Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Helpful Suggestions for a Stress Free Heatwave
1. Don't live on the third floor.
2. If you must live on the third floor, make sure that either
(a) the building next door is far enough away that you can get a frickin' breath of wind, or
(b) the wiring can take an air conditioner without fire danger.
3. In absence of those suggestions, keep yourself well-stocked with fans.
4. If you buy fans, buy them fully assembled.
5. If you cannot buy fans fully assembled, do not wait until it is 92 degrees in your apartment before you start assembling them.
6. If you must assemble them in an apartment roughly the temperature of the inside of your mouth, don't then have 10 children over at your house in an attempt to facilitate the continuation of your daughter's Spanish class, which found itself without a home for the week.
7. If you have said children over, do not give them sticky things to eat or drink.
8. Don't drop an overhead projector on your toe, possibly dislocating or breaking it to judge by the all-consuming pain and alarming bruising on said toe, or else you will spend the whole rest of the night in intense pain and embarrassed by your own stupidity, plus calls to the doctor's office to see if broken toes need to be treated immediately (which would require the entire family to get up and spend about six tortuous hours in the ER) all to find that your toe is fine the next morning, just a little bruised.
9. If you're living with your ex-partner, don't assume that they will understand that your crankiness about all of this is but a necessary part of life, much like picking up the clog of hair from the shower drain or cooking when your apartment is warmer than your own armpit.
10. Own a barbecue grill.
11. Encourage your friends not to be moving out of their apartments this week, because you'll have to help then.
2. If you must live on the third floor, make sure that either
(a) the building next door is far enough away that you can get a frickin' breath of wind, or
(b) the wiring can take an air conditioner without fire danger.
3. In absence of those suggestions, keep yourself well-stocked with fans.
4. If you buy fans, buy them fully assembled.
5. If you cannot buy fans fully assembled, do not wait until it is 92 degrees in your apartment before you start assembling them.
6. If you must assemble them in an apartment roughly the temperature of the inside of your mouth, don't then have 10 children over at your house in an attempt to facilitate the continuation of your daughter's Spanish class, which found itself without a home for the week.
7. If you have said children over, do not give them sticky things to eat or drink.
8. Don't drop an overhead projector on your toe, possibly dislocating or breaking it to judge by the all-consuming pain and alarming bruising on said toe, or else you will spend the whole rest of the night in intense pain and embarrassed by your own stupidity, plus calls to the doctor's office to see if broken toes need to be treated immediately (which would require the entire family to get up and spend about six tortuous hours in the ER) all to find that your toe is fine the next morning, just a little bruised.
9. If you're living with your ex-partner, don't assume that they will understand that your crankiness about all of this is but a necessary part of life, much like picking up the clog of hair from the shower drain or cooking when your apartment is warmer than your own armpit.
10. Own a barbecue grill.
11. Encourage your friends not to be moving out of their apartments this week, because you'll have to help then.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Long Time, No...
It was a fantastic weekend. I really do love Pride.
Here's proof. If it's in print it must be true, right?
But, in my line of work, it's also a spectacularly busy time, and today is my first whole day off since the beginning of June. I can't decide whether to sleep or go to the beach or mop the floor--all sorely neglected for a while. I suspect that all three will happen at some point.
But best of all is the fact that my friend R is briefly in town from the west coast, and we're going to spend the afternoon together. R is one of my very favorite people ever-- we met when she offered to design a website for WT Chronicles several years ago (that long?!) and have been friends ever since. She's brilliant and funny and clever in that way that often makes my jaw drop with admiration and envy; I'm glad that she's returning to the northeast in the fall. That alone makes the tremendously unfair shortness of this visit bearable.
Here's proof. If it's in print it must be true, right?
But, in my line of work, it's also a spectacularly busy time, and today is my first whole day off since the beginning of June. I can't decide whether to sleep or go to the beach or mop the floor--all sorely neglected for a while. I suspect that all three will happen at some point.
But best of all is the fact that my friend R is briefly in town from the west coast, and we're going to spend the afternoon together. R is one of my very favorite people ever-- we met when she offered to design a website for WT Chronicles several years ago (that long?!) and have been friends ever since. She's brilliant and funny and clever in that way that often makes my jaw drop with admiration and envy; I'm glad that she's returning to the northeast in the fall. That alone makes the tremendously unfair shortness of this visit bearable.
Monday, June 11, 2007
If Only They'd Drop it On Texas
In honor of Southern Maine Pride week here, it's just going to be all gay all the time here. As if I weren't anyway.
In that spirit, I found this entertaining article:
The Berkeley-based Sunshine Foundation says it's unearthed Pentagon plans to build a hormone bomb that would turn all those hit by it gay. Uncovered through a Freedom of Information Act request, the plans, dated 1994, indicated that the Air Force's Wright Laboratory in Dayton, Ohio, had asked for $7.5 million to develop the bomb. The proposal said, "One distasteful but completely non-lethal example would be strong aphrodisiacs, especially if the chemical also caused homosexual behavior."
(directly from eyeteeth)
Oh, horror.
(I secretly wish they'd just go ahead and test it, because I'm running out of dating options here.)
Post Script
Saturday, June 09, 2007
Commence the Complaint
So I've been trying very hard not to whine. Sometimes things are easy, sometimes they're hard, and complaining about shit doesn't make it better, plus it drives away your friends.
However, at the risk of whining, I need to explain here the extraordinary concatenation of events leading up to this weekend:
There is this incredibly important event that I'm planning for work. It got fifteen hundred times more complicated about six weeks ago, and now there are two events on the same day, and I'm trying to coordinate over twenty different people representing three agencies, major donors, and a complicated internal hierarchy.
My romantic life is in a shambles (shambles, I tell you!)
I have my final packet of schoolwork due on Sunday, which has meant that I was assigned to write twenty pages of new fiction this month. (I didn't. I only wrote sixteen. But they felt like twenty coming out!)
Finances are more iffy than usual, because
I didn't get my mileage reimbursement.
My mom called.
And, because, I think, the universe hates me, I started my period ONE WEEK EARLY, which means I will be crampy and miserable during what is the most stressful day of my career so far.
If I believed in god I would say that this is some kind of a test. I've been trying to tell myself that it's an opportunity to rise to the occasion and the like, but it's not working all that much.
There. I'm done. Now I'm going to go eat some delicious soy non-dairy frozen dessert. Have good thoughts about the weather for tomorrow, OK?
However, at the risk of whining, I need to explain here the extraordinary concatenation of events leading up to this weekend:
There is this incredibly important event that I'm planning for work. It got fifteen hundred times more complicated about six weeks ago, and now there are two events on the same day, and I'm trying to coordinate over twenty different people representing three agencies, major donors, and a complicated internal hierarchy.
My romantic life is in a shambles (shambles, I tell you!)
I have my final packet of schoolwork due on Sunday, which has meant that I was assigned to write twenty pages of new fiction this month. (I didn't. I only wrote sixteen. But they felt like twenty coming out!)
Finances are more iffy than usual, because
I didn't get my mileage reimbursement.
My mom called.
And, because, I think, the universe hates me, I started my period ONE WEEK EARLY, which means I will be crampy and miserable during what is the most stressful day of my career so far.
If I believed in god I would say that this is some kind of a test. I've been trying to tell myself that it's an opportunity to rise to the occasion and the like, but it's not working all that much.
There. I'm done. Now I'm going to go eat some delicious soy non-dairy frozen dessert. Have good thoughts about the weather for tomorrow, OK?
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Possibly the Gayest Thing Ever
Not in the rainbow-boa-and-light-up-platform-shoes kind of way that will happen during Pride next week, but in the that's-so-queer-it-makes-me-feel-funny kind of way.
Pictures of people kissing themselves (photoshopped). [via bec]
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Snack
Just two tidbits for you today...
California now allows conjugal visits for gay inmates (via feministing)
and
A nice article in today's PPH about a gay couple walking in public made me all teary when I read it. Of course, that might because that same Sunday event that's referred to in the article has been occupying almost every waking moment of my life for the past six weeks.
California now allows conjugal visits for gay inmates (via feministing)
and
A nice article in today's PPH about a gay couple walking in public made me all teary when I read it. Of course, that might because that same Sunday event that's referred to in the article has been occupying almost every waking moment of my life for the past six weeks.
Monday, June 04, 2007
Past & Future
Happy Sort of Birth Day to the 19th amendment, which was first proposed 88 years ago today (it wasn't ratified until a year and three months later, on August 18, 1920). Yay women voters!
I'm still mostly an anarchist at heart, I think, but I vote to hedge my bets. Which makes me either a practical anarchist or a sellout, depending on how you look at it.
Also, the NY Times has a great list of what some famous writers (Foer, Eugenides, LeGuin, Eggers) are reading right now. I've never heard of any of these books that they're reading. Oh, for an unlimited book budget and some free time demanding to be filled!
With that in mind, my next post shall address the May Book Roundup. Notice I did not give a time for such a post, as all of my predictions as to when I will next return are invariably wrong.
In between work insanities, the complicatedness of my home life, and some intense therapy I've been writing the seventh story in my linked collection, and it seems to be going to a very dark place (opiates and liver disease, if you must know) that makes me feel strange in the head as I write it. Likely I will someday look at this story and go, "Thank goddess I'm not there any more."
I'm still mostly an anarchist at heart, I think, but I vote to hedge my bets. Which makes me either a practical anarchist or a sellout, depending on how you look at it.
****************
Also, the NY Times has a great list of what some famous writers (Foer, Eugenides, LeGuin, Eggers) are reading right now. I've never heard of any of these books that they're reading. Oh, for an unlimited book budget and some free time demanding to be filled!
With that in mind, my next post shall address the May Book Roundup. Notice I did not give a time for such a post, as all of my predictions as to when I will next return are invariably wrong.
****************
In between work insanities, the complicatedness of my home life, and some intense therapy I've been writing the seventh story in my linked collection, and it seems to be going to a very dark place (opiates and liver disease, if you must know) that makes me feel strange in the head as I write it. Likely I will someday look at this story and go, "Thank goddess I'm not there any more."
Sunday, June 03, 2007
Burdock 2007
Guess where I'll be August 10-12?
save the date!!
Burdock 2007
6th Annual Gathering for a Free and Sustainable Future
August 7-14th Starks, ME
Be Prepared For:
Making Connections & Building Solidarity
Workshops, discussions, and skillshares
Childrens workshops & Activities
Campfires, swimming, music and art
Lots of fun and lots of free healthy food
Participating rain or shine!
(this is a burdock root. you can eat it!)
Potential Workshops
Do-it-yourself skillshares
Sustainable living skills & wild crafting
Biodiversity and environmental protection
Indigenous struggles
Race, gender, sex and sexuality
Capitalism and class
Political prisoners: struggles and support
Unschooling and youth empowerment
Alternative Building and more!
You're encouraged to bring a workshop to share with others. If you want to get on the workshop schedule contact us by July 24th at burdock@riseup.net.
*Barter Fair!* Saturday August 11th from 4pm till Dark
Bring crafts, medicine, food, clothing, books or anything else you want to trade.
*Open Mic (less) Night:* Friday Night August 10th
*Burdock Cabaret:* Performance & Music on Saturday Night August 11th
Get involved!
Next Meeting and Burdock Work Party weekend: July 1st, 3pm. There will be a workshop before the meeting (topic tba) and work in the gardens.
Contact us to offer a workshop, kids activity, offer rides or transportation of food and equipment (have a large van or truck to offer tranpsort???), peform at the Burdock Cabaret, or help out in any other way!
for more info & directions: burdock@riseup.net
www.burdockgathering.org
box 1582 Portland, ME 04104
save the date!!Burdock 2007
6th Annual Gathering for a Free and Sustainable Future
August 7-14th Starks, ME
Be Prepared For:
Making Connections & Building Solidarity
Workshops, discussions, and skillshares
Childrens workshops & Activities
Campfires, swimming, music and art
Lots of fun and lots of free healthy food
Participating rain or shine!
(this is a burdock root. you can eat it!)
Potential Workshops
Do-it-yourself skillshares
Sustainable living skills & wild crafting
Biodiversity and environmental protection
Indigenous struggles
Race, gender, sex and sexuality
Capitalism and class
Political prisoners: struggles and support
Unschooling and youth empowerment
Alternative Building and more!
You're encouraged to bring a workshop to share with others. If you want to get on the workshop schedule contact us by July 24th at burdock@riseup.net.
*Barter Fair!* Saturday August 11th from 4pm till Dark
Bring crafts, medicine, food, clothing, books or anything else you want to trade.
*Open Mic (less) Night:* Friday Night August 10th
*Burdock Cabaret:* Performance & Music on Saturday Night August 11th
Get involved!
Next Meeting and Burdock Work Party weekend: July 1st, 3pm. There will be a workshop before the meeting (topic tba) and work in the gardens.
Contact us to offer a workshop, kids activity, offer rides or transportation of food and equipment (have a large van or truck to offer tranpsort???), peform at the Burdock Cabaret, or help out in any other way!
for more info & directions: burdock@riseup.net
www.burdockgathering.org
box 1582 Portland, ME 04104
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