Josh's sad girls

So, this is our long weekend... Ixi and I are pathetic and our keeper...



is lovely, despite his addiction to college football. He's making me couscous.

Teeth

One of the most common symbols in dream is losing teeth. Having them fall from your head. It's disturbing. Without the toothfairy to cushion the dreams of children, it could be terribly traumatic for kids to be losing the teeth all the time. It's weird and scary when you think about it.

Having them yanked forcibly, that's not so weird... right? You get your xrays and explanations. Dozens of people around you testify that it wasn't so bad.

There is only less than 1% chance of losing sensation in your chin and lower lip and jaw. Less than 1% chance of opening a hole in your nasal cavity. 15% chance of dry sockets. Oh, and, if you don't eat with your lorcet, you have to take this anti nausea pill rectally.

And, even with the low risks and the deformed face I've got myself, and the weird headaches and achy body and restlessness from bedrest, this is a pretty cool vacation. I get to watch a bunch of movies and cuddle with the doggy completely guilt free for four days. Even on actual vacations I always feel like there are numerous things I should be doing instead. Drugged as I am though, I'm not allowed to do those things. Doctor's orders.

Ixi

Some day there will be aspiring artists who feel nostalgic for the age that created The Royal Tennenbaums and Jenny Lewis. The art of awkward. Sexy Awkwardness.

And, back at the ranch, Ixi is a very strange, very sweet dog.

She doesn't like treats. Or playing with things. She hardly ever pees. We've only heard her bark once, last night when we put her in her crate and went to bed.

She doesn't wag her tail, but if you move to stand up after petting her, she jumps into your lap. She's super cuddly. Today she took a nap with me on the couch.

She hates her leash, but as long as it's slack she walks along beside you. I've coaxed her into walking down stairs, but she's horrified of walking up them.

When she eats she picks up a couple nuggets of dry food at a time and runs about four feet away from her bowl, drops the nuggets and then crunches them up.

We like her. She's already responding to her name and a bright "Come here!" She's very smart, and just has to adjust to her new pack.

Living Recklessly

I must live recklessly today. It is the last day of zero responsibility. Tomorrow the dog comes home.

We have settled on Ixi. Thank you Lacey. I thought for awhile of Isolde being Izzi which is very similar to Ixi, but it seems silly, in retrospect, to give a dog a name that you aren't going to call it ever. Might as well just call her Izzi. But that wasn't on the list. So! Ixi it is.

And never was there a more fey-ish name in the world.

So, I shall start my last irresponsible day with (so far):

Brushing teeth
Playing guitar
checking blog and email

From there I will:

Call: oral surgeon, Lawyer, bank
Get dressed
Go to work
Buy shitty towels at goodwill for Ixi's crate
eat dinner
meet girls at wine bar
find our boys at beer bar
sleep.

This is the master plan. I know! Where will I fit in that case of arson and my bungee jump?

When One Reads too much Victorian Literature...

My office is pretty done now. I love having one. That story/essay V. Woolf wrote about needing personal space? yea, she wasn't kidding.

In lieu of painting (landlords don't allow, time consumption, conspicuous lack of money) I have strung up my red lanterns. Two strings of fist sized ones, two the size of a sumo wrestler's thigh. They traipse diagonally from one corner to the other in the most opium-soaked charming way. The effect is entirely calming.

One super cheap Walmart book case holds all the books I allowed myself to pack, and all my music, poetry, stationary and "Best Costume" statuette.

I've an art corner for oversized works. I broke out my chalk pastels and am working on a composition for them.

Having no friends and only a part-time job to worry about has opened up so much time that I can do things like that. Just sit down and draw for three solid hours. Weird.

All that is missing is a fainting couch. I want one so badly. Reading poetry in red light just isn't the same in this desk chair. Don't get me wrong, Ikea had the perfect desk chair for me. Just comfy enough to remain in, not so comfy that work will be detrimented by the comfiness. It also conveniently matches my Ikea desk and Ikea rugs. Who knew.

But if anyone has a fainting couch laying about, clogging up fire escapes, do not hesitate to send it my way!

Joshua and I have narrowed down dog names to ten. By all mean weigh in. Please refer to Josh's Dispatches from the Flatlands for visual confirmation of the pup in question.

In no order:

1. Ixi
2. Lola
3. Astrid
4. Adelheide (Adel)
5. Isolde
6. Liesl
7. Ingrid
8. Tatiana
9. Petra
10. Lucinda

We have about a week to decide! Excitement!

I think I rather like this dog. She's soft to touch and hard to win over. And she'll match our furniture, Scandinavian and white.

Hero Worship

Yep. It's true. Josh and I have fallen into Michael Phelps Mania. MPM. I don't know, but after the next order of Obama tshirts, we may have to order Phelps Phan tshirts... The man may be the Achilles of our age. Give me a physically bent warrior at all of his caliber in the last 50 years.

I dunno, Mohammad Ali -- maybe. Granted, his "sport" is more warrior like than swimming in a straight line real fast.


I dunno... Who's glory is greater?

Life in a Mason Jar

Paul Verlaine’s mother kept her miscarried fetuses in jars. Three of them. While this seems disturbing (with just a dash of Little Shop of Horrors kitschy charm) but not as much as his smashing them all when he attacked her in 1869.

Was it good for her to finally have those reminders of death and biological failure gone? Did it free her at all from that pain? Was that freedom marred by newfound hatred of her surviving son for killing his preserved brothers?

And, in other news, I had my second shift at the Cafe Bella today, the best Mediterranean food I've found outside of the Mediterranean with a curiously Iranian owner named Ali (pronounced like Jasmine's nickname for Aladdin in Disney's Aladdin). It's pleasant enough, but has no real challenge. Luckily I just landed an interview at a law office for, yes, their secretary.

Haiku Tuesday

Propagate: Cheat Death!

Glut on immortality,

We made a species.

Week One

Ladies and Gentlemen,
We have landed in Stillwater. It hasn't yet been a week, but most things are set up... Even the pilgrimage to Ikea has already happened.

The four hour drive there, and four hour drive home weren't particularly thrilling, aside from a very specific breed of rain that exists in Texas. That is, you can see it coming a couple miles away - literally - and you know to turn on your windshield wipers three seconds before it pelts your car and steal all visibility of the road, which is not to say all visibility. Though you cannot see the road, you can clearly see ahead of you. The showers aren't wide or opaque, just violent in their pinpoint existance. The afternoon light just on the other side of the thunderhead lights the whole rest of the world, and lets you see that this rain will only continue for a couple minutes.

Otherwise, the air is graciously dry.

Joshua and I are busy setting up our offices and playing house. He starts training on Monday, I go in for my first job interview on Monday, it's all very fortuitous.