Order of Operations

1) Learn to Drive a Stick. The 2001 Beetle my dad very unwisely bought years ago is going unused now that he's in HK, my mom's got the minivan, and my brother and Jane have their own cars. I rather hate the bug and everything it stands for, but hey, free car.

2) Get a Day Job. Once I am once again independently mobile, I will be able to interview for jobs. Money is a good thing.

3) Find a Place to Live. Dependant on where I get a job and how much it allows me to allot for rent.

4) Get Back to the Gym. My 24hour membership is paid up until 2009, better use it. I lost about 8 pounds while I was away. In a week in brother's house, I've gained back 4 of it. I need to get the fuck out of this depression hole. See Step 3.

5) Take New Headshots. Having lost the resquisite weight, get headshots printed up and start coldcalling agents to see if they're accepting new talent.

It all starts with mobility. I am going to master the stick if it's the last thing I do.

Sometimes You Want to Go

There is no better place to hide than in London.

The cold here forces you to bundle up. Covered in thick layers to shelter your skin from the stinging chill, you shield your dully aching heart. Stick your nose inside your coat, wrap your face up in a scarf, pull your hood as tight around yourhead as it will go and no one can see the tears slipping quietly down your cheeks as you stare into the corner on the tube. Everyone is too busy trying to concentrate on how to get where they're going without freezing their own arse off to bother looking in anyone else's direction, anyway. Add to this the sheer size and population of the city, and you've got endless places to hide.

Even if you were to walk into a shop or onto a train, face uncovered and shining with tears, scant few people would acknowledge you. Most would politely endure whatever hiccuping request you could manage, and have you on your way as quickly as possible. It is a place where you can be truly alone, even when surrounded by people. Because none of them give a shit about you. And sometimes this is precisely what you need. When you feel miserable and lonely, sometimes what you need is not a pick-me-up but a bring-you-down. The last thing you want is to have your faith in humanity restored. Rather, you need something that confirms what you suspect at that moment yourself: that in fact, no one does love you and you have no one but yourself. There is only one comfort to be had, and that is the satisfaction of being right.

Aaliya once said of her day at work that if one person had been mean to her she would have started crying. I have more of the opposite. I was on the tube and sad and as I tried to move my suitcase further into the corner for an older gent, he said, "no, you're all right." And I very quietly lost it. It is when I'm having a bad day and someone wants to give me a hug. When all I want is to hate everyone and someone has to go and wreck it by making me a cup of tea.

In London, when I can usually count on people to be snide and snarky and generally over me as only people in a large city - and especially English people in a large city completely over its tourists - can be, nothing can upset me more than when a fellow helps me up the stairs with my suitcase, then promptly and kindly disappears to go and catch his own train, as he has gone out of his way to help me.

Samin says...

Samin: haha
i know
doesn't he?
you love jake, don't you?
you think jake is duffman


and...

Samin:aaah
the killing
it's killing me

Sucker

There is a Mastercard commercial in which an elephant and a monkey take it upon themselves to care for their zookeeper when the man has a cold.

How big of a sucker am I that I think that this is the best commercial ever?

Also, how big of a nerd am I that I recognize the actor playing the zookeeper as the guy who voiced Pumba in The Lion King? Elephant and monkey join forces to heal warthog. The monkey tucks him in and the elephant pats him on the head at the end.

Best. Commercial. Ever.

A Sad Sad Day for Samin

by Holly Chou

the rain fell all day.
the sun did not shine.
her kidneys flailed madly, weeping all the while
for lack of chocolate, for lack of love.
soothing coffee would warm and massage her heart,
but as she was told it would also claw and ravage her kidneys on the long way down.

the zemocha man would miss her and the coffee can grew dusty.
the former stared out the window and the latter turned rusty.
the curly haired patron saint of dark dark darky dark chocolate
drank cranberry juice instead, with only a touch of vodka every now and then.

did you know that that was called a Cape Cod?
the Greyhound, the Whiskey Ginger, the Suffering Bastard.
these would not miss her so, one because she never loved them very deeply and two because she did not have to stop

but the chocolate? the coffee?

the little anthropomorphized mug of hot chocolate with arms and legs but no face would stop dancing wildly in the middle of the night. instead, he would only sit quietly, sighing a rich chocolatey sigh and leaning his porcelain chin forlornly on one hand. he would grow cold. and old.

the poem could have picked up at the end,
and told of a new day dawning
how all was not lost,
and life would go on
with chocolate in moderation, with growing love of delicious decaf tea

but then
it would not be
a sad sad day for samin.



by holly chou.

I'm Pretty Sure I Need This

http://www.thinkgeek.com/pennyarcade/postersprints/8ebe/zoom/

That is all.

Harpo, Chico, Groucho and Sometimes Zeppo

Rumor has it that Zeppo, though always the straight man who fell in love with the film's engenue before removing himself to become the group's manager, was actually the funniest Marx of them all.

Now, I love the Marx brothers, especially Harpo, and I find them pretty much hilarious as it is. So to hear that one of them was even funnier? Now, this I gotta see!

Unfortunately, I can't. Because they're all dead. And for some reason, the supposedly funniest one of them all never had a single funny thing caught on film for sad little laugh mongers in the future like me.

Why was he relegated to the sidelines? Was it because he was the most conventionally handsome, and so could not possibly be funny? I guess in the 30s, you had to be ugly to be funny. But because they were funny, the more popular Marxes are made just as lovely, don't you think?*

And now I am suddenly sad about the best writer who no one will ever read, or the best actor who will never get cast in anything (incidentally, Private Jokes, Public Places has not been cast yet...I'm supposed to get a call either way when that happens), or the sweetest music that no one will ever hear. Also about the love of my life, who I will never meet and who will never meet me.

Maybe I've been reading too much Shakespeare to not be morose. Too bad I've got to wait until tomorrow for the next episode of the A-Team to wipe the slate clean.




* - Well really, I'm only referring to Harpo and Chico when I say that. Groucho wasn't that funny. And therefore...