ghostland

hi. i'm in santa cruz now - and boy is it wierd. i mean the town is as wierd or as normal as ever, it's just ME who feels wierd IN IT. it is strange to be no longer a part of something/somewhere/of your friends' daily lives - nor to be a part of anywhere else yet either. very disconcerting for a creature of habit like myself. i don't think i have any new pix for ya, but i'll see if i can dig up an old interesting one. just had lunch with one of my favorite people ever - mr. Don Palermini. he treated me to a delicious plate of tofu chilaquiles at the amazing and undervisited-by-me Walnut Cafe in downtown sc, and then we ambled around in the shady cold and over to the Goodwill - where don bought an old mechanic's jacket with a Hertz patch on it and i bought some slip-on shoes for use in aFREAK. they're a little big, but i saved $80!!

yeah i can't believe i'm saying this out loud - but i'm starting to look forward to the day when i actually WORK again. (horrors!) i didn't think it would come to this - but it is going on nearly a year that i'm work-free. and it is a ster-RANGE feeling. or maybe it's not work per se that i'm looking forward to, but rather the ritual of a normal life - in a place that feels like YOUR TOWN with YOUR PEOPLE in it. i look forward to that. to discovering a new place, one coffeeshop and one running trail at a time. portland?? is it you??

here's a dog that showed up at my brother's house before i left. he was so damn cute and totally adopted me as his new mome in the 2 hours that we were hanging out. i can't wait to have a dog.

oh so i rewatched My Dinner with Andre - a great film from 1981 starring Wallace Shawn and Andre Gregory (and ONLY them) wherein they have a discussion over dinner. for 2 hours. a pretty fascinating and philosophical discussion. i'd seen it before, when i was 23 or 24 - and it had new and cooler meaning to my 36 y.o. self. it's fun to simply be a witness to a conversation sometimes - rather than an active participant in it.

alright, i'm tired. i'm headed to social appointment #3 of 4 today, here in a few minutes. i can't wait to have a bed of my own again. it's nice seeing old (and newish) friends, but it does feel WIERD to be in a town that feels like history to you. alright. bye for now.

volver

hi. i'm back in vegas. somehow SLIGHTLY less inspired and alive and ..good than i felt in santa fe. go figure. but hell - life is GOOD, so i need to quit ma bitchin. i am healthy (hopefully - i just got 4 vials of blood drawn to prove that point - and now my hands have that weak ow-the-keys-feel-resistant-on-this-keyboard-today feeling of bloodlessness. psychosomatic obviously but that's what i'm feeling), and lucky in so many other millions of ways. i don't mean to sound totally silly & spiritual, but here i go (again) (i should just kill this caveat once and for all cuz CLEARLY i AM TOO a flaky californian fruitcake.) but i've been reading a lot of Thich Naht Hahn lately (have i mentioned this?) Vietnamese Buddhist monk - and his writings remind me that damn, every single breath is a gift from who-knows-where and the fact that our eyes actually work is something a blind person would rejoice over forever more - but instead of looking at the blue and the cool shaped clouds in the sky or admiring FULLY the fact that i get to stare into the friggin CUTE MUZZLE of a dog or whatever - i stare at cellulite or a dent in my car and get all bummed. silly misuse of my awesome resource of vision. doy. anyway, i don't think i'm really doing this topic justice. suffice it to say, that TNH ROCKS (i'm thinking of getting I [heart] TNH shirts made) and that i am one lucky moflicker, who needs to remember that on a daily basis.

bud damn, the time in santa fe with Patty was so ... cool. it felt so different from any other time i've spent anywhere. santa fe definitely has its own awesome thing going on, but on top of that, patty and i did such fun things and had such great conversations. AND ! i went to this healer-guy who she sees. which was a total trip. i actually think i had my first truly metaphysical experience there. i'll tell you more about it, if you want to know - but it had to do with exploring my fear of rats. so trippy. and SO COOOOL. but back to the general feeling: in a word, i'd have to say "expansive." and luckily, not so expensive. just for posterity, i'm going to write down the highlights of the trip:
*indian dinner out
*baking scones in
*massage in patty's office!
*healer-guy session
*x-country skiing
*aussie & s. african x-country ski rental guys
*tea at patty's kitchen table at night
*drawing designs with her, for my cafe
*chai at Annapurna (awesome himalayan cafe)
*santa fe baking company - coffee every morning, how could i forget?
*THE HANUMAN TEMPLE. that ruled.
*the gorge in Taos
*the drive back from Taos - we felt all nice & peaceful
*the drive there & back
*falling asleep with my headlamp on, on the sofabed, reading TNH
*beers with lucia
*walking to the shops
*body - organic cafe
*yoga class

okay sorry that was really boring for anyone but me. wait, no one reads this i forgot. i take it back. :)

coffee heaven

howdy people! i'm writing from what might be one of the top 5 coolest coffeeshops i've ever been in: the Santa Fe Baking Company. it's a mere 10 minute walk from my sister's apartment, and it's got almost everything i like in a coffeeshop, namely:
1. multiple levels. there is a main/top level and then one step down to another level and then another 3 steps down to a little grotto-y looking level
2. multiple lightings. there's a ton of natural light flooding the top level/entry area of the place, and then progressively less natural light/a darker feel in the cavey area. very cool. your light can suit your mood!
3. several bars. there are many little 2-4 person tables scattered about, and then also THREE bars with stools. i think bars lend a very casual, cool feel to a place like this - especially because some of the bars butt up to the sides of the small tables. it gets people chatting and it feels less exclusive and solitary, somehow. i got chatting with the coolest woman the other day because of this arrangement! oh, plus, if you're only having coffee, you don't feel guilty taking over a barstool, the way you do taking up a whole table. ya dig?
4. um, great coffee. and free refills at that!
5. free wireless internet access. [did you know that starbucks charges? i feel like free internet access is almost as much a natural right of humans at this point as oxygen in the air or ground underfoot. i'm sorta kiddin. i just get pissed when i have to pay for it. (and i don't. i read instead. which is probably more productive anyway.)]
6. lots of fun, awesome-looking people. after 2 months in Las Vegas, this is like gold. literally. i would pay just to sit here and take in the vibe of people with wool beanies and open, interesting faces full of hope and free tibet stickers on their trucks. i might officially be a hippie. dammit.



7. oh yeah - and no one steals your laptop or wallet when you go to the bathroom! a just-discovered fact! :)

my drive here was uneventful and beautiful. the almost full moon was hanging over santa fe at twilight as i was cresting the last hill on I-25 on my way into town. a little blurry, but damn the moon makes me feel excited and happy.







and yesterday, my sister and i drove to Taos and saw a giant gorge (the bridge over which which many suiciders jump off of, she told me. it became a more-creepy, less-beautiful experience with that info in-hand.), hiked a little snowy trail up a mountain, and finally found a Hanuman Hindu temple where we drank chai that they offered and sat peacefully before an enormous Hanuman statue and some photos of Neem Karoli Baba - an Indian religious man who looks like he was a damn lot of fun. really peaceful vibe there. it was so nice to even just enter a space that was built simply for the purpose of peace and life-reverence. i guess theoretically this would be the idea behind any church i've ever been in, but somehow it didn't feel the same. felt expansive, instead of the narrowing, strangling sense i'd always gotten in my Catholic youth. alright! that's all i got for today. thanks for reading.

shame

alright i was just EMBARRASSED into posting again, as i looked over my most awesome as-yet-never-met-in-person friend ian's blog, where he features me as a prominent link. i update so rarely, i don't even know how to do links anymore, but i'll work on it, for the "ian's blog" i just mentioned.

damn, why do i know so many (or know people who know so many) crazy awesome travelling folks!?!? i am lying in bed here in vegas at 8:53am getting myself stir-crazy reading through different folks travel-stories and thumbing through bootsnall.com forum threads. i've been up since 430am and i reclined here with the intention of snoozing, but now, 2 hrs later, my computer hot from exhaustion, i am AMPED PEOPLE.

so, not that anyone is reading this blog, but JUST IN CASE any of ian's referrals come my way, let me tell you my COOL NEWS: i'm going to Africa in April to work at a Chimpanzee sanctuary for 6 months! cool, right? i am thrilled. i was wanting to travel since i have both $ in the bank and time [a rare coincidence], but i wasn't feeling the rush of excitement at the thought of simply cruising around, lolling sleepily on beaches for months, etc. so i went onto idealist.org and searched for extended volunteer gigs, preferably with animals (but i'd definitely like helping out the kiddos and the geris too, for sure) and preferably that didn't CHARGE YOU (i know!) to help them. and i found one!! and they accepted me! i just found out last week. so now i'm busily setting up bloodwork and immunizations appointments, requesting visas and int'l drivers licenses (apparently i have to drive to town once or twice a month to buy FROO-IT for the apes, just like you'd imagine. dirt jungle roads, i am EXCITED!!) i was just realizing the other night that i'm going to be going to sleep to some awesome sounds, over there at the camp. the only sound i'm dreading is the little tcht-tcht-tcht of rat-scratching. it's my only known semi-phobia, and i'm a bit spooked about that (keep envisioning rats eating my face as i sleep!??! i'm sick), but in an effort to acclimatize myself or whatever the word would be, i have been watching rat videos on youtube, looking at cute pix of rats on cuteoverload.com and yesterday i went to petsmart and watched a hairless rat for a few minutes. i couldn't find a haired one. but this guy was so adorable, i gotta say. something about seeing his pink skin and wrinkles made him seem way less diabolical. plus his ears were giant translucent bells of adorability. and he was cleaning furiously, which eased my fears a bit, about rats supposedly being so dirty.

anyhow, there you have it. i am going to try to post more often here - and really learn how to do cool things on here again. like PICTURES. and LINKS.

pic post test: this is "Cochese" - half timber-wolf and half siberian-wolf. one of the most beautiful dogs at the dogpark (where i spend a DAMN lot of time here in vegas. i've met cool people there - including two olympian swimmers just this sunday!






and i was a cupcake for halloween. it looked better from the front.






and lastly, a recent outfit i quite liked. vertical, horizontal AND diagonal stripes. booya!

i cannot figure out how to line up these pix, people. sorry about that. and THANKS FOR READING!