October 7th, 2004. 11:04pm

four years later

Excuse me ... I have an announcement to make.

Four years. Fourteen hundred and sixty days. If I had a nickel for every day I’ve been online, I’d have $73.00 even. Too bad. I could really use those $73.00.

Some of you have been around since the beginning. Some have only recently joined our program, already in progress. I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus lately. I had a show to do, and before that I was sent overseas as a part of an elite anti-terrorism squad … no, wait … that was ‘Alias’. Nevermind.

Things have changed in the last year, but I find them difficult to quantify. I’ve completed some projects, started some new ones. I have seen the culmination of two years’ worth of effort: A show that was built from the ground to the sky, on the backs of those who had faith in it. In each other. In ourselves. But mostly in each other.

In the last year I have starred in a feature film, and if you live in Hong Kong, you may very well see it. If you live in Canada, chances are you never will. I have started relationships, and ended relationships. I have gained and lost friends … and was happy with both circumstances. My hair colour has changed 5 times, but it remains my very own hair. I have written a play in the middle of the night inside a castle in Whitby. I have sent 1892 emails. I have fulfilled long-time goals. I have admitted defeat. I have cut my losses. I have held my head up high. These things are all a product of change.

Some things, however, remain the same. I occupy the same address. I wear the same shoe size. I am no closer to becoming a Taiwanese pop star. I maintain an unfortunate smoking habit. A year ago, I was still coping with an airport goodbye. A year later, I still am.

And I write, fair reader. That hasn’t changed. The frequency, maybe … but not the result. You’ll still find the ramblings, the prophecies, the musings and the notations that make up my life right here. But maybe….

…maybe not for long. I think five is a good number to end on. The lease here has only got one year left. And then I think it’s time to move on.

Welcome to the final year of mouthychink.com. Please enjoy your stay.

October 6th, 2004. 4:01am

The day I met you.

One production ends, another begins. The latter should be fairly simple: a wedding for two of my closest friends. The former was one of the most taxing shows I've ever done. I've got bruises on my legs, knots in my back and shoulders, and a feeling like I've pulled something in my side. Basically, I'm a mess. I need a massage and a vacation, not necessarily in that order. But I loved every minute of it. And I miss it now that it's gone. Been feeling homesick lately, for a lot of things ... and a few key people. I've never really had a place to call home, so homesickness is a strange thing. Like I just need a nail to hang my hat on. Y'know?

Fair reader, it's like this: Things end. Things begin. And in the middle ... somehow or another we just figure shit out. We move forward. We do our best. And at the end of it all, we hope to God we learned something. More on that later. I'll be back tomorrow, with the year-end retrospective. It's the mouthychink.com fourth year anniversary coming up. Just shy of 20 hours from now. So we'll catch up then. For now, I should probably put my head down for a second, maybe try to work out some of these knots. Take care, fair reader.

See you tomorrow.

i look so fucking white it's ridiculous

September 20, 2004. 6:06pm

"Tear streaked faces, trippy places, all of these beautiful lies...."

Sorry for the lack of updates. The picture above is the cast and production team behind the latest production. We opened Saturday night to a full house, and a standing ovation. Who knew?

August 24th 2004. 4:41pm

It all started with a glance.

Kicked off rehearsal early today, and got caught in traffic on the way home. I checked email before I left the theatre, and there wasn't much. So when I got home, it was a little fucking surprising to download 30+ messages. I have numerous Rogers (now "Rogers Yahoo!", which, I believe, is causing the problems) mail accounts, and it all came flooding in. Couldn't figure out why everyone I know decided to email me in the hour it took to get home. Then I checked the dates the emails were sent. For some reason (and not even God knows why) Rogers has been holding random messages back, and just dumped them all on me. Most were from this month or last month, but I received one that was sent in July of 2003. The fuck?

So this entry is to tell a few people I'm sorry, and that I haven't been ignoring you. Especially kng. I had no idea you were trying to contact me, I'm so sorry. And Mrs. Belly, who I received a few from ... kinda par for the course considering how email treats us sometimes, ne? And Kimchi ... actually, no, I was ignoring you. Bitch. If you sent me mail, and haven't heard back, I'll get back to you soon ... I've got to sort through the rest of these first. I've also got a deadline to hit for early tomorrow morning ... prioritizing was never my strong point.

August 15th 2004. 5:07am

Begin transmission.

The last month has been a little unbelievable. The amount of work The Theatre Company has done to prepare for The Production (our inaugural full production, after two years of workshops and one night stands) is staggering. Holding down another job on top of all that work is damn near impossible, and I have the sensation that life is getting away from me. I blinked and it was August. If I close my eyes again, it'll be October. We're about a month away from Opening Night right now, and there's still a fuck of a lot to do. So if my presence here is sporadic, then you'll have to forgive me. And if you're in Toronto, you should drop me a line. You're not going to want to miss this.

Come October my plan is to take a vacation. Not sure if it'll actually come to pass, I didn't do so well with my last vacation plan. But if all goes well, I'm thinking California in the fall. I think I need the ocean.

While preparing for The Production, one of the artists involved received an email, calling me a "son of a bitch halfbreed". And while that may be true, it's still not very nice. The person who wrote the email remained anonymous, but I'm fairly certain it's just another angry full-blood. Or an ex-girlfriend. I have my suspicions, but I'll keep them to myself.

In any case, the point of this update is really just to let people know I'm alive. I've received some concerned emails, and haven't had a chance to reply as of yet. All apologies. I can't get in to it right now, but things have been a little ... hectic. I'll write more at some point. Otherwise, get on with your lives. End transmission.

July 14th 2004. 3:40am

My power just went out, erasing the entry I'd been writing for the last half hour.

It was pretty good, too.

Knew that SAVE button was there for a reason.

Fuck it, I'm going to bed.

June 29th 2004. 2:02am

"Smoke a cigarette and lie some more..." STP - Big Empty

I warn you, this is going to be brief. Thanks to all that sent me questions about your life. I hope I provided the insight and support that only someone who doesn't know you, or your issues, can. My favourite was from someone named "Brownstone", who asked me what he should name his forthcoming baby daughter. If I'm ever in Manhattan and run in to a kid named "Zippo", I'll know my work was done. You can continue to send me questions, fair reader, I feel like Dr. Phil on crack. Assuming Dr. Phil isn't already on crack. Which is a slim chance.

Things have been a little hectic, lately. Finding time to write is proving more difficult than I thought it would be. There's something ... just below the surface, there's something ... but I can't put my finger on it. Can't figure it out. It drives me to say something, but the words won't come. Somewhere, there's a story or a script or just a scratch on a page that needs to be made, it's somewhere just below the surface. But it's hard getting past the surface, these days. I get the feeling I've built a wall so high even I can't get over it.

June 20th 2004. 1:59am

Memory Lane. Unit #43, Toronto, Ontario.

I should be in bed. Asleep. Unconscious. By all accounts, I am exhausted and red lining. But I'm awake. And writing. Because it really has been a while. Besides sporadic updates from a hijacked connection in the entertainment district that I logon to regularly, I haven't had a lot of time to really sit and write. Most people likely consider that a blessing, as my excuse for writing is sketchy at best. But it helps me make sense of things. Gives me perspective. And we all need a little perspective every now and again.

The problem with computers is that they store a great deal of information you may have forgotten you ever acquired. Old programs you don't need. Pictures from a party you'd rather forget. Photographs of people you don't know anymore. I happen upon these things by chance most days. Some days I go looking for them, but more often than not they just jump out. Like they'd been ignored and are in need of validation again.

Some people have told me that I look to the past too often. I disagree. I think it chases me down, follows me home; like there's a lesson I was supposed to learn there, but didn't. And it haunts me sometimes. Teasing, flickering on the windshield, images of people and places I can't erase. Some because I don't want to, others because I simply don't know how. I opened the instruction manual, but they gave me the wrong model. Personal relationships should come with a warranty.

Don't get me wrong, fair reader, all is well. I just found a message is all. A missive. From someone back in the short history of me. Another face faded. Another airport goodbye. Another unanswered question. Another thing I won't forget - or can't forget - I guess it doesn't really matter which. If you could know one thing, if you had the chance to just know ... something you never did ... what would it be? There's a million unanswered questions out there. If I could have just one, I think maybe I know what answer I'd like. And it's not important anymore, of course ... not in the grand scheme, not in the day-to-day. In this missive, there was a sentence not completed. It hovered for a second, then trailed off and never returned. It's stuck with me for a long while now. I've completed it every way possible, just to try it on. Nothing seems right. Maybe I'm missing a transitive verb, I don't know.

So what would you like to know? If you could, I mean. How 'bout this: send me a comment or e-mail, ask me what you'd like to know. Ask me why your boyfriend left you, or why you didn't get that first date kiss. And I'll send you the answer. It probably won't be right, but it's something of a new perspective. And even if it's completely unfounded ... it's still perspective. So ask. I'll answer. Limited time only. Maybe I'll even post them. Only time (and response) will tell.

"She turned around, what was she looking at? She was a sour girl the day that she left me." STP - Sour Girl

June 13th 2004. 3:06am

All along the watchtower.

Fair reader, I don't know what to say. I've tried to update this site several times over the last few days, and never got to the point of posting an entry. Everything I write looks trivial and bland. You could argue that more than half the things up here are trivial and bland, but then I'd just cry and nobody wants that. Nobody.

June 14th 2004. 2:41am

And then I passed out. Exhausted from a combination of sleep deprivation and killer workouts that I'm assured are "light" but feel heavy. It all caught up to me after that last sentence, and the world cross faded in to a black haze.

In the morning, while doing laundry, I figured I'd take advantage of being near a landline and made a few long distance phone calls to faraway friends. I mostly got machines, but managed to catch up with a few friends overseas. While I was at it, I dug up Kirei's number and gave it a shot. She's been a little down lately on account of a relationship gone sideways, and figured she could use a friendly voice. I hate seeing people go through relationship hell, especially things similar to my own fucked up experiences. She's a good kid, and deserves better than that. And, yes, being a year younger than me does give me license to call you "kid". I'm on the wrong side of 25, and I'll take the few small privileges that come with that.

Driving home tonight, I stopped in at the local Sunoco to fill up on gas and cigarettes. Mary, my gas attendant who works nights and always smiles when I walk in, was being pestered by an obnoxious white woman who (for reasons unknown) was reading newspaper headlines out loud. Mary nodded and threw in "that's nice" or "that's awful", depending on the headline. She rang in my purchases and discreetly rolled her eyes. The white woman now involves me in her one sided conversation, after reading an advertisement for Father's Day. "Hey, Father's Day is this Sunday, don't forget!" She sounds like a commercial for Telus or Radio Shack. I nod as Mary gets my change. "Hey, you should go to the concert on the lake, take your dad to that concert." I smile and look away, I'm not throwing a word in to this. Mary's still counting the coins. "Hey, what? Whassamatter, you don't got a father, huh?" I stuff the bills in my pocket and slide a loonie 'cross the counter to Mary. I think I'm the only person in this city who tips at the gas station. "Everybody's got a father, right? Don't forget, this Sunday..." She thrusts the paper in to my chest to prove it. It floats to the ground. I pocket the cigarettes and walk across the newsprint to the door.

Sometimes these things just write themselves.

June 5th 2004. 2:17pm

Spring is dying.

Summer will take its place. Brisk nights pervade in to June, but there's nothing we can do about that. Dark thoughts rest melancholy on the tongues of my friends, but there's nothing we can do about that. My own thoughts aren't much brighter these days. Maybe it's the weather, maybe it's the medicine, neither one are sitting well with me. A strong antibiotic, my medicine comes in a 40 gram pill.

She sees me at my darkest and tries to force a smile. Eyes searching eyes, she lights a candle and kisses me goodnight. Her hand drifts across my face and I draw back from it. Something true. I've always wanted something true. But in times like these, I need to believe that everything is lost. I catch her hand before it's gone, and mutter an apology. It's just that I know I'm alone here, and god how I hate to be wrong. She smiles weak, her patience tried, and disappears. My medicine comes in the nape of her neck.

Outlooks change, fair reader. Like topography over time, it weathers and it wears. What once was smooth is now jagged. What was fine is coarse. The lay of the land is now dry, cracked, broken and bleeding. These scars. They get in the way of life sometimes. My medicine comes now in stalwartness and silence.

May 23rd 2004. 10:54pm

Written earlier

Fractured pieces of a windshield line the street, caution tape barricades the scene, cops with rain slickers step meekly between shards of glass. And I drive by. Welcome to my least favourite time of year.

Sitting in a parked car, tossing spent cigarettes through a barely open window. Trying to keep the rain out, it slides off the windows, knocks on the doors. Had to leave where I was to write this. A notepad balances on my leg, framed by the spill of streetlights.

Big storm tonight. Water splashes the paper, runs the ink down the page. Not doing a very good job of keeping the rain out. A steady stream of it trickles in, and I'm alone here. Funny how, for all the bitching I do, I find myself parked outside a Tim Hortons in North York. Guess there's just not a hell of a lot of places to go. Guess I'm never quite sure just what to do with myself in times like these. Sitting in a car and smoking cigarettes sems as good an idea as any right now. There are times in this life when nothing makes a hell of a lotta sense to me.

In an hour, The Day will turn.

I try my best to keep the rain out, but this window just won't close.

May 14th 2004. 2:50am

I hate Brampton.

Brampton is a suburb north-west of Toronto. And I hate it. I was there tonight, watching Fucking Krolik play Linus in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown. After seeing the show, I think it should be retitled: You're a Bad Actor With No Apparent Storyline to Back You Up, Charlie Brown. But that might not fit on the marquee. Krolik was the best thing about the show, and that's not just 'cause I love the guy. He was the only one on stage not playing a cliche, and he managed to bring up the other actors he was on with, if only for the short time he was on stage. He's gonna go far, that guy. I've said that from the beginning, and I hold to it. I'm going to ride Fucking Krolik's coattails all the way to the top. Read whatever sexual innuendo you like in to that ... as I'm sure he will.

Unfortunately, we were seated in the midst of some native Bramptonians (Bramptonites? Bramptoners?) who averaged around 16 years of age (I later learned) and talked through the entire first act in their native tongue. The native tongue of Brampton is, apparently, suburban ghetto slang. I'm not even sure why they were there. Maybe there aren't any Tim Hortons parking lots to hang out in around Brampton. Mac the Doll, Helen and Crotchety Ryan were along for the festivities, and we were unanimously dumbfounded at how these people are allowed to leave the house. Especially the little prosti-tots wearing more makeup than clothing. Who raises these fuckers?

When we got outside at intermission, I offered Mac the Doll a cigarette. As I put the pack away, some gangsta-bitch approaches me:

Gangsta-Bitch: Do you have an extra cigarette?
Me: No.
Gangsta-Bitch: C'mon, just one?
Me: You're, like, twelve.
Gangsta-Bitch: I'm sixteen!
Mac: Yah, you're still underage!

She eventually went back to her "crew" and started talking heatedly and pointing at us.

Mac: Um, maybe we should get a ride back to our car.
Helen: Yah, thanks, now we're gonna get shot.
Me: C'mon, people from Brampton don't shoot you.
Helen: Wasn't someone just shot in Brampton yesterday?
Me: Yah, in Brampton, but they were from Scarborough...

Also heard throughout the night:

Crotchety Ryan: I was on your website earlier today. So that one hit today is from me. I was trying to read until the end, before I realized ... it doesn't end. It just continues on and on...
Me: That's my site ... no substance. Nothing but empty calories.
Helen: Is it Atkins friendly?

(as the theatre doors are closing)
Mac the Doll: I'm getting a bad Russian Theatre feeling...

(as a Harley drives loudly by, shaking the window panes outside)
Crotchety Ryan: I was going to take my motorcycle, but it's in the shop getting a louder muffler put on.

Mac the Doll: I want to read some of this on your site tomorrow...

So, there you go, my pilgrimage to Brampton. God willing, I'll never have to go back. On the drive up, I saw a middle-aged stripper and a man that looked like Sonny Bono rolling a joint outside a GM dealership. Shoulda just turned around right then...

May 11th 2004. 3:15am

If you fall I will catch you.

A certain well/out spoken veterinarian had me digging up Goldfinger's version of 99 Luft Balloons this weekend. On kind of a cover kick, I've also been listening to Matchbox 20's version of Time After Time (shut the fuck up, Rob Thomas' voice is gold) and Frente's Bizarre Love Triangle. How about you, fair reader? What do you think the greatest cover of all time is? If any of you say The Ataris - Boys of Summer, I'll come to your house and kill you myself.

And have you heard Rockin' the Suburbs by Ben Folds? It's kinda been the theme song of the last 24 hours. On the warmest night of the year, so far, I took a drive to get some coffee and cigarettes. In suburbia at the time (I'm now safely back in Toronto), there was a fucking car convention in every Tim Hortons parking lot I passed. Like Hot Import Nights vomited out these suburban Fast and the Furious motherfuckers. Don't get me wrong, I've got no quarrel with real racers. The cats from SGR and Racemode or whatever are cool with me, they actually know what they're doing. It's these suburbanite punks with their fat wallets and complete lack of skills that make me angry. Pulling in to the drivethrough, I was stuck behind a dropped Civic that took 5 minutes to get up the driveway incline. Maybe I'm just mad 'cause his fender cost more than my entire car. Or maybe I just don't like one man's overcompensation getting in the way of another man's cup of coffee. Know what I mean? I don't know when hanging out in parking lots became cool. When did people stop hanging out at gas stations and 711s? Fuck, I'm old.

Okay. My rant is over.

I've actually been away the last little while, on that vacation I alluded to last entry. A little west and a little south, it's warmer by the lake and Toronto felt so far away. Me and this girl - with soft lips and a sense of humour - escaped my city for just a couple of nights, leaving obligation and paying jobs behind. We stayed in a town that has last call at 10pm, and you can actually find parking on the main streets. The kind of place I'd never live in and frequently make fun of ... but goddamn it's nice to visit. I didn't even check my email. Funny how it all works out. Pictures to follow, in case you're interested. You're probably not, but I'll post them anyway. Speaking of which, I found out that I have more American readers than Canadian ones. And since there are only five of you out there, three of you must live south of the border. In which case, you have no idea what the hell Tim Hortons is: with the exception of Mrs. Belly who likely still has the coffee grounds in her freezer. Think Starbucks, but less annoying/commercial/cultish.

In other news, I've been having strange dreams about people I know recently. I had a dream about Lee the other night, and oddly enough, one about thisgirlhere. You should both email me so I can fill you in on the details. One involved whipped cream and a bathtub filled with live eels, but I'm not telling which one.

In "this world might turn out okay after all" news, I met a girl on set named Grace. She did my makeup for a few days, and we got to talking. Real sweetheart of a girl. But she was stuck in this situation: Been with the same guy for five years, and it's heading towards a marriage she doesn't want a part of. The way she tells it, this cat is a real control freak. Like Ike Turner, but Chinese. And much like Ike, he'd already been physically abusive to her. Enough to leave bruises once or twice, but careful not to leave anything too noticeable. Suspicious, dependant, paranoid and a fucking sociopath to boot. She'd tried to leave, but he got wind of it every time. Classic story, right? We've heard it all before. She even thought it was her fault, but couldn't figure out how ... she just couldn't understand how he could be so fucked up. Classic. So while she touched up my face, I outlined her plan to leave this guy. Gave her a game plan and fool-proof instructions which basically amounted to: go to work in the morning and never come back. Before she left, I gave her my number in case things went sideways and she got caught over her head. Figured nothing would come of it, that she probably wouldn't leave, because it's classic: they rarely do. I called her a few days later to check up but she didn't answer her phone. This weekend I got an email saying that this guy had called the film's producer, trying to find Grace ... said she hadn't been home in a few days, and he didn't know where she was...

... chalk up one for the good guys.

May 3rd 2004. 1:31pm

Adorned with my mistakes.

Fair reader, I've been to hell and back. Actually, I'm not all the way back yet. I'm still in Hell's area code, but I can see the real world on the horizon. The two look remarkably similar.

I've been running myself in to the ground lately, trying to clean up my life and prepare for the future of the theatre company. Foundation/donorship packages had to be written and assembled, in hopes of getting funding for our next project in September. All four of us are working like dogs, and the goal is far from sight. But we'll get there. I have all faith that we'll get there. And optimism isn't my strong point, so that should tell you something. Eponine and I have been working on foundations and donors, while Sensei and the Urban Samurai have been working on sponsorships. There's a contest to see who gets granted the most money, and I'm convinced me and Ep will win. Not because we have a superior package, but because she's going to sell her body, and I'm going to sell children on the black market.

To make things increasingly difficult, I found out last week that my drivers license had been suspended ... since May 2003. Yes, I've been driving for a year with a suspended license. Aren't they supposed to send you something in the mail, or call you? Well, they didn't. I only found out when my new insurance company ran an abstract on my driving record. So last week, I paid my dues as a public transit commuter, while my license was held in bureaucratic limbo. I took the bus. I took the subway. Then I got tired of all those people, and I took cabs. During one particularly expensive cab ride, the driver almost sideswiped 3 cars, rear ended a bus, and ran two red lights. I was in the back, praying to every God I could think of, because good coverage never hurt nobody. Luckily, we arrived at my destination unscathed.

Cabbie: That'll be $29.50
Me: Do I get a discount because you almost killed me 5 times?
Cabbie: (dead serious) We don't give discounts for that.

I now have my license reinstated and have vowed to keep speeding, but fight the tickets in court.

I've also wrapped shooting on the film, finally. The producer told me that normally they would dump a bottle of Cristal over my head, but all they could afford was Ginger Ale. As long as they deliver my cheque on time, they could dump napalm on me and I'd be happy. Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration. It was a good time, and with any luck, the producer will find money/resources to shoot my (extremely short) short that I proposed to him. We got along real well, and he seems like a good guy. He drives a '72 Volvo, and it's hot as hell.

During this film, I have:

• Played guitar and sang a ballad
• Rocked out on stage with a band backing me up and a room full of people watching
• Made out with a guy named Tim
• Had a snowball fight in 20 degree heat
• More blown takes than good ones
• Rarely memorized my lines before arriving on set
• Stormed off set to my trailer after firing my assistant for having a name that started with the letter "M".

All in all, I'm about ready for a break and more than 4 hours of sleep a night. Things are behind me for now, but there's more coming soon. Just enough time to take a hiatus, find a safe place to lay my head down, maybe dream a little. Before I have to face the world again.

April 25th 2004. 4:16pm

"Waiting for the great destruction. Waiting for Holden Caulfield to call." - Matthew Good - Waiting for the Great Destruction

Yesterday I decided the fate of several high school students by sitting on the audition panel for my old program. As with any program; there are some talented people, some that aren't ready just yet and some that should seriously consider an alternate career. There's only 24 spots available, and out of 400+ applicants, that's a lot of disappointment in store for people. When you tell someone that they probably won't get an offer from the program, their eyes sort of glaze over and they smile to keep from screaming or crying or doing something rash. I let someone else give them the bad news, I hate being the bearer of things like that. The irony isn't lost that my old school is paying me an honorarium to help them judge who gets in to a program I damn near got kicked out of, and technically never graduated from. I do the strangest things for money.

One kid came in with big eyes and bad posture, and he reminded me of myself. One of his monologues was from the play Six Degrees of Separation by John Guare. I'd completely forgotten how much I loved that play, the effect it had on me when I was young. First produced in 1990, and based on a true story, Six Degrees... plays almost like a fable. A young, black con man works his way into the home of a Manhattan socialite couple by pretending to be a friend of their son at Harvard. He cooks, he cleans, he waxes philosophic on Catcher in the Rye, and he claims to be Sidney Poitier's son. He gains their trust, and a good sum of their money in the process. It's a brilliant play. And the film version (starring Will Smith, pre-Independence Day) was actually pretty good. In any case, here's the monologue the kid did:

"The imagination has been so debased that imagination -- being imaginative -- rather than being the lynchpin of our existence now stands as a synonym for something outside ourselves like science fiction or some new use for tangerine slices on raw pork chops -- what an imaginative summer recipe -- and Star Wars! So imaginative! And Star Trek -- so imaginative! And Lord of the Rings -- all those dwarves -- so imaginative --

The imagination has moved out of the realm of being our link, our most personal link, with our inner lives and the world outside that world -- this world we share. What is schizophrenia but a horrifying state where what's in here doesn't match up with what's out there?

Why has imagination become a synonym for style?

I believe that the imagination is the passport we create to take us into the real world.

I believe the imagination is another phrase for what is most uniquely us.

Jung says the greatest sin is to be unconscious.

Our boy Holden says "What scares me most is the other guy's face -- it wouldn't be so bad if you could both be blindfolded -- most of the time the faces we face are not the other guys' but our own faces. And it's the worst kind of yellowness to be so scared of yourself you put blindfolds on rather than deal with yourself..."

To face ourselves.

That's the hard thing.

The imagination.

That's God's gift to make the act of self-examination bearable."

In other news, I've been shooting a film for the past few weeks - one of the reasons my updates have been so sporadic. My schedule shifts like mood swings and is tolerated just as lightly. By the end of this week, I didn't know if I was coming or going, and ended taking a nap in a parked car. Memories of being homeless, years ago, swung back at me. Sleeping in a car does that to me. It's familiar in ways I wish it wasn't.

So I'm shooting this film. And I play a high school student that the lead character falls in love with. The lead character is a 16 year old gay Chinese boy that just moved from HK to Toronto with his family. Inevitably, there's a pseudo love scene and on Friday night I shot my first big screen kiss. With a guy named Tim.

Straight women can't figure out what the attraction is for guys watching two girls make out. Well, I can now claim a lack of understanding for the opposite, because the women I've told have all shown a keen interest in seeing this scene. On set, the female production assistant - Nam - greeted me as I made my way up to the bedroom we were shooting in.

Nam: Come on in, loverboy.
Me: Yah, yah, watch the straight boy squirm, laugh it up.
Nam: Aw, you're not uncomfortable, are you?
Me: Tell you what, you make out with the Sound Girl over there and tell me how comfortable you are.

Actually, I wasn't that uncomfortable. These things don't really phase me ... it's just acting. And I'll do damn near anything for a paycheque. The thing that was making me uncomfortable was that before the kiss ... I had to sing. My character is in a band, and the scene opens just as he's working on a song. So I've got to play the guitar and sing in the scene, before the kiss. And I can't sing any more than I can play guitar. I faked the guitar playing, but had to sing along so we can match my lips moving in ADR (Additional Dialogue Recording, done in studio after shooting wraps). Kimchee called as I was shooting, so if you're reading this, that's why I didn't answer the phone. I was singing and making out with a guy for five hours.

I do the strangest things for money.

April 16th 2004. 11:15am

Throw it all away.

You with your serious look. Me with my ghost eyes. You with your piano player hands. Me with my social pathology. You with your killer smile. Me with my faraway look. You with your gray hairs. Me with my amnesia. You with your certainty. Me with my cigarette dangling. You with your history. Me with my music always on. You with your chardonnay. Me with my checkered past. You standing all alone, waiting for the train to come on a Saturday afternoon while the tracks glisten with rain and sweat, the sun just getting hotter. Coming to see me.

April 13th 2004. 4:29pm

Missing Mrs. Belly...

Sorry for the sporadic updates, fair reader. I'm out of excuses like peanuts at a ballgame, but that analogy should give you some hint at what ails me. Blocked. Constipated thought. My chi isn't flowing and my chakra left town without a note. I'm apathetic and lethargic these days... even though there's plenty to be excited about. And it's not that I'm unhappy ... I'm perfectly fine in my personal life ... but my writing life is as slow as my sex life was back in high school. More than likely, the month of March burned me out, drained me of creativity and left me hung out to dry. March can be like that. I'm boycotting March next year. I will go from February directly to April.

By the by, have you seen Corner Gas on CTV? Fucking funniest Canadian series since This Hour... had Rick Mercer. In other news, Sue Thomas F.B.Eye continues to suck.

10:18pm

I got distracted and didn't finish this post right away. Right now I'm listening to bad J-Pop on an online radio station, waiting for the results of an arts grant to be announced. It's an Asian Artists Fund, and the two guys that are supposed to announce the winners are late to show up at the station ... you don't get more Asian Artist than that. They were supposed to be there at 10. I wish these people would show up ... I can only take so much J-Pop before I kill someone.

10:25pm

They finally showed up. I wish they'd stop talking and just tell me if my company got the money or not.

10:33pm

For the love of God, just tell me if we got the money. [The new Utada Hikaru single is pretty good, though] If one of the DJs wasn't a friend of mine, I'd call in a bomb threat.

10:46pm

It's like waiting for blood test results ... you know it's going to happen, but you're not sure if the news'll be good or not. We need the money. Give us the money. Or at least stop playing this godawful music.

10:53pm

We didn't get it. I hate you all.

April 7th 2004. 7:24pm

I love this song.

I've been hired as stage director for an upcoming event being staged as a part of South Asian Heritage Month. It's a fashion show/theatrical extravaganza. I've also been tapped as a writer, but that's secondary right now. The group responsible is so hip it's tragic, and being a part of them makes me feel like one of the cool kids in high school. Which means in ten years I can expect to be a resounding failure, like all the other cool kids from high school. I can't wait. Ever run in to those people? It's kinda sad. I'd feel sorry for them if I wasn't too busy laughing at their expense.

I've taken to running lately. In some effort to get back in to whatever state of pseudo physical fitness I was in before. It's a bad sign when muscles go in to atrophy at 26 years old. So I've been running. Or at least walking briskly. It beats the hell out of portscanning random IPs for no reason. The only problem is that I'm not exactly a "workout" guy. I don't have the right clothes. If you know me, you're probably picturing me jogging down the street in my beat up loafers and a wool coat ... and smoking. You're not far off. Luckily I saved some runners from when Zen cleared out his closet long ago, and it's warm enough to go outside without a coat now. I don't smoke while I run, but I do take cigarettes with me, just in case. I think they should have cigarettes in little glass boxes inset in the side of street lamps, with little signs that say "Break glass in case of emergency". That'd be swell. I'm a fucking addict.

April 1st 2004. 2:45pm

"There's beauty in the breakdown." Frou Frou - Let Go

It's been raining for days here. Mist, fog and slippery blacktop have replaced snowbanks and salt stains on the carpet. Soon we'll be inundated with mosquitoes and people will start to say "it's not the heat, it's the humidity". I hate that saying. I don't care if it's the heat or the humidity ... it's fucking uncomfortable, let's leave it at that. But that's not for a while. At least another month. The trees are still bare here, leaves line trenches and driveways and sidewalks to places I'm tired of walking to. Grey skies cut in to the window, and I'm tired of this place. Don't get me wrong, things aren't so bad ... not so bad at all. Traffic's a bitch, but other than that, life's grand. I guess I'm just tired of made up people and their made up problems. Like the trees here, they lack substance ... and you can see right through them, out to the real world.

Yesterday, I missed the opening of a new play because I was late. I actually arrived on time, but was accosted in the parking lot by a guy in need. So as my free ticket went to waste, and the doors closed inside ... I was outside giving this guy's car a jumpstart. When he was finally up and running, I booked inside, but by then I was 3 minutes late and denied admittance. Serves me right for being a good Samaritan. I'm gonna go back to hating people and ignoring my fellow man ... at least then I was on time for things. Kinda.

Now that March is over, and I survived it, there's this downtime that I hate. After being so busy, the drop in energy kills me. Makes me lethargic and on edge. I've still got projects moving, but not at the same pace as before. I'm thinking of going away for a few days, getting out of this head space and trying to relax. I tried to relax once before, and it didn't work out for me. Maybe I should get the second time out of the way to make room for the charm of the third. Me and relaxation, we've got kind of a complicated relationship. We find each other in the strangest places, but when I try to go back, it's never the same. Funny how that works.

It's starting to rain again. No surprises these days. None at all.

March 29th 2004. 2:33pm

This will not be forgotten.

Yesterday I sat bolt upright when I heard on the radio they'd found Cecilia Zhang. My heart fucking sank when I heard the words "remains" and "autopsy". I just about fucking died myself. I guess I was with everyone, holding on to the hope she was still alive. Such a strange crime, this one. No motivation, no rhyme, no reason. Just out and out tragedy. I mean, she's a kid, right? Just a kid. This sort of thing kills me. Hopefully the homicide investigation will be more fruitful than the kidnapping one was. There are some sick fucks in the world today.

This sort of thing brings out the Holden Caulfield in me. I want to keep everyone safe, be the catcher in the rye. No one can erase all the "fuck you" signs in the world and, truth be told, I wrote a lot of them myself. But what good is reaching for that brass ring when someone can vanish you away in the middle of the night like fucking Copperfield, without a trace. There's no shortage of evil in the world today. Be safe. Life's fucking short.

i had to write in this chapel for 8 hours | my makeshift workstation (note the ghetto masking tape)

staircase in the main hall of the castle | me getting ready for the $125/plate dinner

lowkey at the hotel we were put up at | panaromic view of scenic whitby

my hilarious cast from last thursday's reading | this one's for jooburger

dilly-esque pictures of celebratory sushi

and strawberry crepes with vanilla whipped cream

March 23rd 2004. 3:40pm

Simple Simon.

Told you pictures were on the way. The first few are from my pilgrimage to Whitby, writing in a castle for 8 hours. I was assigned to write in the chapel, and it was a gorgeous chapel ... but a chapel at 4:00am in a big fucking castle with only 10 other people scattered throughout ... kinda creepy. The other pictures are of the cast from my short play that was showcased at the theatre company's festival of new work last Thursday. You can see two men in tights, My Little China Girl dressed up as "The Sun", two sexy "catholic school girls", Lowkey and Sensei reprising their roles from the August production, and the coolie from the Heritage Canada railroad commercial. No, really, it's him. I find it hilarious that I know that guy. It was a weird little show, but people seemed to like it, so whatever. The other pictures are of the celebratory sushi dinner i mentioned yesterday, with crepes to follow. I usually don't take pictures of food, but goddamn it was beautiful.

Last couple of days I've been a "guest artist" in Teacher's class, warping young minds and trying to ignore the high school flashbacks that hit every once in a while. High school was a long time ago, and I'd rather forget it ever happened. The way my memory is going, I'll probably succeed in that by next week. The classes I'm 'teaching' are alright. The kids are attentive, and most of them are likeable enough. Which is saying quite a bit, 'cause I don't like anyone. I barely like myself. They listen and follow directions, which makes me think I could put them in a sweatshop and start my own clothing line. I want to warn them about the real world, and tell them not to make the same mistakes I did. Caution them about student loans and making VISA payments on time ... and about youth being wasted on the young, it really does makes sense in the end. But these things aren't my place. I'm just passing through, imparting what little I know to likely be forgotten next week. There's a whole decade between me and these kids ... and there's something extraordinarily sad about that, but I don't know what it is.

March 22nd 2004. 4:05pm

This is our last goodbye.

Lipstick pink goes her smile. Flashes of her getting changed to leave imprint themselves in my half-asleep mind. Pieces of her from time to time, and when I wake up I'll try - over coffee and a cigarette - to put them back together. Figure out where we left off. She says I've stopped grinding my teeth in my sleep, and I vaguely remember waking up to her holding my mouth, mumbling "stop it", sometime around 3am. Marble smooth go her hands. Across my face, stopping at my chin, rubbing the uneven patches where I shaved badly the morning before. I pull the duvet over my head to hide from further inspection. I fall asleep for twenty seconds, and when I wake up I'm short of breath and alone. I lie still and pretend I'm floating in the ocean, a million years from here. My body forces me out of bed because I'm craving a cigarette, and it seems like I'm nothing but addictions these days. These days there's not much more to me than that. I leave the place cleaner than it started; luggage shouldered, I lock the door behind me. And out of sync goes my style.

March 22nd 2004. 1:08am

Made a man out of me.

I've been trying to sleep for the past two hours ... no luck yet. Sorry for the break in service, fair reader. I warned you March was going to be hell, and hell it's been. I managed to get one day off where I did no work at all, and that was a joyous occasion. It was celebrated with sushi and bok choy, pictures to come. For some reason, I've taken to Dilly's affection for photographing my food. But it really was quite pretty. Also, I'll update with pictures of the castle I was writing in ... coming soon.

Tomorrow I start teaching at a local arts high school, teaching our youth how to be playwrights. My advice of "smoke cigarettes and drink lots of coffee" is sure to go over well with the school board. I may get offered a full time position. Fucking job has me up at 6:45am to get there on time. The first lesson should be that playwrights don't get up that early. Not even God gets up that early.

There's more I'd like to write, but no time to do it in. I still need a lesson plan for tomorrow and the whole sleep thing should really be taken care of. Goddamn insomnia. I'll be back soon.

March 11th 2004. 2:25am

Give me a sign.

Fair reader, this will be a quick update. Right now I'm at a castle in Whitby, taking part in a 24 hour playwriting festival. I have until 6:00am to write a 12 minute play, set in a specific room. 10 playwrights, 10 different rooms. I was assigned the chapel, so here I sit, awaiting inspiration. Lowkey is in another room, also sent here as a writer. I'm updating via the wireless network here that apparently no one felt obliged to encrypt. Jacking their signal, sitting in the middle of centre aisle, Matthew Good on the speakers. The castle has now been converted in to an all girls private school. It's March Break, but apparently there are still some teenage girls sleeping in the residences upstairs. Lowkey and I are going to pull the fire alarm later and see what happens. We are dirty old men with no shame. Or pride. Or, apparently, ethics.

I love wireless internet access. Though I shouldn't be distracting myself. I'm on page three with only 3.5 hours left. Time to get back to work. See you soon, fair reader. Oh, and last night's reading went very well, thanks for all the well wishes I got over e-mail. I'll take some pictures here and send them to you as postcards. Whitby is a strange place. Everyone has the same haircut and act like they've never seen a yellow person before. Thankfully, I'm safe in my castle. There's a girl locked in a tower somewhere, I'm sure of it. Gonna go find her soon.

March 9th 2004. 8:08am

"Wait and see what tomorrow brings." Tragically Hip - Wheat Kings

My workshop starts in less than two hours, so of course I'm freaking out. Shaky hands palm cigarette after cigarette to burn, a suicidal effort to calm my nerves. On the lunch break today, I'm scheduled to do an interview at CBC Radio, then back to the theatre. They want me to read a section of the play on the radio. I don't interview well. My words come out all jumbled and confused, like they don't know where to go if there's not a keyboard to direct them.

If I'm this nervous now, just imagine the quivering mass of nerves I'll be at the reading tomorrow night. Not a pretty sight. Not pretty at all. This is not the first reading I've done ... but it's the most important.

I'll be back, tell you how it went. Not that anyone cares, but it's something to talk about. Wish me luck, fair reader ... I'll be right back.

March 7th 2004. 5:58am

Everything in hi-fi.

Driving home the other night, raindrops skipped the wiper blades, and the world felt kind of lonely. I pulled to the shoulder and watched blurry lights streak by the rain soaked window, flashes of lives I didn’t touch and never mattered to. I thought of you, then, fair reader. I imagined us as timeless, extraordinary and complete, and all the things we thought we’d be at 26 years old. I want to hear all the stories you have to tell, and laugh in all the right places. We could get together at that place you know, just a little south of here. Gather with our packs of cigarettes and bottles of wine, and just tell stories until the sky clears and it’s safe to pull back on the road. And we can be all those things we only wished we’d become.

March 4th 2004. 1:47pm

Swiftly go the days.

Ever since March hit, it's been a nonstop barrage of things, fair reader. I've got gigs lined up almost back to back the entire month, plus two part time jobs that I've unwittingly taken on. My Extenda-March plan was rejected by city council, so I'm doing my best to prevent burn-out before it happens. Considering that I needed a vacation going in to this, I'm not sure how I'm going to feel coming out of it. But it's safe to assume there will be some meat grinder analogies coming your way soon. The bright side is that I'll have enough by the end of the month to afford that trip south of the 49th. Now I'm just wondering if it's really the right thing to do. I miss the Musicmaker, and I miss the ocean ... I just don't know. Maybe I should wait and see if I survive March, first. Out like a lion, isn't that what they say?

There's a lot to say, fair reader, a lot on my mind. But for the first time in a long time ... it's not cause for concern. My mind is filled with schedules and plans for the future. Tasks to accomplish and goals to meet. It beats the weight of fog and reverie that I've become accustomed to. My Auntie (who's not really my Auntie, but you know how it is with Asians) said it's impossible to make a living being a playwright. She should know, she is one. And she's right, long term. But short term, I'm going to enjoy making my living this way. Come April, I'll sell my soul for cash like everyone else does.

February 28th 2004. 12:47pm

in like a lamb

Why don't you put on a little makeup.

I just finished plugging events in my calendar for March. The way it looks right now, I need March to have 4 extra days so I can finish all the shit I've got to do. I've come up with a solution for this, and I suggest we all modify our calendars for Extenda-March. It's like a leap year, but not. Extenda-March has a grand total of 35 days, and a new holiday on the 34th called "Freelance Day", where every self employed artist in the city gets a six figure paycheque from the expense account of some faceless multinational. It was going to be called "Stick it to the Man Day", but it wouldn't fit on the calendar. Furthermore, in Extenda-March, the 33rd will only be 3 hours long. The other 20 hours will be carried over to "Freelance Day", which will be 45 hours long to accommodate the parade and potato-sack race down the Gardiner Expressway. Since only self employed artists have the day off, all regular commuters will have to take Highway 7 to work, as the 401 will also be closed for other Freelance Day activities; including skeet shooting and wet t-shirt trampoline marathons. The town of Woodbridge is exempt from Freelance Day. Just because.

So I'm a little tired.

Yesterday, I came across a small problem with my laptop. The hinge spring must be a little loose, 'cause my screen swings back and forth like an Alliance MP. Oh how I love Canadian political humour. No, really, the fucking thing will only stay put when balanced at a perfect 90 degree angle. So I've resorted to connecting the screen and the base with a piece of masking tape, holding it all in place. How fucking ghetto is that? I'm stuck working from home, because I can't go out with my gimp computer. All the other computers would laugh at it, and that's how complexes develop.

The past week is a blur. Writing promotional copy for the theatre company's upcoming festival of new work, plus a marketing plan for another company as a favour to Eponine. She sends me point form notes, and I turn them in to sentences. If we'd known each other in university, we'd have much higher GPAs. The week went by in a flash, but it was a good flash. The kind of flash that you wish had been a little longer, so you could really absorb it, settle in to it, memorize it. My nerves are still a little shot, and the stress from two entries ago still keeps me awake ... but a little less. Hearts mend, kid. I guess that's the thing about them ne. They bleed and they break, harder every time ... but they mend. One day they gotta mend.

February 23rd 2004. 5:36am

we have the technology

It's so ... beautiful.

Tonight I decided I'd had it with my computer acting up, and reformatted. Stupid me, thought I could be done in a few hours. By the time I'd finished transferring all of my files to another computer, it was already 1am. Though I was pretty proud of myself for remembering to capture all the drivers I didn't have on disk. However, I did forget to transfer the folder with most of my hacked programs on it. This caused me some distress, because I spent a long time downloading those programs and finding just the right crack or hacked version. Not as much time as the developers put in actually coding the legitimate copies in the first place ... but whatever. On the bright side, it gave me a chance to download Flash and Dreamweaver MX 2004. I'm using Dreamweaver now. It's so pretty. I actually moaned when I started it up. It's beautiful. Flash, on the other hand, took 5 years to instal. Really, it was enough time for the FBI to take a flight from Quantico to Toronto, freshen up, rent a car, eat breakfast, drive to my place and arrest me. And it'd still be only 70% completed. And when it finally did instal, and passed the serial test... it fucking crashed. I tried to run it three times, it never gets all the way through. I think it's meant for computers that aren't powered by gerbils on speed, like mine is. Elitist bastards. Gerbils have feelings too. Ask Richard Gere.

February 21st 2004. 8:52am

no known destination

If I was any less photogenic, I'd be blurry.

The good thing about being up this early, is that I'm privy to such Saturday morning mysteries as the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The downside is that I only went to sleep about three and a half hours ago. This has been happening the past few days, and I can't really explain it. I'm prone to all sorts of sleeping disorders, and this one is new. It wasn't a dream that woke me up this time, not the usual thing. It's different. Not the same. I'm at kind of a loss. I seek explanation in Saturday morning cartoons, but they only offer violence and convoluted story lines. No wonder kids these days are so fucking stupid, look what they have on television. Whatever happened to Looney Tunes? I'd take Wil E. Coyote over Pikachu any day.

Maybe it's stress. It's usually stress. Maybe the strain of the latest heartbreak catching up with me. Maybe all the work I've been doing lately for various projects. Nerves because of the big reading coming up in early March. Pressure to fit in with the cool kids ... no, wait ... that's Degrassi, nevermind. Maybe I'm just getting old. Maybe I just got bored with the old challenges and obstacles, so I'm forming some new ones. I don't know anymore. Probably stress. It's usually stress. That latest heartbreak kinda took a lot out of me.

Whenever something goes sideways, and I dwell on it, the first question Helen always asks me is "have you written about it?" She knows how I deal with life, and it usually involves rearranging 26 letters. She knows what's good for me, often better than I do. This latest heartbreak told me that if I wrote about it, she'd take offense. She'd somehow get back at me. I don't know what to make of any of it. But considering that I haven't slept more than four hours a night in the past week, maybe I should take a closer look at things.

I miss things being simple. I miss decisions we could shrug off, and acting on reflex. Maybe I'm just afraid to grow old. Maybe I'm afraid to grow up. And, yes, I'm paraphrasing a movie there, but they said it so perfectly. I just want something beautiful.

I told a girl my name the other day, and she was happy to learn it. Things like that, they're perfect. I want to put them in a bottle and toss it in the ocean for future generations to find. Years from now, it'd wash up on shore, and some kid would find hope in something. Anything. Doesn't really matter what.

I'm so fucking scattered right now. I'm never really coherent before the early afternoon, which explains my difficulty in holding down a 9-5. Well, that, and my general lack of qualifications. So I apologize, fair reader, for these clipped and poorly structured thoughts. It's been a long week, and I can't remember for the life of me if that was a good thing or not. I got a lot accomplished, my calendar was overflowing, and I managed to not have a meltdown. Like the man said, any day in the sun is a good day. So I can't figure out why I have this empty feeling. This feeling of not being whole. Of being weight, and no substance.

Probably stress.

It's usually stress.

February 13th 2004. 11:58am

i lost you

And I'm lost, too.

I just had a job interview down the street. It went well, I think. I was nine minutes early, and they brought me in two minutes late. I told them about my past job experiences, leaving out the more sordid details, and they told me what they would expect should I be given the opportunity. It's a management position within a theatre, and I think I love theatre because one of the people interviewing me asked: "Are you going to have time to write?" Sure, it was more out of concern for the job security, they don't want someone who will quit a few weeks in because they're unable to concentrate on "their art". But it was still a nice thing to ask.

It's Friday the 13th. Not the best day for a job interview, given the reputation. I kind of wish things had gone a little off, just so I would be able to breathe easy the rest of the day. I'd like to say I'm not superstitious and I don't believe a day can hold bad luck because of a numerical value. But sometimes I still avoid the cracks on sidewalks, and never walk under ladders. I believe in all sorts of things, and I guess it's better than not believing in anything at all.

I'm sitting in one of my favourite cafe's in the city. Sitting in an armchair, the computer balanced on my leg, because there's people at all the real tables. Before I was sitting in this armchair, I was sitting at the bar beside a beautiful girl with electric lipstick on. Porcelain mug stained red, she asked me for a light and I fumbled with it while lost staring in her eyes. When this seat freed up, I moved my things and smiled shyly at her as I left. Sometimes I don't want to get to know anyone, sometimes people are just perfect with their lipstick red smiles and hardly five words said.

February 6th 2004. 4:22am

r.i.p.

Here lies Kaizen.

My fish died. They're supposed to live 2-3 years. Mine lived 2-3 weeks. On the bright side, my reputation for being completely incapable of keeping anything alive very long is untarnished. Not really a bright side when you think about it, but we do what we can.

February 5th 2004. 5:20am

be sure of two things

The tax man fucking lied.

He told me I was getting back a shitload. A fuckload, even. Then he called and told me he made a mistake, his third so far. And now my refund isn't decent enough to handle a trip anywhere, except maybe Scarborough, but the stray bullets flying around keep me safely west. And so, I find myself stuck. There was a small window when I would have been able to get away, and the window is still there ... the opportunity, not so much. I won't get another window like this until around April. We'll have to see about the opportunity.

I've pretty much given up on trying to prepare for anything in this life. The things I think are meant to happen, don't. And the opposite remains the same. I've spent so much time believing one thing or the other was meant to be: Relationships, jobs, opportunities. It never quite works out that way. Not to say that the universe is against me ... it just seems to have its own plan, and apparently all I'm supposed to do is watch. I've met so many people that just sit back, and let "the universe guide them". Phrases like "it was meant to be" and "not under my control" catch like wildfire on the lips of those around me. Easy thing to buy in to. Doctrines like that, they breed apathy. A simple solution to a complex world. I don't buy it. Apparently that makes me cynical and beyond help. But there are no easy answers, fair reader. There are no round trip passes. And maybe they're right ... maybe you really can't save the world. But you gotta do your best. If only for the sake of it, you gotta at least try.

"Two fifty for a decade, and a buck and a half for a year." - The Tragically Hip - Little Bones

February 1st 2004. 10:07pm

uplifting

"I've never been so alone, and I've never been so alive." - Third Eye Blind - Motorcycle Driveby

Writing at Jimmy's cafe right now, two coffees and five cigarettes deep, music far too loud in my earphones ... sometimes the phone rings, sometimes I just get carried away making plans in my head. It's the start of a new month, and I've got two readings of new work in March, just eight days apart. I guess one of them is a pretty big deal, and I guess I'm pretty happy about that. Not that the other one is any less important, but you know what I mean. Or maybe you don't. Whatever.

I like this feeling, this feeling of working on things I love doing. I like this feeling of hope that I'll be leaving this city soon, heading for the coast and warmer weather. Even if it is only for a few days, it's movement. Circulation. There's a girl that just walked in here, and I think I dated her sister once, but I can't be sure. These people grow up, and I don't know who they are anymore. Maybe I should have paid more attention when we were both younger, maybe then I'd know for sure.

Jimmy's gambling at the table in front of me; the sound of dice rolling and cups slamming against formica tables brings me back a lot of years. Ten years ago, I was someone completely different. If you told me then that I'd be back here, doing this, I'd never have believed you. Not for a second. I guess things do change, after all. That's not just something people say. I've suffered some losses, but all in all, change might not be so bad. I don't want to leave this place right now. I want to watch Jimmy lose more money, and turn the volume up even louder. I want to get lost in this. Because I trust little in tomorrow. And today's working out just fine.