we were lucky

Your body may be gone, I'm gonna carry you in.
In my head, in my heart, in my soul.
And maybe we'll get lucky and we'll both live again.
Well I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

(click the video below to have the soundtrack to this entry while you read)



We were lucky we got to say goodbye. We were lucky we got to tell him the things we always wanted to. I am lucky I wrote him that letter, and copied him that poem. We were lucky his students wrote him testimonials in time for him to read them. We were lucky he knew we loved him and he was loved by others. We were lucky we knew he loved us. We were lucky he didn't deteriorate over years and years, but rather faded away over a few weeks and then days. We were lucky he died gently, at home, with his family near him. We were lucky it happened Thanksgiving week because we were already together. We were lucky we were together because it was easier to reabsorb the love into the family network we already have.

It doesn't mean we won't miss him for every holiday and every visit to my grandmother's for the rest of our lives.

• Sun Kil Moon, Ocean Breathes Salty
  

paw

How do we cope, with the days after a death?
Empty days, nothing happens, not even a funeral.

Listening to Jed the Humanoid. How can a song be so silly and so sad?

My grandfather died this morning. It's very sad. He's been sick a while, but it suddenly took a turn for the worse in the last few days. My mom had collected testimonials from his students and he read the ones she had so far Sunday night. I wrote him a letter of all the memories of him and my grandmother that I will keep for forever. We are lucky we could give him these things.

• Cracks in the Canvas, PJ Harvey

freude (no schaden)

why I felt so alive I might never determine
There might be a word to describe it in German

Been busy today. Transcribed the DH full interview, and reworked my statement of purpose for the Russian Fellowship I want to do. And signed a lot of contracts for a freelance transcription job. Transcribing is very satisfying for me. I hope I can do this one within the parameters I quoted.

Home. New Orleans. Martinis. Jeopardy. Work. Impending...bad things. But no sense of forboding just sadness. I'm glad for DH songs to buoy my spirits. I wrote him a note that his songs have saved my life on a number of occasions. Radiohead I should charge with attempted murder.

DH inspires in me a desire to write again. He writes so much. And I could write that much, and maybe find something salvageable and good, and I could remember my moments better. The blog is a forum for certain things, according to my theory, but not for the types of things I wish I better recorded. He also inspires in me a desire to write music again. Or at least play some music, which usually inspires in me a song or two. I was thinking of seeing if my brother would collaborate on a song with me, or if my dad would record me singing one in his studio. Mom has a top of the line ukulele I could use.

Full, full to bursting things, all.

• Darren Hanlon, Elbows (video directed by Natalie van den Dungen)
  

made it home to new orleans. transcribing interview. will be doing a lot of work while i'm here. got a freelance transcription job, have to keep up with regular work, have to keep up with schoolwork. ugh.

why am i still up? i'm so close to finished with the interview, but i have to give up now.

still riding the high.

glad to see there's part of you
reserved for me

I haven't blogged this week, nor did I sleep (till last night; I just woke up). My favorite musician (I'll go ahead and say he's my favorite, after the last few days) came into town Wednesday, and by a series of very fortunate events, I got to hang out with him and his documentation a lot.

I have to tell you that Darren and Natalie are some of the nicest people I've ever met. Ever. I just needed to make a blog update to say that in public.

I don't have time to go through the highlights of their stay. But here are 3:

• Playing pinball tournaments with them
• Getting a song (one of my favorites) dedicated to me and a friend during the last set.
• Interviewing them for almost 2 hours about all the questions I've always wanted to ask about his songs and videos.

Cast of Thousands, Darren Hanlon

more ad reponses

If a dude says "lol" once, I immediately suspect he is either a) used to talking to 13 year old girls or b) a 13 year old girl. If he uses it multiple times, and inappropriatley (eg "saw your ad want to lol do unspeakable things to you lol") I assume he is mentally unstable.

I talked at length to my therapist about the CL exploits and her face was a mask of horror for the entire 45 minutes I was with her. She didn't find these things amusing at all.

Incidentally am at Sherlocks waiting for a dude and freezing my toes and fingers off. The doorman gave me his jacket is I guess how pathetic I look.

OH!! Rufus Wainwright is phenomenal live! What a great bunch of concerts I've been to in the last month! To be topped off by giving a ride to the last concert of the month's performer, the darling Aussie, Darren Hanlon.

personal ad

Things I got in the mail

• A check from the IRS
• A toll road bill for approx. the same amount

I might start a new feature to the blog, "reasons I rejected today's Craigslist personal responses."

• Entire response was one sentence (vast majority); I can understand not wanting to invest a lot of time in something that might not be real, but come on. I suspect a lot of these are spam, but I'm not sure what their end game is, when:
• The response, in its entirely, was "watt uppp??"
• Respondent's own poetry was included
• And it was really bad
• Any nudity
• Didn't include picture (actually, this isn't as big a detriment as the next bulletpoint)
• Included picture, and appeared to be a total douche
• Included picture, and appeared to be 13
• Tried to tell me something about myself ("you were born in May, and had a strong silent-type father, right?"). No, and no.
• Doesn't like music.
• Likes music, but the first band they list is Tool, followed by Metallica
• Claims not to have a problem with women (OK, if someone claimed to have a problem with women, this would obviously be rejected as well, but...you know, they doth protest too much)
• Is more than 2 inches shorter than me (I also balk at more than 3 inches taller than me)
• Married

Well, it makes me sound picky, but you really have to be with the number of responses you get as a lady on CL. I didn't list a picture or anything!

Anyway. There were a few that made the cut, and I've already been stood up twice (bonus!). This is going really well so far.

halloween was last month, dude

Things I got in the mail:

• Leotard (it was to be a backup for my unitard if that didn't work. It might still have a better neckline, so perhaps I will use it for my eventual final Illyria costume)
• Invitation to be a lifetime member of the Texas Exes
  

Ella the dog got in from the balcony while I was out tonight (seeing R Crumb, Art Spiegelman, and Francoise Mouly, I might add; it was fantastic), and ripped up everything she could. I'm sure it probably scared the cats to death, but they seem OK. What a mess. What. A. Mess. Oh, but she has her little paw over her face as she's sleeping right now. What a cutie.

And now I'm off to my radio show, where I will do all songs about dogs. I will post the link to the setlist soon.

Craigslist of the week

I should start another blog feature, favorite Craigslist ads. Sometimes I troll the personals or make random searches on the community and forsale sections, and I come across gems. But they're just my person favorites--nothing I would even bother submitting to the Best of Craigslist. This was from this weekend, from the personals.

Title: I'm looking for someone to watch a Werner Herzog movie with and then make out.
Body: That's about it.

Made me laugh. I wrote to him. Just to tell him he made me smile.

Ella

Things I got in the mail yesterday:

• Mix CD #2 (girl singers) from ronnybear (Doctor Hoss)
  

Things I got elsewhere this weekend

• A dog.
  

I am fostering this dog for the Austin Dog Alliance, and she is adorable. I'm still a cat person through and through, but I am quite fond of this dog and hope she gets a great forever family. In the meantime I can't wait to have playdates with my friends' dogs.

Rough draft costume pics

Here are some of the pics from Halloween night.

things in the mail

I was thinking of starting a new feature of the blog: Things I Got in the Mail Today. I've been getting so much stuff lately. Partly because I ordered it, partly because people are repaying my postcards in kind. But today I didn't get much. Oh, wait, yes, something came for me at work. Anyway, here are some things that have come in the last week:

• Andy's birthday present (not exactly what I thought it would be, without spoiling the surprise)
• A postcard from Italy (just like the song! Ooh, I just discovered that Florence + The Machine covered that song!), from Danielle
• A letter from Jessie
• A postcard from Karam
• Training materials for my new SAT prep job
• Blue hair extensions* (the day AFTER Halloween, of course)

Things I sent in the mail this week

• A long letter to Paw (my grandfather) about all the things that he's given me that I'm grateful for. Along with a handwritten copy of "Courage," by Anne Sexton.

*The hair extensions featured a little broken-English write-up of how Chinese hair differs from white-person hair. It was actually kind of interesting, if I understood it right. Something about hair follicles.

My radio show tomorrow night

http://www.kvrx.org/node/39825

A link from my blog to another blog entry on another blog! Woah! Basically, tomorrow, 10pm central, I'm playing a full hour of Darren Hanlon music, who is one of my all-time favorite singer-songwriters. And oh did I mention he's coming to Austin in a couple of weeks?

AND THAT I'M GOING TO INTERVIEW HIM???? DID I MENTION THAT?

Cats slideshow

slideshow from the class-portion of India

Don't know what inspired me to make this, but I made it yesterday.

Halloween followup

Like lonely ghosts
We stay because we don't know where else
To go

Halloween was a success. While downtown, I downgraded my original goal of:

• Have 2 strangers know what my costume is supposed to be

to instead be:

• Find some pizza.

Check! But in eating the pizza, I lost a glove (don't worry, not the ones I made, just the leather gloves for underneath, but they were pricey, and I had planned on having them around for real use, so I'm kind of bummed, and I keep dreaming I find it).

I think, with the inauguration of my mother's Facebook account, that all my readers are on Facebook, so pics can be seen there. I will eventually upload to here, to semi-complete the Illyrian costume saga portion of the blog. Basically, the costume came out well enough to be worth bettering for a potential DragonCon excursion next September. So it's not done. In fact, in the rush I was in on Halloween day, I forgot some details of the costume (a center frill, and some sequins), which I just discovered upon cleaning my apartment.

I have been cleaning for 5 hours, when all I wanted to do was go to sleep at 6pm, after a day of sailing on Lake Travis. What was my secret to motivation? I took photographs of the mess, and was inspired by the idea of having a "before" and "after" blog update. It was like a cyclone had hit, after 3 weeks not only of not cleaning up after the costuming, but not cleaning up after ANYTHING because of the costume-time. I've made astounding progress. On my fourth load of laundry. Watched 5 episodes of the Dollhouse (including Omega). Broke one of my grandmother's wine glasses. Cleaned up after that incident. Fed the cats. Cleaned the litterboxes thorougly. Talked a friend through a panic attack. Threw out the old food. Changed the sheets. Windexed. Bleached. Washed the dishes (both dishwashers are broken).

My hands are flaky and dry, from all the cleaners.

I do recommend checking out this song. It's beautiful. It's the coda to a first-season episode of the Dollhouse. I meant to play it on my Halloween-themed radio show, but I forgot.

• Lonely Ghosts