after seven tired and hungry hours in jfk i thought i had learned my lesson. the plane was to depart at 7am. michelle was to pick me up at 6am. i was to wake up at 5:55am, just one hour prior had i closed my eyes. i had worked 14 something hours and was beat; i had written down days before what was to be packed, and in my sleep deprevation, packed it all. i was and i did do it all. at 5:55am i woke up and angrily rolled myself out of bed and to the bathroom--brushed my teeth then hissed at my reflection. michelle arrived in good spirits and with coffee. i hastily gathered the remaining items and we darted out the door into the gradual glowing morning.

tbc...

no, this isn't blogger burn out; and yes, i am writing without thinking about what i am writing--regardless of punctuation, substance, and style. i hardly have the time to read, anything. not blogs, not books, not the paper, not even the writing on the wall. which makes me feel crazy and empty, or maybe it's the emptiness makes me feel crazy, or, maybe it's the craziness that makes me feel empty. just functioning and playing all empty and crazy; knowing it's more serious than i take it, and blaming it on the fact i haven't touched a paperback in just as long as the last time i felt a hardback. everything is out of whack: priorities, goals, bills, my day planner, my closet, and the living room...total chaos. stretched so thin by expectations and "lifestyle". i'm ready for the northwest.

todays horoscope for we virgos:

Eclipse number two has arrived -- and with it, the urge to say exactly what's on your mind. Now, since you can expect rather odd and coincidental occurrences over the course of the day, it's a given that what you'll be saying will be a bit over the top -- at least to dear ones who aren't used to seeing you in this 'condition.' Don't even try to hold anything back, though. It's your turn to let go. Big time. They'll get over it.

and that's just the half of it...

i wasn't kidding:

tonight at nokia live

now, where to find a black wig and a pair of converse tennies?

having to pee. having to pee so badly i might not make it to the bathroom if i were to try. but this right here, this pussiant display of self vs self, this is self-control; and probably a sure fire way to develop a bladder infection as well. my roommate hurt her back, so i, the self-less, kind-hearted, and ambulatory roommate, has post-poned my daily itenary in order to drive my own little miss daisy to school for a very important meeting with the school's president. afterall, it was she and taylor who picked me up from the airport at 5am just a few days ago.

for the ride home

'Termite guts can save the planet,' says Nobel laureate:

"The way termite guts process food could teach scientists how to produce pollution-free energy and help solve the world's imminent energy crisis. Speaking at the Institute of Physics conference Physics 2005 in Warwick today, Nobel laureate Steven Chu urged scientists to turn their attention to finding an environmentally friendly form of fuel. In an impassioned plea to some of the world's brightest minds, he explained how he's leading by example, and encouraged others to join the effort which "may already be too late."
Chu, who shared the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1997, has begun studying termite guts – one place in nature where a key hurdle for carbon-neutral energy supply has already been solved. Termite guts take indigestible cellulose, which makes up the bulk of all plant material grown on earth, and convert it to ethanol, which even today is a versatile and popular fuel.
Chu described how he decided to leave the richly-funded precincts of Stanford University to become Director of the Lawrence Berkeley Labs to kick-start the effort. He has been cajoling his new colleagues, including 56 members of the prestigious National Academy of Sciences, to realise the gravity of the problem and shift the focus of their research. And, he says, it's beginning to work.
The US already subsidises farmers to grow corn to turn into ethanol, but $7bn in the past decade has been wasted because the process isn't carbon-neutral. "From the point of view of the environment," explains Chu, "it would be better if we just burnt oil."
"But carbon-neutral energy sources are achievable. A world population of 9 billion, the predicted peak in population, could be fed with less than one third of the planet's cultivable land area. Some of the rest could be dedicated to growing crops for energy. But the majority of all plant matter is cellulose – a solid, low-grade fuel about as futuristic as burning wood. If scientists can convert cellulose into liquid fuels like ethanol, the world's energy supply and storage problems could both be solved at a stroke."
This is where the termite guts come in. A billion years of evolution have produced a highly efficient factory for turning cellulose into ethanol, unlike anything which humans can yet design. By exploiting these tricks, says Chu, we can use biology as a solution to a pressing world problem.
Nuclear fission may be the holy grail, but in the 50 years since it was first proposed, the predicted time-to-market has grown ever more distant. Solar and wind power look appealing, but mankind has not yet discovered how to store electricity on a large scale. Ethanol – a chemical fuel which would release no more carbon than it took to produce, would be the solution.
Immense funding is made available to cure the "diseases of rich people" such as cancer and heart disease, says Chu. "If we can't cure cancer in 50 years," he says, "it will be tragic but life will go on. But if we can't develop carbon-neutral fuel sources, life will change for everyone."

wishing i was still there:

now we're rolling

man can not live on peanut butter alone-though i wish he/me could. during the course of a typical day, it is safe to assume, that i consume 5-7 tablespoons of it: for breakfast, for snacking, and late at night as a post-dinner meal. i leave lunch and dinner #1 open for other sources of nutrition- a smoothie if i think i might be getting ill, or i just need to feel extra healthy; one of those vegatarian enchilida microwavable contrapictions; a cheese burger and fries from Jakks; or, something just totally off the radar if i've over done it with the above mentioned. i'm a creature of repitition. but this morning, an errant spirit came over me, and i, while the coffee brewed and the waffles toasted, i got out the butter, honey, and mixed berries. crazy, i know. being still early and blonde to the root, the precaution in checking to see if the neglected butter was still good or not went right over my head. as i sat on the living room floor with tiff watching either the weather channel or cnn(i can't really recall. we watch both.) and enjoying my colorful breakfast, i realized that something was wrong. and that something was my waffle.

waiting to throw up,
missie rose

i'm sitting here at the mecca of yuppieville: the smu bookstore, and looking around i'm wondering-when did everyone, and i mean everyone, become so cool? so avant garde with fashion and poise? the dresses over jeans...just another staple of the urban outfitters sub-culture, the cuffed jeans with mary jeans...just another basic dressing essential of a soriety girl shopping in between classes, the over-sized sunglasses that years ago i was scoffed and teased for...now, "what's hot". for nearly three years i have kindly stood by and watched my aberrance of style become a costume of cool for post-abercrombie and doonie and burke kiddies. i thought this fad would pass-that soon enough i could go back to the way things were: the style i so deviously stole from the danes and my russian. but three years later, at a bookstore for spoiled squares, i see it's much more worse than i thought.

it wouldn't be so appalling if the taint of poser wasn't so overt in intention, and i probably wouldn't be ranting like some pious elitist of cool if i too could afford every fad-but then again, who knows-maybe i would.

i know i don't mind that the once underground world of blogging is now made into newspaper's columns of interest, or that the once pride in being involved in something new and cutting edege has been exploited by many of those in the media in hope to compensate for trailing so far behind.

i don't mind that zach braff made a quirky-not-really-indie-trying-too-hard-to-be-poignant film that spoon fed the masses bands such as the shins and postal service because i liked that cheesy ass film and witnessing publicity for bands that deserve to have mtv show case their crib over 50 cent's.

i don't mind shows like the OC who do the same week after week because, again, i like that show and i like the thought of sales rising for bands who deserve to be known by more than a handful of other artists, the guys in the record store, and the musically apt.

and with all that stated, the funny thing is that i really like ashlee simpson.

first attempt in writing: not so good.

....hours later

not to sure if things are looking better for round 2 either.

feeling: unsatisfied

the incessatiable me. the terminally hopeless bad speller. the girl with a smirk, with a doppey gaze, with a sparkle in her eyes, with a tear in her smile; the over dramatic, verbum sap!

i'm wanting, seriously debating, on delaying other tax return purchases for a digital camera. just thinking of all the fun that could be had. or all the fun that could be had in oregon, another purchase of debate. and yes, i debate. it's that feeling of being unsatisfied, maybe moreso and plainly put, a tad bit flummoxed with the end of scene.

i waited to hear, i wanted to hear, but nothing was said. strong and beautiful feelings over come with silence; years of emoutional silence, with eyes wide open. i struggle with the reality-with understanding, knowing but neverless, wanting. so very intensly, wanting to hear- needing to cease from assuming, one way or another, an audible tangability. if that's even a real word-if that even makes any sense or not.

so here, in the paranoi of the void, my mind begins to drift, and i cringe for safety and stability. even with these not real words, i am cringing-teeth grinding, "do i stay or do i go?". and if i stay, or if he follows, or if i go, can the unsaid now be natural? is inquiring in and of itself an ansewer in and of itself? or perhaps it is ensuring what is already assumed in optomism.

"so trivial", i tell myself, "i know."but being smart. what about being smart. moving across the country for the, merely, percieved plausible? i can not, or as the case will probably be, i should not move for that which is more hypothetical than it is substantial. and that i derive from the silence.

not without a fight!

verbum sap: enough said-used to indicate that something left unsaid may or should be inferred; word to the wise.

that one is most definately going on the fridge tomorrow for our word of the day. we thought that pills and cabernet would add something-or so, i thought i would medicate myself, open the bottle of red, set the mood, slip out of the room and into my bed, letting the gods of vino and sparklehorse work their magic in the living room. time will tell but i'm dying to know. wake up sleepy head, wake up!!!

being a morning person is such a curse.

a-ha, she's calling now.

enjoy sxsw, friends.

so much, so little. the story goes, around and around and around. i wonder if the sarcasm; the intentional over-dramatics is noticeable? in here. i wonder if that black skirt from old navy will still be there tomorrow? size 1's are always the first to go and the last to end up on sale. it's the only fashion woe we skinny people should ever bitch about. now, to be short-we shorties, have an abundant assortment of, understandably merited, complaints: jeans made only for amazon women, knee length skirts that make us look like pentecostal hobbits, and the annoying size 0 dress that places the boob slots on our tummy instead of, ahem, our boobs.

you should see my little sister, she's pratically a foot taller than me and painfully attractive. i've never been one easily prone to jealousy (zip it, mister.) but about jr. high, when the boys in my class would tease me-accusing me of needing a phone book to see over a car dashboard or placing text-books under my dangling mary jane adorned feet as i sat studiously in my desk, i often thought of my little bigger sister, and bitterly inquired the almighty if he had accidentally given the little bigger some of my birth right inches. when tenth grade rolled around, that hot pubescent august, not only had i finally cleared five feet, become a woman, but i also let my schtick over the height heist go; i finally had boobs, and after endless lonely summer days spent on the texas tornado and the conquistador whilst my friends whipped past me on speeding and flipping carts, i could alas ride the flashback too.

the boys had a new target anyways: a red headed pistol equipped with sticks and stones, and daddy's money to hide her pain in. she and me, somehow always ended up in saturday morning detention together. i remember my other girlfriends would come waltzing into bible class on monday morning; gloating quietly, the lucky gal would pass a note under the desk revealing in scribbled penmanship the three hours spent in detention flirting with hottie so and so. me on the other hand, i never once in my countless saturday morning hanging out in the school cafeteria, had the chance to hang out or play footsy with one of the cute boys. just with the problem child, footsy excluded.

it was problem child that first introduced me to the world of tongue rings and atheism. we would pass the early morning hours writting poetry and bouncing philosphical ponderings from the pop machine. she had a dark sense of humor and i loved edgar allen poe. i imagined one day she would dedicate her life to satan as prank and end up in hell for all eternity. instead, problem child ended up pretty normal-wearing designer jeans and showing up at every "it" show. one would find it hard to believe that once upon a christian highshool, she was such the problem child in saturady morning detention, every week.

earning saturday morning detention wasn't difficult, let the record show. three or more tardies and your ass was theirs. punctuality has never been one of my stronger attributes, but as the years have progressed, i've gotten much better. mrs.king would be proud, dare i say. but it all depends. i don't really think that with me, character traits such as punctuality or perservernace has anything, or much, to do with a lack of strength, but with my inability/disdain to prioritize between instances such as: a quick stop at starbucks for a much needed espresso versus getting to work on time. i've learned the hard way to know thyself; and with such inner insight, i know i'll stop for the espresso everytime, and thus, i know to organize my time in such a way that i am able to afford every insufferable whim of mine. i've heard, knowing and understanding your opponent is one of the key elements in winning strategic games such as chess. not suprisingly, i've found that i am my own worst enemy. classic plot for a tragedy, or a comedy.

i've gone on much longer than i anticipated: waiting, hoping that jon would call me back and help me fix a computer glitch so that the burning of all cds may begin. i've worked way too hard- clicking incessantly on "import", clicking repeatedly "get track names", then to "create new folder", and for the love of god: typing in the band and album names! most of the pirating was to be for him anyways. how can a man live without northern soul and grace? two of the best albums of our time! this is intervention, a requested intervention at that. and me, my diet is lacking some most neccesary iron and wine. though i'm pretty confident that some damien rice, neutral milk hotel, velvet underground, pilot drift( a little n.s with alot of o.s), and the likes will comfortably quell my appetite for the time being.

for no other reason, but another.

where did we all go?!? drifting off into space; into spaces of space, with our secrets, and longings-desperate for meaning and literal for substancial intention. like others. we take our grins, our double meanings, and create some sort of percieved verve; and, in the soft perplexity of chaffing engagements and clicking clocks, shall disappear into never never land.

the end.

from my older sister living in sri lanki: perspective

"Well, the mental picture you paint is all I need to hear - I'm glad your moving to a less stinky area :) The situation here is crazy. Remember how it was after 9/11? Everyone was flying flags, hugging the ones they love, being kind to strangers: that's the thing about tradgedies. People are touched by the realization of how short life is and how much love we feel towards each other. On this island you see men holding hands, girls walking arm in arm, children who leave their parents house only after their married and that's usually not until their 30's. It's like Mexican families - gramma, uncle and cousin are all immediate family members and usually reside within the same domocile. But these things aren't new here. They didn't start happening after the tsunami - it's always been like that here. Tragedy has always been at their doorsteps, walking their streets, lurking in their neighbors house. This country was already taking each day and cherishing it. These people already openly loved one another and were kind to strangers.

Some days here in the city it seems like nothing has changed. The destruction was to the south and north of Colombo but, miraculously, missed the 30 km of coastline of the city. The other day I was at the health club where we work out. It's actually a Hilton Resdience Hotel and it's where Brett lived from March until August when we moved into the house we're in. A man was wondering around the bar, talking to people. One of the waiters told us the man lost his wife in the tsunami. In my mind I wondered, why he was still here. Why doesn't he leave? Does he want to stay? Is he unable to find the magical 'closure' that's suppose to begin the healing? Or, like Brett, does he work here in Sri Lanka and lived in this Hotel with his wife, his wife who is now gone.

Other days you hear the impossible. A bus swept off the coast of Sri Lanka washed up on one of the islands of the Maldives. Another story of a girl in a hospital, around 7 or 8 years of age. She doesn't remember her name, who she was here with, she has complete amnesia. No one has called looking for her. Then you hear about miracles. People who left just one day early from vacationing, a couple driving along the coast who decided to go and look at a waterfall in the mountains and when they returned everthing was gone including the road they'd been on; a small factory that faced the ocean moved a mile inland just two weeks before the tsunami hit.

The city hasn't changed, the people really haven't changed much either there's just a new word in their language now - tsunami. It's the story's that have changed and its the foriegners arriving in the airport who have come to help the people who live here. And the ex-pats. I was grateful before this disaster to the people living here and the kindness they showed but now there is a gentleness in my gratitude. And there's something else I feel too, but I can't describe it. The word appreciative is probably closest to how I feel but it doesn't quite fit the feeling. I guess that's something I'll have to think on.

Hope that helps paint a picture for you of what I am seeing here. No major physical damage where I am but emotional trauma.

Love ya bunches - give Michelle a hug for me then have her hug you for me :)
Shannon"

not by any means of intention is this blogging thing coming to an end. i feel it to be more of an natural elimination; the shuffling of commitments; a sooner than later, later. but who knows. i tried skateboarding tonight...what a riot. i was holding a cig with one hand, a beer with the other, while breezing through a warehouse on 'my board'. no, not my board, literally; just trying to hip to the lingo. it was fun and i think i could be good. make that golden. i think i could be golden. yes, golden. that's nice. i've always had this premination that there are some things, if ambition and preserverance applied, i would be awesome at. like ice-skating and gymnastics, sculpting and somethingology. i'm a vault of potential, what can i say...the salty dogs are, definitely, wearing off.

like most things in life, finishing my new york saga is more effort than it's worth. but i'm in a mood tonight. an awfully dangerous mood. the type that involves me frozen in my car at 1am, listening to sinatra, and watching the neighbors sprinkler make a puddle in the street. not reflective, not pre-occupied, not enamored with this or with that, not trapped in some thought process, simply, mentally, lethargic. a tad bit tipsy too, perhaps. there has been a lot to take in today, but as i sat in my car just a few minutes ago, i can honestly say that i was blank as a blank and it felt nice. after sinatra, i let the silence in, even though i hate that silence: the silence so silent it in itself is loud, is obnoxious, makes your ears want to bleed and your heart beat a little faster, unsteady in perfection. i use to make myself sit in my car till i absolutely couldn't take it a second longer. like holding your breath under water, just 30 seconds longer, 10 seconds longer, breathe. i did it till this one night when the silence was so loud that i crumbled into tears. just pushing the limit, my weirdness, a limit of, in an audible and contradicting (non-)sense, the invisible nihilism. or an ear infection....i'm not sure. going to rock shows can do that. in fact, thanks to radiant, my ears are buzzing as i write. and being past 2am, my bed looks down right tasty. on that note,

sweet dreams.

part 2...

exactly on schedule, the plane hits the run way. it was as smooth of a flight as i have ever been on. i contemplated praising the pilot on my out but shortly came to the conclusion that i, knowing nothing about flying, might come across as someone trying to be a know-it-all by complimenting on something i knew nothing but the comfort about.

walking through the terminal to the baggage claim, i thought about 'the terminal', the movie. i remember someone telling me that it was based off of a true story-and while watching the movie weeks ago, how the thought of it being an actual account versus a fictionalized script, affected me deeply; on how cruel everyone was to this helpless and victimized man. and although the terminal was filmed in and about jfk, how incredibly similar la guardia mirrored the appearance of jfk. but it was the cruelty tom hanks character received that i found to be puzzling. this was because on my last trip to the city, i experienced nothing but kindness and helpfulness from new yorkers: a girl in a bar offering me a cigarette, an old man on some street in china town, after looking at me looking dumbfounded at a map then back up to the street sign, asking me, with the gruffiest new york accent imaginable, if i needed some help with directions, the couple in the subway suggesting places i should visit, and the friends of erik who enthusiatically cheered for me each time i got up to bowl.

as i stood on the corner outside the airport, sweetly waving my hand for a cab like they do in the movies, a cab driver pointed at the sign behind me, which read, "taxis ->". i must have looked like a total goof but the people behind me didn't chuckle, they just kept on moving. as did i, but with rosy cheeks.

after waiting in line for over half a hour for a taxi, i'm finally in one and on my way to the lower east side apartment jackie(rachels sister) found for us on craigs list. the cab driver is telling me about when he was young. his accent is strong and i have a vexxing time at understanding everything he's telling me, but being conscious of the moment at hand; of feeling the coolness of the pleather seat become warmer each second i'm slumped over it, of the reflection of me-of the tassels of my hair that had mysteriously fallen from my pony tail and the cream wool scarf swallowing my face, staring back at me from the night lit maze of senescent apartments and dodgy streets outside the window, of this conversation between two people from two different worlds--i doubt my previous suspensions of this trip being a mistake could be true, even despite the yearning in my heart to be on the opposite coast in another type of automobile with a man i can verbally understand.

to be continued...

real world: nyc

to my right was the hov lane. it stretched out ahead of me gleaming and sparkling with the possibility of uninhibited speed. in less than forty-five minutes, flight 412 would be taking off to la guardia with or without me. and at that moment in time, painfully snailing through traffic on 635's pre-5 o'clock rush hour rush hour , i was afraid it would be without me. the stress levels were at their highest, i could feel the anxiety welling up into tight knots within my chest and adding heat to my face-i still had to drop off jons parents mini van to the park and fly, catch the shuttle to the airport, check in my bags, and haul ass to my gate. i took a deep breathe and closed my eyes for some buddha reflection: "you should not fight what you can not control". i repeated it silently over and over and decided i would stay in the traffic trapped lane despite the need for speed; that i would do my very very best at making my flight, and if i could not, then i could not. sure i had worked my ass off for over a month to do this trip. sure i had spent over a month pinching my pennies, nickels, and dimes. sure i had decided to follow through on my word of going to new york with the girls over a later request to spend the holiday weekend with the devilishly good looking, jon. sure i would be missing out on, what i assumed would be, a week full of priceless memories. sure.

to my right, is a barren field. the blades of grass are dull with color. out in the distance bleakers, or something of that nature, paints the horizon with sci-fi imagery. closer in view, is the wing of flight 412's plane. i'm sitting, still trying to catch my breath from the sprint in, astonished that i made it and curious if perhaps i shouldn't have; questioning the possibilities at why it seemed everything was against me making it on this plane. of course, being prone to epic stricken curiosities, i speculate that the plane will probably crash, and such that i will die, or that it was just a busy day and i wasn't as prepared as i should have been.

to be continued.

skit-skat

this may be the longest break from blogging in my two and a half year stint doing this thing. you wouldn't believe how, literally, in demand me and my time are. we might be hotter than lindsey lohan or scarlett johansberg. might, i re-iterate, humbly. and humbly because, unlike my similaties fast and glamorous lives, i have had time to sit in front of my computer, in my pjs two nights since my last post, and, write two, very, rough drafts; in addition to the fact that my life isn't in the least a tad bit glamorous. but that's on the dl. as to the posts in waiting- one was about christmas shopping on christmas eve and the other about the tsunami in asia. both have left me a little contemplative, a little distraught, and alot drained. at this very moment in time, i'm sitting at the end of the bar here at my work. so, obviously, i'm also a little distracted. just wanted to leave something before i go to new york tomorrow.