Firestorm

Fires continue to rage all over the LA area. Box Canyon, Bell Canyon, and Malibu Canyon are particularly hard hit, but so far the firefighters have been doing an amazing job. Some houses have been lost, but it could be so much worse. Fortunately the winds died down early this evening and that's a great thing. Hopefully they'll finally get these things under control overnight. The 2 big blazes are still at least 20+ miles west of me, but there is a smaller one outside of Burbank that concerns me more. It's still like 20 miles from me, but it's heading east so it's more of a potential threat to me than the others. So I've got a bag packed in the trunk of my car just in case. That whole "better safe than sorry" thing. My housemates have promised to evacuate my dog if anything happens while I'm at work tomorrow, so I feel better about that. I'm not that attached to anything else. If it burns it burns. My insurance company will pay me and I can start over. How it goes sometimes and the idea of losing all my worldly possesions doesn't stress me out nearly as much as it probably should and not nearly as much as it would have a year ago. Call it a shift in my priorities. Sure, I'd miss my books, and my DVDs, and stuff like that, but it's just stuff. I can replace it if I want and most of it I can probably live without. (Too bad I didn't have that little epiphany before I moved and had to pay to ship all this crap out here.) Seriously though, as long as I have my dog, my laptop, and my car, I could get by just fine. (My horse Callie is still in the ATL, so I'm not counting her in my list of "need to haves" in this situation.) On that note, if things are still burning come this weekend, I'm going to try and volunteer with the LA Horse Rescue group. There are a lot of horse owners in these canyons and many of them don't have horse trailers and need help evacuating. Some of the big boarding stables have 100's of horses at them and getting them all moved to safety can be a major undertaking. I don't have a truck and trailer, but I can still ride shotgun, help load horses, etc. Eventually Callie will be out here and I'd like to think that if I need to get her out of harm's way, someone will be there to help me, ya know? So anyway, just wanted to let everyone out there in blogland know that all is well here in my little canyon and that I've managed to avoid the fires thus far. If the winds shift though, I'll be sure to let you know...

"Remember in elementary school you were told that in case of fire you have to line up quietly in a single file from smallest to tallest? What is the logic in that? What, do tall people burn slower?" -- Warren Hutcherson

Burn, Baby, Burn

There is a serious downside to my wonderful Santa Ana winds. Wildfires. Living in the canyons is always an adventure, but during fire season it can be downright scary. The winds last night started a blaze in Chatsworth which is about 25 miles from me. Then there were 2 others which popped up elsewhere in the Southland later in the day. Firefighters got them contained initially and there have been no mandatory evacuations as of yet, but they are all still burning at this hour, and for the next few months this is going to be an ongoing concern. The canyon I live in avoided the huge rash of fires that tore through the area last season. Let’s hope and pray that we are equally fortunate this year… So I called Verizon this morning to find out why the hell no one showed up to fix my line on Tuesday. Get this. A repair tech claimed he showed up at my place at 10AM, there was no one here, he checked my line to the box on my apartment, it worked fine, he left a note on my door, and left. Bullshit. I was here watching TV from 7:30AM to almost 1:00PM (thankfully the Sci-Fi channel was doing a “Firefly” marathon), and no tech showed up here. I have glass doors on my apartment. There was no way I would have missed him unless he was the Invisible fucking Man. Needless to say I was pissed and the rep I got this morning was properly appalled when I told her the whole long saga of what I have been dealing with since Friday. So it finally took me talking to that rep (who was actually very helpful), a supervisor (who was not), and ultimately the VP of Repair Services (who the stupid supe blind transferred me to. Wanna bet she got her ass chewed out for that?) But whatever. Once I got a VP involved you better believe they got a repair tech out to my place in short order and the end result is that I have phone service again and that they have credited my bill for a month… The best part of my day was that one of my favorite Texans showed up at work today. He and I had discussed going to dinner tonight, but he had something come up and couldn’t go. So he came by bearing a single yellow rose as a sorta peace offering. He admitted that he finds roses cliché, but yellow roses are a Texas thing, so he felt he could get away with it. I was quick to let him know that had he not been a Texan I would have had to tell him that A) I’m not a big fan of roses and B) I hate the color yellow, but I totally get the symbolism of getting a yellow rose from a Texan and that makes it one of the coolest gestures ever :) I’ve decided this guy is a figment of my imagination. There’s no way he’s real… So that was my day. Mostly, I’m glad to have my phone back… and “Lost” was great tonight. Next week looks to be really good too… Less than 24 hours till “Smallville.” Woo Hoo! Ok, so I’m a dork. I admit it. It’s not like it’s a secret at this point…

"Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable." -- Bruce Lee

Blow Job

It’s a bit early for the Santa Anas, but we’re getting a taste of what we’re in for. We’ve got some serious winds blowing through here tonight. Sustained winds of 30 miles an hour and gusts of 70+ miles an hour according to the news. I have my windows open and the wind is howling through here hard enough to blow out the candles I had lit. It’s fucking awesome. I love wind, probably even more than I love thunderstorms. I think there is something incredibly sexy about it. Now if I just had a man here to channel some of this sexual energy into. Adam came in to the shop today and hung out for over an hour. It was great… but I don’t think we’re quite to the point that I could ask him to come home with me just to satisfy my wind lust ;) The Naked Indian is about 2500 miles too far away. HWMNBN is not an option. That leaves S-boy…. HMMMM. Now there’s an interesting thought… Let’s just not go there… Aside from my visit from Adam, today wasn’t great. It didn’t suck, but it wasn’t great. People were just grumpy. Me included. I’m still without phone service. Verizon was supposed to be here this morning, but the repair guy didn’t show. I need to call them in the morning and figure out why not. At this rate, Verizon is going to be giving me free service for a long time to come. It’s bad enough they cut my line off in the first place, but then to blow off my scheduled repair appointment, really pisses me off… Let’s see. What else? New “Smallville” this week. (Finally!) This season is going to be great. Lex is finally going to go bad. It’s about damn time… I found my new tattoo artist. Her name is Kat Von D. I just need to go meet with her. Not that I can afford to get a new tat right now, but when I do get my next one, I’m pretty sure I want Kat to do it. I must just be into women artists. Most of the time I relate to men better than women, but when it comes to tats I’m more drawn to the girls. I’m sure there’s some deep-rooted psychological reason for that… but, enough babbling for this evening. I’m kinda sleepy and I need to get up earlier than usual so I can yell at some poor Verizon rep that really shouldn’t have to deal with me first thing in the morning. I am a call center rep’s worst nightmare. Maybe I should just ask for a supe right off the bat and save the poor rep the grief…

"Absence weakens mediocre passions and increases great ones, as the wind blows out candles and kindles fires." -- François de la Rochefoucauld

Out Of Touch

I have been without phone service since Friday, which has been something of a mixed blessing. For one thing, it kept me from putting up the extremely maudlin post that I wrote on Friday night. It was much too forthright and soul-bearing for public consumption, that’s for damn sure… So here’s the re-cap of my last few days… As expected, the weird lights over LA on Thursday night had an explanation. Turns out the Army launched a rocket from their base near Santa Barbara. It was a 4-stage kinda thing or something and the stages separated about the time they were over LA. (There are pics up on blogging LA.) So, mystery solved. Sadly, there were no aliens or anything cool like that involved... That doesn’t explain the weird animal behavior. The dogs were still “edgey” all weekend. So I’m thinking we’re still in for an earthquake. We’re way past due. It’s gonna happen. It’s just a question of when… So after a particularly hideous day at work on Friday, I came home to find that I had no phone service. One of my housemates had Verizon out working on her phone line and in the process of fixing her, they somehow disconnected me. I was not amused. I really wanted to come home from work, check my e-mail, post to my blog, watch “Battlestar Galactica,” and then play some EQ into the small hours of the morning. Such was not in the stars for me though. Well, at least my satellite connection was not effected and I could still watch the season finale of BSG. Missing that would have really pissed me off… No questing for me though… Grrr… Argh… As far as work went, it really wasn’t that bad. I just had this one particularly ugly confrontation with a customer and it sorta ruined the whole day. She was really, really not nice and nothing I could have done would have made her happy, but I still let her get to me more than I should have… Oh well. How it goes sometimes. I have much more important clients who think I pretty much walk on water, so fuck her… I also know of at least 3 beautiful men who (the last time I checked anyway) seem to think I’m pretty fucking fabulous and that thought makes me feel all kinds of better :) Saturday I got my hair cut and colored. It needed both pretty desperately. The color came out a bit too light this time though. The color my stylist uses is called “Bonfire” and then she throws in a bit of “Apricot” and “Cherry” to keep it from being that unnatural, flaming copper red that many salon jobs can turn into. Well, this time I think we leaned a bit too far toward the Apricot side of things. Some of these highlights are getting dangerously too close to that dreaded blonde spectrum. When I go back in November, I’ll have to make sure we throw a bit more Cherry into the mix… Saturday night I was supposed to go to this charity fundraiser thing with S-boy, but he got food-poisoning and had to cancel. I was more disappointed by that than I should have been. It wasn’t like it was a date or anything. We were just going to this thing as friends. He’s been really busy lately and I haven’t seen much of him in recent weeks, so I was just sad that I didn’t get to spend the time with him. I like him a lot and dig just hanging out with him, even though I know we’re not going to turn into anything. We’re just friends and that’s ok by me. It feels right. As hot as he is, and as much as I’d like to jump him; that is not our destiny… although I still think that at least once we’ll probably both end up drunk some night and will take glorious advantage of each other ;) I’m just going to gloss right over Sunday. It wasn’t a bad day; it just didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to. I had hoped to go to a movie with Adam, but it didn’t work out. I’m just glad I at least had the balls to ask him out and that he actually wanted to go. Hopefully, next weekend we can get our schedules on the same page. Honestly, I don’t care what we do. I just want to finally have a chance to spend some time with him. Time that has nothing to do with work. Where we can talk about whatever. Be ourselves. See what happens. Then I can try to evaluate these feelings I have for him. Basically decide if I’m totally delusional and need to bury said feelings before they get me really hurt, or if this is the guy I’m going to let go for and try and take a shot with. That thought scares the shit out of me. I was soooo not looking for anything like this. HWMNBN really fucked with my head. I had trust issues in regards to men before that whole fiasco and he most definitely made them worse. I was so sure that I wouldn’t even be entertaining the idea of a serious relationship for a very long time to come… but maybe I was wrong. Maybe I was just waiting for the right kinda guy to come along. Is Adam that guy? I don’t know yet, and I’m afraid to get my hopes up, but so far he has been so sweet and charming that it’s hard not to. You know how sometimes you just “click” with someone? That was the case here. For some inexplicable reason it just feels right. I want this to work out. To turn into something. Am I willing to settle for just being friends with him if it turns out he doesn’t feel the same way and I’m reading something into this that isn’t really there? Yeah, probably. I’ve been down this road enough times with enough guys to know that that is a real possibility. Will I be happy about it? Not a fucking chance. I’m thinking this time I might just have to try and fight for what I want. Tell him exactly how I feel and let the chips fall where they may. Not settle for just being friends. Maybe my mistake in the past has been accepting my fate and graciously just burying my true feelings and letting them go in the hopes of at least salvaging a friendship out of the ashes… I’m not saying it hasn’t been worth it. I don’t regret my past decisions. I have been blessed with having some truly amazing men in my life… but just once I’d like to have one of them realize that given ½ a chance, I can be pretty amazing myself… Whoa. I should stop right there. I’m getting ahead of myself. Way ahead of myself. I guess I should at least let next weekend play itself out as it will and not put any undue pressure on it… Oh look. After all was said and done, I still ended up with a soul-bearing post. I’m such a fucking sap sometimes… Oh well. Hopefully you all still love me anyway… Can I at least get everyone to say a little prayer of well wishing for me this time around? Light some candles? Cross your fingers and toes or something? Please? I’m getting really tired of being the hopeless cynic around these parts…

"The man who fights too long against dragons becomes a dragon himself." - Friedrich Nietzsche

Apocalypse Now

We're in for something major here. Maybe a big earthquake or something. There were bizarre lights over LA tonight and all the animals were acting strangely. I have no explanation for the lights. If you have ever seen the Northern Lights then you'd know what this looked like... problem is that I'm a couple thousand miles south of where the Aurora Borealis should be visible. Everyone else was pretty baffled by them too. There were people standing on street corners, taking pictures, just gawking in general. Maybe there will be something on the news tonight. Whatever it was, it was cool... On my way home from work, it was like "Wild Kingdom." I have coyotes run out in front of me all the time (they are suicidal, stupid animals), but tonight it was more than coyotes. I also had a bobcat, a mountain lion, and 4 deer try to play car tag with me. It was fucked up... I'm thinking these have to be omens portending something... or maybe it was just one of those days where weird shit happens... Along with these signs of what I am sure is an impending apocalypse, I did have another glorious day. S-boy paid me a surprise visit this morning and damn if he didn't look (and smell) good. He is far and away one of my all-time favorite people ever... Then this afternoon Adam came to see me. Sigh. He looked good too. And he's so sweet. And dammit but I turn into such a fucking girl when I'm around him. It's stupid that he can get me as flustered as he does. What's worse is that he doesn't do it on purpose. We'll be having a perfectly normal conversation and then he'll say something and I'll get all "blushy" or at a loss for words or whatever. He finds it kinda amusing too. I think he realizes that it's out of character for me. You guys read my blog. I'm ballsy and opinionated and not afraid to speak my mind. So why is it that all of a sudden this guy can just smile at me and I get all self-conscious and can't seem to string together a coherent sentence around him? I know he's pretty, but he's not that pretty. (If I was going to get tongue-tied around anyone it should be S-boy who is easily one of the hottest people I've ever seen in real life, but with him I curse like a fucking sailor and feel like I've known him my whole life.) I should be sooooo annoyed by this sudden lack of control over my emotions, but I'm not. I kinda dig this feeling. I haven't had butterflies like this in a long time... I'm so going to get my heart ripped out and stomped on, aren't I? I know not to fall this hard, this fast. I know that and yet I see myself doing it anyway. Dammit. Grrr and Argh. Things are about to get complicated. I can just see it. I haven't even gone out with this guy yet... I'm a fucking idiot.... Somebody just shoot me... It would make things so much simpler...

"There are so many tensions involved in any creative activity so when there is a catastrophe you never indicate that you think the end of the world has come. You examine it and say, "Well, this is a fine new catastrophe. Now, what else is important today?" -- Goeran Gentele

One Fine Day

Today rocked. I never really slowed down from the time I got up until I sat down to write this post, but that's ok. It actually started last night. I had the best dreams. They were really damn good and way too realistic, but trust me, I'm not complaining. Today my day started with kinky text messages from this really hot guy I know. It made my morning commute very interesting and honestly made it hard for me to concentrate on my driving, but damn did it start the day off right ;) Every day should start off that well. Traffic wasn't horrific and I actually got to work early. Things were busy, busy, busy all day. The one sorta lull we had was around 3:00 and just as I was about to run grab a quick bite to eat, my boy Adam walked in the door. I'll take him over lunch any day... actually I'd like to just have him for lunch... wait, let's not go there. I'm horny enough as it is and thinking like that will only get me into all kinds of trouble, but damn he looked good today... So anywho.... we talked for like 45 minutes and things went just swimmingly. But you know what? I'm not going to post the details. I really like this guy and I'm not going to fuck it up by saying something that might jinx it... Suffice it to say that an earthquake could have levelled half the city tonight and I would have surveyed the damage with a smile on my face. Which is a good thing because if I hadn't been in a deliriously good mood, the last few hours of my day would have sucked. My last rep leaves at 6:00 which puts me working up front alone for the last hour. Well, tonight we got slammed for that last hour. Even all the lab people had left for the night by the time I got finished up and they are usually there a lot later than I am. It was after 8:00 by the time I got done writing up the last of the day's orders and got everything locked up. Still not caring. How stupid is it that conversations with 2 guys can put me on Cloud 9 for an entire day that by all accounts should have sucked? Maybe I just really needed to find a silver lining in everything today. The week was potentially headed in a dismal direction and my subconscious decided that maybe it shouldn't go that way. Woo Hoo! for that. Is it too much to hope that tomorrow is even better? What the hell. Call me greedy, but I'm going to hope for just that...

"Hope is a good thing - maybe the best thing - and no good thing ever dies." -- Stephen King - "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption"

Paging Noah

It rained here today. The first real rain since I moved out here. You would have thought the world was coming to an end. I thought Atlanta was bad when we would occasionally get snow and the city would basically shut down. Apparently the same thing happens here when it rains. I turned on the news and there were reporters in rain ponchos out and about all over the city. It looked like they were bracing for a hurricane and when I looked out my window I expected to see a great deluge and the animals lining up two-by-two. Such was not the case. Yes, it was raining steadily. Yes, there was lightning and thunder. But c'mon. We got a whole inch of rain. Seriously. All this for an inch of rain. No mudslides. No flooding. Just some water falling from the sky. Pardon my incredulity. I must have lived in Atlanta too long. I was used to getting an inch of rain every day, all summer long, so I find LA's reaction to the whole rain "phenomena" way more amusing than I probably should... Ok, so the traffic caused by the rain was definitely not amusing (it took me an hour and 1/2 to get to work today), but the rest of it was all pretty fucking funny to me... and I needed some amusement after yesterday. Aside from the rain, today was fairly uneventful. I didn't get to talk to any of my boys though and that makes me sad :( Hopefully Wednesday will be better. It should be. If nothing else I expect to see Adam tomorrow evening. He needs to come by and pick up some prints and hopefully will finally come to his senses and actually ask me out rather than just flirting with me and making vague suggestions that we "go do something." I appreciate that he's trying to be a nice guy (and have to admit that the whole chivalrous thing he's got going on kinda turns me on for some reason), but enough is enough. I'm used to my men being more aggressive. So either he steps up and asks me out or I'm going to ask him. Hopefully that won't scare him off, but I don't think it will. He seems to realize that I'm not like most of the other girls in this town... or at least I hope he realizes that. If not, he's in for one hell of a shock ;)

"Life is the fire that burns and the sun that gives light. Life is the wind and the rain and the thunder in the sky. Life is matter and is earth, what is and what is not, and what is beyond is in Eternity." -- Seneca

Primal Urges

I was going to do a post with one of my infamous lists since I haven't done one in awhile, but I didn't know where to start. I have a bunch of shit that I want to rant and rave about, but honestly just don't have the wherewithall to do it tonight. My heart just isn't into putting forth the effort to come up with a list. That requires some organization of my thoughts and I'm not what you would call clear-headed today... Ever have one of those days where all you really want is to have someone rip all your clothes off, slam you up against a wall, and... well, you know... I had that day today. I woke up late, which put me in a pissy mood right off the bat... I snapped at a friend on the phone when he called me this morning. Then when I called him back later in the day to apologize, I found myself annoyed when he didn't answer his phone. I was the one being a bitch and still had the nerve to be angry when I couldn't get in touch with him. How stupid and irrational is that? Traffic wasn't bad for a Monday, but was still annoying, and when I got to my parking deck all the good spots were taken. Not the end of the world, but in my state of mind it was overly irritating... One of my reps showed up late for work and was in a bad mood when she did get there. That made me even grumpier... I then had a beautiful man basically offer to rip my clothes off and slam me up against a wall, and... well, you know... but like a moron I laughed it off like I thought he was kidding, when what I should have done is taken him home and fucked him blind... Some days I am my own worst enemy... This behaving myself sucks. I don't think I can keep it up much longer. And I'm not sure that I want to. One thing's for sure. The next guy I do sleep with is in for a helluv a ride...

"As the cat lapses into savagery by night, and barbarously explores the dark, so primal and titanic is a woman with the love madness." -- Frank Gelett Burgess

Danse Macabre

I don't normally work on Saturdays, but my rep who was supposed to work today had a gig come up (she's a drummer) and really needed the day off so I told her I'd cover for her. We're only open from 10-2 on Saturdays so I figured what the hell. Besides, I need to take a 1/2 day off on the 30th so this will make up for that. It also worked out well because Tim Burton's new film, "The Corpse Bride" opened here this weekend, but is only playing at 2 theatres so if I wanted to see it I would have had to go into town anyway... Since this was my first day opening the shop by myself, of course it couldn't go smoothly. For some reason my code for the security alarm (which worked fine when I tested it on Thursday) chose not to work today, so the first order of business was convincing some very cute LAPD officers that I wasn't trying to rob the place and do in fact work there. I guess they decided I didn't look like a criminal because they didn't arrest me and after much ado I finally got the damn alarm to shut off. Most of the rest of the day was quiet. I had like 3 customers between 10:oo and 1:00. Then at about 1:30 the world suddenly showed up. At 2:00 when I was supposed to be closing up I still had 4 people in the shop waiting. So much for me making a 2:40 movie. Oh well. Fortunately one of the people who came by was Adam. I admit that one was my fault. I had e-mailed him earlier in the day bitching about being lonely and bored at work so I wasn't entirely surprised when he dropped by. We had another nice chat... although I was slightly disturbed to realize just how much I had missed not seeing him this past week. My heart did this stupid, girly somersault kinda leap in my chest when he walked through the door. Ladies and gentleman, I do believe I have developed a serious crush on this one. Dammit. When the fuck did that happen? Sigh. What was I saying the other day about being a glutton for punishment? So anywho.... it was ok that Adam ended up being the main reason that kept me from getting to my movie on time. (I must really like him if I'd give up Johnny Depp for him, even if it is an animated Johnny Depp ;) So, it was almost 3:00 when I got out of there and headed over to The Grove. The Grove is this odd place that honestly could really only exist in LA. It was originally the home of the LA Farmer's Market. It still is, but it has morphed into something else as well. It's now also this upscale kinda outdoor shopping mall. So if you're one of those people who needs to buy fresh kumquats at the same time you pick up the new bag from Coach or those new Lucky Brand jeans, then The Grove is the place for you. It also happens to be home to one of the best theatres in the city. Hence the reason "The Corpse Bride" was playing there. (The only other theatre to open it this weekend was at the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica and well, we all know I'm not supposed to go to Santa Monica, so The Grove was really the only place I could go see it.) This post was originally going to be a movie review, but seems to have become just a general recounting of my day. Odd the places my brain goes sometimes... but anyway, back to the movie. I loved it. But then that shouldn't really come as a surprise to anyone. It's Johnny Depp and Tim Burton. Duh. Is everyone going to like this movie? No. Probably not. Before you go to see it, ask yourself, "Do I love Tim Burton movies?" Then ask yourself, "Did I think "The Nightmare Before Christmas" was an amazing film?" If the answer to either of these questions is not a resounding "YES!" then "The Corpse Bride" might not be the movie for you. It's basically an animated musical with a Tim Burton spin on it. If that sounds like your kind of thing, then you'll totally dig it. I thought it was hip, cool, and fun, but then my world is a little warped so.... well, you get the idea... I then proceeded to get all turned around leaving The Grove and somehow ended up going the wrong direction on La Brea and taking a really convoluted route back to Hollywood to get on the 101. No worries though. At least now I know how to get to the LACMA and I want to go see the King Tut exhibit that's on display there, so it turned out to not be a totally wasted detour... So that was my day... And it was by all accounts a good day... Tomorrow promises to be much less eventful (but hopefully will still be good). I plan to sleep in and do some writing. I also need to do laundry. And wash my car. And I promised Roland I'd take him to PetCo. Ah. The glamorous Hollywood life I lead these days.... hehehe :)

"I would do anything Tim Burton wanted me to. You know - have sex with an aardvark... I would do it." -- Johnny Depp

Closure

So against my better judgement I called HWMNBN and asked him to go to dinner tonight. What can I say? I'm a glutton for punishment. Actually, I saw it more as a necessary evil. He had tried calling me all weekend and I ignored his calls and messages. When I finally did talk to him on Monday night we did not have what I would call a stellar conversation. It ended with him telling me to grow up and calling me a bitch and then me hanging up on him. And I was ok with that... But then he ran into another friend of mine on Tuesday night at a party... and while very intoxicated proceeded to tell that other friend a lot of things about me that he had no business telling anyone... So I decided enough was enough. I'm sick of this childish bullshit he's been pulling lately. He and I needed to sit down in a neutral environment and clear the air once and for all. I picked a nice (i.e. expensive) restaurant near his place that would be fairly quiet and where (hopefully) he would behave like the rational adult he is supposed to be. Not that being in a public forum has stopped him from behaving like a moron in the past, but I was hoping he would recognize the seriousness that this little rendevous deserved... and for once I got my wish. He was the perfect gentleman. He was more reserved than normal, but still behaved like the charming, funny guy that I fell for what seems like eons ago. It was nice to see that guy again. So we talked about everything that had brought us to this breaking point. We talked about our various problems and issues. We talked about the future. Sadly it will probably be a future apart. That's probably the best thing for both of us. There has just been too much damage done. One good conversation over a great dinner doesn't change that. And it was a good conversation. I see a light at the end of the tunnel for him. That makes me happy. Despite everything that's happened, I still love this guy. I want him to get better. I want him to be happy. Now I think maybe he might be. He has a long road ahead of him, but I have hope that he might yet get where he is supposed to go... So yeah. I'm glad we did this. Dinner was great and we went for a long walk on the beach afterwards and if nothing else, at least now we can say that things ended on a good note. And who knows? Maybe in the distant future things will be different and our lives will bring us back together again. I sorta hope that happens. Like I said, I'm a glutton for punishment... or maybe I'm just an eternal optimist... yeah, I like that better...

"For me, forgiveness and compassion are always linked: how do we hold people accountable for wrongdoing and yet at the same time remain in touch with their humanity enough to believe in their capacity to be transformed?" -- Bell Hooks

Just Blue

Sorry about not posting yesterday. It was sort of a bad day and I didn't feel like sharing. Suffice it to say that I just don't understand why some people do the things they do. I'm tired of worrying about people I can't fix and having my heart broken because I can't stop caring about certain people even though I know I should just cut them out of my life and move on. Call it my tragic flaw... Today was a bit better. Mainly because it was busy and I hardly had time to think, let alone time time to be upset about the stupid people in my life. I also talked to all 3 of my favorite men today. Adam and S-boy both called this afternoon and I talked to The Naked Indian on the way home from work. My own little personal Trifecta. I call it a good day when I get the chance to talk to just one of them, so today was a really, really, really good day in that respect. Aside from that, I have nothing report... I'm just in a blue state of melancholy. I'll snap out of it... I need my horse back. I miss her and a nice quiet ride is what I need on days like this... Or maybe I need more caffeine. I haven't had much the past 2 days. Yeah, that's what I'll blame this funk on... I'm very tired so I'm going to call it a day. A good night's sleep might help me a lot too... Hopefully tomorrow will be me more eventful and I'll have something interesting to post... Night all...

"Did you ever see an unhappy horse? Did you ever see a bird that had the blues? One reason why birds and horses are not unhappy is because they are not trying to impress other birds and horses." -- Dale Carnegie

Darkness Falls

Another bizarro day here in LA. This one instigated by some LADWP worker who wasn't paying attention to what he was doing and cut a line he shouldn't have cut and knocked out power to half the damn city. Initial reports were that the city was under attack, but such was not the case. Nope, it seems we Angelenos are perfectly capable of fucking things up all on our own without any help from the outside. Things were nuts for a couple of hours. Traffic lights weren't working which made driving a free-for-all. People got trapped in elevators. The news helicopters were out in force so to look up in the sky you would have thought we were being invaded. It was just an all around crazy kinda day. The power was back on by like 3:00 but you wouldn't have known it because when I left work at 7:15, traffic in Hollywood was still a nightmare. It was like people got stuck and couldn't find their way back out or something. It literally took me 45 minutes to go the like 4 blocks to the freeway. Once I got on the 101 things were fine, it was just getting there that was the problem. Never a dull moment around these parts... Still, in spite of all the blackout silliness I have to say it was a pretty good day. I talked to Adam twice. (I really need to come up with a blog nick for him.) That brightened my day a lot more than it should have, but I don't care what anybody thinks. I'm really starting to dig this guy. He hasn't asked me out yet, but I'm really hoping he does. He seems like he'd be a lot of fun to go out with. He's way prettier than me, but then most of the guys in this town are, so I'm just going to have to learn to live with that, but you know what? I think I can handle it :) Adam is of course an actor. All the guys I meet these days seem to be. He called me from a film set today and has a TV show he's going to work on tomorrow. Me and my damn actors. Well, at least most of them are creative and fun... In other "biz" news, I have 2 friends who got big roles this past week. Yay for them! One is a girl who works for me and she actually got leads in 2 upcoming films. The other is a guy I know who just signed for a recurring role on an NBC mid-season replacement show called, "Thick and Thin." I'm very proud of him. I have no idea what the show is about, but for his sake I hope it does well... So that's my West Coast report for this lovely Monday. I soooo can't wait to see what happens tomorrow....

"Apparently there is nothing that cannot happen today." -- Mark Twain

Solar Powered

I've figured out a little secret about Los Angeles. I'm not sure that I'm supposed to share this with the outside world, but I've never been one for following the rules, so here goes. Apparently the whole city is solar powered. Everything. The vehicles. The buildings. The people. Without sunshine it just ceases to function. Since I've been gone so long I must be partially immune and can run under my own power at least for short periods of time. Some sort of weird Atlanta-based battery back-up or something. I got up this morning and my canyon was totally fogged in. I expected that once I got down into the valley things would clear up like they normally do, but such was not the case today. The whole city was foggy and overcast. In response the whole city just slowed down. Traffic moved on the freeway, but at a placid, uncongested rate. People walked down the sidewalk in something of a daze. The woman at the coffee shop forgot to charge me for my mocha and when I offered $$ to her she just looked at me blankly and said not to worry about it. Not one to turn down free caffeine I practically bolted out the door before she came to her senses. Work was dead. The few clients who wandered in seemed to lack the ability to make even the simplest decisions on their own. I felt like I was in some fucked up episode of "The Twilight Zone." Not that I'm complaining. After the crappy day I had on Thursday, a slow Friday was just what I needed. About 2:30 the sun finally decided to show itself and it was like God had flipped a switch. Traffic picked up. More people came into the store and they were happy and organized and looked like they'd just woken up from a good nap. So it ended up being a beautiful day in the City of Angels. This guy Adam that I'm starting to have a thing for, showed up just as I was getting ready to close. I was 1/2 an hour late getting out of the shop, but I honestly didn't care. Adam and I suddenly had lots to talk about and it turns out we have a lot in common. He also brought me a bottle of expensive gin. I like guys who come bearing gifts for no apparent reason other than they were thinking about me and wanted to get me something. He also gave me a really sweet card. I'm so glad I was alone in the store when he showed up though. I briefly turned into a total girl and I would NEVER have heard the end of it if there had been witnesses. I get enough shit aboyt S-boy as it is. Throw Adam into the mix and they would really never let me live it down... of course I suspect I'll be seeing more of Adam in the future so the mocking is bound to happen anyway. Oh well. I can live with that. If the only thing they have to harass me about is the parade of beautiful men populating my life, I can't really complain now can I? Everyone have a fantabulous and beautiful weekend!

"The sun shines and warms and lights us and we have no curiosity to know why this is so; but we ask the reason of all evil, of pain, and hunger, and mosquitoes and silly people" -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Suckage

I hate the world today. People just went out of their way to piss me off or annoy me. From S-boy, to the guy at the coffee shop, to my customers, to basically just about everyone. It was little things and big things. Why is it my life has to run on everyone else's time table? I'm just sick and fucking tired of being taken for granted... Grrrr... Argh... I really shouldn't be posting anything today. I'm going to end up saying something stupid or that I don't really mean, so I'm just going to write today off and start over tomorrow. It has to be better. If it gets worse, things could get ugly. I can get self-destructive when I get angry and that's not a path I want to go down if at all possible. I'm actually in a fairly good place with my life right now and the last thing I need is some random excuse to take some stupid detour that will just get me into trouble... Maybe I just need to go out and get really, really drunk... Or pick up some cute guy and well, you know... Yeah, because neither of those things would be considered stupid... Grrr... Argh...

"I could end up having sex here, and the prospect doesn't appall me. What better way to exorcise rejection demons than to screw the person who rejected you?" -- Nick Hornby - "High Fidelity"

Stop and Smell the Billboards

Let me say (for what is probably the 1000th time) that LA is a weird fucking place... and I mean that in the best possible way. I honestly love the freaks that populate this metropolis, but sometimes even I don't understand them. Traffic was just bizarre this morning. I have learned when to tune into certain radio stations for traffic reports. I know where to expect congestion practically every day. I can get off the freeway and wind along side streets to get to work. Today though defied all logic. People were just stopping on the freeway for no apparent reason. They weren't merging from one freeway to another. There were no accidents. Just all of a sudden people would bunch up and come to a virtual stop. It was stupid. So I finally got into Hollywood and all along Highland Blvd the billboards had changed over night. When this happens it is apparently ok for people to stop dead in the middle of the street so they can check out the new signage. And these were not tourists. These were regular Angelenos who should have been in a hurry to get to work. But no, it is obviously much more important to oogle the almost naked woman on the new "Nip/Tuck" ad than it is to arrive at your destination in one piece. Granted, I've had a 6-story high Johnny Depp on Hollywood Blvd distracting me from my morning drive since "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" came out in mid-July, but even so, I've managed to control my drooling until the light at least turns red and we've all come to a complete stop. When I'm one of the only people out there with something resembling self-control, the world should be afraid... very afraid.

"Bypasses are devices that allow some people to dash from point A to point B very fast while other people dash from point B to point A very fast. People living at point C, being a point directly in between, are often given to wonder what's so great about point A that so many people from point B are so keen to get there and what's so great about point B that so many people from point A are so keen to get there. They often wish that people would just once and for all work out where the hell they wanted to be." -- Douglas Adams

Comfort Food

The inside of my car smells like warm, vanilla bread pudding...

Just thought I'd share that little tidbit of information with the masses...

I now return you to your regularly scheduled life...

"Great food is like great sex - the more you have the more you want." -- Gael Greene

Emotionally Disturbed

I picked the absolute wrong movie to see this afternoon. That's not to say "The Constant Gardener" was a bad film. It was actually an incredible film. Ralph Fiennes is always brilliant and this time was no exception. It was just an extremely emotional movie. It would have been heavy and depressing to watch on the best of days and today was not the best of days for me. I woke up with a killer headache, which is always a bad sign. I'm tired and horny and I wish this headache would go away. I miss The Naked Indian. I miss HWMNBN (the HWMNBN that I knew before he was abducted by the Pod People). I'm not sure how I feel about the situation with S-boy. I'm just all over the emotional fucking map today. None of it is rational. I know that. My knowledge of the irrationality of it does not make it go away though... Fuck!... So anyway, back to the movie. It's a great story, but definitely not a happy one. One of the main characters dies literally 5 minutes into it. You then spend the rest of the movie finding out why. I'm a big fan of the reverse narrative when it's done correctly and they definitely do it right here. Mostly it's about conspiracies. Conspiracies by govenments. Conspiracies by global corporations. Conspiracies to keep things from those we love. Murder. Lies. Betrayal. Like I said, heavy-duty emotional stuff. The stupid thing is that by going in to this film in the frame of mind I was in, I probably got something out of it that was not intended. It depressed me on a whole different level. I should have been focused on the evil that is wrought on innocent victims by corporations and governements as they play their global chess games (although that aspect was disturbing to say the least). Instead I mainly found myself upset by the fact that I don't have someone in my own life that cares about me even half as much as Justin (Ralph Fiennes) cared about Tessa (Rachel Wiesz). How fucking illogical is that?!? I hate myself when I get like this. Fortunately it doesn't happen too often (although more often than it should). Maybe I just need to get laid. I dunno. That would at least cure my headache... I'd settle for just having someone pull my hair... Sigh. No such luck there either... Since I don't have a better alternative, I'm going to go take a nap. Maybe I'll be less grumpy and emotionally disturbed once I catch some zzzz's.... Sorry about the rant. It made for sort of an odd movie review. I still recommend checking this movie out. Just don't be looking for a "Happily Ever After" when you go to see it...

"Love is merely a madness, and, I tell you, deserves as well a dark house and a whip as madmen do." -- William Shakespeare - "As You Like It" - Act III, Scene ii

Riding Off Into The Sunset

I've started writing again. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. For the last couple of months, I've been focused on getting my real life back on track. Getting settled into my job. Extricating myself from a bad relationship. That kind of thing. Before that I was fully immeresed in my script I was working on. I cranked it out pretty quickly and it was very theraputic, but it was a hard journey for me. That script was very close to my heart and many aspects of it were largely based on my real life. It forced me to confront a lot of feelings I had bottled up inside of me and that was a good thing, but other parts of it that I had not intended to mirror reality ended up coming scarily too close to being true. That script is in desperate need of additional pages and honestly needs a major re-write, but I can't do it right now. I need some distance from that story. I also need some unbiased input, but I'm not ready to share it with anyone else yet. Soon. But not yet... In the meantime I have not been in a writing "zone." Everyday real life has just been too all-consuming. That's not to say I haven't had story ideas bouncing around in this head of mine. Two in particular have been nagging at me. One has some basis in the reality of my past and it's a story I need to tell, but I'm not going to go there yet. So that leaves my other idea. I should be writing low-budget indie fare that would be easier to sell or that I could ultimately put together and produce myself. Fuck that. I'm not in the mood to be practical right now either. Writing is an emotional outlet for me and I need to write the story that most wants to get told. That story is currently a Western. I'm not sure where it came from, but I don't really care. I like the characters already. Many of their traits are definitely based (at least loosely) on people in my life. They have to be. It makes it easier for me to write people I know. I'm about a 1/4 of the way through the outline and this is most definitely not a low-budget project, but then by their very nature, Westerns usually aren't. There are period coustumes. Authentic sets to be built. Horses to deal with. That kinda thing. Still, I think it's a good story and that's the most important thing. I'll be happier once I get the outline done, but I'm not looking forward to the emotional turmoil this is going to put me through though. And it will. I get very involved in my writing. Somehow I don't think writing a period piece will make that part of the journey any easier. Well, let's hope it's at least an interesting trip...

"Writing is a form of personal freedom. It frees us from the mass identity we see in the making all around us. In the end, writers will write not to be outlaw heroes of some underculture but mainly to save themselves, to survive as individuals." -- Don Delillo

Where There's Smoke...

It's been an all around disconcerting kinda day. It started last night about 3AM. There was something lurking out there in the dark and I honestly don't know what it was. Casper was going nuts outside and Roland was sitting at the door doing that deep-throated growling thing that German Shepherds do so well. At first I thought maybe there was an earthquake coming. Animals tend to behave strangely before one; they can sense them approaching in a way us lowly humans cannot. Then I heard something outside. Something big out in the brush. I turned on the floodlights. Casper came bounding up the stairs and sat on my porch growling. There was definitely an animal out there. I caught a glimpse of whatever it was, but then it was gone. It was probably a mountian lion, but they usually don't come this close to the house, so honestly I don't know what the fuck it was. Needless to say, sleep was elusive for the the rest of the night. Talk about some scary ass dreams... This morning I found myself in Santa Monica. Now I know I said I was going to avoid SM this weekend, but it was for a good cause and I had S-boy along with me, so I went. We helped out for a couple of hours taking donations for the hurricane relief effort. It was time well spent, but I hereby renew my vow not to go to Santa Monica anymore... Tonight I'm a little concerned for my own well-being. Just as it started to get dark I noticed this weird fog coming up over one of the hills behind the house. Turns out it wasn't fog. It was smoke. I can smell it now. It smells like one of those wood-burning stoves and should be conjuring up happy images of cold winter nights in front of the fire. Sadly that's not the case. Out here that is not a comforting smell. It usually signals the approach of a wild fire. It's dark now and fortunately I don't see any telltale glow along the ridgeline. The dogs both seem calm. I also have not seen any helicopters or heard any sirens so I'm not overly concerned... yet. Still, I have a bag packed and I'm going to keep Roland close to the house just in case the wind shifts or something and we have to leave in a hurry... So, it's proving to be an interesting start to the holiday weekend. Well, I never said my life was normal... Fuck it. Normal is boring. Call me crazy, but I like living out here on the edge. It keeps life interesting :)

"I like someone who is a little crazy but coming from a good place. I think scars are sexy because it means you made a mistake that led to a mess." -- Angelina Jolie

Crazy Chicks

Women are nuts. I know this because I'm just as crazy and irrational as the next girl. Here's an example. I have this pair of rust-colored raw silk pants that I bought like 13 or 14 years ago. I paid a lot of money for them and have just been unable to give them to GoodWill even though they have not fit me since like 1993. In the back of my mind there was always the insane notion that I would be able to wear them again. I almost gave them up on this last move, but they had taken on this weird talismanic quality and I found myself packing them up and dragging them across the county for no logical reason. Well today my madness paid off for once. I decided on a whim to try them on and fuck me if they didn't fit again. Woo Hoo! It's the little things in life that make me happy these days. See. Nuts. I admit it... Overall the day was uneventful. I didn't sleep well last night. I had fucked up dreams that didn't make sense and they were peopled by people I should most definitely not be dreaming about. There were some good dreams too, but I think I'll plead the 5th as to who was in those and what we were doing ;) My dog lost his mind briefly today. At some point he let himself into the apartment and apparently got bored because he ate a book. He has plenty of toys of his own, but for some reason he took issue with the book "Meg" and ate it from cover to cover. There were just little shreds left. What can I say? Roland is apparently not normal either. What a pair we make... So a holiday weekend approaches. I was going to hit the beach, but that requires me to drive all the way to the beach, and with gas as high as it is I'm not sure I want to make that costly a journey. Granted, I could go to Santa Monica instead of Huntington and it would be a lot closer, but chances are very good that I'd run into HWMNBN in SM and I'm just not prepared to deal with him right now. I guess I'll give S-boy a call tomorrow and see if he wants to bring his dog up here and go hiking or something. He can afford these crazy gas prices. At least someone can...

"No doubt exists that all women are crazy; it's only a question of degree." -- W. C. Fields