe I'm not as awkward as I think I am. I rarely feel weird. I AM weird. Feeling weird would just be repetitive.

5. Lozo told me he was 6'3: "I'm just throwin' it out there." And I was like "BACK OFF!" JK. That didn't happen.

Let me tell you a little something, grasshopper, about the internets. In the past four months, I've met two new people with whom I am quite funny. If you've ever had the pleasure of Riese & Carly's company, you know that we're really remarkably funny as a duo. That's one of our selling points, in fact, re: teevee show. Also, now it's been confirmed that Lozo & I are also funny. Not Riese & Carly funny, but funny. Also, I've just met him, things could get more or less funny.

Anyhow, this would be an advantage to meeting people through blogs -- you can usually gather from someone's internets self-presentations if their jokes are gonna jive with something intangible deep inside your snarky soul. So, there. That's one. Also; Stef is the only living soul who's had the pleasure of hanging out with both of the aforementioned match-ups, which makes her the luckiest person on the whole planet.

We hit up another bar to amp up the pre-stripper likkeration via shots of Maker's Mark. It was fierce. Then we headed to the West Side Highway, like a band of wild hooligans.

iv. She Can Pop It, She Can Lock It

Haviland's been to The Hustler Club "a few times" and apparently endorsed it to Stef. Therefore, because Haviland's my BFF and a Rising Star and an expert on half-naked ladies, we went to The Hustler Club which employs, apparently, only skinny perky-breasted girls w/significant quadriceps. They wear dangerously high heels and grind against patrons half-naked, hoping to sell dances, like Yankees game vendors, except they're vending their bodies. Most patrons were male, but there were a lot of lesbians on Sunday night, probs 'cause Sunday's no-cover night and lesbians are cheap. JK, they just don't like paying for naked girls to dance on them. Still though: fun, yay, girls, dancing, gymnastics, etc.

Good choice for "first time," howevs, probs too classy for me. Next time, I wanna go somewhere that doesn't try so hard: deviants doing crazy shit, trashy lunatics galore, chaos, yelling/screaming -- general grit and swarthy underside of life shit. I mean, if I'm gonna step into the Dark Side, I'd like it to be seriously Dark, not some cartoon plastic version of darkness. This red plastic ring on my new shelf [uncovered during furniture moveathon] was an engagement ring stand-in from T[]B[], not from Count Chocula, you know? I don't fuck around.

We enjoyed a variety of activities: arts & crafts, canoeing, lanyards, and hopscotch. In our downtime, we busied ourselves ascertaining which tits were real & which were fake. I kept asking people about Perky & Punctual, but no one knew what I was talking about. That was a little frustrating, but fine.

So: THESE GIRLS CAN DO GYMNASTICS. Dude, this is SERIOUS. Like, I wanna learn to do all of those tricks. In general, it seemed the girls were totes getting a good workout & that's good, very empowering. Seriously, I want very badly to go off into feminist theory, get all Carol Queeny or something right now, but I won't.

*
vi. Are You a Player?

I kept thinking about that episode of The L Word[Episode 202, entitled "Lapdance"] in fact, when they take Tina to the strip club and Alice comments that Tina's stripper looks like Bette, which's funny, because obvs she doesn't: she's simply ambiguously ethnic w/long dark hair, like many females do. A cocktail waitress asks Shane if she's a "player," which's awesome. Happens to me all the time.

Anyhow, wouldn't it be awesome if strip clubs had a method of finding dancers who looked just like your ex? I mean, who doesn't want to re-visit getting their heart torn out, but in a safe and fun environment like a strip-club? Yeah?

"I am not getting a lap dance. If you buy me a lap dance, I will get super uncomfortable on 100 different levels/positions and make everyone feel weird. FYI. Don't do it. I beg of you." -Me

A lot of girls tried to sell us dances, though we looked much less monied than many other patrons. One smokin' hot girl Leiliani (that's what Lozo thinks her name was] wouldn't take no for an answer: she sat on Shy for a bit 'til she realised he wasn't gonna go for it, then hopped on Lozo--also uninvited, but he didn't seem to mind. I couldn't look--I just told Stef to relay via facial expressions what exactly was goin' down. I felt like it was a private moment beween Lozo and and Leliani and I didn't want to, you know, watch. Plus, she looked a little bit like my ex.

So, anyway, Lozo is deaf in one ear. If you add up all his disabilities, it's almost like Boxing Helena. It's okay. I love Twinkies.

She sorta talked like a cheerleader, like she was gonna be like "Hey! Ready to strip! LEETSS GO!!" She had a deep-ish voice. I like that in a woman. [Really, I do.] How do I know all this? Because she was forced upon me by my "friend" Lozo. I mean that in all possible permutations of the word "friend."

Leilianahaha shared the following tasty tidbits of information with me:
-"I love dancing for girls. Girls are easy to dance for, I love girls."
-"I love girls."
-"You have a really good body, I can tell."
-"I love girls."
-"Private rooms upstairs are [massive amount of money I don't have, totes tuned out] and [something else I can't afford] is [another massive amount]."

Stef said the look on my face was "priceless." Howevs, there was a price, luckily I wasn't the one paying it. There are def. worse things in the world than a beautiful half-naked girl grinding her ass between your legs with her tits in your face. But I just can't buy into it, and I've got this problem with all salespeople -- I'm always trying to engage the bill collectors in conversations about their lives. I'm like "Let's cut the crap and get real."

Anyhow, Michele told the strippers that we knew each other from blogs. Lozo & I decided it would be much cooler if we were twins who knew each other from the womb, but Raven stopped believing us when we disagreed over who was born first.

We closed the bar down, made out, and walked Lozo to the PATH train. It was all just kinda funny, yeah? It was funny. Maybe it was what I needed.

Topic: A Shot at Love With Tila Tequila

I figured this show was a strong sign of the apocalypse and the eventual destruction and complete moral bankruptcy of the entire country, guaranteed to be chock-full of bikini-clad trashwhores and bisexual stereotypes. I figured clearly I could remedy its evil by recapping it. The first ten minutes were so offensive to bisexuals I had to leave the room, Zoey and I were stunned. It was like watching a bunch of dumb elephants: who cares if the elephant is hot and bisexual, what does that have to do with me?

Made me want to die. I don't mean that, not literally, don't panic. I would never do that. I love life. For example; I love flowers, sunshine, and hugs. Also I like scratch-and-smell stickers. Do they still make those?

So though I missed the first half, I caught the second half of A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila at the gym on Wednesday (10-10) morning, because I was filled with multifarious energy of all emotional extremes and needed to run it out. Like walking it out, only faster, and worse for your knees.

Second half: way better than first ten minutes. Though she continued to say ridiculous things about men vs. women, everyone became so intensely ridiculous that the entire show reached farcical proportions possessing measurable entertainment value. Also, Tila's not as retarded as I thought. I could shoot the blonde girl who was like 'I don't get butch women, like, ew,' but I might never get that chance.

At the end, at the "big reveal" of her "big secret" (I'm A bisexual, as in "bisexual"=noun. WTF?), I found her choice of words alarming. "I've never told anyone this before ..." Except the producers of the show? Right?

The clips for the upcoming season -- AMAZING. This's going to be the best reality show of all time, and by that I mean the best/worst. Offensive, but then again, most television is offensive, it's just more innocuous.

Also: as one of the 60 gazillion lesbians/bisexuals who received the casting call for this show -- well. I'll talk about that later. They're tricky bastards, MTV. Also: Steffanie from Irvine, California? I have a feeling you're about to get kicked off the show. I want you to know you have a shot at love with me. JK. No one does, I'm an emotional basketcase obvs. JK. Ugh.

Topic: Natalie Needs a Job, Tara [D] Needs a Roommate.

My friends think that my blog is like craigslist sorta. The thing is, a lot more people read craigslist than my blog. In any event:

1. Natalie needs a job. She's very beautiful and can do gymnastics. Also, she has great breasts. No seriously, she's really smart, has a Masters in Policy and Philosophy or something something from the London School of Economics and a B.A in Psych and Women's Studies from The University of Michigan and a lot of experience in non-profits and also was a paralegal and worked at the gardening store. Her first job was at the Dunkin Donuts in Cleveland, Ohio, when she was 14. There she is! See:

2. Tara [D] needs a roommate. She's very beautiful and can do lots of "gymnastics." Also, she has great breasts. She sent me the ad they posted on craigslist, but it's a little long, and I like to be brief here on this blog, so I've summarized it for you, and also just quoted it:

-Looking for a girl to move in ASAP to a Warlem apartment and split a huge walk-through double w/curtain currently dividing the room, though a temp wall is "def an option." Spacious apartment, beautiful hard-wood floors, white walls, large kitchen, living room, bathroom. Tara's a "down-to-earth, friendly, easy-going girl" and her two "flat-mates" are "independent, intelligent, hard-working and pretty much rock!" They're grad students/young professionals in their twenties who like to "have a good time" but also "take care of business." $700/month with one month's rent security deposit, utilities are extra and split between everyone, they've got wireless and SERIOUSLY EVERY TV CHANNEL THAT EXISTS. The best part is that there's a liquor store that delivers, a good deli with an ATM, right by the 1-9 and Columbia, and you'd get to hang out with memememememe. She'd like to add that they are "LGBT and cat friendly." If it wasn't for the cats and the fact that I've already got an apartment, I'd live there, no joke. Seriously though, you'll meet a lot of hot & fun girls if you live there, it's like, instant social heaven. Also they take care of business.

These are two of your potential roommates, Tara and Vicky:

If this post really was about the Yankees, it would have an opening paragraph much like the one I just read in the NY Times while waiting for my latte at Starbucks: "Everything changes. Things fall apart." [holla, Yeats by way of Achebe!] "For 12 seasons, there was sunshine on his shoulders. But now there is darkness ..."

SlumDay Top Ten Part Two: I Look So Hard, I Look Obvious

[This post is supernBad right now becaue I took an ambirn so i cannot see teh srcreen, it is like advancing s w===iS I===o I will have to type tommorw to fic his blog becauer it his very bad norw.]

[OK: I'm proofing this right now -- Monday, 5:00 p.m. -- but I can't bring myself to delete the above gibberish in brackets, because I think it's the best thing I've ever written. I also woke up this morning and thought "I have to finish a Sunday Top Ten today," and was surprised to see that--OMG--I already did!!]

I don't think I'm going to have any actual worst nightmares or greatest dreams if I don't ever sleep. Carly and I were up all night on Friday for The Write-a-Thon, which we planned to start 'round 9 P.M., directly following the South of Nowhere viewing. However, due to a number of factors including the presence of Natalie my BFF from the University of Michigan ("We fell in love in English 125" is how the story begins), Vicky, and alcohol, we didn't start the write-a-thon 'til 1 A.M. Twelve hours and many pages later, Carly and I emerged into the brill light o' day and determined it was the brightest day of all time and it was possible we were no longer walking in a straight line. It didn't help that everyone in my neighborhood is psychotic and was wearing things like bright yellow see-through tracksuits. I say something a lot like this right here.

Anyhow, this is a continuation of what I got started earlier this week: an evaluation of my overused phrase "that'd be my worst nightmare," which's applicable to situations that're actually possible in real life and I'd probs not have an actual in-sleep nightmare about. Just things I'd call "my worst nightmare." Get it? Got it. Good.

When I was writing this intro on Saturday, I wrote: "My hair is so greasy right now, I could start my own line of hair gels and mousses simply by extracting natural oils from its silky strands." Now it is Sunday night, and I'd like to amend that: "I cut my own bangs today before I went to Cameron's wedding. I've had better ideas, but also worse."

SlumDay Top Twelve:
THAT WHICH I'VE REFERRED TO AS MY "WORST NIGHTMARE"

Installment 2: #5-#1

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5) Spilling Something On my Clothing And Not Being Able to Change

I'm the clumsiest person I've ever known. Therefore, it's odd that I've chosen this neurosis, as I get stuff on myself all the time, but basically; when I do, outing over, I'm going home. Usually I don't wanna be out in the first place, so I'll force whomever made me leave the apartment to switch clothes with me if they want me to stay out. Surprisingly, this works. In other situations (e.g., work) I'll take a swing at stain removal or find a way to hide it -- borrowing a scarf, throwing on another top, etc., and I often bring back-up clothes for this purpose if I'm wearing white or eating anything tomato-based (which I'm not supposed to do anyhow 'cause I'm allergic to citric acid, but I like to live on the edge). I didn't do that tonight at the wedding, even though I wore a white shirt, 'cause instead I was just super careful. I realised it's really hard to eat food and not spill on yourself. How do y'all do it? Like, weird. You are all Jedi warriors.

Like those mortifying moments in Seventeen Magazine. Do you remember those? It was like, girls bleeding all over themselves with a big hole in the ass of their brand new jeans while singing off-key in the talent show in front of the cutest boy in school and his parents.

I actually switched "my drink" from vodka-cran to vodka-tonic to prevent impending spillage. 'Cause tonic is clear. Like windows. Not like doors though, doors are different. You can't see through doors but you can see through windows. You know where I learned that about the doors/windows? My Mom, when I used to stand in front of the teevee while singing/dancing and she'd say "Ree-Ree, you make a better door than a window." I was a dancing fool! Kazaam! [I'm running out of words, I swear, I need a new language, I'm running out of words and repeating myself like a broken record being sung out loud at the talent show by a beaten horse.]

I've been known to actually purchase new shirts post-spillage because New York makes it impossible to just swing home and pick up a shirt and this's probs one of the 50 million reasons that I owe Visa my first-born child and you probably do not.

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4) Not Having Immediate Access to Coffee

I just need it. Some might call that an "addiction," but I think "affection" is a better word. I wake up and I need it right then. I've got a vivid recall generally only applicable to trauma re: the one morning I went without: I was running late for my indentured servitude at Banana, I hadn't time to pick up an iced coffee. Worst. Morning. Ever. First of all: all their clothes that season looked like bad window treatments, secondly, my head hurt, thirdly, I thought I was preggers, fourthly, I was nauseous, fifthly, I was wearing tight pants, sixthly, I was wearing the very same shoes I'm wearing this exact moment which're about as comfy at whatever that dude had going on in the opening scene of Dances With Wolves, seventhly, I needed coffee, eighthly, everyone there hated me, I felt, especially the customers, who I ignored to sit in the dressing rooms and massage my temples/try on tight pants.

Also, as soon as I get my coffee, I spill it on myself. Go up to "5" for what happens next.

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3) Being Suddenly and Unexpectedly Without Internet For Extended Periods of Time When I Want to be Using the Internet

Last week, while battling zero phone reception and no internet at one of many resplendent temp jobs I've suffered through lately, I wondered when this changed for me. I'd always been slightly neurotic about being away from email for many hours 'cause I do so much professional correspondence on there. But last year on the cruise I was capable of not checking every day. Obvs this year I had to check compulsively--although part of that was because I was being cyber-harassed at the time blablabla you know what I'm talking about.

Seriously, I can't even get on the OurChart mainpage at this temp job! [Pause for the fact that I was trying to get on OurChart, which means that clearly I was scraping the bottom of the entertainment barrel without my typical entertainments available] It was randomly blocked there. That's a little weird, right? No OurChart? I can get on Gawker, but not on OurChart. You know why? Because everyone hates gay people.

Also Max: OurChart makes the DMV look user-friendly. Get your shit together already!

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2) 10.11.06: From Email, Susie Bright was interviewing me about my my story "What Happened to That Girl," published in Bright's Best American Erotica 2007 ...
"Being in porn."

"Being in porn would be my worst nightmare. I'd die. Sex and the naked body and female pleasure and male pleasure are great, there's a huge "feminist friendly" porn industry totally growing right now, especially women making porn for other gay, bi and straight women (the heterosexual male gaze dominating porn has made it difficult for women to enjoy)—but I don't know—even seeing Paris Hilton getting fucked somehow felt uncomfortable to me and clearly I don't know Paris Hilton, I just feel like I do because I watch everything she does and listen to her album a lot. (I wish I was kidding, but I'm not). For me, sex itself is super-intimate, and super-private." (-me)

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1) Reading Something Old And Realising I Haven't Really Changed That Much in Three Years, or Sometimes Like, 15 Years

I was often "awarded" "Most Improved" as a little girlchild, which I despised. It's not a real "award" obvs, it's simply a recognition of how bad you were when you started. It was easy for me to win this; I was desperately shy and awkward and the unfurling of this social anxiety had a way of manifesting itself as something resembling "improvement." My walls, under proper circumstances, might dilute to reveal a more brilliant, palletable and talented Marie at the end of the summer theater camp session or soccer season. But rarely had I truly become better at anything, I just became confident enough to actually take the ball down the field all by myself or to actually emote.

I was going through old livejournals in Carly and I's hunt to uncover the funniest jokes we've ever made (there's a point to this, I swear) and what struck me was how little I've changed, after all.

November 2003:

I'm sick, it's turning me into a little girl. It's a funny thing, being taken care of. Wanting it, not wanting it.

I think sometimes we all just want a break from holding it all together.

Sometimes, Natalie and I just lie on each other. And go--ohh.

I guess I don't know if I'm little or big at all these days. If I'm excited about graduating or dreading it. If I even care right now that my body is aching and I can't stop coughing, or that I'd rather just no-show tomorrow than have to call and deal with our insufferable managers?

One of my roommates, Megan, just broke off her engagement, and tonight she was talking about it, and she was like, but now, where does this leave me, I had my life all set up for me and now here I am with no place to live, no resume, no place to go, no job, nothing, and then Natalie said me too, and I said look, me too, and Celesta said me too, and Deena said me too, and it's true, it's all of us, none of us have a clue what the fuck we're doing. And all those e-mails from the career center are mocking, in their own way.

There's a center in all of us we can't live without, and I want to fall in love with mine again, and sometimes in pure moments I do, and sometimes I don't know who I am. sometimes I'm irritated by the quantity of reading we're forced to do, when all want to do is watch movies, sit in Barnes & Noble (see, not Borders, cuz they are evil right now) and read the first five pages of every book in the place. write postcards to people that I owe postcards to. Write stories, or write anything at all. Call my grandparents.

Tonight feels almost as bad as the night I realized there was something v.wrong with my body, which prompted me to go to the doctor and get diagnosed with fibro....it goes in and out and eh, maybe I'll just take some Vicadin, and forget about hurt altogether.

**

18th August 2004:

Seriously: I don't know anything right now. I don't know what I want at all but I'm not sure I'm ready to be an adult. Any opinion I have is a phase, a whim, a concept, an unfinished idea.

Why does uncertainty seem so new each time? It feels completely unique, as does that trite truism disguised as epiphany, promising to lead me to breakthrough but apparently I 'd prefer just to sit at the edge of breakthrough forever. Like it's the dock of the bay.

It seems like I've been battling the same problems for a few years now, and it seems like every time I advance somewhere, I take a few steps back in another area. I get on top of love but lose my money, I get on top of my writing but lose my friends, I get on top of work but lose my mind. You know? Like: I'd like, sometimes, for everything to just get up at the same time and come to the middle of the room. I'd like to rally all my troops.

I always freak out this time of year: I get heart palpitations and've been known to quit jobs, move apartments, drop or re-gain friends/lovers, cut my own bangs. [I also generally get one year older around this time of year too.] It might be related to the fact that I'm used to starting a new school or totally new school-related situation every September and now I just attempt to recreate that panic artificially, sans school.

Cameron, my agent/friend got married tonight. Her husband, Jay, is awesome. They are awesome. They should give everyone hope [they did]! We boarded the Lady Whitmore at the Chelsea Piers:

Stephen: Marie, I gave you very specific instructions on how to dress.
Marie: Wha? You said you were wearing a suit and tie. I couldn't find a tie though.
Stephen: I said a dress would be good for women.
Marie: I'm wearing a blazer! You said Don was wearing a blazer.
Stephen: [sigh]
Marie: Are you not gonna talk to me all night 'cause I'm not wearing a dress?
Stephen: You look great, Marie.
Marie: I won't steal any girls from you.

It was beautiful; the weather was amazing, the vows were lovely, the Rabbi was lovely, the sun was lovely, your girl is lovely, Hubble. I almost cried, honestly! They truly do have an inspiring partnership. Also they closed the ceremony with 'Love Song' [The Cure]. HOT.

J.Jackson [another agent from our agency] said: "She has so many bridesmaids!" and I said "I'm gonna have five." And she gave me a surprised look, since all night I'd been displaying nothing but cluelessness on all things "wedding," but what's funny is that's the only thing I know. I know fo' sure it'll be Krista, Natalie and Haviland, but the other two spots have changed and changed again, we'll see, I know how I am. Besides, Natalie and I might end up getting married, and then I'd need someone to take her spot. We always said we'd get a commune in Vermont together if no one else was willing to spend the rest of their lives with us. Which is likely. She has a boyfriend though, he's very patient and lovely also.

If I'd been giving a toast, I woulda talked about when I realised I needed to get a new passport in three days because Alaska is now, apparently, accessible only via international waters, and Cameron went with me to the passport office to be my "witness" at five in the morning just so I'd stop annoying everyone talking and freaking out about it. And she had to attest she'd known me for three years. She coulda gotten deported if they'd uncovered that lie, obvs. JK, like they never woulda done that. OR I'd talk about when we got stoned in the office and then she went to the gym and had the best workout of her life and I went on a date and made up a bunch of weirdo stuff to see if I could freak him out, and I mos defo did.

I realised, sitting on this boat in the water watching the ceremony, that none of my friends have gotten married yet, but I feel like I'm at the age where that ought to start happening, right? I've only been to a few weddings in my life: a half-cousin, a cousin, a half-grandmother and two commitment ceremonies: my Mom & Susan, my friend Marc from The Macaroni Grill & his boyfriend Mark.

Is it just us -- 'cause we're too picky, or career-obsessed, too restless, too "progressive," too busy -- ? -- too dysfunctional -- too gay?

I remember when I was 18, I had a 27-year-old boyfriend and the age gap seemed insignificant, we were at very similar places in our lives: fingering unpredictable futures, feeling time was running out to make those choices. I mean, we met as servers at The Olive Garden. My Mom didn't get pissed I was dating an "older man," she said I'd always been "very mature."

Was I a remarkably mature 18-year-old? Or is this constant grappling specific to the conflict between pursuing art/pursuing sense/pursuing the perfect scowl about the word "art" to begin with? Or is it possible that I'm simply an immature 25-year-old? [Totes.]

Not like having no fucking clue what you're doing with your life is something only done by the incredibly mature; but that at 18, I was already thinking I had to know all that, and soon, and feeling absolutely that no-one'd make that choice for me, or even encourage me in one direction or another. I started freaking out about this stuff when I was 14 and haven't slowed down since, except for when it made me sick [see: fibro] and I literally couldn't physically move anymore until I got my shit together.

Sometimes I wished a parent or boyfriend or girlfriend would say: "Marie, you need to become a schoolteacher or something pronto," or "Time to run the Fisher Funeral Home with us!" or "Move to Idaho!"

This is almost twenty years ago!:

I would totes wear that dress still though, it's so Margot Tennenbaum! Also I just gave myself that same haircut this afternoon. See what that is? That's "bringing it back around in the most suprising way ever, even to Me, and I wrote it."

I want my wedding, if anyone ever dares to spend the rest of their life with me and announce this intention in public, to be just like the one in The Muppets take Manhattan. Like when I walk down the aisle I want all the muppets to be there, singing. "Somebody's getting married ..."

Also, this is funny. Look how much I've changed since Apri 17, 2004:

SomeDay Top Ten: Live Through This And You Won't Look Back

So, back on Monday night, I accidentally pressed "return" which became "publish." It may've come up on your Google Reader. Then I had an idea to do this in like, stages. And somehow this now fully-staged oft-edited posting experiment has become its own kind of testament. It's probably one of the longest blog posts of all time, but I like it that way, 'cause it's all here, started & finished: my name is Marie, and this is my heart. And--also--what I've found most stunning about this as it evolved in my head and on "the page" [I feel like such a pretentious fuck using that kind of language, hot!] is that it's such a strange full-circle because as much as I was drowned out at times, I cannot understate the following: She was the best writing teacher I've ever had. And I've had a lot of kickass writing teachers--official ones. She helped me find my voice, develop it, own it ... and punctuate it. And I'm saying that right now with that voice. The indisputable fact of That Gift is perhaps the only thing from all of this that I Know For Sure.

*

So I published what I had so far, and then I republished as each segment developed. I said: "Ideally this entire process, which will be approximately as exciting as watching paint dry, will be completed within 32 hours. Comment at any point. I'll probs respond to comments quicker than I'll update the post, which I think might be kinda interesting and fun." That turned out to be a big lie.

Also, I'd like to add that because Stef has forfeited payment for her kickass blog redesign, I have one free date with Lozo still to give away. Just something to think about.

I won't regret saying this,
this thing that I'm saying,
Is it better than keeping my mouth shut
That goes without saying.
- Tegan & Sara, "Call it Off"
*

I'm way behind on email/thank-yous/phone-calls[surprise!] everything right now. Obvs.

*
Most Recent Update - 8.23/9:26 P.M. EST - Installment # 10


*

Sometimes, you go through something brief but intense in both good and bad ways and your whole life changes. That's a good first sentence, right? Okay, moving on then: I think I'm developing some sort of bruise on the lower corner of my right palm/wrist connector area from typing too much. I'm going to be injured from typing. That's pretty much the most looserish illness you can develop, besides whatever it is that people get from masturbating all day to Sailor Moon. Or dressing up like a Klingon for any number of consecutive hours.

So lately I've started to notice the wires of thoughts fizzing through my brain that don't take the same paths anymore; some things exploded or burned out or turned liquid on the way from [there] to here. But they feel real, too, and no less honest.

And ... I know there're so many factors going into how I feel here now ... and I'm still limited in what I can say and petrified, too; I learned the hard way that not only is the internet a free place to really go off at someone without any recourse for the attacker or protection for the victim, but it's also a place where you can actually attack someone on grounds that're not only ridiculous, but precisely the opposite of the truth. Reader: I'd've married her. [We considered ourselves "engaged."]

That [redacted] magazine article reminded me of how good things once were. I'd tried to forget, obvs, as The Girl I Chose became a totes mad twatwaffle ... It wasn't just the content that brought me back, but remembering how much she'd labored over the article with me, remembered her bringing home groceries and making me dinner while I sat glued to my computer ...

... and then ... remembering being yelled at for hours, and hours, and more hours, until the hours became my life and where else could I've gone every morning, really, than my life?

*
"Behold I come as a thief,
blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments,
lest he walk naked, and they see his shame."
-Revelation 16. The King James Bible.
*

So this week's Sunday Top Ten is a reflection, like the kind you get when you gaze into a small pond or other reasonable body of water, on the things that've changed that I didn't even notice were changing. One of those changing things is this blog; I'm trying to post more frequently but with greater brevity. So far my success rate has been about 0%.

On the topic of this Sunday Top Ten, I had Crystal read it, and threw the idea at Stef and Lozo. All three thought I should just say it. I keep trying to organise it, but I can't.

Sunday Top Ten:
Things That've Changed,
or
Things We Lost in the Fire
or
How We Live Now

*
I know what I wanted,
I gave what I gave
I'm not sorry I met you
I'm not sorry it's over.
- Stars

*
10. I Am Ready to Move to Someplace Sunshiney

Sitting on the subway with Natalie the other night it didn't feel any less true to say "I am so over this city," in the same way I used to defend it as though it's busted arteries were somehow still supporting my heart.

*
9. I'm Addicted to Email

Now that I have my Dash [Truth: my previous phone, a Sidekick--a gift from my mother--was stolen after (redacted) started a fight on a Philly street-corner, attracting a crowd that ultimately included thieves. Her wallet was stolen. She didn't replace her wallet--she had me instead--and subsequently didn't replace my phone. Besides, I had nothing to say to anyone.] I've become more addicted to checking my email than normal. Howevs, I can't really reply in anything resembling proper English, or comment on my blog, or read anyone's blog, or access Google Docs. It's like I can see in but I can't do anything about it. Like a Read-Only Doc or something. Nevertheless, I must check. I must check obsessively and constantly.

*
8. I'm No Longer Afraid of Mice.

I'm not afraid of mice anymore. I used to be so scared of 'em that when we spotted one in our Interlochen dorm, I built a chair-bridge from the door to the top bunk and wouldn't let my feet touch the floor 'til we'd been rid of them for many days. Also, the top bunk wasn't even mine. I mean, mice're gross, obvs, but there was a mouse in our kitchen here and I didn't scream or anything. For the record, having a mouse in one's apartment in New York City isn't indicative of anything (bad cleaning habits, infected building) besides that you are alive and life is unfair. Also part of my fear comes from the Sex in the City episode where Carrie wakes up and there is a mouse on her bed.

Tears for fears, fo' real.

*
7. The Final Playlist. 18 Carefully Chosen Tracks.
Heart/Stars. A Better Son or Daughter/Rilo Kiley.
Don't Cry Out/Shiny Toy Guns. Where Did The Good Go/Tegan & Sara.
Don't You Know/The Sleepy Jackson. Hear Me Out/Frou Frou.
Nineteen/Tegan & Sara. Who You Are/Tears for Fears.
Good Luck/Basement Jaxx. 23/Jimmy Eat World.
Floorplan/Tegan & Sara. If I Ever Feel Better/Phoenix.
Your Ex-Lover Is Dead/Stars. Explode/Uh Huh Her.
Soil, Soil/Tegan & Sara. Next Plateau/Longwave.
What the Snowman Learned About Love/Stars. Ave Maria/Franz Schubert.

*

6. I Wanna Be a Robot

I got an email Monday morning, oddly enough, from a reader who worked at a law firm I'd applied to for part-time admin assistant stuff right around returning from the cruise -- basically confirming all my worst fears -- it was not cool at that time to google me when you're looking for someone to type and enter data and not cause trouble. Like O.K. it's possible that I'm is totally into Satan and a first worldian douchebag whore, and it's probably not true, but why risk it? I mean, Satan! That is serious business! The devil herself!

I ended up talking to this girl back and forth all day, and ... ugh. Things're better now, thank G-d, and though technorati remains deeply attached to old things, my heart doesn't [ha!], and, finally, neither does Google.

But still, I totes just say whatever I want and my name's right there. This would be fine if I wanted to work in publishing but I don't really -- mostly because I feel it's just more smoke and mirrors and the pay is shit. For some bizarre reason, as confusing to me as my recent desire to live in L.A., I want a randomized robotic office job. Yeah, weird. I always said I could never do it and now, when the temp agency called and asked if I could start the next morning at some office job they didn't even describe to me, which implies it involves sitting on my butt and inputting data while slowly transforming from human to octopus, I was like "WHEEEE!!!!" I think it's because I need some stability.

I'm running around like a chicken with it's head cut off. I'm tired. Also, I think I am not only losing my tan, but becoming perhaps transparent.

I started a temp job on Wednesday morning and said "I am so proud of myself for getting up on time, I'm pretty certain I'll end up being late." Obviously I was. Also I was told at 8:45 A.M. on my first day that I would be serving the next 9 hours of my life WITHOUT INTERNET. And then my phone, which has limited internet capabilities (read: not blogger, not grammar), died!! What the F?

*
5. I'm Raw.

One of many enlightening activities I accomplished on Wednesday while WITHOUT INTERNET at work was reading through my notebook -- not my journal -- my sketchbook. It's mostly to-do lists, but writing too and I saw that at first, I was resentful & broke & bitter, but also ecstatic in a way, high on my strength at breaking free. I wrote: I'm feeling easier about it all of a sudden, and it's almost not being able to stop myself from stopping myself coming but not certain I ever will come.

I felt sad & guilty, too, a failure, like I could've done more. But -- post breakup, I remained sympathetic & sensitive [through more than either of us will ever say] 'til the online slander started, and that exhausted what remained of my tolerance for mistreatment. So. This's me right now being [semi] straightforward because I realize that lately, pieces of the story've been leaking out of me passive-aggressively, shards, 'cause I held my tongue so well then and it continues its reverb.

I'd say I want to scream and what I meant was: I am screaming.

I wanna clear what I can because air is a vast & tricky thing; it's hallucinations, ideas, the fog, the fallible mailable ridiculous air, which is, p.s., never enough.

I wanna clear the air so I can step out of it, go walking beneath the enormous sky.

I had such a reservoir of non-judgmental acceptance. So what happened was such a unique, maddening way to get to me. For one: as a writer, I've just naturally got a lot online. But mostly: this space'd become remarkably precious, both because it'd brought her to me to begin with and because I'd been so intensely private about my sex & dating life on my blog prior to her precisely to avoid any possibility of having to explain a breakup online, which's like my worst nightmare. I mean, I took sick days in junior high after breakups. I hate having to bring all that personal nonsense into the light. It's impossible for anyone to judge. Breakups are personal, complicated, subjective things.

I've always been careful how I tread the line between honesty and "dirty laundry," and I was pissed to see her try to demolish that in her mania, get to me, break me. I didn't want to air mine. I don't. But it's still out there, it's still flapping, I still see it, am asked about it, feel it, hear about it, know people wonder about it, remember it. So, I think there's enough behind us and enough before me to warrant some kind of something... said.

I didn't read her blogs for a long time. I still wanted what I'd always wanted: for her to be well. But I got really angry, too, that everything at that point had been left in such shambles and that there wasn't even mercy here. In permanent public space. That there was so much I had to say in response but didn't.

That anger's hard to shake: that 24/7 cyber-slaughter--the commenting on my stuff [the subsequent moderation], the day she asked everyone I knew to be her myspace friend. When she was emailing and commenting everywhere -- other bloggers, my readers, my friends, my family, drunken heterosexual Lozo. The phone calls, the texts. Those effin blogs.

Oh I wish my arms were wider
I wish that I could hide you
So you can rest and repair
-The Cardigans, "Feather and Down"

My natural tendency towards loner-hood amped up a bit when her hospitalisations started, and the social isolation reached it's peak during the last&longest one. I was traveling to Suburban NY every day. People stopped understanding altogether and the more things I gave up (jobs, money, stability, friends), the more I fought to cover up and keep it all together -- the more this blog meant to me. I let it become an actual outlet for the first time ever.

It'd been up and down like that for a long time, and I'd done everything I possibly could to help her get better. After all, in health she was What I'd Wanted, she'd been So Good. Even in mania, I'd loved her. I justified putting everything aside to be there. I incurred expense. I stuck around because I loved her, because she was devoted wholly to me, because she told me our whole lives before that point had existed to make our union possible and I agreed, because she loved me, because I saw glimmers of her old self and she made promises and I always hoped. And the more I threw in, the more I needed her to come out of it.

*How do you know when to let go?
Where does the good go?
Where does the good go?
-Tegan & Sara, "Where Does The Good Go?"*

We'd joke: "This is the longest relationship I've ever had. We've been together for 100 years, totes." Because we'd already been through so much together.

So then I fell apart, and I had to, before I could call it off. Thunder, Perfect Turtle:

From Original Draft of "Naked on the Internet" Panel Recap:

I squat on the heels of my cowboy boots, pull my dress over my knees, lower my head into my neckhole like a turtle receding into it's shell and--though this sounds as if it's going somewhere sexual, it's totes not--tell [her] I wish I was dead. I'm not going to the panel. Can you tell everyone that you killed me?

Her: Jeez, death death death's all you can talk about. I don't want you to die, is that okay? Why don't you want to go anymore?

Me: I just don't wanna. I don't have anything to say. I'm stupid and annoying.

Her: Aw, Auto-Win, [strokes my hair tenderly] Why're you being thunder perfect turtle right now?

Actually, I do know why death death death's all I can talk about: Kathy Acker. [She]'s advised me to stop reading everything she's been telling me to read, as clearly it's "too much for [my] little baby mind to handle." Don Quijote, Nietzsche, Kathy Acker, The Art of Love, Marquis De Sade, Bartimelle, et al. I have this thing where the voice of whomever I'm reading seeps into my mind and becomes my mind.

4. This Blog Like, Means A Lot To Me

So, I zoomed in here. I realized when I was out for dinner with Natalie last week that Wow, I say "blog" every other word, which's a lot for someone who only updates twice a week. It's become a big part of my life, which is really seriously hilarious considering my intentions when I started.

And it's resulted in so many fabulous things; my readers, who've become friends, many of them in "real life" -- I met K-Lily through my blog, and TB of course, and, obvs: Carly.

Rachel, who at one point was the only one who knew what was really going on via a private blog called "Too Much Information" later re-titled "Not the Mountaintops." Stef who's redesigning my website, Jaimie who invited me to read at her theatre.

Crystal, who not only fiercely believes in me and my choices/talent in a way that inspires ME to do more, but has also gotten me the most reliable freelance gig I've ever had and listened to me whine for about 50,000 words while enabling the development of new career skills.

Team Caitlin [Caitlin #1=Our Producer!, Caitlin #2=Santa Claus/Magic!], who hauled ass to get an audition space for Carly and I ... and then we found out that we need to join SAG or something, urg/whatevs. People who've read the teleplay and given us feedback, like Crystal and Abby, and "m" [who I actually knew in college and then re-found on the blog, true story].

I could literally go on forever. Wow. I mean -- I really could. To even begin to fathom it would be impossible. If you think I've forgotten you because your name is not in this paragraph, you are wrong.

All the people who've responded to my call to financial arms ... and anyone who's ever commented, or emailed, or offered a connection or a gig or a job or a girl or just advice. Or a story. Or an undercover-in-a-museum flickr photoset.

And Lozo, my masseuse.

3. Then I Became Not Too Proud to Beg

I've had many conversations recently, re: The New Starving Artist. I know several others who're misconceived to be "going places"-- at the top of their game, career in possible overdrive, just exploding everywhere. But truthfully they've got maxed out credit cards, tore-up shoes and a lot of Ramen. Also sidenote I love Ramen. TB taught me the "secret" which is to put an egg in it. I know that sounds gross but seriously try it. I know, I was skeptical too. Except you Carly, I know you don't like Ramen.

The internet's created a funny kind of psuedo-"fame": the Broke Successful Person. People no longer have to make a physical effort to find your work via library or movie theater or art gallery. You've volunteered to come to them, they can find you and enjoy you at their leisure and consequently appreciate you without incurring financial cost. I'm not complaining, I'm just getting to this point: now more than ever it is possible to appear as if you're doing good when you're actually not. It's beautiful because I think it's a meritocracy, unlike the other kinds of archy-s that've plagued the art and publishing worlds.

Oh yes: and credit cards. Are often vital.

Certain things imply success: you've worked with well-known people. You've been to some particular events of distinction. Perhaps you seemed, for a time, to forego work altogether to take care of someone you loved, who claimed to understand you couldn't afford to do this. You've been scraping together the most random kinds of income to support all the free writing and then one week everyone keeps calling to say wow! You're doing so well! And you're like: Whoa! But I'm broke!

You've appeared places, with it is what you do, beaming, well-received, glossy. You've become a "name" which is now possible, in certain circles, to just come up.

But also; you're broke. It's your fault, you feel. Not everyone would've been so pliable as you'd been. Not everyone would've been so vulnerable, embraced the smoke & mirrors. People ask you if you're getting by, you respond affirmatively, you can't admit the smoke, because you're choking on it ...

When it's not your industry, it's easier to imagine that things are going better, or are about to go better, than they actually are. I look at people who claim to be broke and think, "See, even as you're saying this I can't really believe you. How on earth could [seemingly successful artist or actor] be broke? They're doing so well right now!" but then you think; of course they can be! Because I sure am.

It doesn't mean anything that I was in a major women's magazine [the payment for that goes to the editors of my anthology, not to me] or that I have a sorta-popular blog. Even I assumed incorrectly that TLW Online was a profitable venture, when it's actually just their labour of love. But I heart LW recaps and all that's come into my life because of it -- things money can't buy. "Priceless" as Visa might say, ironically. I wish there was no money. Then we could just trade things according to worth, and depend on each other maybe, even, to get by.

You can be in a video watched in 1.2 million homes and it's entirely possibly you're to earn not a single dime from it. [I'm not, obvs, but some people are, I hear of these things.] Certainly no physical book or public theater could gather that kind of momentum and popularity on it's own accord, be transported via body and space, like the internet can. So.

Dacia wrote about this in September and I remember it distinctly. And kottke made some valid points about what we do as bloggers, and so that contributed to my fundraising drive. It's hard -- underneath it all I always feel like a fraud, which's perhaps why it's so easy for someone to attack me and I'll take it because maybe i feel that even when they are wrong they are secretly right, they've uncovered me, and what they see is worthless and undeserving. I do good things, but underneath is bad things.

I feel like I wouldn't like me if I met me
I feel like you wouldn't like me if you met me
-Tegan & Sara, "You Wouldn't Like Me."

All this good work is leading up to something. I love this & the people, and I wanna build an audience for future ventures that I imagine to be profitable. Lately I've had people providing concrete support, and now, also, even more people that've put money in the Damn-the-Man jar.

"I'm so broke" jokes and "I can pay you with a Lozo, but not money" jokes are fun jokes. But on Sunday as I pondered this paragraph, I've realised my pride and inhibitions related to talking about money hasn't actually changed. What changed was circumstances, some sort of touched upon in this blog in many areas of this post.

Broke people sometimes annoy me because they never want to do fun things, so I try to pretend like I am not also a broke person. Visa can tell you all about this.

It's true that I write full-time, but not with a full-time income, and I don't know what to do about this.

I won't go into the specifics of what's gone down recently in my life; I am now, and always have been, happy to do this for free--I believe in making agreements and mine here is: "This is my work. It is free." I never intended to make money from blogging because I do not have any exclusives on Britney Spears' sexuality or Judith Regan's latest book deal. And when I do get similar information, Haviland makes me promise not to say anything. Also, my ex slept with Maggie Gyllenhaall. JK. I mean, JK about being genuine about releasing that information as an exclusive. It's a joke.

So there's a lot of things in here that kind of explain what led to my question like, well, maybe if I could just get $5 from everyone, my problems'd ease up a little. My Mom said she'd read about someone doing it. So that's that. [Kinda?]

*
2. Um,

I don't know why I think this is the most amazing book cover of any book I've ever been in, but I do. I mean, the title, the FONT! Wow. My story "Fucking Around" is in this book:

***
everything i love get back for me now
everyone i loved, i need you now
so conned, i lied i lied to me too (so what?)
hold out for the ones you know will love you
hide out from the ones you know will love you
-tegan & sara, dark come soon
****
1. Formerly "#7"
A True Story:
Live Through This,
And You Won't Look Back

One morning I woke up knowing something was wrong, and so I went to New Roc. I'd never been there before so I just got on the Metro-North to the stop called "New Rochelle" and then I got off there, and got into a car, and asked the driver to take me to City Hall, wherever the jail was, and so he did. I think it cost four dollars, it seemed like a bargain.

It was an impossibly sunny, warmish-spring-perfect day, I walked up the marble-y steps of City Hall and went inside the sanitary, chalky building. Everyone inside it looked tired. I was tired. I'd grown less good at eating and sleeping. I gave them her name and said I thought she'd possibly spent the night there. The woman told me she'd actually just left but: Oh, she was just walkin' all over the place talking to everyone --

And so I decided to find her. I didn't know how I'd do that because I'd never been to New Roc before. So I just started walking, and I asked G-d, because I knew of that for sure, to lead me to her. I walked down a few sidewalks. This wasn't a good part of town, I could see that already. All the stores sold booze or greeting cards. Like, drink some Jack Daniels, then get a card to apologise to your wife for what you did afterwards.

And I walked down these streets and then I saw her, waking out of a store with a fresh pack of cigarettes. There she was: my girl, she was right there. I'd come there and found her, and so I thanked G-d for that. I jogged a little but she was in her own world so she didn't hear me coming up behind her. She had a million bags, it seemed like, always carried five or six books with her at a time.

I caught up and blocked her in the street. She looked up, saw me, stopped.

She said: "Hey," as if I'd been planning on meeting her there, as if she'd spent the night in jail simply to be nearby when I made my first visit to New Rochelle. She seemed surprised but not surprised enough, as if strange things like this happened all the time because of her or for her -- they did, after all. Of course I would just psychically know where she was. Of course I would just find her with no clues whatsoever and no knowledge of the area.

She hugged me -- a quick, tight, glorious flash of real -- she held me, said she'd missed me and that she was sorry they hadn't let her have her phone in jail. She kissed me. Those were still her lips. I thought her arms were still her arms but I looked closer and they were covered in bruises, even more than there'd been on Friday or Saturday, when we'd covered them in foundation for the photographer from the magazine for my article.

Then she stopped walking. I stopped. I turned and took her in: she was a slick black shark that day: in her sunglasses & Trinity black leather jacket, like her fingernails might shoot into laser beams and then burn me up, like in a fancy movie. Sometimes, when she wasn't around, I had a strange urge to sit on my bed and stare at the wall and move my lips in the shape speaking usually makes.

I stopped walking too, because she'd stopped.

She commanded: "Walk. And don't look back."

She let me take ten steps ahead of her and I started walking. She started walking behind me. This was easy. I didn't look back. I started thinking and then I remembered that thinking wasn't the point. The only point was to obey.

We were at an overpass that went over the highways. Cars drove beneath us like it was an ordinary day in an ordinary world. Though I've been to New Roc for real now, I still can't figure out where we were that day: somewhere between City Hall and the train station, I guess.

It was a beautiful day, brilliant bright beamy sunshine. It was for us.

Then she told me: "Okay Lot's Wife. You can stop now." And so I did. "Knock knock."

"Who's there?" I receded, she neared me.

"I love you!" She said.

"Knock knock." She said (that's her second line in a row).

"Who's there?" I said.

"Interrupting weirdo!" She said.

"Interrpting we--" I started to say.

"I love you!" She said.

I smiled. I knew those words, I knew that person.

We walked together to the Metro-North. I knew that's where we were going but she didn't tell me, I just knew.

She told me she'd given herself the bruises to punish herself for being prideful and judging everyone. Then she gave me her phone and told me to call her work for her and tell her boss she was sick and wouldn't make it in. She told me she had no time for work; she had to to learn Proto-Indo-European.

"I feel like yelling at people," she told me. I didn't really grasp then that she meant that. This was the very first time. This was the day after Easter.

That's when it started: on the Metro-North, heading back into Manhattan. She started yelling. I was there on the seat with her in this normal train, with normal people, being normal, and I realised I'd just stepped into some kind of something scary. I remember I was reading The Book of Daniel that day off of paper, printed out from the online Bible @ bartlebys -- because the fact that I hadn't read it was becoming a major issue in our relationship. I just kept thinking I could try to go along with things and then maybe I could fix them.

She started in on me then for a minute because I'd said "Be quiet." She asked me why she needed to be quiet. Did I not want people to know that G-d is coming to condemn them, that Buddha was NOT hallucinating and we can WORSHIP our MIRRORS and we can go worship Angelina JOLIE and the BUSH AdminiSTRATION while in the THIRD WORLD people are HUNGRY they don't need ANYTHING because my GOD IS GOOD and my GOD IS KIND and my GOD IS WATCHING and MY GOD IS COMING ... she was next to me but her cadence was riding up up up up to elevated language, I thought this person was my girlfriend, where has she gone ...

I was eager to get off the train so we could start over out there in the station with new people. Maybe we'd have another chance in a new crowd.

We were pushed out into the station. All of me panicked for a second, like I was a mouse that'd just found itself in a brand new city all alone in a big train station. I wanted to scamper for a corner but all I could do was follow, I wasn't going to leave her. There was no way. I was going to get the Real Her back. I was going to do it.

Why would I leave this woman? I had to wait for Real Her to return so that we could talk, because I missed her. You lose your relationship to reality and the people who exist in it, you have to re-orient your social group to fit the insanity you've gotten accustomed to and usually there is only one other person in your group.

She apologised for yelling at me and said: "Let me buy you a flower," and so then she did. I carried it close to me like someone might pluck the bud right off it while I stood waiting for her -- she'd decided to "trannie it up" and duck into the men's room to save waiting in line. It worked. I thought she was clever. I held my flower to my face.

She said she wanted to go to Bryant Park. I said okay. She stopped to give money to every homeless person. I did that too. I like giving my money away. I bought $20 of fruit roll-ups from some kid on the street who seemed really down and out. She wanted to give the fruit roll-ups to homeless people but later I'd also see her eating them, poking out little cartoon figures, sticky on her thumbs.

So, she'd give, and then the next person wouldn't, and she'd yell: "Don't walk by homeless people like ROBOTS!"

I winced. I wanted to walk away and I also wanted to tackle her onto the ground and hold her there til help came, so instead I just walked beside her, my whole body totally evaporated. Tense vacancy.

We were sitting in Bryant Park and she hadn't stopped, she started preaching to everyone to from her seat, told me the secret to poaching/preaching was to call someone on your cell phone and go like this: Hello? Father? Is that you? What did you say about my gluttonous worship of Angelina JOLIE?

People were staring, whatever.

I leaned forward on the table we were sitting at and took her hands, which had cuts in the palms. I said: I'm very scared. do you remember when you talked about how you'd kept yourself off meds for so long and done a great job controlling your episodes? Because I feel like you might be having one, right now?

What do you want to do? She asked. Put me in A CAGE? Like JEEE-SUS? Like you killed SOCRATES? For preaching in the MARKETPLACE?

I said: I want you to get help, I think that maybe we should talk about this, I feel like maybe right now it would be a good idea to see a doctor and maybe think about meds or maybe stop drinking or --

She said: I can be alone, you don't have to be my bride!

My body lifted from the chair and I walked away. It's important to mention I was still holding my flower.

I knew exactly where she'd be and for how long just how I'd known she'd be in New Roc that morning; I just knew because we could communicate on invisible telephones wired to our brains.

I went to the subway station and then I turned around and came back.

I can't just walk away, I said.
I need to be alone, she said.
Will you call me later, I said.
I will call you later, she said.
I will see you later, she added.
Okay, I love you, I said.
I love you too. You are my wife, she said. Marie. I will never leave you. You are the last woman I will ever be with. Okay?
Okay.

I went home petrified. I went home a mess. And I stayed in various states of mess for some time, Haviland came over, we were on speaker phone with my Mother the social worker and I was whining, repeatedly going back into my survival mode where I just curl up and declare my intention to become a starvation artist (not a starving artist, that's different). I couldn't get in touch with her but I tried. She called me on accident once and I heard her yelling at strangers. At some point, her phone stopped picking up.

At 2 A.M., I was lying in bed, un-asleep, and she walked through the door to my room. I saw right away that it wasn't her. Her face changes, she becomes someone else. It was someone else. I saw her eyes flash flint and I knew it, I saw it.

"What happened?" I asked. I was almost crying already, but she'd told me there would be a place where there would be no more tears; and soon.

"Baby, I got mugged," she said, exhausted but not a trace of surprise, like it was one of many things she could've done for entertainment that fine evening.

"How did you get here?'

"I just walked here from the West Village."

Thank G-d she had keys to my apartment then. I was living on 106th. She'd walked at least a hundred blocks, probably more. She made herself something awful to eat. I held her like she'd come back from war. I listened to her and saw the bruises everywhere, absolutely everywhere. I felt like a nurse. I would feel like a nurse for a long time but I didn't know that yet. I told you I was a weirdo, she said.

She'd had everything lost or stolen, it seemed. Me too, I thought. But I hadn't, not then. Here's the thing, I've just realised: control. Pre-breakup, and with the exception of a few briefly topped peaks, she seemed to [usually] turn it off when she needed to; at work, in restaurants, in front of other people, even for doctors. That was the tricky thing. Why was it just me and the strange public who usually enabled it? Did that make me strange?

When was it that she made me throw a glass of water at her in public? Yes, it had been a few days prior, the night after a day we'd spend with the photographer from the magazine article she'd helped me craft into something kinda special but scary too. We were having dinner at Cafe Mode and she asked me to throw a carafe of water at her, I said I wouldn't. That was a lot of breakable weight and water to throw at a person: but -- a glass was not too much.

It was actually like, totally awesome. We laughed so hard about that. I'd really done it, thrown a glass of water at her and then she musta thrown one back because I remember being drenched.

We dashed into the night all laughter, hightailed outta that restaurant, I thought these are the adventures that are now my life. I thought, Choose Your Own Adventure I Choose ----. I felt very Sancho. We wanted to make Easter Eggs for Haviland. We were wet, it was too cold for April. The air beat us, our skin froze.

But also: I learned so much. About writing. Literature. Love. Myself. Madness. Sanity. Self. Spirit. Sacrifice. Humility. Ego. Soul. Words. And, perhaps, an erratic [but, in this case, conclusive] case of compulsive TMI.

So, yeah, that happened.