here it hasn't even started raining yet...this week there was a 3 and a half hour traffic jam because a woman was attempting suicide from a bridge on 1-5 during morning rush hour. police eventually closed the interstate in both directions because passing motorists were yelling for the woman to jump. police brought out her boyfriend to try and talk her down. then she jumped.

but she lived.

Seattle has a history of ‘women’ stopping traffic by perching in high places.

So tonight is girl's night. I'm in charge of bringing champagne and renting old Sex & the City episodes on DVD, as well as a copy of the Madonna Drowned World tour concert someone at work lent me. Bring on the estrogen. Tomorrow is a theme party. Monte Carlo. I want to look like Grace Kelly but may just have to settle for 1950s faux glamour. I have this great swishy, sweepy black and white patterned skirt. I just need to find some black kid gloves and fake pearls. I may bring Ted to the party - the first instance of him meeting some of my friends. Hope it all goes well.
And my brother called me this a.m. (woke me up in fact - but that's what family's for) to tell me that he and his wife will be staying with me all weekend. Um...okay. So I guess I need to do some cleaning and grocery shopping for my incoming houseguests. But, yea, three-day weekend. And I really want to go bed shopping since mine is about 10 years old. I keep getting advice on firm vs. soft, whether to get a pillow top, and different sizes. I'm sure it'll all be a learning experience. But how nice to shop for something that's equivalent to taking short naps in all the stores you go to.
As for websites I visit, I love the popculture, so I hit mightybigtv.com, fametracker.com and then damnhellasskings.com as a portal for fun content based sites.
Have a great weekend everyone. They're letting us out of work early so it's home to clean. Let the party begin!

Hey, everybody. i just got an AOL Instant Messenger account. My screenname is jzmull in case any of you want to talk to me. Or whatever.

We got that Converge record a few days ago. I haven't had a chance to hear much of it yet, but it looks great.

It looks like our Asheville show is going to be with Cherry Valence and Tight Bros From Way Back When, which means the show is going to be laaaarge. Sweet.

Angie - Beeville is about 2 1/2 hours southeast of me, on the way to Corpus.

Upma - you may not believe this, but I've never been to Ego's. But I've heard good things. So I couldn't really judge its dive bar ness. But the place I'm talking about, Ginny's Little Longhorn. They serve Pabst in cans. There's a jar of pickled eggs on the counter. The air is thick with smoke. Various honky-tonk bands play on a mini-stage in the back. It's great.

Zach - THANK YOU so much for identifying that song. I'm doubly impressed since I seem to have made up most of the words myself (though I'm sure I'm not the only one who does that). Yeah, such relief.
So I spent the weekend in Beeville, TX visiting an old college friend. We swam, painted our nails, ate endless meals, played this fun game called Apples to Apples (have you ever played it, it is SO much fun), discussed whether land ownership was a bourgeois contruct in America (it's a family of academics - this conversation happened at breakfast, at BREAKFAST - another example: this is a joke her dad told me:
Two atoms are walking down opposite sides of the street when they bump into each other. Are you okay, one asks the other. I seem to have lost an electron, he answers. But are you sure you're okay, she asks again. I'm POSITIVE, he says. BA DA BING!) and just had a good time hanging out, oh, we also went to this clothing store's going out of business sale, everything was 70% off. I'm wearing my new $1 skirt today. I love it. I swear, I always feel like I've been on a two week spa retreat when I go to Beeville. Something about being out in the country, everything is slowed down, conversations at meals take longer.
And I was supposed to meet up with Ted last night at this cool hotel's bar but the heavens opened up instead. Thunder, lightening, hail. So the plan was called off. A flash flood warning was in effect, after all. So instead I think we're going to this fun dive bar tomorrow night that's about a block and a half from my house.
And JT, this can't be said enough: you rock. I love all the clothing.

You can't get to heaven with a silver spoon
you can polish everything
except for the mark on you.

Sleater-Kinney, "All Hands on the Bad One."

Do you guys recognize this song? - it's been running through my head and I can't remember which girl band it is:
"duh dun't dun't duh, dun't dun't duh dun't dun't duh uhhh, You can't get to heaven on a silver spoon, polish everything, except for the moon, yeah you, give me the first big light, to shake the hand of mine. duh dun't dun't duh, dun't dun't duh dun't dun't duh uhhh"

I've been working on a little piece for the Squeaky Wheel "Pooch and Pussy Show," which is tomorrow which I guess is really just later today (my sleeping schedule is horrendous lately, it's 4:30 am, I should be sleeping like the rest of the east coast). I finished it Thursday although I'm not completely happy with it. I've also been trying to get some work done before school starts.

Got my 16 mm footage I shot with the Bolex back from the lab on Wednesday. Shot half a roll of Kodachrome. That film stock looks so good, I did some night and early morning shooting of the city skyline from my fire escape, timed exposures and single framing. I'm very pleased with the results.

There's some so-so pictures of some of the clothes I've made over the past few months at: http://www.geocities.com/jtprinker/dadarex/clothes.html

My address for those of you who need it is:
133 Elmwood Ave #5
Buffalo, NY 14201

Zach, I would say send me a copy of the new Slave but I can probably pick it up somewhere in town in a couple of months. Congrats!

My friends who recently moved to Paris told me that Bjork is playing there on November 1st, and they'll buy me a ticket to the show if I want to go. As tempting as it is, I think I'll be visiting in January or May depending on the January Seize Him! mini-tour and my financial situation.

It's to bed for now, then back up in a few

Fellini's Satyricon. Yeah, that's a long movie. I'm not saying it isn't very visually rich. Cause it is - very visually rich. And the set blocking and the dream-like feel and so much artistic mastery (but only half the subtitles - really, long scenes went by and no subtitles) and damn, but if it wasn't 2 1/2 hours sitting in Paramount's no room for your knees and I'm only 5' 3" seats. And I did have to turn away during the hand getting cut off scene. But I loved the framing and the makeup and just how it all looked.

After that, since my throat had been bothering me all day, but I was doing the whole I'm not going to get sick mantra, we hung out at Ted's house drinking fruit juice. I had mango juice in a wine glass. He was so cute - I guess he'd gone a little wacky fruit drink crazy at the grocery store. I had my choice of Goya mango, banana, tamarind, some type of flower and maybe prickly pear as well. Whew! Such excitement. But really nice and fun and we're supposed to hang out again tonight provided I don't have a full fledged sore throat by then. But to stave that off, I'm currently sucking on robitussin honey lemon cough drops and bought some zinc gum and am trying the positive thinking. Oh, so I then had a Fellini based dream last night - which involved me moving dreamlike (though how else could I move in my dream) from scene to scene and it all culminated in my watching a burlesque show with Ted (did I mention that Satyricon is very decadent as well?) But then I woke up.

ugh, zinc gum tastes like ass.

You mean I have to watch someone's hand get cut off.
Oh my.

Zach - super fantastic! Please continue to kick much ass.
I, too, covet a CD burner. Thankfully I have a few close friends who own them and who in exchange for raiding my CD collection, burn me some of theirs in return.
Angie - good luck on the back to school week.
Upma - what did you think of Peaches? I know some people who saw her here this week and couldn't stop raving about it.
Date #3 with the new boy tonight. Fellini's Satyricon. I'm ready for decadence.

Great news today. Slave got picked up by Desert Moon Periodicals, the biggest independent publication distro in the US. They distro Punk Planet among other things. They want 250 copies of issue #6 when it comes back from the printers (next month), but, here's the kicker, they want to get up to 3000 copies per issue by the publication of #7 or #8. 3000 copies! That's a 1000 more than we printed of issue #5! Wow! John said, "we just got signed." It's not far from the truth. Kick ass.

I just got back from a long weekend with the fam in Dallas. It involved little more than huge meals and hanging out by the hotel pool. And most importantly, celebrating my parent's anniversary. I had a great, relaxing time.
You guys are all awesome. I loved catching up on the posts.
So I met this boy out dancing last week and we had our second date last night. I'm trying to only be cautiously optimistic. But the fact that he loves to read, is as big a sci-fi geek as I am and has been known to dance makes it hard not to babble on and on about him. We're going to see some Fellini film tomorrow; I've got fingers crossed.
Well, I should try and catch up on all the work on my desk.

I was just thinking yesterday, when I was eating my own vomit and tracking my feces on the carpet, how my dislike of pets might stem from my similarities to them. Very insightful, Louise. If you'll excuse me now I have to go lick my butthole then kiss Benji on the mouth.

Babies grow up and start mowing the lawn. Your dog or cat will never, ever, ever mow your lawn.

Aw right?

a man boarded the bus. as he reached the driver he held out his hand which contained a crumpled dollar bill. (fare is $1.50)
"i just got outta jail. all i got is THIS dollar, which i wanna use for pop. that aw right?"
apparently the driver thought it was aw right.

That's why it's imperative you become a celebrity, zach
Upma, I'm 27.

If I were a celebrity asked to sign a bra for charity, I would probably draw nipples on it.

i'm possible dreams. a banner carried by walkers "we tit it for you, mom!"
i went to see the rally at the end of the seattle 3 day walk for breast cancer research & treatment. thousands of people in 9 cities across the US walked 60 miles in 3 days raising millions of dollars. a friend of mine did the walk. she's been training for months. i'm not usually at all touched by manufactured sentiment but the sheer amount of people walking and cheering, survivors and friends and family was pretty amazing. the event was put together really well. jacob compared it to a nazi pageant. i think i'll either walk or volunteer along the route next year. this year i'm decorating a bra to be auctioned off for breast cancer research after a celebrity signs it. i wonder who the celebrity will be...

So I went out last night to see this 80s covers band - the members were dressed up as Prince, Madonna, Adam Ant (yum - face paint and all) and Robert Palmer. The drummer, lame, had no costume. They played lots of one hit wonders hits and they quizzed the audience on 80s trivia. Yeah, I've forgotten all 80s pop culture. All. But I had fun dancing and having middle school flashbacks.
Upma - one of my most favoritest books to recommend to people is A Natural History of the Senses by Diane Ackerman. She has a chapter on hair which I think you would get a kick out of.
Angie - I am so with you about weekend mornings. And this weekend'll be especial nice. I'm heading to Dallas to celebrate my parent's anniversary (so we can visit my brother and sister-in-law at the same time). On the agenda: laying out by the pool reading and eat huge dinners. Paradise.
Ok - must go chop some ham for a photo shoot.

The "put her in a bag and throw her in the river" comment was, of course, a very, very funny joke. I'm sure you all see that.

No, I'm anti-animal. I like animals. I think they're great when they're in trees and holes in the ground and in the zoo and stuff. It's when humans bring them into their houses that I start hating animals. I cannot understand why anyone would want a parasitic, hair and shit machine crawling around all over their house. Yuck. And worse, you have to provide for it. When your shit machine gets hungry, you have to feed it. When it gets sick, you have to fix it. The little freeloader does nothing.

And I do not believe in the unconditional love malarky either. That love is very conditional. If you stop feeding the fucker, the fucker finds someone else to love.

So, no thanks. The only animals I want in my life are the talking cartoon kind.

So I just found out that the first of my close college friends is engaged. And I can't stop smiling. The type of couple they are, capital L, love - that's the type I want to be. Someday. Maybe 10 years from now, when I'm done flirting with cute rockabilly boys and dating musicians.
So I hung out with the biscuit for the last time yesterday. He leaves for New York tomorrow. It was really fun. History aside, he makes a much better friend than, well, than anything more than a friend. He made me this cool French lounge CD which we ended up spaztically dancing around to, and then we tried to woo these raccoons with stale bread onto the balcony. But the raccoons snubbed us, and they hadn't even seen us try to dance.
Tonight I go secret shop American Pie 2. I hope it isn't lame.
Happy belated birthday, J.T.

This past week and weekend have been exhausting, I spent most of the week suffering an unusual Buffalo heat wave and making clothes for good friends who were leaving. One of my closest friends in Buffalo, Jana, left with her boyfriend for Paris on Saturday for a year, but still managed to throw me a surprise birthday party on Friday night (actually we have the same birthday, so it was sort of for both of us, but only a surprise for me).

Saturday was spent saying goodbye over homemade crepes. My roommate left town for a week on Saturday also, so I'm enjoying the place to myself.

On sunday (my actual birthday I rearranged a lot of my stuff in the apartment (without disturbing any of my roommates space, of course) and got acquainted with my old stuff plus a lot of new stuff that I got from Jana that she didn't want to get rid of but couldn't take with her, lots of kitchen stuff including a food processor and blender. It's nice having friends at a media resource center also, the Squeaky wheel girls came through for me, I got a super 8 camera (which has a few problems) and a old winding regular 8 camera (which finding film for will be a little difficult) as gifts from them, very cool.

Sunday evening I had dinner with Julia, which was really nice. The verdict is still out for me on whether one can maintain healthly friendships with exes, I would like to think so, and my conscious mind seems to think so also, my subconscious mind is a whole different story, I still have bizarre and slightly disturbing dreams where Julia is the star...

Now, I'm invoking some serious discipline for myself, I want to be ahead of the game when school starts in a couple of weeks, most of my friends have left until then which makes it a little lonely around here, but also less distractions.

What a delightful weekend of cheese. Both queso and fondue. And then some dancing at the Derailers show. And a little bit of shopping. Very therapeutic.

here's my first article from magnetandsteel about exes.
http://www.magnetandsteel.com/articles/glitter01.htm. It's called The Ex-Tester.
and double ditto on the sticky road of being friends with the ex. in fact mr. I just broke up with you last Friday after four very enjoyable dates called the other night "to say hi and cause he wanted to talk" whatEVER. I tend to follow the when it's over, it's over rule. But it's much harder when you've dated over a year/lived with that person/were soulmates/never expected the breakup. But your head sounds like it's in exactly the right place, Mike. Do what's best for you. Maybe Jan's "tired of waiting for you to feel better" because she feels guilty seeing you upset and hurt. And her feeling guilty is NOT your problem. But that's my long distance pop psych theory. Could be completely off base. ps. I love your song titles much, they crack me up
So tubing was fantastic yesterday. Relaxing, beautiful, a good mix of ice cold water and beating down sun. Afterwards we went to eat at a place where everything, I mean everything, on the menu was fried. So swim&bitch was a sucess. And a wine&bitch (hee hee, whine and bitch) was suggested next cause they're are some cool Texas vineyards around here we may tour.

my modem on my home computer has been kind of fritzie lately so i haven't been able to write at much length. and actually since getting back in town i don't have much to say anyway. just catching up on things. some more job noise on the line. these things seem to go in cycles.

as for friendships with exes, there was a point in time where i was friends or friendly with all my exes. then sort of all at once all but one completely fell apart. and that one has always been a rather strained exception anyway. i don't know if it was coincidence or the change in my lifestyle or both, but they all dissappeared around the time i got into a serious relationship.my mom would explain all of this away with her theory that there are no platonic friendships. obviously i don't agree with that, but i have a modified version of the theory which involves ALL relationships being based on some level of attraction (or obligation- but that is nearly a theory unto itself).
mike, you're gonna be ok. and though it is nice if you and jan can be friends, it is OK if you don't want to be friends. not now. even not ever. steph and angie will back me up on this i think.
kainui, maybe you shouldn't characterize the fact that your lovers have thus far made better friends than lovers as a mistake. and have no fear. no writer could ever capture you in the two dimensional world of print. i tried to explain why but words (of course) failed me, or perhaps i failed the words. i conjured only mediocre metaphors and stale similies. you're too complicated, smart, observant, enigmatic, beautiful, and vibrantly alive to become a stock character even for a writer with much more skill than i . i hope my feeble attempts at the elusive adjectives don't offend.
zach, the web page is looking good. i can't wait to see more. i'm always amazed at the tech skills ya'll show. i've really gotta start teaching myself more than baby html. zach, jt, mike, upma your pages make me jealous.
i'm looking for the "little things" but i think what i really need is a big picture moment. or medium picture anyway. i've got really long term goals. but not many short term goals and no mid range goals to get me from here to there.

A very, very simple website for my band can be found here. It should grow in the coming days, but for now it's just a baby. I'm still learning. Eventually, all of my house will have pages connected to this one. I think. At least, the Crimson Spectre will.

Upma - I don't think you're silly at all. I love morning glories - and you don't often see blue flowers. I don't know if this counts as a little thing - but I'm cutting out of work early tomorrow to float down a river, instead of stitch&bitch, this week it's swim&bitch. I'm really looking forward to it being me, an inner tube, the sun on my back (but lots of sunscreen), and five other girls out having fun. Another thing I'm looking forward to is a fondue party this weekend - you know me and my feelings about cheese. I think my personal hell would be lactose intolerance.
Shel - so did you ever see the painting Alec did of Jacob? He brought in prints of his portfolio the last week he was here, and I got to see it.

it's not easy being a 10

so as i settled in on the red eye a man grabbed a blanket from the overhead bin in front of me. the girl sitting next to me asked him for a blanket. he obliged and offered one to me as well. i accepted whereupon he turned to the girl beside me, gestured toward me and said "talk her into being number 10."
as he walked away the girl beside me began to explain in an outraged voice. "he was talking to me before we got on the plane. he's arabian or something and he has 8 wives. that's his 8th wife back there. he's taking her on vacation. he was asking me to be his 9th. i guess he wants you to be the 10th." we chuckled together and the conversation continued to pleasantries and small talk about how she's a basketball player for a houston university and how she was going to visit her boyfriend in san jose. after takeoff we both drifted to sleep for a while, or at least i did.
later there was a bit of turbulence and i awoke to that man leaning over me. seeing that i was awake, he bagan to speak to both me and my seatmate once again.
"so have you considered my offer? you will be quite well taken care of."
"yeah. thanks but no thanks."
"are you sure? there are many advantages..."
(at this point, wife number 8 leans forward in her seat waving and smiling, "it's lots of fun!!")
"yeah... no thanks."
"i can put you in touch with number 2,4,5,7, & 8. they will all tell you how much they love it. they are quite well taken care of."
"what about wives 1, 3, and 6?"
"oh, i am thinking of replacing them. in my country you are only allowed 10 wives at a time."
"uh huh. so what happens to the women you decide to 'replace'?"
"i give them a lot of money and they are turned out on their own. (he chuckles) 10 wives gets pretty confusing sometimes. i've given up calling them by name. i just call them by number."
"yeah, well, like i said, no thanks. i'm not really that fond of being a number."
"oh, but for YOU i would make an exception."
at this point i tried to wind down the conversation as quickly as possible becasue he was still leaning over my seat into my face. my seatmate and i finally managed to assure him we didn't want to be wives number 9 & 10.
i hope he and wife number 8 had an enjoyable vacation in dallas.

as for my trip to louisiana, the parade of marrying and birthing friends continues. it took until day five to get into a fight with my mom, the topic of which involved me going to the wrong casino to "meet" them for the buffet. upon my return to seattle i saw my tax dollars at work in seafair where i toured and aircraft carrier and watched the blue angels.
back to the grind.

So the events that transpired the past two days make me not want to date any boys for the next three years. I received startling confessions from the biscuit about him and a common friend of ours, got told by jon (the crush) that he didn't feel a spark between us but then he still tried to continue making out with me but only wanted to be friends which led to me ditching him at the Spoon show, and received song lyrics from an ex-boyfriend on my answering machine. A song inspired by me. Good lord. A little drinking. A few tears. A trip to the gym and a cheesy movie (Legally Blonde) later, I'm feeling better.
bleh.

Last night was Brian Lowit's wedding, which I got a last minute invite to. I'm glad I did, because I really like Brian and I had a great time at his wedding. They decided to get married at Guilford College because that's where they meet and getting married is really expensive in DC. And since Guilford is a Quaker college, they had a Quaker ceremony. they entered together and had friends speak. And there was a lot of moments of silence.

Then they had a very nice reception with catered vegan Indian food. And they had a Moon Bounce.

The whole event was tons of fun. The wedding was really lovely and the reception was fun. Plus, since Brian runs Lovitt Records, it was a great chance for a easily starstruck geek like me to hobnob with indie rock luminaries. Engine Down were the ushers. Amanda MacKaye was a table away from me. I was just reading a book with her in it that morning. Weird. Plus, Benji talked Mike from Go! in Chapel Hill into promising us (the band) a show whenever we wanted. Cool.

I made a photo album of some San Francisco pictures and some others. It's here. There are a lot of people in this you've probably never heard of.

photos

Upma - what's the link to that Spoon animated video?
Angie Joe - sounds like that situation just sucks. My heart goes out to your friend. I guess the most you can do is encourage your friend to be strong and be there for her as much as you can.
So this was my day at work yesterday:
Slept in a bit, went to the Omlettetry
"Hi, I'd like to order five fried eggs...to go"
"o...kay"
I sit down to wait. When the short order cook gets to my order, he pauses, looks around
"Are all these five eggs for one person?"
He looks over to me. I'm sitting demurely in a pink skirt. I wave.
"They're for me."
"Would you like all those on one plate?"
"I'm not eating them."
He looks confused and beckons me back into the kitchen. I explain that I'm shooting the eggs for a German textbook and chances are they won't get eaten at all. I leave, and now my car smells like a giant fried egg.
When I get back to work we have to evacuate the building due to a fire alarm going off. Secretaries run and scream in the hall "it's not a drill!!"
We file down five flights of steps. Get to the very crowded lobby.
false alarm.
Take the elevators back up.
Then I leave to go to Central Market to pick up the pizzas for the second photo shoot. I run into my friends Jim & Bev there. Make small talk. Get invited to go to the lake with them on Sunday. Head back to work. go to photo shoot.
1 o'clock shoot - two 13 year old girls
2 o'clock shoot - three 15 year old boys
(and two giggly girls staring at them at the studio door but too shy to actually come in the studio - thank god it becomes easier as you get older, but I remember that stage - the giggly, embarassed, oh my god, look there's BOYS here stage)

I hope that some day soon my posts (and everyone elses, for that matter) are long ecstatic run-on sentences.

Angie - the D-Day museum is AWEsome. And Gerrish works there now. She's the volunteer or program coordinator or something like that. If you run into her, tell her I say hello.
So swimming yesterday was wonderful. I did some weird combo of different strokes for 10 laps and as I did the frog kick on my back and water rushed by my ears going "plunk, plunk" like a piano and nothing but blue skies and white clouds and that tired but really hungry feeling you get afterwards and going to see Bridget Jones at the Alamo Drafthouse (they show movies and serve food and beer) and only spilling queso on my shirt twice and laughing through the whole movie and then coming home and deciding to call the boy insteading of waiting for him and talking to him on the phone for over an hour and getting teased but laughing more and making plans for tonight to hang out and then again on Friday to go see Spoon and having to come to work but not being stressed out even though by all rights I should be and, well, that's been the last 24 hours.