.

nina simone – I can’t see nobody

I did actually have that fever. So for another half day and night, all that happened was sleep and soup and Owen Meany. A quail egg tastes just like a plain ol’ egg only smaller and cuter. It was a little odd floating poached in the mushroom soup, but there’s an egg on everything here, on the cheeseburgers even, everything. There is a “in case you need an egg here’s an egg” universal policy. That was fine, I love eggs, but getting pineapple again proved a little difficult. Here’s how it goes. You ask for something, you ask it of the woman who is trying to serve you, she has no idea what you’re talking about, she holds up a finger ‘one minute please’ and she fetches someone, usually a guy. Once it was a Russian woman, but mostly it’s “The Man”. He comes over, I say Pineapple, he has no idea either. There is a display of pineapples near the guy in the rooster hat who is cooking on the grill. I stand up, point to myself, point to The Man, and say “I will show you.” He nods. We walk over to it and I point and say Pineapple. Ooooo, “Pwie-IppL.” I giggle, I can’t help it. I say it again, carefully, Pine Apple. He watches my mouth, smiles and says carefully, “Pwie-IppL” I totally giggle, and he laughs. And I look at him, the crinkle corner of the eye twinkle smile thing and realize holy shit I’m Chinese flirting.

"Nothing to Me," Lee Hazlewood
"Some Say (I Got Devil)" - Tortoise
"Gimme Shelter" - Merry Clayton (best in show)

Once it’s in your mouth, you can’t really back out. You’re going to have to see it through, that’s the rule generally speaking, everyone knows that. Soooo, be careful what you put in there in the first place is my motto. Some people get braver with alcohol but I tend to get even more skittish with the little warning message going on a loop in the back of my head, ‘you’ve been drinking, caution, nothing new, you’ve been drinking, caution, etc.’ So it’s in the morning that I’m most likely to go for it:

-The thing that looks like a spiny sea urchin is some kind of heavy sticky cake with spikes stuffed with orange mush, and it’s good, mango I think.
-The thing that looks like a cupcake of black mealy worms is some kind of puffed rice held together by a goo that tastes like a berry of some kind, and it’s good too.
-The smokes fish sucks just like I thought it would, bass I think, and it tastes like ham gone very wrong.
-The things that look like little round potatoes are steamed dough balls stuffed with brown stuff that looks like apple butter. It’s pretty good, but after two bites I still had no guess whatsoever about the brown stuff so I stopped. I wasn’t even sure if it was sweet or not, honestly.
-The thing that looks like a steamed dough ball covered in egg yolk is a steamed dough ball but the yellow stuff is a pineapple reduction, I think, and the stuff inside tastes like minced taco meat.
-The thing that looks like a philo dough cuplet filled with something fleshtoned and covered in what appears to be carrot shavings almost went in, I gave it a little lick to be frank but I think you can still take that back, and it was gonna be fishy I could tell.
-The thing that is clearly pork sausage tastes a little like fish, but at that point I was probably fish-paranoid and hallucinating because who would do that?
-The doughnut was a doughnut and the hash brown wedgie was a hash brown wedgie, both fried enough to break your teeth—did the fry it twice, like shooting a dead guy?
-The pineapple was FANTASTIC.

Later: I’m not pregnant. Here’s how it happened. I go to buy a headset. I walk to the mall, the “real” one, big expensive western thing, multistory all glass etc. For me, whose petals close when talked to unexpectedly, the shopping customs are rough. There’s no bargaining this time, but the level of awareness of my presence just unnerves me. But, as with most things, it comes down to desire vs. fear and holy sooner or later batgirl who do you think is gonna win? So, I see it. The fur. The slept in it for a year, lost my mind my heart maybe my soul in it, my only friend when the lights and the heat went out in the food left to rot house I just got back and nobody in that X-belonging god damn city so much as called in it, the showed up in the emergency room in week-old pj’s with pneumonia in it, got better in it, always look weirdly only I would wear it and look good in it fur coat. I bought it from an Asian woman at a vender convention in Chicago, a little too big and not my best color . . . I want another one. And here it is. In pink. I reach out and touch, sure enough, same stuff, peculiar soft snippets sewn together bit by bit. The tag, what the hell is that? 194656183056 . . that’s not the price. Lots of itsy bitsy calligraphy-numbers-more-caligraphy. And the inevitable two sales women on either side of me a foot from my head SMILING. It’s fine, but I wish I could tell them if you knew me better you’d not like me this much, honest. I'm sure it's easy to figure it out but I can’t think straight. I leave. But I at least want to know how much it was. All around there are signs that say SALE and then 7! Or 5! Seven what? I wander around some more and find a drug store. I go in and think well I’ll buy a thermometer bc I am kinda hounded by this sinus thing for real and maybe I should pop the cipro. Besides, I figure then I can learn how the price signs work,which is really what I'm after. So I make the little shape of a thermometer at the guy in the air with my hands and SMILE REAL BIG and he brings me over to the pregnancy tests. I laugh, he laughs, he’s so happy for me. So fine whatever (see feeling 10. of previous post), I look carefully at the little price sticker below, think I got it, buy it, and yeah ok the change basically comes back as I expected, around $5 not $50 in case you ever find yourself in China possibly carrying an immaculate conception short on cash and need to know that. I go back to the store and pink fur is $300 apx. If it had been brown, I’d be wearing it right now, but I figure if you’re gonna buy yourself a new boyfriend, the gay one probably isn’t the most serviceable choice. The word for Thank You sounds like zitszits. The second thing I’m going to learn to say is fur coat . . . and then get better at the bargaining thing.

Also. Captain of Industry says if you get lost here you stay lost. There is simply no way to communicate where you ought to be. You’re just screwed. So when it’s that important, probably Starbucks is not the best landmark choice. See, I knew Lil’ Ridiculous would turn up. I could go to the moon and that bitch would turn up, sure as shit. My feet are killing me now. I wonder what I’d get if I went back to the drugstore for toenail clippers. Maybe the headset.

I miss a few specific nuzzlyhugs a day, especially when I get tired, but which I often don’t get half the week etc. whatever etc. anyway. If Ears had email . . . The 5 star hotels help, what with the seasaltmudsomethingthaibaths in the spa, but I kinda love it that nobody speaks my language bc I hate chit chat esp the American back slapping yuck have a happy day kind . . . In other words, I’m visibly invisible. Juuuuust watchin. Again, a familiar feeling in a situation where it makes sense for a change.

If this goes through, it’s gonna blow my blogwad for the rest of the trip prolly. Say La Vee, the links are time sensitive (thanks for them to DmS).

Buddy Tate and Claude Hopkins -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (March-October 1960)King Curtis -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (April 1960)Cannonball Adderley -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (November 1960)George Shearing -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (June 1962)Carmell Jones -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (1965)Freddie Hubbard & Jimmy Heath -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (1965)Chris Connor -- Love Medley: What Is This Thing Called Love? / You Don't Know What Love Is (Aug 1986)Jessica Williams -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (Oct. 1986)Mel Powell -- What Is This Thing Called Love? (October 21, 1987)

Top Ten Feelings:

1. Things are weird. Everything. People. Life on Earth. That I am. That I won’t be. That I’ll worry that my tits are too small in between being and not being. All of it. All of it all the time.
2. My list of expectations is empty-either I’ve fulfilled them or I ain’t gonna.
3. My list of hopes, same thing.
4. Sad, about 2&3.
5. Oddly thrilled, about 2&3, new lists! I love lists.
6. Missing most of whom I love.
7. Madame Theory blew a gasket (i.e. clueless).
8. Adroit (cz I dunno what that means really so I think of it as having good muscle tone and being clever while also clueless and despite intermittent terrible health choices—what is that? It’s the daisy in the snow thing--Is there a proper word for that?)
9. Far flung (see 1. and 6., dashes of 2. & 3. & 5., + big dollop of what the hell am I doing here? + What the hell is here doing here anyway?)
10. Fine Whatever When in Rome Just Go With It Pray and Do My Best Try to be Good

When I am standing in my own kitchen, these feelings are largely not well matched to the environment and probably indicate at least some measure of distress, off and on. But in Shenzhen China, what else could I possibly be feeling than most of that? So, weirdly of course, I had to go half way around the world for my emotional life to make sense to me, commensurate with the context. If it weren’t for 6., I’d just stay here until this was home and I’d be shit outa luck all over again. The girls could fly to visit. But there are boys. Heavy on my mind.

Other thoughts—random order:

I’m “crispy” which is something like “skinny”. (I was lightly pinched on the upper arm in wonder 3 times.) My guestimation is that they’re surprised to find an English speaking westerner in a Chinese size. Well, think about it. Would you not find a 6’2” 220 lbs Chinese guy walking around a little unexpected?

S. says, Tony will find us. We’re in a 6 story mall. We didn’t call him. How could he possibly . . . and then there he is, “hello!”

A haircut is a hairs cut, as in one at a time. S. wasn’t kidding about that either. Now the best haircut I’ll ever get will be 16000 kilometers away. That’ll be like my haircut went off to war and I never get to see him. [Figures.]

I cannot imagine what this place smells like in August. It’s like the urban dictionary. I so do not want to know. There is never ever not a smell. [And if only my tits were the size of my nose per, I’d be a knock out. I can smell like I can smell my kid’s dandruff from here kinda smeller.] Sometimes it’s good, like jasmine spritz. Sometimes it’s just the china smell (like an accent you don’t know you have but you do, same thing with the smell you don’t know you have but you totally do). A lot of the time it’s like a lab retriever with nasty gas, sorry to say.

The degree to which a person’s expectations can be anticipated—this cannot be over described. Like for instance during the hairs cut. If I have to look up, they dim the lights. Every time. He dropped a comb and apologized. (an FPH really would blow a gasket) It gets to be like you eat a french fry and they put another one on your plate and you’re not surprised. S. has the Get Offa Me thing down, wow. She walks like 50 mph and says NO! hahahah I think on my own I’d get into apologizing contests that would last all damn day. Hence how I wound up 6 flights up and god knows how many hallways deep buying a stupid purse for at least 5x its worth, and no not in the mall.

Later, I take that last thing back about apologizing. You get over it. GET THE MOTHER F’N HELL OFFA ME! You have no choice: We leave the shopping-thingy, it’s not really a mall and I dunno what to call it, place filled with shit both good and bad and ranging from massages to chloe dresses to dancing bears, everything anything. Outside, a woman tries to give us a baby. S. gives her a fairly large stuffed pig. S. had the pig because it came with her cocktail at dinner. The woman wants a dollar. S. says, I gave you a pig get offa me. 20 ft. further on, another woman another baby and this one chases us. We’re already running because someone else in between had a monkey to throw and that finally freaked S. out. The baby thing happens all the time. What happens if you take the baby? S. doesn’t know. I kind of want to play catch the baby just to check it out. But this is no place to let Lil’ Ridiculous off leash. (If I can help it.)

Later still, upon reflection it occurs to me that I just don’t want much in the way of material goods if it means I’d have to be assertive at all about it. I like to shop, but that’s a process of wandering around alone touching the colors of things. The acquisitions are a by-product merely, most of the time. Here, if you want it you have to step back up to their desire to sell it, and all bullshit otherwise is absent completely. It takes the “do I really?” question to its core, right away. And for the most part the answer is Nope. And when it’s yes, then it’s Yes. Period.

The one-child policy is kinda total bullshit. There are like a billion more people here than are accounted for. No, seriously.

People are not allowed to sell stuff on the street. Everyone sells stuff on the street. So the cops go by and she pulls out of ball of yarn and knits, like O don’t mind me I’m just standing around knitting. What she was selling depends on what you want to buy. A television, and car, what?

The Chinese people are various and beautiful and sometimes not so much. The Westerners are hideously ugly almost always. Like hurt your eyes fugly. They come here hoping the Chinese people won’t really know or something so that they can get laid. (??) Dunno.

for Virgo this week: The swan is a beautiful bird, right? If you see one gliding across a pond, it evokes in you a feeling of calm. In fairy tales, it's a symbol of natural grace, an emblem of animal elegance. But those lovely associations are becoming irrelevant in England, where swan populations have grown so massive and voracious that they're threatening ecosystems and damaging biodiversity. I guess we could say that their destructive overabundance exemplifies the theme of too much of a good thing. It's an apt metaphor for the challenge I believe you'll face in the coming days, Virgo.

taking the bait . . .

Chinese piledriver
Noung, (Chi-Neez Pile-Drive-Er) The act of performing a "69" (Mutual Simultaneous Oral sex) whilst standing up, holding the woman upside down as she performs fllatio. Moments before orgasm . . [I can’t go on with this. I can’t believe it goes on. And if you really consider the logistics of this, you’ll have to conclude it’s meant for men who love midgets, which I am sure there is a word for.]

Chinese fuck puzzle
A Chinese Fuck Puzzle is something totally complicated or in disaray [or misspelled?] or disorganized. A clusterfuck. [I am so not looking up clusterfuck.]

Chinese cupcakes
A pair of stolen panties that . . [who thinks this stuff up?]

Chinese bellybutton
When a girl is so fat her bellybutton is no longer a circle but a straight line.

Chinese bricklayer
Performing cunnilingus from the wheelbarrow position. Sarah needs to build up her arm strength; we were barely ten minutes into a chinese bricklayer and she needed to rest.

Chineasy [told ya]
tight Asian, not necessarily Chinese. Lucy Lui is Chineasy.

Chinese chode chomper
A chinese person who chomps on chodes. [chodes?---I’m not telling you.]

Chinese basket job
A woman sits in a basket suspended from the ceiling with the bottom cut out. The basket is lowered and spun so the vagina spins freely around the penis. [Who thinks this stuff up?!]

Chinese bake-away
The act and decision-making process of ordering Chinese (and to a lesser extent less monosodium glutamate laden) take-away while baked (stoned). Motivated by inability to cook and a lack of ready consumables, those initiating a bake-away must overcome several major hurdles:
1)Finding a menu while munted
2)Deciding on a finite (as opposed to infinite) number of foodstuffs.
3)Gathering together keys and cash to facilitate transaction
4)Maintaining both by telephone and face-to-face with delivery person, despite awareness that your reality is not that of the world
The bake-away process usually takes one to two hours from start to finish. [lol okay I’ve been to these, although these days I’m all straight as an arrow except for slowly but surely becoming a Chinese alcoholic.]

Chinese alcoholic
Someone who stopped smoking pot, which should help her remember the all the details of a Chinese fuck puzzle, but who has a hard time resisting the temptations of dom perignon and absolut and beer, like when she’s waiting for certain persons who live on Chinese time.

Nightmares on Wax – The Sweetest (setting the mood on Chinese time, give it to :46 sdkfasdlkfajsdlknzz then woopStop. repeat.)

Damien – Woman Like a Man (for Slushie, who plays it on repeat, but girl stoooop with the urban dictionary.)

Ismeal Lo c. Marianne Faithfull – Without Blame

los lobos – hold on

.

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OUCHy Vaccine: Blessing in Disguise
1.2007

Shivaree ~ Goodnight Moon nuzzle

For crapping for not crapping for not breathing and over breathing coughing panic hack for lethargy for germs of hand of face of butt of mind of liver eyes dry eyes wet eyes itchy unclean wet dry evaporative . . . . if God himself wanted to get it on with me, I’d have a medication to prevent it. Why pack clothes? I should just go in saran wrap and call it a day/night/whatever.

From Customs and Etiquette of China:

If you fall ill in China, you should be able to arrange a visit to the doctor through the staff at your hotel. It is very worrying for the Chinese, who see themselves as your hosts for as long as you are in their country, to have a sick foreigner on their hands, and they will make every effort to see that you are well cared for.

Standards of care do vary, however, and you would be well-advised to take with you a supply of any medicines and pharmaceutical products you think you may need. Hypothermic needles, for instance are often used more than once, so take some with you in case you need to have an injection of some sort.

While I found that alarming (!), the degree to which FaintedPurellMaven would find it so actually struck me as kind of funny.

Doors open and close I sleep and wake I can’t lock much out I worry a lot in general. I check it all in my head like along a fence line sniffing for trouble, with low growling at even just the wind. I read. The urban dictionary—why’d you get me started?

grilled cheese

Used to describe a female of bad taste, hygeine, or sluttiness. Opening her legs would be like peeling apart a grilled cheese sandwich.

I slept with Jeri last night, and I had to stop, being I realized she didn't shower for a week...she was such a grilled cheese.

transformer

(n) An act carried out by a male by tucking his penis and testicles between his legs giving the appearance of a woman then quickly opening his legs, letting them swing back into position in a shocking display of manliness.

Oh god, not the transformer!

a girl that looks great from a distance, but is hideous when she gets up close.

(v?) The act of having anal sex with a woman and then when she is not looking, switching guys.

We pulled off one damn good transformer last night.

a lesbian that is attracted to heterosexual females, typically for the purpose of sexual conquest and nothing more. Once she has turned out the straight woman, she is no longer interested.

moose

(n) An affectionate term to describe someone socially inept (or at least awkward). Moose tend to have specialized knowledge on some geeky topic, such as star wars, dnd, star trek, lord of the rings, etc. Drama and art majors tend to be moose. Acts of moosery are possible from anyone whether they are a moose generally or not, as long as they miss some conversational subtlety

spaghetti

Turning your sexual fantasies into a popular Italian side dish.

Hey Martha, pass me the spaghetti.

side dish

A mental or visual masturbatory aid; someone who you look at (a picture of) or think about when you masturbate.

ice tea

When your lover puts ice cubes in her mouth and blows on your balls.

soup

Pot, marijuana, weed, cannibas.

cowboy

adj. a very handsome and rugged man; a man that some members of both sexes would not mind having some form of sex with.a gay or preconceived gay man that appears masculine beyond his heterosexual counterparts or other men.

A cute farmer boy who knows how to treat a lady!

Save a horse, ride a cowboy

(v?)You're banging a girl and you say, "Wow, I guess great sex runs in your family. But I think that you're sister/mother gave better head." Assuming that things go to plan, you're wench gets angry and tries to throw you off. Stay on as long as you can.. that's the fun.

Don't try this with manly women.. they get pissed.

I can’t repeat what I found under “gas leak”

Mason Jennings - Drinking As Religion (strong recommend)

http://www.tutiempo.net/en/Weather/Shenzhen/ZGSZ.htm

welp, my hair is gonna suck, curly humid fuzzhead. guess I'll buy a red hat

Clem Snide –Fill Me With Light

hot chip - so free (for DmS)

mamas and papas - got a feelin (this guy died, "FYI")

dj krush - final home (piano mix) ft. esthero

Marianne Faithfull – Guilt

Marianne Faithfull is like herself with this vague other flavor (Cayenne? Mick Jagger? Cocoa powder? What??). This song is great too: I thought hmm actually I’m not sure I never stole a scarf from Harrod’s to be honest bc I was 14 when I was there and I do remember paying for the earl grey and I don’t remember even getting a scarf either way, BUT I was a bit of a clepto back then so it is POSSIBLE that I stole a scarf . . . and then I got this little quick-sweaty feeling like I just got caught doing something bad and I’m over here more than a couple of decades removed from a crime I probably didn’t even commit (!). Wacked, la la la.

.

Meanwhile, on a similar yet very different note, it was really tough to choose, and the opening of “Laying Pipe” is a riot, but “Love Muscle” is my pick for best in show. What’s yours? I suppose I have no defense against the accusation that my ambient playlists sound like porno background now that my favorite mp3 site posted this one, which is fine (fine fine) except that meanwhile on a related yet very different note, my X-father-in-law is the biggest fan of my mixes. (Wacked, la-zzz la-zzz bumpbump bambam wa wa wa.)

"Symphony 1997: II. Earth (Yi3)" by Tan Dun (performed by Yo-Yo Ma and the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra) ancient Bianzhong Bells (mixed in)

for Virgo this week: I hate greed almost as much as I hate hatred. So I was mistrustful when your inner teacher hinted that I should look in the thesaurus under "acquire" for clues to your major themes in the coming months. There I found words like "amass," "collect," "gather," "secure," "earn," and "take possession." After duly meditating on your astrological aspects, I decided that what your inner teacher was driving at is this: 2007 should be a time of building up your reserves, carving out a more substantial niche, and getting the tools and resources and training that will provide a foundation for your dreams well into the future. So here's my question to you: Can you engage in this much acquisition without becoming grasping, predatory, and manipulative? Personally, I'm sure you can.

Imogen Heap – Holding Out for a Hero (Bonnie Tyler cover)

First it’s up then down then up and up and then down down down. And you start to wonder, Is it me? Have I entered this equation only to be some random curse element? Almost imperceptible but having a microscopic negative impact that’s throwing the Zen off? [petal wilt]

Red GuyIENS hockey angst playlist:

The Magnetic Fields (S. Merritt)- All I Wanna Know

fc kahuna - hayling

dj krush - days end
for you with you something

. . . I gotta rest 3 minutes at 5 meters below the surface or something like that awhile. And listen to music. I think I might want to stay right there, Right Here, perfect pressure all over, with tunes and an underlament of heartbeat(s)

Eleni Mandell - Pauline [highly recommend, chinese glamour lip smack]

eels - souljacker (p1)

self help reading + music + liverwurst

A Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) is a fundamental project management technique for defining and organizing the total scope of a project, using a hierarchical tree structure. The first two levels of the WBS (the root node and Level 2) define a set of planned outcomes that collectively and exclusively represent 100% of the project scope. At each subsequent level, the children of a parent node collectively and exclusively represent 100% of the scope of their parent node. A well-designed WBS describes planned outcomes instead of planned actions. Outcomes are the desired ends of the project, and can be predicted accurately; actions comprise the project plan and may be difficult to predict accurately. A well-designed WBS makes it easy to assign any project activity to one and only one terminal element of the WBS.

A question to be answered in the design of any WBS is when to stop dividing work into smaller elements. (This is the level of granularity.) If a WBS terminal elements are defined too broadly, it may not be possible to track project performance effectively. If a WBS terminal elements are too granular, it may be inefficient to keep track of so many terminal elements, especially if the planned work is in the distant future. A satisfactory tradeoff may be found in the concept of progressive elaboration which allows WBS details to be progressively refined before work begins on an element of work. One form of progressive elaboration in large projects is called rolling wave planning which establishes a regular time schedule for progressive elaboration. In reality, an effective limit of WBS granularity may be reached when it is no longer possible to define planned outcomes, and the only details remaining are actions. Unless these actions can be defined to adhere to the 100% Rule, the WBS should not be further subdivided. (As CapitalofIndustryGuy would say, “Oookeeey.”)

+ Big Star – Thirteen (I love just about every version of this song. But I like the real thing the best.)

+ A wasteful sandwich = LIVERWURST. Because it’s fabulous, with pickles and mayo on whole wheat, but after one or two it tastes like throw-up kinda. Then the rest of the meat(?) sits in the back of the fridge until you throw it out embarrassed. But in the meantime, it tastes like childhood love, like goat gut soup, like cannibal on rye with onions, like DQ tacos, like what only you yourself know of the peculiar charms and taste of a thing, like fragile heaven. I figured if I was going to teach myself ganttware today, I’d eat what it is encouraging me to and affording me in squandered grocery money and memory, in this case of DmS being able neither to swallow it nor spit it out. (I killed it too, tandem oddly as per usual.)

space station big chance

Siouxsie and the Banshees - The Passenger (iggy pop cover)
bonus track: alana davis - 32 flavors (and then some, Ani cover)


hurts to purr - mr. atom and me

for Virgo this week: Normally there are about 9,300 people on the planet who could be your very best friend, even your soul mate. But in 2007, I believe that figure will rise dramatically--possibly as high as 16,000. This hot tip from me to you should clue you in to the fact that the universe will be exceptionally sympathetic to your interests in the coming months; it should motivate you to ask aggressively for what you really want, as opposed to whining and pining for what you sort of want.

Cowboy Junkies - Cowboy Junkies Lament
Cowboy Junkies - To Live is to Fly

from Customs & Etiquette of China, by C. Mason and G. Murray:

You may also find that the Chinese refer to one another by their job title—Mayor Wang, and Manager Li and so on. This is a direct translation of the way they would normally refer to one another in Chinese, and you might find it a useful habit to adopt, because you are almost bound to meet several people who share the same surname, and it will help you keep them separate in your mind. (Like Dostoevsky characters. Does this not make you want to be a, um, o say a dominatrix contortionist dog grooming spinning class teacher efficiency consultant or some weird ass thing, just for kicks?)

These days, however, complications can arise when Chinese people start choosing Western names for themselves. They are, of course, quite right in thinking that “James Chen” is easier for a Western visitor to remember than, say, Chen Jianrong. Particularly in Hong Kong, you are likely to come across many a “Peter Wong” or “Ivy Mao”, or even the odd “Ribena Lo” or “Rolex Chan”, but this habit of reversing the order of surname/personal name is occasionally carried over into their Chinese names too. So it is a good idea, especially when confronted with a Chinese name of only two syllables, such as Jing Wang, to check whether the bearer of that name is a Mr/Ms Jing or a Mr/Ms Wang. (Ok, all jokes aside, how do you politely check that? Can you stare rudely Western style and ask, "What do you want me to call you?" And if they say “Greg” because you’re too stupid to deal with a Chinese name, do you feel offended or guilty?)

Ryan Adams - English Girls Approximately

Doug update. The old man sailed right through the femoral artery surgery that cleared a blockage that extended from his groin all the way down to just below his knee. The vascular surgeon slowly shoved a balloon through it that whole way, which took HOURS, well past midnight, after which grandpa woke up, ate a double dinner double fisted style, looked at my mother and said, “You’re so pretty—Do you do your own make up?!” Then he wanted a cigarette and refused to take his vitamins.

In Disney’s version of Mulan, the little Chinese dragon tries to talk her out of fighting the Mongolians. “They pop out of the snow like daisies!” he says, appalled. When I look at my grandparents, I kind of feel that way, i.e. like a Mongolian. If I subtract chain smoking and the complete absence of green and/or fiber of any kind from their diet, and then add in my running my brains loose to Eminem today and nearly every day, I have to wonder that if they’re 90 that might mean . . . (I’m banking on DmS to shoot me—don’t forget!)

All jokes aside, he’s slated to see my sister’s baby in the spring of this (banking on good) year. Bob Dylan – Not Dark Yet

Underwater hockey. As weird as that is in itself, little do they know that meanwhile half way round the world, Chinese women are making those sponged “hockey sticks” with the fat of their asses. Left, Right, Toss, Left . . . And as weird as a giant hockey puck is in itself, believe it or not you can have that in the M&M spectrum of colors if you know whom to ask.


zhou xuan (周璇) - flowers under a full moon (月圆花好)

Iron & Wine – Passing Afternoon

Sarah Harmer – Go to Sleep

Sarah McLaughlin – Possession (solo piano)

Jack Johnson – Upside Down

Portrait of David – Constant Flow

Amos Lee – All My Friends

gotye - your hearts a mess

Some were born to play with, to think constantly about it, with a nod
not much more, to the future and what its executives might have in store.
We aren’t easily intimidated.
And yet we are always frightened,
frightened that this will come to pass and we all unable to do anything about it, in case it ever does.
So we appeal to you, sun, on this broad day.
You were ever a helpmate in times of great churning, and fatigue.
You make us forget how serious we are
and we dance in the lightening of your rhythm like demented souls
on a hospital spree. If only,
when the horse crawls up your back, you had known to make more of it.
But the climate is military, and yet one can’t see too far ahead.
Better a storehouse of pearls than this battered shoehorn
of wood, yet it can cause everything to take place and change for you.

“Girls on the Run” - John Ashbery

Granpa's femur bypass surgery on Monday, no visitors. I'm jonesing for influx. Anybody got any?

bob dylan - cold irons bound (highly recommended)

buena vista social club - dos gardenias

tiger baby - chinese fairytale

mio caprice - artboy meets artgirl

jose gonzalez - crosses

for Virgo this week: Patriarch Bartholomew, the leader of the Orthodox Christian Church, has a flock of 300 million. Unlike most other religious leaders, he crusades for the preservation of the environment. "To commit a crime against the natural world is a sin," he says. "For humans to cause species to become extinct and to destroy the biological diversity of God's creation; for humans to contaminate the Earth's waters, land, air, and life with poisonous substances: These are sins." The astrological omens suggest that he'll be a good role model for you in 2007, Virgo. You'll generate lush personal dividends if you intensify your intention to live in harmony with nature [is this a euphemism?] and invoke a spiritual zeal as you defend your planet against its despoilers.

Toilet pucks are edible, first of all, and I didn’t kill X and bury his toxic ass in the backyard last year either, so I think I’m all good. Then again, I am an American. (wince) Maybe I’ll defect. Meantime I’ll post a war sucks and thus so does W. and all his stupid ass mothball mouthed shit faced fucking friends song. In further thoughts sent to Doug, I’ll note I was listening to this because while he was in the marines my mother refused to talk until he came back. She was about 2 years old, and perverse already stubborn like mule.





Jackie Sue











.

.
Iron & Wine – Love Vigilantes

Sitting on the phone.

How’s it going?
He just came out of surgery and it seems okay.
Define okay.
Well he didn’t even bleed they said!
(pause) Wouldn’t that be a problem if they’re hoping the infection bleeds out?
Right.
Riiiiiiight.
Well they have a vascular person ya know um a Vascular Specialist coming I guess to increase his circulation I guess, tomorrow.
To get it to bleed, apparently.
Yeah, right.
Well not to be an asshole ( . . . ) but if he’s got to bleed out gangrene within 48 hours, wouldn’t his foot just being like day old steak on the counter for over a day be kind of less than ideal?
I don’t know. I’m on kind of on overload with all this.
Ma, I’m going to get a ticket for the weekend, one of those business commuter things, okay?
No no it’s going to be fine, she says a little panicky.
I am going look for a ticket for this weekend if you call me later or I am going to drive to your doorstep by morning if you don’t.
(pause)
Oooooooookay.
Oooooooookay.

Later.

Then she calls back. There are four operations planned in quick succession. The rest of the foot. When that doesn’t work, then a bypass surgery in the calf. Then when that doesn’t work, then the leg will be removed below the knee.

The doctor looked pitiful, she says, He seemed hopeless and said it was terrible when there just was no blood because then there was nothing to be done really.
I say, Well if they don’t think those next two surgeries will work, then why not skip to the last one and not make him suffer so much on the way?
(goes bonkerinos): “Well they’re not going to kill him this isn’t Oklahoma or wherever they do that shit so they keep him ALIVE and then you just take the steps of that because that’s that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
(paaaaaaaaaaaaaaause)
Mom, a care-plan is a negotiated settlement. You can ask how many options they considered and you can ask that their decisions be justified. If someone were going to hack into you four times with you awake for it, I’d kind of be like um is that the best you can fucking do . . .
WellShirleyasksallkindsofshitWe’reNotDoctorsTheyKnowI’mgoingtogonow.
Sigh. Okay.
Okay? I’mgoingtogonowI’mtirednowyou’renothereyaknowso.
Okay okay.
Okay[Click].

I have a head cold. I am not unhappy. A cd comes in the mail and I sew a curtain. Mom is adamant I cannot show up sneezing (“Did you just Cough?!”), so I lay around w the kids and we sneeze and get out the playdough. The oil’s been changed in the van and I watch the flight prices and I pop another vitamin C and make pea soup and write letters of recommendation for students and write in my journal Chinese Crayolas! and I watch America’s Top Model and I clean absolutely everything and I wait and do what I think is best: I remember. I focus everything else from my mind and remember him. The thing about dying in the United States is that they medicate you within an inch of your life and then keep you there in that inch until nobody remembers what you were like before. I remember him built like a barrel filled with something, solid and short and strong as hell. I remember the boats the cars the golf carts (he didn’t golf), the black lab dog he loved (and of course named Sambo), his leather jacket tight and making that leathermovingsound when he walked, and his less-than-gifted power-tool moments (woopsie—but you don’t need the whole finger, he said, flipping me off with the stub and a wink).

Ben Harper – The Drugs Don’t Work (The Verve cover)

A good year I’ve been saying I have a feeling, a Reaping Year I named it. The idea basically comes from the psychological paradigm of full functionality, which is not the same thing as happiness, and within that paradigm misery and cynicism and alienation are all necessary so that unlike the slogan “depression is never normal” (you can find that at mentalheath.org etc) actually the lack of it would be a marked hindrance. It’s not as if I want to be unhappy because God knows I do not. But it is necessary to be willing to be unhappy is the thing. Emotional risk. Ability to choose among bad choices and to calculate feeling into decisions wherein there is inherent pain. An integration of the full range of feelings into rational assessments and subsequent actions. A person who is unwilling to be unhappy cannot be happy, is the thing. He or she cannot be whole. So. It is day one of the reaping year after a hard sewing year, wherein I made the instinctive decision to be unhappy since I was anyway. (duh)

Tonight my grandfather has part of his foot removed because he has diabetes related gangrene. The wound will be left open in hopes that in the next 48 hours the infection will drain away from the leg. This procedure will be done with local anesthetic because he is a smoker and has perpetual pneumonia in the one lung he still has. If the infection does not drain away but continues further into the body, he will have the rest of his foot removed. He has end stage spinal stenosis, so an epidural will be unlikely given the conductivity of his nervous system through the spine.

My grandfather, like every girl’s own daddy, stamped and formed how I love men and what for. I was the first grandchild before a slew in subsequent years, the first child (after the death of my brother) of a favorite eldest daughter. He doted on me and I loved his ways that made my grandma grim, his convertible orange karmen gia. She doted on me too, the early reader, because she had given up college in the 30’s for his 8^th grade education and his ways that made her grim, so we shared words and similar weaknesses. His hands like calloused claws smelled (sensually) of earth smoked something and machine oils. I was like orange juice concentrate with too little water added, and he would rub roughly the side of my face and twinkle at me in his eyes, and to my incessant “can we can we can we” he would calmly say “Wait Awhile” again and again, bemused. And he poured me Pepsi and fried me a pork chop with black pepper. My grandma glowered at him for his skirt chasing, but then would look at me, our matching blackbrown almond eyes locked, and she would laugh.

Book-ended between them on one side and my daughter on the other, I have done whatever I managed to do because they were watching. I understand the mixed blessing of (a community’s) eyes intently upon me. I understand mixed blessings, generally speaking. My girl just passed her (re)cancer check. My grandfather will not live out this year or maybe this week, and then neither will she, my grandmother Shirley, who is not loved better than he is by anyone but me, because she will follow him and for reasons I could not put language around but I understand. So I pack the bag with my new clothes. I thank in my head FaintedInk and CapitalofIndustryGuy for inspiring me to upgrade my professor girl look. Doctors don’t scare me. I scare them. General anesthetic. He cannot die by inches. Before the week is out, I might do my best to kill him. Douglas Ott will share my son’s name and, I hope, this weekend will look at my feet and call out my name before his eyes reach my face and he will say “god I wish I were young”, eyes sparkling at me.

He taught me, and she did too, to never have on my tongue and in my nose the smell and taste of someone for whom I would not be unhappy if asked. Would I be unhappy for you? (Thank god they told me about that question. Thank. God.)

Cowboy Junkies -
Common Disaster