Thursday, September 20
Her Words
Monday, September 17
Ordinance
In Seward there's a law that there must be an equal or greater ratio of churches to bars.
There's a lot of churches there.
There's a lot of churches there.
To be known
At the Fairview bar I see a waiter from the Roadhouse. He points at me and yells, "Mushroom swiss quiche with bacon bits on top!"
We arrive at Mountain High Pizza Pie right as it opens, so the cook takes our order for two waters to start. He's getting the waters when the waitress walks by and says, "She doesn't like ice in her water." He dumps out the ice.
We arrive at Mountain High Pizza Pie right as it opens, so the cook takes our order for two waters to start. He's getting the waters when the waitress walks by and says, "She doesn't like ice in her water." He dumps out the ice.
Thursday, September 13
Too Bad Montana Gave That Kid Wine
The rooms in the employee housing up the hill have TVs in them. The channels are limited. It's not a normal cable package, it's a few chosen ones. A&E, HGTV, Fox News, HBO Family. The Alaska Channel, which is actually long advertisements for Alaska properties also owned by the corporation that owns the lodge.
There's an employee photo contest every summer, and this year someone put the photos entered on one of the static channels, along with a radio station that plays 70s songs. My friend and I watched it tonight and came up with ways each photo illustrated whatever lyrics were playing when it was shown. Like they were intentional music videos. ("I don't care what you say anymore this is my life;" a picture of a moose staring at the camera and not giving a shit.)
When he mentioned that the channel used to be just static, I was like "We could have had a public access show all summer." Wouldn't that have been fun? A side project for the restless employees, so they'd do something other than stack up three heavy wooden picnic tables and climb onto the roof, for instance. (I might have thought that idea up and encouraged others to do it, but let the record show I myself did not climb up onto the roof.) (Troublemaker.)
We imagined commandeering the channel somehow, wearing masks and holding up poster boards with a conversation written on them. It would have been like that season of the Real World where they had a public access show. Too bad neither of us plans to come back next year.
There's an employee photo contest every summer, and this year someone put the photos entered on one of the static channels, along with a radio station that plays 70s songs. My friend and I watched it tonight and came up with ways each photo illustrated whatever lyrics were playing when it was shown. Like they were intentional music videos. ("I don't care what you say anymore this is my life;" a picture of a moose staring at the camera and not giving a shit.)
When he mentioned that the channel used to be just static, I was like "We could have had a public access show all summer." Wouldn't that have been fun? A side project for the restless employees, so they'd do something other than stack up three heavy wooden picnic tables and climb onto the roof, for instance. (I might have thought that idea up and encouraged others to do it, but let the record show I myself did not climb up onto the roof.) (Troublemaker.)
We imagined commandeering the channel somehow, wearing masks and holding up poster boards with a conversation written on them. It would have been like that season of the Real World where they had a public access show. Too bad neither of us plans to come back next year.
Friday, August 31
Latinate Animal Adjectives for Fun and Profit
The ones you already know:
Canine - dog.
Bovine - cow.
Avian - bird.
Equine - horse.
Feline - cat.
Serpentine - snake.
Simian - ape.
Ursine - bear.
But there are others! Fun!
My favorite new-to-me latinate animal adjectives:
Aquiline - eagle. (Makes so much sense!)
Asinine - ass/donkey. (Makes so much sense!)
Herpestine - mongoose. (Bummer!)
Hirudinal - leech. (Good insult)
Oscine - songbird. (Good compliment)
Strutious - ostrich/emu/rhea. (The ostriches, they do strut)
Canine - dog.
Bovine - cow.
Avian - bird.
Equine - horse.
Feline - cat.
Serpentine - snake.
Simian - ape.
Ursine - bear.
But there are others! Fun!
My favorite new-to-me latinate animal adjectives:
Aquiline - eagle. (Makes so much sense!)
Asinine - ass/donkey. (Makes so much sense!)
Herpestine - mongoose. (Bummer!)
Hirudinal - leech. (Good insult)
Oscine - songbird. (Good compliment)
Strutious - ostrich/emu/rhea. (The ostriches, they do strut)
Tuesday, August 28
Manifesto
We work for corporations whose idea of customer service is to build a karmic dam where the customer who throws a tantrum like a three-year-old is rewarded for it. Where the customer has paid for the right to treat the company's employees like shit.
What does that do to the employees? They must be either false, or they must be perfectly spiritually evolved in order to turn the other cheek and reward the demanding demeaning behavior with a free upgrade at a hotel, fines waived at a library, empty products returned for cash at a health food store.
On the other hand, the people who yell and throw a fit and act like not having their every whim catered to is a gross injustice - they are raging against the corporate machine and may genuinely feel that they must debase themselves and the employees they speak to in order to get their due. The bottom line of a company - make x amount of money at a profit - that's a tricky thing to find. The easiest way to make a profit is to gyp people. People are sick of getting gypped, sick of working themselves to the bone to go home and deal with, for instance, Verizon, a mega-company that cares not a whit about the absurd bureaucratic hoops people sometimes have to jump through in order to give Verzion the money they earned at a job they despise.
Oh, the whole system's screwed. I am not one to get free upgrades, generally, and I wonder if it is because I empathize too strongly with the employee who's telling me no, these are the rules, no, this is what you paid for, no. I try to pay attention to the people who manage to get more for their money, more than they've paid for, without screaming and yelling and splashing in the karmic dam of the corporation, but so far I haven't been able to deduce their method. Maybe a calm still feeling of deserving it.
Sometimes I feel like my friends who work in customer service, bowing to the will of tantrumey customers, have had their personalities deformed just as truly as a factory worker gets his hand mangled in a machine. To grit your teeth and smile, and give, to someone who rightfully deserves to be told to stop behaving like a spoiled brat. It wears on you after ten, twenty years. Especially if you're trying to care about your job, invest some meaning in it even though it's menial. If you choose the false front over spiritual evolution the false front can meld itself to your real self without you realizing it.
I leave you with an anecdote. Once my friend who worked the graveyard shift at a diner told me that her friend spit in a terrible tyrant's side of ranch, and my friend helped by stirring in the spit bubbles with her finger. Think about that if you're ever tempted to snap your fingers at a server like they're scullery maids on the Titanic. If what I've said about the spiritual disfigurement of not standing up for what's right is not enough to dissuade you from throwing a tantrum in a business establishment: consider some 20-year-old tweaker's spit in your side of ranch. Mmmm.
What does that do to the employees? They must be either false, or they must be perfectly spiritually evolved in order to turn the other cheek and reward the demanding demeaning behavior with a free upgrade at a hotel, fines waived at a library, empty products returned for cash at a health food store.
On the other hand, the people who yell and throw a fit and act like not having their every whim catered to is a gross injustice - they are raging against the corporate machine and may genuinely feel that they must debase themselves and the employees they speak to in order to get their due. The bottom line of a company - make x amount of money at a profit - that's a tricky thing to find. The easiest way to make a profit is to gyp people. People are sick of getting gypped, sick of working themselves to the bone to go home and deal with, for instance, Verizon, a mega-company that cares not a whit about the absurd bureaucratic hoops people sometimes have to jump through in order to give Verzion the money they earned at a job they despise.
Oh, the whole system's screwed. I am not one to get free upgrades, generally, and I wonder if it is because I empathize too strongly with the employee who's telling me no, these are the rules, no, this is what you paid for, no. I try to pay attention to the people who manage to get more for their money, more than they've paid for, without screaming and yelling and splashing in the karmic dam of the corporation, but so far I haven't been able to deduce their method. Maybe a calm still feeling of deserving it.
Sometimes I feel like my friends who work in customer service, bowing to the will of tantrumey customers, have had their personalities deformed just as truly as a factory worker gets his hand mangled in a machine. To grit your teeth and smile, and give, to someone who rightfully deserves to be told to stop behaving like a spoiled brat. It wears on you after ten, twenty years. Especially if you're trying to care about your job, invest some meaning in it even though it's menial. If you choose the false front over spiritual evolution the false front can meld itself to your real self without you realizing it.
I leave you with an anecdote. Once my friend who worked the graveyard shift at a diner told me that her friend spit in a terrible tyrant's side of ranch, and my friend helped by stirring in the spit bubbles with her finger. Think about that if you're ever tempted to snap your fingers at a server like they're scullery maids on the Titanic. If what I've said about the spiritual disfigurement of not standing up for what's right is not enough to dissuade you from throwing a tantrum in a business establishment: consider some 20-year-old tweaker's spit in your side of ranch. Mmmm.
Animorph app
I know what the four people who read this blog are wondering. And that is this:
"Now that you have a Droid Razr Maxx 3000 phone, what apps have you downloaded?"
1. Color Flash. It's a flashlight. You can use the flashbulb on the back of the phone that's made for the camera as the flashlight, or you can choose to have the screen light up instead, which is less intense. I mostly use this when I read in bed at night. I just set my phone on my pillow and read without moving my head.
What makes this flashlight app different from others? It has a police siren feature, where the screen alternates red and blue light. In case you are in high school and have a video group project where someone needs to pretend to get arrested.
Maybe all flashlight apps have that feature. I am not going to download them all and then tell you which ones do and don't, because this is not a real blog. This is a blog that four people read.
2. Hour Glass. This app is useless and hypnotic. It is an hourglass that responds to the phone being tipped one way or another, or all the way over. The hourglass is full of little balls, instead of sand. You can decide what colors you want everything to be, along with the size and amount and elasticity and density of the balls. The app does not tell you how long it takes for all the balls to fall, which makes it truly useless. I, however, zone out on it a couple times a week.
3. Moon 3D. This app tells you what phase the moon is in. I guess you can look at the dark side of the moon with it, or something... like, a picture of the dark side of the moon... but I don't do that because it's bad luck. Have you ever seen the Wizard of Oz? Chyeah.
4. WomanLog. This app tells you when you are going to start shedding your uterine lining, and what days are optimal for getting pregnant or avoiding getting pregnant. Ideally, there would be an app that combines Moon 3D and WomanLog, so that I can make some sort of goddessey connection between the moon's cycle and my body's, but I haven't seen one that does that yet.
5. GT Lite. This app is "The Goddess Tarot." I do the one-card oracle reading where I ask it a question and then it gives me a card and its interpretation. I think tarot cards are fun, especially quality ones that have interesting illustrations and weave in actual mythology or folklore connected with whatever goddess/plant/animal the picture's of. I just asked the oracle if I am nauseous because I ate Skittles earlier, and it responded with the Fortune card featuring Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of prosperity.
6. BeFunky photo editor. This is probably not the best photo editor but I am okay with it. I like Instagram but I don't like how you have to crop all your pictures into a square to use it. BeFunky is pro-rectangle. It has a lot of filters. I want to say like 10-15. You can also change the exposure etc manually. It lets you save the pictures you edit to your phone, which I didn't used to think Instagram lets you do. (It does, you just have to be sneaky about it.) Anyway. I would download various other photo editing apps to play with them if I wasn't seriously concerned that I spend too much time on my phone as it is.
7. WebMD. This is a terrible app that will convince you you are dying. Do not install it. I have it on my phone just in case I feel like freaking the hell out.
8. Obviously I also have the Amazon app, the Yelp app, and the Google Maps app.
In summation, I feel like there are other apps out there I would enjoy, but I don't know about them. I am not into games. I refuse to download anything that's a game.
There's probably like an herb and plant identifier app that's cool. There might be temperature/weather forecast apps that are better than just looking that info up online.
There might be an app that has you log everything you eat and how much you sleep and whether you've pooped lately and how much you exercise and how much you hang out with people TO SEE HOW your mood/outlook/severity of depression are affected by those factors. That would be pretty cool. I would also want it to track how many hangnails I have, how clean my room is, how many days it's been since I washed my hair. How many pages of my journal I've filled with writing. How many unanswered emails, texts, and unlistened-to voicemails I have. I could track all of those things manually and make like a Microsoft Office pie chart... box and whisker plot?... to interpret all the data, but you know. That wouldn't give me a reason to stare at my phone.
WHAT APPS DO YOU HAVE? What apps do you wish existed? What apps do you think are crappy? (Crapps!) Let me know.
"Now that you have a Droid Razr Maxx 3000 phone, what apps have you downloaded?"
1. Color Flash. It's a flashlight. You can use the flashbulb on the back of the phone that's made for the camera as the flashlight, or you can choose to have the screen light up instead, which is less intense. I mostly use this when I read in bed at night. I just set my phone on my pillow and read without moving my head.
What makes this flashlight app different from others? It has a police siren feature, where the screen alternates red and blue light. In case you are in high school and have a video group project where someone needs to pretend to get arrested.
Maybe all flashlight apps have that feature. I am not going to download them all and then tell you which ones do and don't, because this is not a real blog. This is a blog that four people read.
2. Hour Glass. This app is useless and hypnotic. It is an hourglass that responds to the phone being tipped one way or another, or all the way over. The hourglass is full of little balls, instead of sand. You can decide what colors you want everything to be, along with the size and amount and elasticity and density of the balls. The app does not tell you how long it takes for all the balls to fall, which makes it truly useless. I, however, zone out on it a couple times a week.
3. Moon 3D. This app tells you what phase the moon is in. I guess you can look at the dark side of the moon with it, or something... like, a picture of the dark side of the moon... but I don't do that because it's bad luck. Have you ever seen the Wizard of Oz? Chyeah.
4. WomanLog. This app tells you when you are going to start shedding your uterine lining, and what days are optimal for getting pregnant or avoiding getting pregnant. Ideally, there would be an app that combines Moon 3D and WomanLog, so that I can make some sort of goddessey connection between the moon's cycle and my body's, but I haven't seen one that does that yet.
5. GT Lite. This app is "The Goddess Tarot." I do the one-card oracle reading where I ask it a question and then it gives me a card and its interpretation. I think tarot cards are fun, especially quality ones that have interesting illustrations and weave in actual mythology or folklore connected with whatever goddess/plant/animal the picture's of. I just asked the oracle if I am nauseous because I ate Skittles earlier, and it responded with the Fortune card featuring Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of prosperity.
6. BeFunky photo editor. This is probably not the best photo editor but I am okay with it. I like Instagram but I don't like how you have to crop all your pictures into a square to use it. BeFunky is pro-rectangle. It has a lot of filters. I want to say like 10-15. You can also change the exposure etc manually. It lets you save the pictures you edit to your phone, which I didn't used to think Instagram lets you do. (It does, you just have to be sneaky about it.) Anyway. I would download various other photo editing apps to play with them if I wasn't seriously concerned that I spend too much time on my phone as it is.
7. WebMD. This is a terrible app that will convince you you are dying. Do not install it. I have it on my phone just in case I feel like freaking the hell out.
8. Obviously I also have the Amazon app, the Yelp app, and the Google Maps app.
In summation, I feel like there are other apps out there I would enjoy, but I don't know about them. I am not into games. I refuse to download anything that's a game.
There's probably like an herb and plant identifier app that's cool. There might be temperature/weather forecast apps that are better than just looking that info up online.
There might be an app that has you log everything you eat and how much you sleep and whether you've pooped lately and how much you exercise and how much you hang out with people TO SEE HOW your mood/outlook/severity of depression are affected by those factors. That would be pretty cool. I would also want it to track how many hangnails I have, how clean my room is, how many days it's been since I washed my hair. How many pages of my journal I've filled with writing. How many unanswered emails, texts, and unlistened-to voicemails I have. I could track all of those things manually and make like a Microsoft Office pie chart... box and whisker plot?... to interpret all the data, but you know. That wouldn't give me a reason to stare at my phone.
WHAT APPS DO YOU HAVE? What apps do you wish existed? What apps do you think are crappy? (Crapps!) Let me know.
Monday, August 27
Tuesday, August 21
Monday, August 20
Who came up with the name Walkie Talkie? Should I start calling my laptop Sittie Typie?
A fun thing to do is look at the security guard across the lobby, and then use the walkie talkie to tell him something, and when he just raises his voice slightly to answer me I pretend like I can't hear him unless he uses the walkie talkie too.
I woke up feeling like a million bad-breathed bucks.
I decided to eat three cloves of raw garlic before taking a nap today.
I read this as "Shoes who are boring wear sneakers"
and then I looked closely at the picture, expecting to see the person wearing another pair of shoes under their Converse.
In Which I Lie
Guy Who Is Nothing Like the Fonz: People in high school* always told me I reminded them of the Fonz.
Me: Oh yeah...?
Guy Who Is Nothing Like the Fonz: Yeah, but I don't even know who that is.
Me: Yeah, me neither. [winces inwardly at the terrible lie]
Guy Who Is Nothing Like the Fonz: I think he was on like Three's Company or something.
Me: Hmm. [dies inside]
*High school was like two years ago for him.
Me: Oh yeah...?
Guy Who Is Nothing Like the Fonz: Yeah, but I don't even know who that is.
Me: Yeah, me neither. [winces inwardly at the terrible lie]
Guy Who Is Nothing Like the Fonz: I think he was on like Three's Company or something.
Me: Hmm. [dies inside]
*High school was like two years ago for him.
Secret Room Sects
There's a secret room in the hotel. If you push on a wooden panel in the wall in one of the lobbies, it opens into a small room, maybe more of a closet, that's for some reason very hot. Actually the reason it's very hot in there is that it's a portal to hell.
Who loves secret rooms? I love secret rooms. My best friend in elementary school lived in a house with a secret room for awhile. You'd open the hall closet and push past all the jackets to an alcove beneath the stairs. When her brothers ran up and down them it sounded like thunder.
---
Someone left a book titled The (New, Illustrated) Great Controversy in the lobby. It's written by Ellen G. White and is the basis of the 7th Day Adventist sect of Christianity. It's kind of interesting that this book and the book that is the basis of Christian Science, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, were both written by women. Should I write fanfiction of Ellen G. White and Mary Baker Eddy as friends? lovers? enemies? Spies who frequent secret rooms in hotel lobbies and coat closets?
Let's see: Mary Baker Eddy was born in New Hampshire in 1821. Ellen G. White was born in 1827, in Maine. That would totally work. Stay tuned!*
---
*I will never actually write this.
Who loves secret rooms? I love secret rooms. My best friend in elementary school lived in a house with a secret room for awhile. You'd open the hall closet and push past all the jackets to an alcove beneath the stairs. When her brothers ran up and down them it sounded like thunder.
---
Someone left a book titled The (New, Illustrated) Great Controversy in the lobby. It's written by Ellen G. White and is the basis of the 7th Day Adventist sect of Christianity. It's kind of interesting that this book and the book that is the basis of Christian Science, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, were both written by women. Should I write fanfiction of Ellen G. White and Mary Baker Eddy as friends? lovers? enemies? Spies who frequent secret rooms in hotel lobbies and coat closets?
Let's see: Mary Baker Eddy was born in New Hampshire in 1821. Ellen G. White was born in 1827, in Maine. That would totally work. Stay tuned!*
---
*I will never actually write this.
Tuesday, August 14
Guvnuuuuuh
Sometimes, unbidden, Lindsay Lohan's British accent from The Parent Trap will come into my head. Particularly her saying the words "A lot a lot".
Other times it's Renee Zellweiger saying the words "Mini gherkins" in a British accent, as Bridget Jones.
Other times it's Renee Zellweiger saying the words "Mini gherkins" in a British accent, as Bridget Jones.
"She is NOT a Sagittarius" --from a different conversation at a different job I was eavesdropping on and laughing at
It's my birthday on Friday, I said, and rambled a little. Then I said, "When is your birthday?"
"November 23," he answered. This co-worker I only see once a week at 5:30am.
"So then what's your sign?" I asked.
"Uh... Sagittarius."
"Do you feel like a Sagittarius?"
"Ah... no, not really. I don't know. No. I don't let other people tell me who I am."
-----
Two thoughts:
1. Do people realize my (impertinent) sudden interest in them is not out of nowhere, but out of a self-conscious feeling that I have been talking too much about myself and I would like to immediately balance the conversation back out? If so, does it make my interest seem insincere? If so, do they care?
2. That's a good answer. I DON'T LET OTHER PEOPLE TELL ME WHO I AM. That's like something Coco Chanel would say.
"November 23," he answered. This co-worker I only see once a week at 5:30am.
"So then what's your sign?" I asked.
"Uh... Sagittarius."
"Do you feel like a Sagittarius?"
"Ah... no, not really. I don't know. No. I don't let other people tell me who I am."
-----
Two thoughts:
1. Do people realize my (impertinent) sudden interest in them is not out of nowhere, but out of a self-conscious feeling that I have been talking too much about myself and I would like to immediately balance the conversation back out? If so, does it make my interest seem insincere? If so, do they care?
2. That's a good answer. I DON'T LET OTHER PEOPLE TELL ME WHO I AM. That's like something Coco Chanel would say.
This Sentence
It has been said that erotic love, like certain religions, seems to contain the meaning of life without actually disclosing it, and
--from this review written by Lorrie Moore of an Alice Munro book
--from this review written by Lorrie Moore of an Alice Munro book
Tuesday, August 7
Tuesday, July 10
Recipe Corner
The security guard (not Liz Taylor, a different one) brought me warm, home-cooked food tonight. I exclaimed over it and was like, "Mmmmm" a bunch of times.
It was genuinely good, but what made it better is that 1) it has been a long time since I ate non-restaurant food, and 2) I ate it at 3am.
HOW DID YOU MAKE THIS, I asked him.
Here is the recipe:
1. Brown Italian sausage in olive oil
2. Chop up bok choy, throw in big stem pieces
3. Add a dash of soy sauce
4. Add the smaller leaves of bok choy, along with sliced jalepeno
5. EAT.
Variations we discussed:
Balsamic vinegar instead of soy sauce
Add chopped garlic
Add chopped ginger
Variation I vetoed:
Add pasta
What we discussed while we ate:
1. How Apple Cider Vinegar is wonderous
2. How it tastes good on salad, mixed with olive oil
3. How at Latitude 62, a restaurant/bar/lodging in town, they give you like a bucket (exaggeration) of ranch with your salad
4. How ranch ruins salad
5. How when I was studying abroad in Italy there was this girl who insisted she could not eat pizza without ranch to dip it in, and embarrassed everyone by asking for it everywhere, to the mystification of the Italian waitstaff, and her mom finally mailed her a bunch of ranch packets, which she would MIX AT THE TABLE, in Florence and all other major cities in Italy, and dip her authentic Italian pizza in. To the disgust/dismay of the Italian waitstaff.
6. How her nickname was Ranch Packets.
It was genuinely good, but what made it better is that 1) it has been a long time since I ate non-restaurant food, and 2) I ate it at 3am.
HOW DID YOU MAKE THIS, I asked him.
Here is the recipe:
1. Brown Italian sausage in olive oil
2. Chop up bok choy, throw in big stem pieces
3. Add a dash of soy sauce
4. Add the smaller leaves of bok choy, along with sliced jalepeno
5. EAT.
Variations we discussed:
Balsamic vinegar instead of soy sauce
Add chopped garlic
Add chopped ginger
Variation I vetoed:
Add pasta
What we discussed while we ate:
1. How Apple Cider Vinegar is wonderous
2. How it tastes good on salad, mixed with olive oil
3. How at Latitude 62, a restaurant/bar/lodging in town, they give you like a bucket (exaggeration) of ranch with your salad
4. How ranch ruins salad
5. How when I was studying abroad in Italy there was this girl who insisted she could not eat pizza without ranch to dip it in, and embarrassed everyone by asking for it everywhere, to the mystification of the Italian waitstaff, and her mom finally mailed her a bunch of ranch packets, which she would MIX AT THE TABLE, in Florence and all other major cities in Italy, and dip her authentic Italian pizza in. To the disgust/dismay of the Italian waitstaff.
6. How her nickname was Ranch Packets.
Shelley Duvall, Chicago Chicanos, and Wisdom Teeth: A Teaser
Exciting things in the near future that fall between "Maybe" and "Probably" on the scale of probability that I will write about them:
-Driving taxi Tuesday night.
-Taking the Parks Connection bus Wednesday morning with my pal Val La Osa to Anchorage.
-Picking up a rental car in Anchorage, then picking up her brother and two male cousins from Chicago, where she is also from, at the airport.
-Hanging out in Anchorage for the afternoon/evening, then driving to Seward and staying at the Windsong.
-Driving back to Talkeetna Thursday night.
-FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH MOVIE NIGHT on Friday, showing of The Shining at 11pm, intentionally postponed to that hour because I was the one who suggested that movie, because I've wanted to re-watch it ever since working at a BIG NATIVE AMERICAN DECOR HOTEL WITH LONG HALLWAYS, and I haven't, and 11pm is when I get off work on Friday.
-Dentist appointment the following Thursday. I haven't been to the dentist since I was either 16 or 17. That's either 11 or 12 years ago. I brush my teeth A LOT, barely ever floss. I recently became aware that most adults have 32 teeth, while I have 28. I think I'm missing a molar at each end, but I'm not sure. I stared at a tooth chart while touching my teeth (v. attractive), trying to figure it out, but I couldn't. I feel like once I get past the canines they are ambiguously shaped, and I can't tell the difference between a premolar and a molar. I did a little reading online about this and apparently having only 28 teeth can indicate the (looming, menacing) presence of impacted wisdom teeth. Which is a horrible thought. If I have impacted widsom teeth and they want to do surgery to dig them out, what will I do? Will I let them? I don't know. Probably if they are pointed sideways toward my other teeth I will get them out, but if they are pointed in the correct directions I will let them be, because I have space in between every single one of my back teeth. This is already very long, but an interesting anecdote about wisdom teeth is that a dentist dropped one of my mom's down her throat during an extraction while she was pregnant with me. It would be cool if I had 29 teeth, because that would suggest the tooth floated wombward and I grabbed it.
Vogue
There's a full-length mirror in the back room of the front desk, and it's right next to the doorway of the managers' office, and I checked myself out as I walked by it, and my manager saw me out of the corner of her eye and was like, "What??" all weirded out/anxious, and I was like, "Oh, what. Nothing, I was just looking at myself in the mirror. Haha." And she laughed with relief and was like, "Oh my gosh, I was like, 'Why is she looking at me like that?!'"
I really don't know what expression I had on... or since she only saw me out of the corner of her eye, what my aura was, or whatever... but I guess it was alarming.
Monday, July 9
Sunday, July 8
Australopithigus or Something
A short list of people I have noticed think they are superior to me, because our culture supports them in this belief:
- Neat/orderly people
- People who have no problem writing small
- Morning people
My 4 or 5 Trees
Here are the ([haltingly] spoken word) lyrics of Rachel's song "4 or 5 Trees" on Systems/Layers.
I was thinking about it again the other day.
I'm not sure of...
I'm not sure of...
I can't remember the name.
It was down the street from my apartment.
It was down the street from my apartment.
I used to go down there pretty often...
Once a month or so.
It was set back from the street.
Once a month or so.
It was set back from the street.
It had a courtyard garden...
a courtyard garden with a winding path,
a courtyard garden with a winding path,
a stone gazebo,
and four or five trees.
It had beautiful tall windows and red stone walls.
I never went inside.
It was clear to me that...
It had beautiful tall windows and red stone walls.
I never went inside.
It was clear to me that...
I should keep it as it was in my imagination.
The most peaceful place.
The most peaceful place.
I haven't been inside Things and Dreams, a gift shop in Talkeetna, because it's clear to me that I should keep it as it is in my imagination. A gypsy fortune teller's incensey lair with scarves and veils nailed loosely to the walls. There's a shelf of sinister-looking snow globes, and a shelf of unlabeled amber-colored glass tincture bottles. The light inside is dim. The gypsy fortune teller has long grey wavy hair, red lips and an unreadable facial expression. She tells my fortune with a pack of regular playing cards. As the conversation moves she interprets my dreams and things.
Sunday, July 1
Front Desk Snacks, 2:30am **UPDATE**
Janitor: Can I buy some Skittles?
Me: Yeah but we only have bullshit Tropical Skittles.
---
A week later:
Janitor: It's too bad you still only have these makeshift Skittles.
Me: Shantytown Skittles.
Me: Yeah but we only have bullshit Tropical Skittles.
---
A week later:
Janitor: It's too bad you still only have these makeshift Skittles.
Me: Shantytown Skittles.
Friday, June 29
Subtle difference between appliances
Every time I checked the dryer both of my work shirts were in today, it was off and the clothes were still soaked. This happened three times before I decided to wait in the laundry room to find out what was going on.
After about ten minutes a Bulgarian girl walks into the laundry room and opens all three dryers to check if the loads are dry so she can put her wet clothes in. She opens a dryer, then closes it, then moves onto the next one. Do you detect the missing step in this process?
"Are you going to turn those dryers back on?" I ask her.
She turns around. "It is automatic," she says.
My eyes get big and I smile in disbelief. "Noo, it's not." I walk over and show her.
"Oh!" she says and laughs. "Sorree!"
After about ten minutes a Bulgarian girl walks into the laundry room and opens all three dryers to check if the loads are dry so she can put her wet clothes in. She opens a dryer, then closes it, then moves onto the next one. Do you detect the missing step in this process?
"Are you going to turn those dryers back on?" I ask her.
She turns around. "It is automatic," she says.
My eyes get big and I smile in disbelief. "Noo, it's not." I walk over and show her.
"Oh!" she says and laughs. "Sorree!"
Wednesday, June 27
Harley and Shauna
In town I see Harley.
I start my day with a white chocolate mocha from the lodge, then have my free meal from Twister Creek. I choose artichoke fritters and a chef salad and two pints of their sour beer of the week. The sour beer tastes like apple cider vinegar but gets me buzzed. The chef salad is an homage to my sister, who ordered them at McDonald's when we were kids, when I always ordered like a chubby happy American the cheeseburger Happy Meal with an orange soda.
I am alone on the deck in the sun, reading a book I ordered in the mail called Rat Girl by Kirsten Hersh, the lead singer of Throwing Muses. It is a good book, a memoir that prompts me to write notes in its blank endpages. Probably also the combination of caffeine and alcohol prompts me to write my thoughts down.
Harley leans in toward some flower boxes next to me and says, when I look over, "These are poppies!" He's talking about a tall red flower. I nod encouragingly. "I've never seen poppies in real life before!"
I laugh and say, "Really?"
"Yeah." He stares at them some more than says, "Dozer! Come here!"
His bully-breed dog has wandered onto the deck and is nosing around the tourists and their food, hoping for scraps.
I am familiar with Dozer, whom I have mistakenly called Bowser before. (Blame it on too much Super Mario Bros. 3 as a child.)
I met both Harley and Dozer down at the river at the start of the season. Harley is twenty, sells drugs. He's on meth and LSD and pot all at once. He's a loose cannon who plays the guitar. He's desperately alive, which is something I understand, but he said the night I met him, as I was walking away with a gay friend of mine, "I hope she's easy!" Harley is not my ally and yet I recognize him.
The gossip in town is that he slammed his dog's head into the street when it was bad. That he brought his gun down to the river one night and was shooting it off wildly, and people asked him to stop, and he wouldn't. He throws stones for Dozer to fetch, which must be bad for Dozer's teeth. Harley's mom works at the pizza place and last month she had a black eye.
I heard there was going to be a town meeting about him, which is what happens in a town of 800 without a police force. I don't know if the meeting ever happened or what the results were. People are concerned. I see him driving his four-wheeler around drunkenly with an underage girl hanging onto his waist on the back of it.
I am not pro-Harley. I think he is dangerous and someone to stay away from. If I had been at the river when he was there with his gun, I would not have been one of the ones to plead with him to put it away. I would have left immediately.
However. If someone is taking delight in a flower, it is my birthright/heritage/duty to let him know that I dwell in the shell-shaped Venn Diagram of flower-delight with him.
Whatever Venn Diagrams I share with Harley, I know that he is doomed. I am not the underage girl hanging onto his waist for dear life as he careens drunk around town on a four-wheeler. If I were to stretch out a hand to him he'd pull me down off a cliff.
He makes me think of Shauna from elementary school, who was also doomed.
One Father's Day we were making construction paper ties on plain white paper shirts with appreciative things written on them. This is akin to Southern Californian kids making snow-themed winter crafts, which we also did. Our blue-collar fathers wore light blue collared shirts with embroidered nametags ironed onto them. Most of us had never seen the snow.
The day we made the ties and shirts, Shauna told everyone her dad was Rambo and threw her in the street.
She lived with her grandma, along with her older sister and older brother. I think she probably never met her dad.
Once I brought, for Show and Tell, a paper from Hong Kong with my name on it in English and in Chinese characters, with a quick-stroke painting of a flower above it. My grandma got it for me on one of her retired travels. I left it in my desk and after recess found it torn on one side. It was kept in plastic and someone had torn the paper through the plastic, so the plastic was bent and stretched. Upset, I showed it to the teacher, who knew it was Shauna. She was made to confess and say sorry.
Once I was talking with a friend of mine about a Helen Keller biography for children we'd both read and loved. Shauna, nearby, said, "I read that too."
We exchanged glances, knowing she hadn't read it. "What's it about?" I challenged her.
"Um... it's about a girl... and her dog..."
My friend and I laughed. The cover of the book was a painting of Helen Keller hugging a dog. Of course if Shauna had read the book she'd say right away it was about a blind and deaf girl.
Once I overheard some PTA moms discussing Shauna. "Those brown eyes... it's eerie. It's like she knows what you're thinking."
I noted this jealously, wishing they were discussing me, wishing they were talking about my blue eyes knowing what adults are thinking. On long car rides I used to pretend to sleep, hoping my family would discuss me as if I were not there, wanting to know what they really thought of me.
In third grade I befriended Shauna briefly. We had a therapist-patient relationship, although that sounds absurd when you're talking about two eight-year-olds. I don't remember what I said to her. I only remember her periodically reporting to me, "I didn't lie at all today!"
Or, "I lied once and it felt bad!"
I remember nodding approvingly and encouraging her to keep trying.
I remember an unusual amount about my early childhood. I remember the first and last names of most of the people in my elementary school classes. I remember anecdotes about each of them. This has prompted me to Google random ones of them throughout the years.
I Googled Shauna a few years ago and found her on a website called Jailbabes in California. Her picture was uploaded. She had the same knowing eyes. She was in prison for an unspecified offense, seeking male penpals. I thought about writing to her but didn't. I have always been ambivalent about my weirdly good memory - embarrassed about it at times, like it indicates I have no life, like nothing noteworthy has supplanted my early childhood memories.
I right-clicked her picture and saved it to my computer. I wrote her an email in my head that I never sent. I forgot about her for another couple years.
Then I saw her older sister at the library where I was working in my hometown. I asked, "How's Shauna doing?"
Her sister gave an embarrassed laugh. "I don't know. Usually when people ask about Shauna it's because she owes them money, or screwed them over somehow. I don't know where she is now. Last I heard she was in prison."
I wanted to ask what for but knew it would be nosy, so I changed the subject and asked about the toddlers she had with her. She was checking out a tall stack of picture books for them. She looked stressed-out in the way of mothers with young kids, but basically happy. Her kids also seemed happy. She was relieved to talk about them instead of Shauna.
I befriended her, the older sister, on Facebook. A few months later she posted information about Shauna's memorial service. Shauna, born the same year as me, died on Thursday, March 11, 2010. I copied and pasted the information into a Word doc and saved it. I Googled around a little in vain, trying to find out how she'd died. I thought about her all that afternoon and night, and the next day sent her sister a Facebook message.
"I see that Shauna passed away, and I want to tell you I'm sorry to hear it. When I heard about her passing, a memory sprang to mind I want to share with you. Once in 6th grade we were all playing Truth or Dare and someone dared her to kiss Stuart Johnson on the cheek. Nobody thought she would dare to... we were all like eleven, and that was totally scandalous... also, he was the 6th grade hottie... but she went up to him, said she had a secret to tell him, and when he leaned in to hear it, she kissed his cheek. He turned bright red and everyone just howled with laughter. I remember her grinning, totally pleased with herself.
I hope you and your family are doing well and remembering Shauna happy."
She answered my message the next day.
"Thank you."
I start my day with a white chocolate mocha from the lodge, then have my free meal from Twister Creek. I choose artichoke fritters and a chef salad and two pints of their sour beer of the week. The sour beer tastes like apple cider vinegar but gets me buzzed. The chef salad is an homage to my sister, who ordered them at McDonald's when we were kids, when I always ordered like a chubby happy American the cheeseburger Happy Meal with an orange soda.
I am alone on the deck in the sun, reading a book I ordered in the mail called Rat Girl by Kirsten Hersh, the lead singer of Throwing Muses. It is a good book, a memoir that prompts me to write notes in its blank endpages. Probably also the combination of caffeine and alcohol prompts me to write my thoughts down.
Harley leans in toward some flower boxes next to me and says, when I look over, "These are poppies!" He's talking about a tall red flower. I nod encouragingly. "I've never seen poppies in real life before!"
I laugh and say, "Really?"
"Yeah." He stares at them some more than says, "Dozer! Come here!"
His bully-breed dog has wandered onto the deck and is nosing around the tourists and their food, hoping for scraps.
I am familiar with Dozer, whom I have mistakenly called Bowser before. (Blame it on too much Super Mario Bros. 3 as a child.)
I met both Harley and Dozer down at the river at the start of the season. Harley is twenty, sells drugs. He's on meth and LSD and pot all at once. He's a loose cannon who plays the guitar. He's desperately alive, which is something I understand, but he said the night I met him, as I was walking away with a gay friend of mine, "I hope she's easy!" Harley is not my ally and yet I recognize him.
The gossip in town is that he slammed his dog's head into the street when it was bad. That he brought his gun down to the river one night and was shooting it off wildly, and people asked him to stop, and he wouldn't. He throws stones for Dozer to fetch, which must be bad for Dozer's teeth. Harley's mom works at the pizza place and last month she had a black eye.
I heard there was going to be a town meeting about him, which is what happens in a town of 800 without a police force. I don't know if the meeting ever happened or what the results were. People are concerned. I see him driving his four-wheeler around drunkenly with an underage girl hanging onto his waist on the back of it.
I am not pro-Harley. I think he is dangerous and someone to stay away from. If I had been at the river when he was there with his gun, I would not have been one of the ones to plead with him to put it away. I would have left immediately.
However. If someone is taking delight in a flower, it is my birthright/heritage/duty to let him know that I dwell in the shell-shaped Venn Diagram of flower-delight with him.
Whatever Venn Diagrams I share with Harley, I know that he is doomed. I am not the underage girl hanging onto his waist for dear life as he careens drunk around town on a four-wheeler. If I were to stretch out a hand to him he'd pull me down off a cliff.
He makes me think of Shauna from elementary school, who was also doomed.
One Father's Day we were making construction paper ties on plain white paper shirts with appreciative things written on them. This is akin to Southern Californian kids making snow-themed winter crafts, which we also did. Our blue-collar fathers wore light blue collared shirts with embroidered nametags ironed onto them. Most of us had never seen the snow.
The day we made the ties and shirts, Shauna told everyone her dad was Rambo and threw her in the street.
She lived with her grandma, along with her older sister and older brother. I think she probably never met her dad.
Once I brought, for Show and Tell, a paper from Hong Kong with my name on it in English and in Chinese characters, with a quick-stroke painting of a flower above it. My grandma got it for me on one of her retired travels. I left it in my desk and after recess found it torn on one side. It was kept in plastic and someone had torn the paper through the plastic, so the plastic was bent and stretched. Upset, I showed it to the teacher, who knew it was Shauna. She was made to confess and say sorry.
Once I was talking with a friend of mine about a Helen Keller biography for children we'd both read and loved. Shauna, nearby, said, "I read that too."
We exchanged glances, knowing she hadn't read it. "What's it about?" I challenged her.
"Um... it's about a girl... and her dog..."
My friend and I laughed. The cover of the book was a painting of Helen Keller hugging a dog. Of course if Shauna had read the book she'd say right away it was about a blind and deaf girl.
Once I overheard some PTA moms discussing Shauna. "Those brown eyes... it's eerie. It's like she knows what you're thinking."
I noted this jealously, wishing they were discussing me, wishing they were talking about my blue eyes knowing what adults are thinking. On long car rides I used to pretend to sleep, hoping my family would discuss me as if I were not there, wanting to know what they really thought of me.
In third grade I befriended Shauna briefly. We had a therapist-patient relationship, although that sounds absurd when you're talking about two eight-year-olds. I don't remember what I said to her. I only remember her periodically reporting to me, "I didn't lie at all today!"
Or, "I lied once and it felt bad!"
I remember nodding approvingly and encouraging her to keep trying.
I remember an unusual amount about my early childhood. I remember the first and last names of most of the people in my elementary school classes. I remember anecdotes about each of them. This has prompted me to Google random ones of them throughout the years.
I Googled Shauna a few years ago and found her on a website called Jailbabes in California. Her picture was uploaded. She had the same knowing eyes. She was in prison for an unspecified offense, seeking male penpals. I thought about writing to her but didn't. I have always been ambivalent about my weirdly good memory - embarrassed about it at times, like it indicates I have no life, like nothing noteworthy has supplanted my early childhood memories.
I right-clicked her picture and saved it to my computer. I wrote her an email in my head that I never sent. I forgot about her for another couple years.
Then I saw her older sister at the library where I was working in my hometown. I asked, "How's Shauna doing?"
Her sister gave an embarrassed laugh. "I don't know. Usually when people ask about Shauna it's because she owes them money, or screwed them over somehow. I don't know where she is now. Last I heard she was in prison."
I wanted to ask what for but knew it would be nosy, so I changed the subject and asked about the toddlers she had with her. She was checking out a tall stack of picture books for them. She looked stressed-out in the way of mothers with young kids, but basically happy. Her kids also seemed happy. She was relieved to talk about them instead of Shauna.
I befriended her, the older sister, on Facebook. A few months later she posted information about Shauna's memorial service. Shauna, born the same year as me, died on Thursday, March 11, 2010. I copied and pasted the information into a Word doc and saved it. I Googled around a little in vain, trying to find out how she'd died. I thought about her all that afternoon and night, and the next day sent her sister a Facebook message.
"I see that Shauna passed away, and I want to tell you I'm sorry to hear it. When I heard about her passing, a memory sprang to mind I want to share with you. Once in 6th grade we were all playing Truth or Dare and someone dared her to kiss Stuart Johnson on the cheek. Nobody thought she would dare to... we were all like eleven, and that was totally scandalous... also, he was the 6th grade hottie... but she went up to him, said she had a secret to tell him, and when he leaned in to hear it, she kissed his cheek. He turned bright red and everyone just howled with laughter. I remember her grinning, totally pleased with herself.
I hope you and your family are doing well and remembering Shauna happy."
She answered my message the next day.
"Thank you."
Tuesday, June 26
Every Little Thang
At the Roadhouse the cashier is a pretty young woman whose lips don't lie flush against her teeth, which makes her look French. She has a bright red hickey on the front-side of her neck the size of a half dollar. She doesn't smile at me, probably because I am openly checking out her hickey. To the old man in front of me, though, she says "How's every little thang?"
I finished my quiche quickly, with still a lot of tea in the silver kettle on the table next to my mug, so I carry my mug and Harper's and purse over to the other room, where you can sit by a gas fire and chill.
I am chillin when a guy I know from the lodge walks up with a stroller and sits next to me. He is twenty-two and has a two-month-old baby. He reads his newspaper quietly and I read my Harper's, and pretty soon he says, "Ever seen one of these?"
He shows me a black-and-white picture the size of a postage stamp in the Classifieds section. I look at it closely. "It's an Ultralight," he says. Beneath the photo is printed "Ultralight Aircraft Trike."
"No," I say, in a way that invites hearing more.
"An Ultralight's like a cross between a motorcycle and a kite."
"What!"
"Yeah. They're pretty unsafe. I think the rate of death in owning one is the same as a smoker's - something like one in three."
"Holy shit," I say, and look at the picture even closer. "I'm surprised they're legal."
"They barely are," he says. "I went up in one with a buddy of mine about ten years ago. It was pretty fun. We went up about a thousand feet, which is the highest you can get without needing oxygen, and then spiraled down in circles for about twenty minutes until we were close enough to touch down on the Talkeetna air strip."
"Oh my God," I say. "That sounds really scary, but really fun."
"Yeah."
Companionable silence.
"Have you ever been up on a glacier?" he asks me.
"Yeah, last summer I landed on one. This summer I flew up around the mountain but we didn't land. It was fun."
"Yeah," he says, nodding, "It is fun. One Fourth of July we went up and had a picnic at Base Camp."
"That's cool."
"Yeah, but don't ever smoke a cigarette if you're up that high. I got altitude sickness really bad."
"Ugh."
"Yeah. Lack of oxygen. I got real nauseous, a headache. It took like twenty minutes to go away."
"You don't smoke anymore, do you?"
"No," he says. "Or drink. If I drink I want a smoke. And I don't have self-control when it comes to drinking, so I know I can't do it."
"Well, that's good you figured it out so young. What are you, twenty-two?"
"Yeah. Well really my body figured it out for me. My senior year of high school I was drunk every night. Finally a couple days after graduation I couldn't walk, so I went to the doctor's and they said my appendix had burst."
"Oh no!"
"But then they couldn't find it when they opened me up. But they saw that one of my kidneys had died, and so they took it out, and also part of my liver."
"Oh my God!"
"Yeah. And then my intestines were swollen and pushed my stomach up to where my lungs were, and my lungs up into my rib cage, and my ribs punctured both lungs."
"Wait, what happened to your appendix? Is it still floating around in there somewhere?"
"No, it just disintegrated. They vacuumed it out in little pieces. Actually the surgeon went on lunch and they brought the janitor in with a mop to clean it out."
I laugh.
"So then they didn't staple up the incision in my stomach very well and it came open. It looked like a vagina."
I laugh.
"I wasn't the first one to think that, either. My friends saw it and they were like, 'Dude, that looks like a pussy.' So I went to the doctor's and they said they wouldn't sew it back up again because they didn't want to trap infection in. So I just had to let it heal naturally."
"Oh my God. That's like Alien. Good thing it did."
"Yeah. You want to see it?"
It is not every day a young man asks me if I want to see the vagina-scar on his stomach. I did want to see it but felt shy to say so. "Do I?" I asked, instead.
He lifted his shirt. It looked like nothing, like a patch of skin where hair doesn't grow on an otherwise hairy stomach. "Oh, that's not too bad," I said.
"Yeah," he said as he dropped his shirt, sounding disappointed.
"You should go visit high schools and tell this story so kids know not to drink to excess."
"They wouldn't listen, though."
"Yes they would," I said. "That's a horrifying story."
"I really wasn't taking care of myself. I was living on alcohol and Hot Pockets."
He's covered in mosquito bites
"How's your chubby baby?" I ask the morning restaurant supervisor. I met him a month ago when he was six months. He had the chubbiest baby legs I had ever seen. I only held him for a couple seconds before he got fussy and started kicking his chubby little legs around. It was almost unbearably adorable.
You can only say that about a baby. For the record she grinned when I asked that question.
Questions that would not make a person grin:
"How's your chubby boyfriend?"
"How's your chubby wife?"
"How's your chubby daughter?"
"How's your chubby dog?"
"How's your chubby uncle?"
"How's your chubby life?"
You can only say that about a baby. For the record she grinned when I asked that question.
Questions that would not make a person grin:
"How's your chubby boyfriend?"
"How's your chubby wife?"
"How's your chubby daughter?"
"How's your chubby dog?"
"How's your chubby uncle?"
"How's your chubby life?"
Sunday, June 24
:|
So far any time I have tested the theory that not smiling, as a woman, leads people to believe that you are powerful and deserving of respect, it has proven true.
However in most situations in my life it is more important to me to be friendly/ make friends than it is to hold a position of power. So I still smile often.
However that is a useful thing to know. And by "know" I mean it is a useful thing to have proven to myself several times over. Which means I can do it - not smile in a situation where I am expected to smile - without thinking about it, without the anxiety of breaking a social rule.
However in most situations in my life it is more important to me to be friendly/ make friends than it is to hold a position of power. So I still smile often.
However that is a useful thing to know. And by "know" I mean it is a useful thing to have proven to myself several times over. Which means I can do it - not smile in a situation where I am expected to smile - without thinking about it, without the anxiety of breaking a social rule.
Here is a thought experiment for you: the next time you read something peppered with / punctuated by smiley faces, mentally change the smiley faces to neutral faces. : | Then read it again and mentally change them to sad faces. :( Then consider what this reveals about the function of smiley face emoticons in writing. Bonus points if you consider how use of the smiley face emoticon is gendered.
Sunday, June 17
FYI
If you have a wedding and reception at a hotel in rural Alaska, the hotel employees will eat all of the leftover food and cake afterwards as if they are feral children and/or Oliver Twist.
P.S. When I thought of Oliver Twist I tried to think of the Artful Dodger but instead the phrase that came to mind was "Grateful Dodger," which then made me think of like a Grateful Dead cover band that wears Dodger baseball shirts and hats and pickpockets their fans. Also, half of the band members were wolves and half of them were foxes, for some reason, but they were human-sized. Probably because I just typed "feral children," and I think if you're going to be a feral child, the two best species to have as parents would be wolves and foxes. Ideally your mom would be a wolf and your step-dad would be a fox, but I guess that's unlikely.
P.S. When I thought of Oliver Twist I tried to think of the Artful Dodger but instead the phrase that came to mind was "Grateful Dodger," which then made me think of like a Grateful Dead cover band that wears Dodger baseball shirts and hats and pickpockets their fans. Also, half of the band members were wolves and half of them were foxes, for some reason, but they were human-sized. Probably because I just typed "feral children," and I think if you're going to be a feral child, the two best species to have as parents would be wolves and foxes. Ideally your mom would be a wolf and your step-dad would be a fox, but I guess that's unlikely.
Utah Teen Seeks Agoraphobic Girlfriend
Tonight the guy who runs the taxi (who recently asked in a sincere tone if anyone had any firecrackers, M80s, anything like that, and when someone said "Why," he said, "Because I'm thinking I'm just going to park all the taxi vans in a circle, pour gasoline all over them, and then light a bunch of firecrackers in the middle") (it is a stressful job) asked if I wanted to drive to Anchorage tomorrow at 10am.
"Umm..." I said. I work tonight 10pm to 8am. I work tomorrow night 10pm to 8am. If I really needed something from Anchorage I'd do it, but otherwise... "No, I don't think so. Sorry, I have to sleep."
"That's cool," he said. "Also, you'd have to pull the trailer behind the van." I guess for the passengers' luggage.
My last Anchorage run was a fun adventure of cultural stereotypes that turned out to be true, sandwiches that turned out to be garbage, me pretending to talk to Laura Ingalls Wilder while pretending Joni Mitchell was in the passenger's seat pretending to talk to Amelia Earhart.
But if I'd said yes to tomorrow's I feel like there would have been too many foreboding elements - it's supposed to rain, I'd be running on zero sleep, I just got over a horrible flu, I'd be pulling a trailer, and who knows whether any of the passengers would Canada me through it. Sorry. I know I would've had good stories for you, had I said yes and survived it.
---
In other news, I have two new neighbors, who are boys from Utah who look like they're twelve. They listen to emo music. All the time. Really loud. And sing along. All the time. Passionately.
Do you know what emo music is? It's inanely repetitive chord structures behind whiny-voiced guys yell-singing about their emotions, who all have this weird pronunciation with their vowels where they change "y" sounds into "oi" sounds. So like, "goodbye" would be yelled through the nose as if on the verge of tears and pronounced, "good-boiiiy". I don't know if that explains it. You are probably already familiar with this genre of music, dear reader. Somehow I've escaped it til now. Maybe because my neighbors back home blast either hip hop, R&B, or mariachis.
Hmm. How is it possible that when my neighbors back home blast those genres of music, I am annoyed the way you would expect a white woman who does not listen to those genres to be annoyed; HOWEVER, when I am in Whiteyville, USA and my neighbors blast emo music, I am as annoyed as a Mexican woman who listens exclusively to hip hop, R&B, and mariachis? I am the worst of both worlds. In this sense.
When I was a teenager back home I would sometimes do the music-war thing where I'd crank up K-Earth 101 (bubblegum pop oldies station) in response to the wall-thuddingly loud basslines of my neighbors' hip hop music. Which gets the point across in a non-confrontational way. Bubblegum pop oldies is one of the least aggressive genres of music. The point it gets across is, "I find your music as annoying as you find this music, so let's not do this."
However I don't know what the opposite of emo music is. Metal, or something? I don't like metal either. In response all I do is turn my music on at a normal volume, which drowns their music out. Because ultimately what I care about is that there be peace in Southcentral.
Just one more thought though: the other day one of the lyrics of one of their stupid emo songs was, "I want a girl who doesn't leave the house when I'm away." I snarled at our common wall in response.
"Umm..." I said. I work tonight 10pm to 8am. I work tomorrow night 10pm to 8am. If I really needed something from Anchorage I'd do it, but otherwise... "No, I don't think so. Sorry, I have to sleep."
"That's cool," he said. "Also, you'd have to pull the trailer behind the van." I guess for the passengers' luggage.
My last Anchorage run was a fun adventure of cultural stereotypes that turned out to be true, sandwiches that turned out to be garbage, me pretending to talk to Laura Ingalls Wilder while pretending Joni Mitchell was in the passenger's seat pretending to talk to Amelia Earhart.
But if I'd said yes to tomorrow's I feel like there would have been too many foreboding elements - it's supposed to rain, I'd be running on zero sleep, I just got over a horrible flu, I'd be pulling a trailer, and who knows whether any of the passengers would Canada me through it. Sorry. I know I would've had good stories for you, had I said yes and survived it.
---
In other news, I have two new neighbors, who are boys from Utah who look like they're twelve. They listen to emo music. All the time. Really loud. And sing along. All the time. Passionately.
Do you know what emo music is? It's inanely repetitive chord structures behind whiny-voiced guys yell-singing about their emotions, who all have this weird pronunciation with their vowels where they change "y" sounds into "oi" sounds. So like, "goodbye" would be yelled through the nose as if on the verge of tears and pronounced, "good-boiiiy". I don't know if that explains it. You are probably already familiar with this genre of music, dear reader. Somehow I've escaped it til now. Maybe because my neighbors back home blast either hip hop, R&B, or mariachis.
Hmm. How is it possible that when my neighbors back home blast those genres of music, I am annoyed the way you would expect a white woman who does not listen to those genres to be annoyed; HOWEVER, when I am in Whiteyville, USA and my neighbors blast emo music, I am as annoyed as a Mexican woman who listens exclusively to hip hop, R&B, and mariachis? I am the worst of both worlds. In this sense.
When I was a teenager back home I would sometimes do the music-war thing where I'd crank up K-Earth 101 (bubblegum pop oldies station) in response to the wall-thuddingly loud basslines of my neighbors' hip hop music. Which gets the point across in a non-confrontational way. Bubblegum pop oldies is one of the least aggressive genres of music. The point it gets across is, "I find your music as annoying as you find this music, so let's not do this."
However I don't know what the opposite of emo music is. Metal, or something? I don't like metal either. In response all I do is turn my music on at a normal volume, which drowns their music out. Because ultimately what I care about is that there be peace in Southcentral.
Just one more thought though: the other day one of the lyrics of one of their stupid emo songs was, "I want a girl who doesn't leave the house when I'm away." I snarled at our common wall in response.
Monday, June 11
The State Dog
The worst is when I am at work by myself and idly scratching the two mosquito bites on the left side of my scalp when all of a sudden I look over and see the mosquito flying near my head, and I know it's THE mosquito because when I kill it, bright red, fresh blood spurts out of its tiny smashed body. And I stare at it, because it's my blood.
Sunday, June 10
This Here Gun Says I'll Take My Love to Town If I Want (or, How to Make Me Giggle)
The security guard walked through the lobby last night swinging his radio and singing, "Janie's got a gun," (Aerosmith) except with my name instead of Janie.
He walked through the lobby again this morning and sang, "Janie, don't take your love to town," (Bon Jovi) except with my name instead of Janie.
He walked through the lobby again this morning and sang, "Janie, don't take your love to town," (Bon Jovi) except with my name instead of Janie.
Baby Cats
I have just met the new shuttle driver, and she is telling me about her son who also works at the lodge, and his fiancee Jolene, and their new baby. The son and his fiancee are in their early 20s. I ask the shuttle driver how they met.
"Well it's a funny story cause Jolene was actually married to someone else when they first met," she begins. I immediately switch from listening out of politeness to listening out of genuine interest. "Her husband now, he worked on the Slope, so he'd be gone weeks at a time. And then when he was home he didn't do nothing with her, and Jolene's real active, she likes to go out and do stuff. So he appointed Forrest as her substitute husband, because he was willin to go out and do stuff with her. Sure enough, one thing led to another..."
"And they fell in love," I say. That, right there, is why people tell me shit. I didn't finish her sentence, "And they started having unprotected sex," or "And she started cheating on him." I (outwardly) assume love.
"That's right," she says, nodding. "But they didn't get together til after she and her husband broke up."
I nod, like, of course.
"And the thing is, she asked him to get her a dog. She woulda been happy with a dog to take her on walks. Jolene loves walks. But her husband just kept bringing home all these baby cats."
I shake my head in dismay. Baby cats? For Jolene?
"What's Jolene gonna do with a buncha baby cats? They can't take her on any walks. She needed a dog."
I nod again.
---
Thoughts:
1. I really wish more strangers would tell me intimate gossip.
2. If you name your child Jolene she will become involved with adultery.
3. As someone who needs more Alone Time in a relationship than the average person, and who adores baby cats, I think I should try to track down Jolene's first husband and see if we can give it a go. Added bonus: most guys who work on the Slope make around $40/hour.
4. I really want to meet Jolene. Her mother-in-law painted such a vivid picture of her. Fingers crossed I run into her someday, and fingers crossed she's not a self-googler (although I feel like if you are willing to tell strangers intimate gossip you can't get mad when they put it on the internet, so if she should be mad at anyone for this blog post it's her mother-in-law).
"Well it's a funny story cause Jolene was actually married to someone else when they first met," she begins. I immediately switch from listening out of politeness to listening out of genuine interest. "Her husband now, he worked on the Slope, so he'd be gone weeks at a time. And then when he was home he didn't do nothing with her, and Jolene's real active, she likes to go out and do stuff. So he appointed Forrest as her substitute husband, because he was willin to go out and do stuff with her. Sure enough, one thing led to another..."
"And they fell in love," I say. That, right there, is why people tell me shit. I didn't finish her sentence, "And they started having unprotected sex," or "And she started cheating on him." I (outwardly) assume love.
"That's right," she says, nodding. "But they didn't get together til after she and her husband broke up."
I nod, like, of course.
"And the thing is, she asked him to get her a dog. She woulda been happy with a dog to take her on walks. Jolene loves walks. But her husband just kept bringing home all these baby cats."
I shake my head in dismay. Baby cats? For Jolene?
"What's Jolene gonna do with a buncha baby cats? They can't take her on any walks. She needed a dog."
I nod again.
---
Thoughts:
1. I really wish more strangers would tell me intimate gossip.
2. If you name your child Jolene she will become involved with adultery.
3. As someone who needs more Alone Time in a relationship than the average person, and who adores baby cats, I think I should try to track down Jolene's first husband and see if we can give it a go. Added bonus: most guys who work on the Slope make around $40/hour.
4. I really want to meet Jolene. Her mother-in-law painted such a vivid picture of her. Fingers crossed I run into her someday, and fingers crossed she's not a self-googler (although I feel like if you are willing to tell strangers intimate gossip you can't get mad when they put it on the internet, so if she should be mad at anyone for this blog post it's her mother-in-law).
Nacho Cheesier
I drove five guys to Anchorage on Wednesday.
But let's back up a minute: on Tuesday I drove the taxi from 4pm to 4am. Then I slept from 5am to 10am Wednesday morning. Then I drove the taxi back to town where it belongs, and saw the guy who runs it.
"We've got five climbers who want a ride to Anchorage. Three Russians and two Canadians. They need to leave in ten minutes. You'll have to take the 15-passenger van. You want to do it?"
"How much of the fare do I get to keep?"
"A hundred. And whatever they tip you."
My phone was on its last bar of battery power, I hadn't eaten breakfast, and I didn't remember how to get to Anchorage.
"Okay."
But let's back up a minute: on Tuesday I drove the taxi from 4pm to 4am. Then I slept from 5am to 10am Wednesday morning. Then I drove the taxi back to town where it belongs, and saw the guy who runs it.
"We've got five climbers who want a ride to Anchorage. Three Russians and two Canadians. They need to leave in ten minutes. You'll have to take the 15-passenger van. You want to do it?"
"How much of the fare do I get to keep?"
"A hundred. And whatever they tip you."
My phone was on its last bar of battery power, I hadn't eaten breakfast, and I didn't remember how to get to Anchorage.
"Okay."
Friday, June 1
Overheared
[Southern accent]: Naw, don't guh that way! Yull havta hike stairs!
---
Update: that same person just asked me if there is a shuttle to the main lobby... which is up two stories in the elevator (no need to hike stairs!) and down an (admittedly somewhat long) hallway. In the same building. Maybe we should just go ahead and get Segways for all the guests. Then, like the CEO of Segway, they can accidentally ride one off a cliff. Or those durn stairs.
---
Beneath this sweet, helpful exterior... just past that thar veneer... lies what lies beneath all veneers. A filed-down jagged stump-tooth. That is claustrophobic and wants out. That blogs.
---
Update: that same person just asked me if there is a shuttle to the main lobby... which is up two stories in the elevator (no need to hike stairs!) and down an (admittedly somewhat long) hallway. In the same building. Maybe we should just go ahead and get Segways for all the guests. Then, like the CEO of Segway, they can accidentally ride one off a cliff. Or those durn stairs.
---
Beneath this sweet, helpful exterior... just past that thar veneer... lies what lies beneath all veneers. A filed-down jagged stump-tooth. That is claustrophobic and wants out. That blogs.
Tuesday, May 29
Following By Email
Two boring things:
1. I don't think there is a way for me to see who is following by email. I can see who is following this blog with a blogger/google account, but not by email as far as I know.
2. I only recently realized that if I edit a blog (for typos, embarrassing cliches I didn't notice til days/weeks/months later) people who follow by email get an email for every single edit. Oops! For that reason I am trying to cut down on the edits. Love you!
1. I don't think there is a way for me to see who is following by email. I can see who is following this blog with a blogger/google account, but not by email as far as I know.
2. I only recently realized that if I edit a blog (for typos, embarrassing cliches I didn't notice til days/weeks/months later) people who follow by email get an email for every single edit. Oops! For that reason I am trying to cut down on the edits. Love you!
Things I Need From Civilization
I asked someone who is going to Wasilla this week to buy me three things from the Wal-Mart there.
1. Blank cd's. The other week I drove a nice couple who were staying at the lodge to Denali, three hours north. It was the first time I had ever been north of Talkeetna. I made a hundred dollars.
Their accent was not familiar to me, so I asked where they were traveling from. "We start in Quebec," the wife said. She pronounced it, "Kee-bec." Huh, I thought. I've been pronouncing it wrong. We tried to talk about the weather where I am from versus the weather where they are from but were thwarted by the fahrenheit/celsius conversion. Then we tried to talk about gas prices where I am from versus gas prices in Alaska versus gas prices where they are from, but were stymied by gallon/litre converson. The car fell silent and I thought, I wonder if the real reason the US refuses to convert to the metric system is so small talk with foreigners will be difficult and we will remain in an ignorant bubble.
Anyway, it turned out they were from Brazil and had started their vacation in Quebec. We all had a good laugh when I explained I thought they were from Quebec. This was a preposterous assumption to them, probably because (from what I hear) Brazil is one of the best countries.
On the drive home alone I could not get any radio stations to come in and I did not have any cd's with me. I let the radio search continuously for a clear station and tuned out the static. The whole drive back, the only song that came in was "Cheap Sunglasses" by ZZ Top. I realized how good of a song it is. Then a bird smacked into my windshield and probably died.
I could go online and buy a tape-to-iPod converter thing... like that fake cassette you plug into your iPod to trick the car into thinking your iPod is a tape... but I like the idea of making cd's more. The challenge of picking songs I will not immediately get sick of. Trying to balance upbeat songs with slow songs. Trying to put some ones everyone knows on the cd's so that when I drive the taxi in town, my drunk friends will ask me to turn it up.
2. Bug spray. Did you know if you get too many mosquito bites it turns into leprosy? Little-known fact. I can't believe I forgot to pack bug spray after last summer. Not much else to say about this one. Except that I am really sick of the joke where people call mosquitos the state bird of Alaska. I might start saying that mosquitos are the state flower. Or the state dog. Each state should have a dog. Why not? I should try to start that.
3. Glue. To make these. I already have watercolors, and cardstock in the form of discarded hotel key envelopes. I've got big plans to turn the flowers into a crown and wear it on Solstice. I haven't yet tried to make them because I am still enjoying the fantasy stage of the project, where it is really fun to do and turns out beautifully.
1. Blank cd's. The other week I drove a nice couple who were staying at the lodge to Denali, three hours north. It was the first time I had ever been north of Talkeetna. I made a hundred dollars.
Their accent was not familiar to me, so I asked where they were traveling from. "We start in Quebec," the wife said. She pronounced it, "Kee-bec." Huh, I thought. I've been pronouncing it wrong. We tried to talk about the weather where I am from versus the weather where they are from but were thwarted by the fahrenheit/celsius conversion. Then we tried to talk about gas prices where I am from versus gas prices in Alaska versus gas prices where they are from, but were stymied by gallon/litre converson. The car fell silent and I thought, I wonder if the real reason the US refuses to convert to the metric system is so small talk with foreigners will be difficult and we will remain in an ignorant bubble.
Anyway, it turned out they were from Brazil and had started their vacation in Quebec. We all had a good laugh when I explained I thought they were from Quebec. This was a preposterous assumption to them, probably because (from what I hear) Brazil is one of the best countries.
On the drive home alone I could not get any radio stations to come in and I did not have any cd's with me. I let the radio search continuously for a clear station and tuned out the static. The whole drive back, the only song that came in was "Cheap Sunglasses" by ZZ Top. I realized how good of a song it is. Then a bird smacked into my windshield and probably died.
I could go online and buy a tape-to-iPod converter thing... like that fake cassette you plug into your iPod to trick the car into thinking your iPod is a tape... but I like the idea of making cd's more. The challenge of picking songs I will not immediately get sick of. Trying to balance upbeat songs with slow songs. Trying to put some ones everyone knows on the cd's so that when I drive the taxi in town, my drunk friends will ask me to turn it up.
2. Bug spray. Did you know if you get too many mosquito bites it turns into leprosy? Little-known fact. I can't believe I forgot to pack bug spray after last summer. Not much else to say about this one. Except that I am really sick of the joke where people call mosquitos the state bird of Alaska. I might start saying that mosquitos are the state flower. Or the state dog. Each state should have a dog. Why not? I should try to start that.
3. Glue. To make these. I already have watercolors, and cardstock in the form of discarded hotel key envelopes. I've got big plans to turn the flowers into a crown and wear it on Solstice. I haven't yet tried to make them because I am still enjoying the fantasy stage of the project, where it is really fun to do and turns out beautifully.
Hospitality
At the hotel we have a radio code for when a toilet is clogged up.
"Front desk to janitorial."
"[Bulgarian accent] Janitorial here, go ahead."
"We've got a code 917 in room blah blah."
"[Bulgarian accent] Room blah blah, copy that."
917 is the only radio call we have, other than "code red," for an emergency. But I don't think "code red" is really a code, because it is obvious that it indicates an emergency. (Or that someone needs tampons I guess.)
Sometimes I wish we had more radio codes to save guests from other kinds of embarassment. Here is one half of two conversations I just had:
Answering the phone:
"Front desk!"
...
"To cool the room down? Um, just - if you turn the thermostat down, the room will get cooler."
...
"Just like um, turn the knob to the left? And the room will cool down. Do you see the thermostat?"
...
"Okay, so turn the dial on the thermostat... the dial? The thermostat dial... do you want me to send someone to your room to show you?"
...
"Okay. No problem... bye."
Into the radio:
"Front desk to janitorial."
...
"Can you... go to room blah blah and show them, uh... how to turn the thermostat down?"
...
"Thank you."
"Front desk to janitorial."
"[Bulgarian accent] Janitorial here, go ahead."
"We've got a code 917 in room blah blah."
"[Bulgarian accent] Room blah blah, copy that."
917 is the only radio call we have, other than "code red," for an emergency. But I don't think "code red" is really a code, because it is obvious that it indicates an emergency. (Or that someone needs tampons I guess.)
Sometimes I wish we had more radio codes to save guests from other kinds of embarassment. Here is one half of two conversations I just had:
Answering the phone:
"Front desk!"
...
"To cool the room down? Um, just - if you turn the thermostat down, the room will get cooler."
...
"Just like um, turn the knob to the left? And the room will cool down. Do you see the thermostat?"
...
"Okay, so turn the dial on the thermostat... the dial? The thermostat dial... do you want me to send someone to your room to show you?"
...
"Okay. No problem... bye."
Into the radio:
"Front desk to janitorial."
...
"Can you... go to room blah blah and show them, uh... how to turn the thermostat down?"
...
"Thank you."
Saturday, May 12
3 Things
1. I found a t-shirt at the Free Box that has the lyrics to Def Leppard's "Pour Some Sugar On Me" printed on the front of it.
2. I came up with a new mixed drink called High-Heeled Boots On the Rocks. At the river, there is nowhere to walk but on rocks, and it is hard not to stumble.
3. I ate nothing but carrots and Cinnamon Life for a few days because I had no other food, no ride to Cubby's, and the food at Nagley's is outrageously expensive.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)