Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Tacoctober

I've been invited to a variety of Halloween parties it's true, but I'm wondering if I can just trick everyone into believing I'm at a different Halloween party than them and ditch completely! My costume is pretty good (a killer bee) but my bangs are officially too long as of this week, I have a pimple, which always seems dire to me, and I'm so beat! I feel like it's been too long since I hung out with myself -- just, you know, maybe some fro yo, some online shoe shopping, trying on all my clothes and then throwing them on the floor, daydreamin'... Maybe that's what I'll do, and maybe it's not -- you'll never know for sure!

In other news: goodbye October! We've had some crazy times, and I thought we weren't going to get along for a few weeks there, but we made it! See you again next year!

Sunday, October 28, 2007

dog sleep disorder; futon new york city; captain singleton defoe

I just realized I have no responsibilities starting at 1 PM this Thursday until 6:10 PM the following Wednesday! And I have a car! Now that is something to look forward to. Where should I go? What should I do?

Have you ever checked your "search history" on that google search toolbar on your computer? I just did, and it's pretty good. Here are some highlights starting with "a":
  • A throng of bearded men, in sad-colored garments, and gray, steeple-crowned hats,
  • a potato in situ
  • acute sore throat
  • african dog
  • age of consent new york state
  • akron catholic
  • albert ayler
  • annie actress
  • aoyama
  • antebellum
  • anxiety disorder
  • ashlee simpson
  • atopia
  • atopica
  • attachment disorder dog
  • audio documentary
  • autodocumentary

Either she pooped in a bucket or she didn't

I thought that apartment in Greenpoint was going to work out, but then it fell through! I'm still looking for a place. Yesterday I went to look at an apartment that advertised itself as having three bedrooms/two bathrooms and wood floors. One of the bathrooms is private (aka only for the actress from San Francisco who was renting out the other two bedrooms), and the wood floors are actually that wood veneer tile stuff that you can buy at Ikea! Take your lies somewhere else, you cheating hippie! (Not that everyone from San Francisco is a cheating hippie obvs.)

I just saw this on Craigslist:

$825 Non-smoking petless girl to move into cool Williamsburg apt.


Reply to: hous-461266805@craigslist.org
Date: 2007-10-27, 12:44PM EDT


I'm looking for someone to take over my room in our awesome apartment one and one half blocks from the Grand Street (L) subway station on a quiet block in East Williamsburg. I'm moving because I got a job far away that starts at 7:00am and that's too early to commute from here.

The Apartment: You will pay half the rent (you can see the lease when you sign it) on a two bedroom railroad garden apartment. Your room is in front and has a higher ceiling (very high!) and a bigger closet and your roomate's room is in back and is attached to the garden. Of course you have use of the garden, but will have to go through her room (she's totally cool about this). The large garden is exclusively ours and the two twenty-something year old guys who live across the hall, but I've never really seen them use it (they're cool, but barely ever home). The apartment was renovated during the summer just before we moved in and is totally new and very nice (kitchen, bathroom, windows, doors, floors, paint, everything is new and nice!) The building is small-three floors with two apartments on each. Both bedrooms are large by NYC standards and are roughly the same size. The middle room (common space) is a combo/kitchen and living room and has very little in the way of furniture, so a small couch of yours may be welcome (you'd have to discuss that with your new roommate). Of course, anything you can fit in your unfurnished room is welcome. It easily and comfortably fits a full bed, dresser, desk, tv stand, chair, etc. Each bedroom has it's own private entrance/exit to the building's hallway. The neighborhood has plenty of stores (including Payless!!!) and supermarkets, bars, launrdy, restaurants, etc all very close.

The Roommate: She's very cool and easy to live with. She's clean and rarely home, as she's a teacher, has a serious boyfriend who lives two blocks away, and has a very active social life and goes out frequently. She's in her late twenties and funny, smart and stylish. She's girly (like she puts on twenty five outfits and elicits your opinion on each before going out) but she's not excessively so (she spent a month in Ecaudor this summer and stayed in some nice hotels, but also spent a good portion of that trip essentially pooping in buckets). She's also pretty hot, so watch your boyfriends! She likes to drink a nice bottle of wine and doesn't smoke weed, but doesn't really mind if I do, but no alkies or druggies, please. And she doesn't care if you socially smoke or whatever, but she'd like for someone not to smoke cigarettes in the apartment. She's not looking for a new best friend or anything and will totally respect your privacy and ask that you respect hers, and she's not looking for her clone, but she would like someone sort of like herself. In other words, you should be: in your twenties, fun/social, not dumpy or frumpy, not butchy or tom-boyish, well-educated, fashionable, relatively clean, have a normal job and be responsible with bills and rent. If you are not these things, please don't waste our time making us meet you and feel badly when we have to then giggle and smirk after you leave and come up with a suitably compassionate lie to reject you. I'm sorry to be so frank, but I don't want to waste your or our time and energy. Also, she has a cat and doesn't want anymore pets.

We're looking for someone to move in on December 1st or a few days before that.

Thank you for your interest...serious inquiries only.


This must be totally fake, right? There's so much to dissect: Writing in the 3rd person. So much excitement for Payless. No tomboys. But also no best friends. And you have to watch your roommate try on 25 different outfits while she's getting ready. Unless you leave secretly through your separate exit!
In other news, I went to see Morrissey last night and whoa.

Friday, October 26, 2007

Reader-Produced Issue

For Columbia undergrads Halloween starts the Thursday before the actual holiday. For me, I keep wishing for more time! If you have costume ideas for me, please share them. What if I went as the little girl with the Thor helmet from Adventures in Babysitting? God, I feel lame just writing that.

Here, this is a 100% guaranteed cheer-up. When I was 13 I wanted to model the entire path of my life on this video. I wonder where this girl is now... if you have spare time on your hands please try to find out.



Also, I need a new ringtone for my phone. If you can't think of a good Halloween costume for me or locate the Dirty Boots girl, please just tell me what song my phone should play this fall.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Oh, a day spa!

Did you know there's a whole genre of girl-in-car videos on Youtube?



I guess that is exactly who I would have pictured knowing all the words to "Last Dance With Mary Jane," if I had ever pictured it before.



Whoa, what happened to Katie?

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Secretly

Hillary Clinton totally reminds me of my mom!

Friday, October 19, 2007

What goes around comes around

So, this morning I went to Greenpoint to look at that house, which I think I'm going to take, and it was interesting to talk to the owner of the house who is a mom and an artist whose art is all produced collaboratively with her husband. (I was going to write about that.)

I came home, and -- even though I'm totally poor right now until my mid-semester stipend comes in -- got a lentil soup from the coffee place down the street from me where all the people who work there are crazy. (I was also going to write about the crazy-people coffee place.)

So, I come home, reach my hand into the bag (which is a little soggy already because p.s. it's raining, and I actually bought a $3 umbrella in Greenpoint in response to this weather sitch, further compromising my budget) and immediately I am scalded by the soup -- the lid wasn't on right! So then I put the soup down, wash my hands, come back, pick up the bag again, and the soup spills ALL OVER THE COUCH.

It was just about the most disgusting thing I've ever seen (brown lentils on brown chenille), and also the saddest, and it could have become even sadder because my first thought was "I could probably save some of this" ("save" aka "eat"). But it seemed more important to save the couch. So, I did, although there is a pervasive smell of lentils in my apartment now, which, as those of you who enjoy lentils know, is not always the best.

And now I am forced to eat this disgusting vegan chicken salad that I got earlier in the week at Fairway and that tastes like all it's made with is celery and Miracle Whip. No joke, I think I'm going on a fast because the sight (and smell) of the lentils on the couch plus the taste of this fake chicken salad vegan mayonaisse crap is enough to make me hate all foods 4EVS!!!

IS THIS KARMA??? It's true that I have been slightly full of hate this week but I've done lots of good things too! Maybe I will meditate on this while I wash the lentils from my yoga pants.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Check it

Charlie put all these photos from Wendy's wedding on his flickr page! I'm only in one, but that's okay! I was probably doing something fun while these pictures were taken, although the world may never know for sure.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

I hope you're keeping some kind of record

Twice in the last week I've been getting off the elevator on the first floor of my building and someone else (not the same person though) has tried to get on the elevator while I was getting out. Like, simultaneously squeezing through the door. Both times I fought back -- right of way, motherfucker! -- but both times also the person was so insistent. It was like a turf war. This morning the woman kept saying "sorry! sorry!" and then just trying to push past me more. I mean, why would you try to get on an elevator right when someone else is trying to get off? Have you never been on an elevator before? Who are you??? It makes me nostalgic for London, where "accidental" passerby violence against stupid pedestrians seems way more acceptable than it is here in the Poinciana.

I'm reading The Things They Carried for a class and I'm so not into it. Yeah yeah, it doesn't have to be true to be true, bla bla, trauma, communal memory, what's new? I get it. Plus, Vietnam is such a bummer.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Omens for right now

  • Giant pool of blood on the 116th st. 1 train platform, with a few deli napkins scattered and a smears/drips trail leading up the stairs to the exit.

  • Tiny notebook left in elevator in my building, with coffee stain on spine and writing in pencil on first page only.

  • The song "Driveway to Driveway."

  • This text message:
r u in a truth ad?! Im engaged! Howru?


Monday, October 15, 2007

Other Zoes

Star of such films as "Drumline"

Screenwriter of "Bad Lieutenant," actress, and dead person

Famous photographer

Mischa Barton's sister

Computer scientist from Stanford

Friend to Downsies

Friend to Bichon Frises

A zebra, of course

A cyclone

A research turtle

Sunday, October 14, 2007

Return of the repressed Express pants

Oh in other news, I might have found an apartment in Greenpoint, although the girl who already lives there is being a little weird and I'm not sure if it's because she's busy or because she hates me. But in any case it makes me realize how psyched I am to move. Everyone knows how much I love to move! No, seriously, I do.

I'm trying to figure out my fall wardrobe now that it's suddenly fall, and here's the problem: in a rare moment of closet-organization fervor, I threw away nearly all my pants back in August. I didn't really like any of them that much, and at the time I thought, "Well, I never wear any of these anyway!" I'm sure I don't need to spell it out for any of you, but just remember that those pants that made you feel fat in August might just make you feel warm in October.

And I have the same shoe problem -- I tossed more than a dozen pairs in the summer, but now I have, like, a pair of sneakers, two pairs of boots, and a bunch of party shoes. And some flip flops. And, I just went shoe shopping but I bought a pair of patent-leather pumps and a pair of yellow suede ballet flats. WHY??? I blame Tim Gunn for all of this -- why is he encouraging people to have only ten items in their closets???

Right now I'm staring at the pile of cute sundresses on my floor, wishing it would magically become a pile of cute wool jumpers. Preferably already on hangers. This is really one of those times when an intern or wife would be useful.

Saturday, October 13, 2007

In another part of the world

I had midterm essay meetings with lots of my students and everyone looked so tired. Even my doorman noticed it. I looked in the mirror during a break between conferences yesterday and my eyes were all puffy, my bangs are getting too long, no more summer tan.

When I was driving to Toronto that song "Once in a Lifetime" came on my iPod at the perfect moment in Western New York, driving past some fields and hills and farms, all sunny and pretty with the leaves changing and the still-green grass. How many people have written diary entries and blog entries and short stories and yearbook pages about this is not my beautiful life, behind the wheel of a large automobile, you ask yourself: how did I get here? Well, it's a pretty good song.

Ever since I came back home on Monday there's been a dog barking somewhere in my building. I figure it must be a new dog, a dog who isn't used to getting left home alone. Pretty soon someone will complain and his owners will realize that their dog has a whole life of his own when they're not home -- they hardly even know him.

Last month when I got my thesis advisor assignment I started thinking, how did I get here? What am I doing? Where is this going? It's different to ask those questions when you know what you're doing for another couple years than it is to ask it when you're on that countdown to who-knows-what.

I remember back when I moved out to California after the big break-up I was so lost: walking a mile to the BART every morning to go from Berkeley to SFCC, spending all my money on jeans, writing mean notes to my roommate, making out with the randomest selection of guys (DMV, college bars, the mall, summer school), eating only carrot sticks and pizza and crying all the time. But then I got a job, and a better apartment across from Trader Joe's, and I learned to drive, and I would drive from Oakland up to my suburban job listening to "No More Drama" (mostly because I couldn't stand listening to any music besides top 40, anything that reminded me of New York and my old life) on my Discman connected to my tape player. And I was like, Mary J is so right: it's up to us to choose whether we win or lose. Maybe I liked the stress 'cause I was young and restless but that I was long ago and I don't wanna cry no more. No more Zoe/mom drama, no more his-friends-or-my-friends drama.

So I got a better job and even a car with a CD player, and a few years went by and then I was applying to graduate school, and it was a big relief to everybody, especially my parents who were not sure how to describe me at dinner parties anymore, but that didn't bother me because I was doing it for myself, you know? I was into it. I wanted to stay in California, or move to Toronto -- it seemed like an inspiring place to go, even though I had only been there a little before, especially given the state of the world in late 2004. I didn't really want to go back to New York.

But in between applying and getting in, my grandmother died and then my mom got sick. I remember sitting there when my mom had just had her surgery, fucked up on morphine and cursing me out because I was trying to keep her from pulling out her I.V., and I totally hated her for how much she looked like my grandmother, how much her voice sounded like my grandmother's voice. And of course, I hated myself too for pushing her away for a whole decade, for living far away for the past four years, and I didn't blame her at all a couple months later when I heard her say to her friend on the phone, right in front of me, that her naturopath thought the disease was caused by me, by the stress of caring about me and fighting with me for so many years. Guess what? All those times you wished your mother would die back when you were 14? Experts agree, you could get your wish! Except that luckily, my best efforts were foiled by medical professionals at Mt. Sinai.

So, I said yes to Columbia, and I tried not to think about the reasons why. Of course, that's all hindsight. At the time, I just didn't think about it -- it didn't feel like trying. And it's so easy to do something when you know exactly what's expected of you -- that doesn't really feel like trying either. But now I have to start having thesis meetings, and figuring out what I'm going to do for funding next year, and figuring out what I'm going to do after that. And exactly ten days after I found out who my thesis advisor is going to be, I found out that my mother is sick again, and she's probably (maybe? I guess I have to be careful what I say) going to die. She actually didn't tell me -- she told my sisters, at the dinner table, while I was sitting there having a conversation with my dad about baseball (I guess she likes the convenience of overhearing). And it turns out she's known since April. Thanks, Karen!

And, I know this is crazy, but the first thing I remember thinking is, "why did I bother?" Why did I come back here? Was it just to save my mom? (Did I really think this would be enough?) To make myself feel less guilty? Or did I have some purer reason, something about my hopes for my own future, happy and separate like I used to feel? Did I think I'd find something good in New York in spite of my reservations? And, have I found it? I guess the answer is, it all depends on what I do next. I need to get that feeling back that I had when I knew what I wanted instead of what everyone else wants. I need to get back to that feeling you get when there's only one bus an hour to work so you can't be late, back to the way I used to imagine myself finishing something I care about making and having other people care about it too, back to the discman and the car and the pizza.

Yeah, I just need to figure out what I need to do next. But then here's another question: Is it okay for me to leave again?

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

Everyday People

Okay, here's what I'm doing:

I went to Toronto for Wendy's wedding. It was fun. I got pretty drunk. I saw Ted Leo. That was okay. Saw some friends. That was cool. Then I came home, last night, and today I went to class, went to a meeting about my new job as a writing "consultant" (tutor) for Intro to Gender Studies, came home again, and now I'm going to see "Eastern Promises" again and then I'm going to hang out with David Cronenberg.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Coming soon

  • World of my doormen

  • All new puking story, aka what I did this weekend

  • Academic celebs and their beverages of choice

  • Recent flaneuserie: 8th Ave vs. 7th Ave; and more

  • Seasons change: am I having a pants crisis or a shoe crisis?

Meanwhile, here are some text messages I received recently:
who is jane jacobs?

Read lou pearlman article immediately. I love pinkberry!
Also, when I woke up this morning after a long Monday night, I discovered that I had texted google for the address of this bar Dragonfly on Santa Monica Blvd. in Los Angeles. What a mystery!