Steam Clean the American Dream

Ever get sick of yourself? I'm sick of myself. I'm mulling over important little things like whether or not I should call myself an artist anymore. Between that and my inability to shut off my mind at night, I can't sleep.

Wouldn't it be nice to suddenly get some control over my brain?

Experiment #3

Does this publish? It does! The last two I wrote evaporated into the ether.

Paulie's back from Madrid with great stories. He loved this trip, which differs from the last few. Yippee!

Joe Vs. the Volcano is on in the living room. In the kitchen, beef stew simmers. Larry, a small black cat bent on stealing your soul, sleeps on the floor. Outside, a light rain falls on foggy New Brunswick. I should do four loads of laundry but I feel languid and have a hard time caring, just at the moment.

It's a really nice afternoon.

Re-pressurizing the Cook

Paulie's leaving for Spain tonight. Yesterday we had an intense day of errands. Today promises to be just as full of verbs like PACK and CLEAN and FAX. On Tuesday, I'm getting the beginnings of braces, which will hurt a bit, and I'm thinking of orthodontia as my new weight loss plan. If all I can eat is pulverized fruit, I'll be a twig in no time!

As part of my scheme to get myself off the couch and back on track, or pick a new track and shrug at the conductor, I shuffed money until it pinched and bought a new PowerBook. This means that even on the couch, I've got no excuses for not writing. Mamie stood between me and the Apple store salesman like a U.N. translator and said, "Yes, you need that," and "Nope, that's too much for you." The salesman seemed shocked when this peculiar interaction resulted in a purchase. Also, I refused to let Mamie buy another toy. In the car on the way over Mamie said, "Whatever happens, don't let my buy any more iPod toys! That's not in my budget." After we left, she said, "Thank God you were there or I would've lost my mind and bought that thing." So I bought her a Slurpie.

Last night, when we finally sat down for the evening, Paulie and I saw Auto Focus, about the life of Bob Crane. Greg Kinear is a very, very good actor. That story, though, felt like a two-hour slo-mo train wreck. I wasn't wild about the ride.

Star Bright and Sparkleplenty

I was going pretty crazy with a car that smoked like a house afire, though I really didn't drive anywhere but to work and home again. Still, it's unnerving to sit at the corner of Lewis and French with a car fuming and passersby shouting my car was about to burst into flames. Yesterday, Paulie bought me a simple little blue thing that's - well - a convertible. I would've bought it myself if the credit union had been opened, so now I owe him a little cash. I'm a nervous, conservative driver, but it happened that a dreadful accident occurred between the dealership and the house. So, I had New Car Bootcamp on the way home. Yikes! It wasn't the worst thing that could have happened to me. For instance, Paulie and I could've left the house twenty minutes earlier and been IN the accident that wrecked New Brunswick all day.

It's Fourth of July. Our neighbors have entertained us with small fireworks shows all week. If we have to move out of this neighborhood in the fall, I will really miss the great Latin music rising up from the backyard parties, the random Roman candle shows and abundant barbecue smells every weekend.

Sign Post on the Highway to Hell

Last night, I watched a thing on the National Geographic Channel about the (dun dun dun DUN!) Storm of the Century. Perhaps you recall it as a four-day several-feet-deep snow storm in which hundreds of people were killed and I remember it as a tremendous adventure in which half a dozen people got snowed into the Heartbreak, and Sam and I mounted an Arctic expedition across Donaldson Park, and then hiked to the grocery store to feed the half-dozen people snowed into the Heartbreak. It was awesome. I felt so *alive* and was sorry when the snow melted. The date was March 13, 1993. And then I thought, "I had just turned 30. I was so fucking young. No wonder I enjoyed that natural disaster."