thunder and lightening at five am....right on top of the house.
right on top of each other FLASHBANG! rumblerumble FLASHBANG!
the cat's still under the clawfoot tub, twelve hours later.
the bathroom cabinet from our backyard has "mysteriously" come in and is now on the floor at the bottom of the stairs to the second story. ie, right outside my kitchen door. whatever....
Friday, August 26, 2005
Thursday, August 25, 2005
more neighborhood bla bla
the bright yellow building kittycorner from the spyhouse, with the spanish banner for tarot readings and other spiritual services, has a toilet sitting on the lawn in front of it.
come to think of it, there was a bathroom mirror/medicine cabinet on the back lawn of my place last night... i wonder if some bathroom appliance fairy was flying low yesterday afternoon, dropping off needed items in yards that don't need them.
heh.
come to think of it, there was a bathroom mirror/medicine cabinet on the back lawn of my place last night... i wonder if some bathroom appliance fairy was flying low yesterday afternoon, dropping off needed items in yards that don't need them.
heh.
Saturday, August 20, 2005
hip hip!
three cheers for great theatre.
saw the guthrie's THE CONSTANT WIFE last night (kind thanks to zack for thinking of me when he was offered free tickets!), and it was awesome. a 1920's comedy about fidelity and the economic practicality of marriage, with a lot of well disguised politics to it, the more i think about it this morning. brilliantly paced and timed, really just classic. a great opening night for them, i hope it's a good run too....
to say that the production values at the guthrie are impressive would be, um, and understatement. i didn't love every choice the costume designer made, but the fabrics were delicious and even if it does betray my compulsive inability to drop the attention to things like this, they were beeautifully made. i don't, actually, usually look so acutely at construction, but the fabrication was undeniably stunning in this case....i think the whole show must have been built, it was that perfectly suited to the actors and the show, and the men's suits were at least as gorgeous as the women's clothes.
three cheers indeed!
saw the guthrie's THE CONSTANT WIFE last night (kind thanks to zack for thinking of me when he was offered free tickets!), and it was awesome. a 1920's comedy about fidelity and the economic practicality of marriage, with a lot of well disguised politics to it, the more i think about it this morning. brilliantly paced and timed, really just classic. a great opening night for them, i hope it's a good run too....
to say that the production values at the guthrie are impressive would be, um, and understatement. i didn't love every choice the costume designer made, but the fabrics were delicious and even if it does betray my compulsive inability to drop the attention to things like this, they were beeautifully made. i don't, actually, usually look so acutely at construction, but the fabrication was undeniably stunning in this case....i think the whole show must have been built, it was that perfectly suited to the actors and the show, and the men's suits were at least as gorgeous as the women's clothes.
three cheers indeed!
Thursday, August 18, 2005
query
does anyone else find it... ironic, or somehow, um, fake, to watch a waiflike man with nearly blue pale skin, eyeliner, and shoulder length ink black hair get into a white mercedes hatchback kompressor and drive away from a coffe house?
YES, BOYS AND GIRLS, THE CYNICISM HAS RETURNED, rising in a phoenix-esque manner from the shores of last week's blind paralytic panic.
i'm at the spyhouse, eating a decadent almond croissant, (purchased from a girl with surface piercings on her forearms, walking gingerly as the tops of her feet are freshly tattoo'd) watching the zoo that is my neighborhood and loving it. as i told my mom the day i brought her back from the airport --where i live the punks are real. a few blocks over in gentrified uptown, they're a little affected. but here it's all real. as another thought about the neighborhood, i noticed the other day that with the few exceptions of small dogs, all the dogs i've seen in the neighborhood in a week and a half qualify as dangerous breeds. i'm not afraid, the sweetest, brightest dog i know is a pit named athena (but i have heard about the recent death in the sunset), i'm just surprised since so many ads i looked at specified no agressive breeds... it's interesting. i'm not generally prone to petting dogs i don't know anyway, but maybe it just adds to the edginess of the hood.
so as you can see, in addition to having found my sense of cynicism, i am also much more relaxed about the place i live. much of this could be attributed to the simple act (within half an hour of her arrival) of my mother finding the locking mechanism on my windows, so i don't feel unsafe leaving them open when i'm not there. i think the rest of it is just the comfort of mom... i was worried that moving is stressful and money is worse, but really we handled both of those things and nobody yelled or cried. mama makes all things manageable.
we went to ikea, i know it's stupid cookie cutter, but i don't care, it's also affordable and simple and i like what we found (a tall narrow bathroom cabinet we purchased and brought home, and a bookshelf that we didn't b/c it wouldn't fit in my car, as well as a super cool table that folds down to a 6" wide console when the leaves are down...which was out of stock. so i'll return with lora and her family's suv soon....) i have shopped and looked other places too, but money and time are of the essence ---the office portion of the living room remains a maze of boxes until i get more shelves to unload them into and make it a useful work space.
we went to alexandria for the weekend, stayed with the gracious godfather of theatre l'homme dieu, vern and his lovely wife paula. they have a great place on the lake, and took us out on their pontoon for my mom's birthday. she was enthralled and it was great. we went to the theatre campus, but it's very very strange when empty. first of all, it only takes 10 minutes to show the whole place. when it's full, with rehearsals going and lunch cooking and saws running and sewing machines humming, it's hard to get from one building to another with your train of thought intact. with no one there it seemed a little... little. but it's beautiful, which one sometimes overlooks during hive-time.
we had dinner at the black forest, a forty year old german restaraunt a block from my house (boasting, among others, a bill board that says: "non-germans find it excelllent. germans find it surprisinly adequate." my mom laughed heartily... also one that reads: "bring the kids. we serve brats.") she met courtney and katie there, friends from last summer's season... lora took us to minnehaha falls, which was beautiful, and we had lunch with kenzie and grant the other day...so she's met some folks, which was important to me too.
we did some math, which told us that on a very tight budget i can deal until something comes up that i can live with --i not only have great distaste for almost every job we've found in the star tribune, the citypages, and craigslist, i'm vastly underqualified for almost all of them. i need something, and soon, but at least i can spend a couple bucks at the grocery store and a couple bucks at the coffee house for internet access and be alright.
that's about all i have to say, but i did want to share one last thing.... http://www.taize.fr/
i was in taize for holy week the year i was in berlin. it was one of the most singular and communally beautiful weeks of my life, and this sentiment is no doubt being echoed in grief around the world this week. brother roger was a man of peace so profound it almost can't be described... his brothers and sisters must keenly feel his absence in taize, and millions around the world feel it quietly in their own way. peace be with you
YES, BOYS AND GIRLS, THE CYNICISM HAS RETURNED, rising in a phoenix-esque manner from the shores of last week's blind paralytic panic.
i'm at the spyhouse, eating a decadent almond croissant, (purchased from a girl with surface piercings on her forearms, walking gingerly as the tops of her feet are freshly tattoo'd) watching the zoo that is my neighborhood and loving it. as i told my mom the day i brought her back from the airport --where i live the punks are real. a few blocks over in gentrified uptown, they're a little affected. but here it's all real. as another thought about the neighborhood, i noticed the other day that with the few exceptions of small dogs, all the dogs i've seen in the neighborhood in a week and a half qualify as dangerous breeds. i'm not afraid, the sweetest, brightest dog i know is a pit named athena (but i have heard about the recent death in the sunset), i'm just surprised since so many ads i looked at specified no agressive breeds... it's interesting. i'm not generally prone to petting dogs i don't know anyway, but maybe it just adds to the edginess of the hood.
so as you can see, in addition to having found my sense of cynicism, i am also much more relaxed about the place i live. much of this could be attributed to the simple act (within half an hour of her arrival) of my mother finding the locking mechanism on my windows, so i don't feel unsafe leaving them open when i'm not there. i think the rest of it is just the comfort of mom... i was worried that moving is stressful and money is worse, but really we handled both of those things and nobody yelled or cried. mama makes all things manageable.
we went to ikea, i know it's stupid cookie cutter, but i don't care, it's also affordable and simple and i like what we found (a tall narrow bathroom cabinet we purchased and brought home, and a bookshelf that we didn't b/c it wouldn't fit in my car, as well as a super cool table that folds down to a 6" wide console when the leaves are down...which was out of stock. so i'll return with lora and her family's suv soon....) i have shopped and looked other places too, but money and time are of the essence ---the office portion of the living room remains a maze of boxes until i get more shelves to unload them into and make it a useful work space.
we went to alexandria for the weekend, stayed with the gracious godfather of theatre l'homme dieu, vern and his lovely wife paula. they have a great place on the lake, and took us out on their pontoon for my mom's birthday. she was enthralled and it was great. we went to the theatre campus, but it's very very strange when empty. first of all, it only takes 10 minutes to show the whole place. when it's full, with rehearsals going and lunch cooking and saws running and sewing machines humming, it's hard to get from one building to another with your train of thought intact. with no one there it seemed a little... little. but it's beautiful, which one sometimes overlooks during hive-time.
we had dinner at the black forest, a forty year old german restaraunt a block from my house (boasting, among others, a bill board that says: "non-germans find it excelllent. germans find it surprisinly adequate." my mom laughed heartily... also one that reads: "bring the kids. we serve brats.") she met courtney and katie there, friends from last summer's season... lora took us to minnehaha falls, which was beautiful, and we had lunch with kenzie and grant the other day...so she's met some folks, which was important to me too.
we did some math, which told us that on a very tight budget i can deal until something comes up that i can live with --i not only have great distaste for almost every job we've found in the star tribune, the citypages, and craigslist, i'm vastly underqualified for almost all of them. i need something, and soon, but at least i can spend a couple bucks at the grocery store and a couple bucks at the coffee house for internet access and be alright.
that's about all i have to say, but i did want to share one last thing.... http://www.taize.fr/
i was in taize for holy week the year i was in berlin. it was one of the most singular and communally beautiful weeks of my life, and this sentiment is no doubt being echoed in grief around the world this week. brother roger was a man of peace so profound it almost can't be described... his brothers and sisters must keenly feel his absence in taize, and millions around the world feel it quietly in their own way. peace be with you
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
warning
that's all, just warning.
i don't know how to describe my mood or explain any of the thoughts i've had in the last 24 hours. i left l'homme dieu yesterday, with the last of my stuff and my cat (who's alternating between under the bathtub and under the work table, but has also been on the bed with me, and eaten a little....i'll take it.)
about here: it's hot. i have no money...due to my own failure to mail checks promptly and the u.s. mail's failure to deliver as expected, i'm actually overdrawn. the fact that i'm publishing that information on the internet should tell you a little about my state of mind.
overwhelmed.
a little anxious...even distantly frantic if that makes any sense.
totally unprepared for what it would feel like emotionally to be here, with an apartment, and a few possible design gigs on the horizon, but no actual income beyond my rent/health insurance fund. totally unprepared for the fact that living in a city would be scary to me. ME? i don't know what's wrong with me...if it's the isolation of the last two months up at the lake, or if i just don't remember what it took to adjust the other direction when i got to champaign-urbana....but i live on really busy streets. i feel like i can't safely leave my windows open when i'm not home. urbanites take themselves seriously, and i don't know if i'll really make friends or if i'll just have co-workers. suddenly the whole thing seems like it might have been a bad idea. should i have come home? should i have gone to chicago? i have no idea. i'm reasonably sure that no matter where i went after grad school there would be an adjustment period and it would be strange.
****WHOA, SIDENOTE: i'm sitting at the "famous" spyhouse coffehouse, which is in my backyard, to use their wi-fi (and air conditioning), and two boys/young men just walked past outside, with carefully positioned sideways hats, carefully bleached and distressed jeans, and --i'm not shitting you-- beltbuckles with moving l.e.d phrases, like the ticker on a deli that lists the numbers being served....and i'm pretty sure the letters moving across them read "fornicator". I COULDN'T MAKE THIS UP IF I TRIED, I REALLY COULDN'T.
so there are somethings about urban living that are...entertaining.
i don't really think that i'll give up, or have a breakdown anymore severe than the tears of frustration i've already had...and i think that it will all work itself out in whatever way it's supposed to. but i'm feeling pretty rough about it all right now. it's hard to motivate to unpack...i need a lot of furniture. my mom is coming tomorrow, and we'll get a second bookcase, and at least one dresser, and then i'll have things to unpack into. but i can't believe i ever thought it would be a bad idea for her to come help, i can't imagine doing this without her. i'm also having a little trouble adjusting to the idea that seeing jacob will require several hundred dollars in travel cost, and be much less often than we're used to. that freaks me out a little, too. not in the sense that i worry about us as an "us"...but it's uncomfortable.
THAT'S THE WORD: UNCOMFORTABLE. everything about my surroundings right now is uncomfortable. and make me want to... i don't even know.
and now it's pouring rain! hopefullly that will eleviate some of the humidity and heat. that will also make me more inclined to unpack, if the weather weren't so nasty drippy hot. definitely glad that i moved the futon inside from my car (by myself, today's lesson that you can do things you don't think you're able to) before this started. my mom bought it to save herself the cost of a hotel, but it's here now so come sleep on it!
i should get a few other things done....hopefullly there will be brighter posts in the future, more immediately think good thoughts for me. (thunder and lightening! there are things to love about the midwest!)
i don't know how to describe my mood or explain any of the thoughts i've had in the last 24 hours. i left l'homme dieu yesterday, with the last of my stuff and my cat (who's alternating between under the bathtub and under the work table, but has also been on the bed with me, and eaten a little....i'll take it.)
about here: it's hot. i have no money...due to my own failure to mail checks promptly and the u.s. mail's failure to deliver as expected, i'm actually overdrawn. the fact that i'm publishing that information on the internet should tell you a little about my state of mind.
overwhelmed.
a little anxious...even distantly frantic if that makes any sense.
totally unprepared for what it would feel like emotionally to be here, with an apartment, and a few possible design gigs on the horizon, but no actual income beyond my rent/health insurance fund. totally unprepared for the fact that living in a city would be scary to me. ME? i don't know what's wrong with me...if it's the isolation of the last two months up at the lake, or if i just don't remember what it took to adjust the other direction when i got to champaign-urbana....but i live on really busy streets. i feel like i can't safely leave my windows open when i'm not home. urbanites take themselves seriously, and i don't know if i'll really make friends or if i'll just have co-workers. suddenly the whole thing seems like it might have been a bad idea. should i have come home? should i have gone to chicago? i have no idea. i'm reasonably sure that no matter where i went after grad school there would be an adjustment period and it would be strange.
****WHOA, SIDENOTE: i'm sitting at the "famous" spyhouse coffehouse, which is in my backyard, to use their wi-fi (and air conditioning), and two boys/young men just walked past outside, with carefully positioned sideways hats, carefully bleached and distressed jeans, and --i'm not shitting you-- beltbuckles with moving l.e.d phrases, like the ticker on a deli that lists the numbers being served....and i'm pretty sure the letters moving across them read "fornicator". I COULDN'T MAKE THIS UP IF I TRIED, I REALLY COULDN'T.
so there are somethings about urban living that are...entertaining.
i don't really think that i'll give up, or have a breakdown anymore severe than the tears of frustration i've already had...and i think that it will all work itself out in whatever way it's supposed to. but i'm feeling pretty rough about it all right now. it's hard to motivate to unpack...i need a lot of furniture. my mom is coming tomorrow, and we'll get a second bookcase, and at least one dresser, and then i'll have things to unpack into. but i can't believe i ever thought it would be a bad idea for her to come help, i can't imagine doing this without her. i'm also having a little trouble adjusting to the idea that seeing jacob will require several hundred dollars in travel cost, and be much less often than we're used to. that freaks me out a little, too. not in the sense that i worry about us as an "us"...but it's uncomfortable.
THAT'S THE WORD: UNCOMFORTABLE. everything about my surroundings right now is uncomfortable. and make me want to... i don't even know.
and now it's pouring rain! hopefullly that will eleviate some of the humidity and heat. that will also make me more inclined to unpack, if the weather weren't so nasty drippy hot. definitely glad that i moved the futon inside from my car (by myself, today's lesson that you can do things you don't think you're able to) before this started. my mom bought it to save herself the cost of a hotel, but it's here now so come sleep on it!
i should get a few other things done....hopefullly there will be brighter posts in the future, more immediately think good thoughts for me. (thunder and lightening! there are things to love about the midwest!)
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
the answer is valium
in which: the cat eats and mouths off, i take a step toward getting established in minneapolis and you get my address, and jacob steps toward st. louis
the cat and i went back to the vet yesterday....an iv bag full of fluid (this time instead of settling across her shoulders in a lump waiting to be absorbeb, the lump was down one side, which made her equilibrium useless), and some valium. actually diazapam. essentially the cat's been in anxiety attack mode for two months, and now that she's had something for it, eating is not only something to do but something to talk about....and rub up against people about, and headbutt people about, and yeah. life's good. she staggers a little still, but her lips and ears are getting pinker. and she's crafty --she's eaten all the "old" purina kibble out of the bowl, and left most of the "new" good-for-her-liver kibble. alread this morning when i shot her pill down her throat (we're getting better at that), she felt heavier. now she's got a little more to put up a fight with about the pills, actually.
i rented a box truck and am moving from storage to my apartment tomorrow! that will be nice...i probably won't unpack, but i'll get it all loaded in, and the bed made, and then there'll be a place for the cat and me in the world besides here....
**NEW ADDRESS:**
Andrea Gross
16 East 25th Street #2
Minneapolis, MN 55404
seriously, can anyone help me with uploading pics? i'll post the ones from the season and the lake, and my new place once it's photo worthy, if i can just do it simply!
and finally, jacob left this afternoon for home, to go to st. louis and sign contracts on friday... the job is so good, and will allow us a certain amount of planning (the california new years is definitly on!!), and even the distance will be good when we adjust to it. . half the life i've had here isn't here now. we had a great weekend though...took our time with goodbyes to places and things, danced all night at "$10prom" last night. the summer's been solid for us, whatever it's been in other capacities....
at the moment i kind of feel like i have the bends, and that's all i want to say about it
the cat and i went back to the vet yesterday....an iv bag full of fluid (this time instead of settling across her shoulders in a lump waiting to be absorbeb, the lump was down one side, which made her equilibrium useless), and some valium. actually diazapam. essentially the cat's been in anxiety attack mode for two months, and now that she's had something for it, eating is not only something to do but something to talk about....and rub up against people about, and headbutt people about, and yeah. life's good. she staggers a little still, but her lips and ears are getting pinker. and she's crafty --she's eaten all the "old" purina kibble out of the bowl, and left most of the "new" good-for-her-liver kibble. alread this morning when i shot her pill down her throat (we're getting better at that), she felt heavier. now she's got a little more to put up a fight with about the pills, actually.
i rented a box truck and am moving from storage to my apartment tomorrow! that will be nice...i probably won't unpack, but i'll get it all loaded in, and the bed made, and then there'll be a place for the cat and me in the world besides here....
**NEW ADDRESS:**
Andrea Gross
16 East 25th Street #2
Minneapolis, MN 55404
seriously, can anyone help me with uploading pics? i'll post the ones from the season and the lake, and my new place once it's photo worthy, if i can just do it simply!
and finally, jacob left this afternoon for home, to go to st. louis and sign contracts on friday... the job is so good, and will allow us a certain amount of planning (the california new years is definitly on!!), and even the distance will be good when we adjust to it. . half the life i've had here isn't here now. we had a great weekend though...took our time with goodbyes to places and things, danced all night at "$10prom" last night. the summer's been solid for us, whatever it's been in other capacities....
at the moment i kind of feel like i have the bends, and that's all i want to say about it
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