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!

sPin city

howdy folks. this is gonna be a quick one. of the 2 of you that check this blog on occasion i think you both already know what's going on, but for any happen-to-stop-by-ers:

i packed up my santa cruz life and moved to vegas! just kidding. i did pack up my shit and i AM in vegas - but only for a month or so. my bro needed some kind of emergency sorta help and once again i being the UNEMPLOYED and SORTA FLAKIEST family member, was an obvious choice to come help out. my tone there sounds words than i feel, actually - i am totally psyched to spend time with die bruder - i just wish he lived in .. tahoe or hawaii or durango.

anyhow - i will write more later, cuz i'm about to go venture out of town by myself for the first time since i've been here. apparently there's a LADIES mtn bike ride starting at 10am in boulder city - riding around what is meant to be some "epic" (according to IMBA) terrain - Bootleg Canyon. I've just had my giant bowl of red river cereal (thanks sven & amanda!) and am about to get ready - but just wanted to announce that, at summer's suggestion, i have created a NEW flickr account. it goes a little something like this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jtothez/ they only allow you to upload 20mb of pix a month, so i'm afraid i might be done for the month (does anyone know if the month ends/begins on the 30th/1st? if so, i'm hosed - cuz i just uploaded them all yesterday, the 1st.

alright, more soon. having a lot of feelings over here. as usual. i can't believe i haven't worked in 4 months - surreal. ok, more luego!

partytime

fun night. fun day too, in a wierd way. i QUIT the flush/cleanse/fast - and started the return-to-sugar party pronto. they recommend you break your fast with juice for the first day and then gradually work your way up to salad two days later (?!?). i went straight for the chocolate peanut butter bar that my sister sent me in the mail (along with the running clothes that i'd accidentally left at her house in jersey. it's like one of those target ads: junkfood. running clothes. junkfood. running clothes.) yum. and then i baked THREE desserts. "to bring to a party." but really i just friggin MISSED PREPARING FOOD and was makin up for lost time. i love LOVE (!) preparing food. and eating food. and sharing food. etc. ILOVEFOOD. so quitting was a good start to the day. then over to a dinner party hosted for some friends who are visiting from vancouver. i was the only single person there and only one of three individuals not attached to a kid. that's cool.

oh yeah, for the record, i made:
1) peanut butter cookies with choc chips - they are so delicious and the recipe is SO easy: 1 cup PB, 1 cup sugar, 1 tsp bkg soda, 1 egg. THAT'S IT! [okay and i add choc chips]. bake at 350 for 10 minutes.
2) coconut cardamom rice pudding. that was good, first time i made it.
3) nasty cupcakes. that i didn't bring with me. they're still in my fridge (along with leftovers of the other 2!) if anyone wants some...

alright so then i went downtown to see if any movies were about to start at the Nick and saw Shortbus. have you seen this film? i walked in a minute or two after it'd started, down the (nearly full) theatre's center aisle to a huge image of a naked guy doing what was basically a yoga plow pose - the one where you're on your back with your feet over your head - straining to get his penis to reach his mouth (eventually he succeeded!). i felt a little like a perv walkin in to a peep show, by mySELF no less. there was more hardcore sex in that movie than in any i've ever seen. in a theatre. it was very interesting and the characters were engaging and the dialogue was so natural - really well written, but there's a part of me that does think the sex got a weeeee bit grauitous. or maybe i'm just a prude. [not that i didn't enjoy it - but you know how it is when it feels like a director is just jerking off a little in his choice of scenes? and i do mean that figuratively in this case] anyhow. i hope i get to talk to someone about that movie soon. i'm gonna read some reviews now. it DID inspire me to build some dioramas, in a wierd way. they had this cool NYC cityscape that was made out of cardboard or something - that made me so happy every time they'd show it, i don't know why. but i thought that would be a cool thing to build: miniature cities. alot of work though, for sure. but hey i'm unemployed, what else am i gonna do. peace out.

call me Master

ok i'm doing THE CLEANSE. the MASTER cleanse - after hearing random folks and friends and relatives talk about it for the last 10 years. all i drink (or eat) is water with lemonjuice, maple syrup and cayenne pepper in there. and then i can drink licorice or peppermint tea. and i'm supposed to drink salt water in the morning and herbal laxative tea before bed. for 10 days this is supposed to happen. but it aint gonna. i'm tellin ya right now. i'm on hour #4 or so and i'm about to crack. i came into this coffeeshop and ordered my licorice tea and felt instantly MALIGNED that they now (suddenly) carry the best vegan cookies in town (by Black China Bakery, FYI) - they're shortbread cookies tha are heart-shaped and half-dipped in chocolate with crushed pistachios stuck to the chocolate. YUMMERS. anyway, i can't have that. cuz i'm gettin all CLEAN.

it's funny how instantly you realize the strength of your relationship to food. lord howdy. and for that matter - your (my) relationship to EMAIL. it is another sort of sustenance in a way. i sat here drinking my tea all happily, checking email - and as soon as the email was done/gone, i instantly thought about getting a snack. hmmm...

so physically, as a point of reference for this fast and its effets on Ye Younge Body that i inhabit, i would like to note the following conditions as of today:
*severe pain in right shoulder/neck/rhomboid
*consistently-threatening headache -- which is to say, a fair amount of sinus pressure. really sore occiput and pretty tender forehead and top-of-head
*CRAZILY tight hips. for quite a while now
*pretty depressed mindset, to be honest. total feeling of directionlessness. that's a bummer.

yeah - i do NOT know what to do next. i'm trying to be "open" and let my heart answer these questions - cuz god knows the craziness in my mind can't figure this important shit out... although as i just left my friend's house in the mountains, i DID say out loud, to myself "i want to live in the country." so there i go, i suppose. that's a start, i guess.

happiest girl in the world

today i am so happy. it's one of those days (honestly, couple of days now) where you think "is this even possible? isn't there something i should be worrying about?" (surely we're the only culture that worries about having forgotten what they should be worrying about.) yeah, i'm so... excited and i feel FULL, in a wierd, awesome way. like, i read a book in bed today at 3pm until i fell asleep - and i had no guilt about it. this is something i don't recall having been able to do in the past. there was always something nagging me, disrupting my full-on enjoyment and giving-in to the luxury of it. maybe it's just that i'm in a new town, and that i'm completely in love with my new job. this is new for me, folks. i don't believe i've ever uttered the phrase "i love my job" in my life - it honestly feels too good to be true.

sorry, by the way, about my absence, if anyone's been checkin in. i've had a helluva month since i quit bell. wait no - it's only been 3 weeks, is that possible? so much has happened!! holy crap! the day i quit, we had drinks out, it was crazy, i was exhausted from all the crying, etc. the next morning, i had bkfst with some friends (2 of them coworkers) and they got up at 9 to shove off to work and i got freaked out. ran around town getting stuff to bring with me on my roadtrip (a trip which, until that day at 9am, had not had one thing planned about it, by the way) and i got in my car at 2 and headed north. i think the mini freak-out at bkfst when my friends got up to go to Bell and i wasn't joining them- is to be credited for inspiring me to actually get in the car & go. i had to do something, all i felt was loss at that point.

headed up to Portland (spent one night in Mt. Shasta)

and quickly the sense of loss faded and all i felt was possibility, hope, aliveness. my time in portland was incredible. i connected with my dear friend lisa's friend up yonder and usually those things can be kinda awkward - but she is the coolest and it was actually quite a bit like hanging out with lisa directly! every neighborhood in that town was cooler than the next - crafts and cool shops and fun, open people all over the place. PLUS i got to go on 3 runs right in the city ON DIRT TRAILS. not lame paths through mown municipal parks - FULL ON WOODS with TRAILS! i feel like that city was built for me. AND, i haven't even mentioned (though most of you already know, i'm sure) that it's about as progressive as a city can get (with the exception of the Oregonian, i hear). awesome animal rights magazines come out of there and there's free public transport in the city center and two awesome hostels (i recommend the NW one - so amazing!). ANYHOW...

i drove up to Vancouver to see some friends of mine who used to live in santa cruz - awesome couple that lives such an inspiring lifestyle. he's german and she's canadian and the way they live (riding their bikes to work, recycling/reducing/REUSING every possible thing they can, eating sooo healthfully, etc) totally inspired me to lower-my-impact as well. maybe it's a european thing, i dunno - but it kicks ass. so i had two of the best, cheapest (like $5 US!) sushi meals of my life there - very easy to be vegan in that town as well - and i went on what was hands-down the most intense and awesome mtn bike ride of my life up there (Ned's Atomic Dustbin? anybody?) it was the stuff they have in all the CRANKD movies and in the Banff Film Festival - crazy ramps and 10ft drops way deep in the woods and dry creek beds and ROOTS EVERYWHERE. really challenging and so damn fun. i went over the handlebars twice and i think i'll actually have a little scar on one hand to remember the ride by :). thanks amanda! :) these 2 are also incredibly gracious hosts - making you feel not at all like an imposition (which i fear i do to people who visit me) but seeming completely thrilled to be able to show you around. awesome quality - yet another which i hope to acquire.

ok, sorry this is long. AND THEN i drove back down, with one night in portland (and another incredible meal there - there's also awesome food in that town, for real!), and then hauled it in a day down to santa cruz, totally refreshed & stoked on life. i felt so damn free on the road - you know the feeling - just me in my car with some stuff and i can drive anywhere, meet anybody, do anything. life is good.

so my sisters came to town to run the big sur marathon as soon as i got home and they KICKED ASS!!! beat their last year's time by nearly 30 minutes. who does that!? superstrong, superbeautiful awesome women. check em out.




my folks and my niece and her boyfriend were there - and our time together was so killer. i love those people!

alright - my sister stayed in town for a few more days, we ran around, went wine-tasting, tried to celebrate my bday on the beach but got kicked off by the cops (that sucked), went on a few of my favorite runs together, ate yummy food, hung out and chatted - i was so damn sad when she left. i felt like my heart was broken. i've had to call her everyday since. i love that girl.

okay, and finally, alas, forsooth and anon --- here i am in lovely norfolk VA - where the people are even way lovelier than the architecture and the weather, which is sayin somethin, honestly. my job is knocking my socks off. i cannot BELIEVE i can get paid to try to help animals. AND i get to use some fun skills i've gained over the years in these efforts. it is honestly the best job i can imagine, at this point in my life. i wake up smiling (literally). and i walk home after work grinning like a scared chimp [they are actually scared when they grin, i didn't know that until recently.] oh yeah, and i feel myself quickly becoming indoctrinated, i hafta say. i came in going "Now listen up folks, your shock marketing tactics are only losing you credibility and we need some change around here!" and i'm already going "Right on! more naked protests! more lesbian make-outs in times square! whatever it takes to get people interested in the organization and clicking through the website!" AND, to be fair, i'm starting discussions about initiatives that are a little more in line with the attitude i came in with [i'd say more, but this IS a public venue, i just remembered, and i don't want to give anything up to the ENEMIES.] okay, this is a ridiculously long blog. if you made it this far, you must really love me. cuz it wasn't that interesting! thank you! i love you too!