Riding the electrified third rail.

First of all, it was a mistake to think I could get away with wearing my new boots in San Francisco. My sister and I, no matter how lazy our plans, always spend at least an hour walking all told. She will say a place is at "the end of my street," and it's 12 blocks away.

So by the time I reached the Powell St. BART station around 8 p.m., my calves and toes were crying out for mercy.

Not that this precludes the day from being full of joy and wonder, mind you. Margot's new apartment is in an awesome location and looks amazing. Her new roommate is sweet. Her bar is stocked, not that this matters to me, but it does to her. Her kitchen has a gas range. You could do a lot worse.

We picked up a falafel to split and had coffee from somewhere--iced--and hung out at her place for awhile before the day's activity was decided. It was determined that we would go to a store and buy things to cook. This involved a bus trip up Geary to Trader Joe's, where Margot stocked up on liquor, coffee, and coffee-flavored liquor, and I got things to make a small Mexican-style feast.

The food turned out amazing: tilapia fillets baked in a jar full of Cuban mojito sauce, black beans mashed with garlic and baked with pepper jack cheese, and avocado mashed up with fresh lime and salt; finished off with pico de gallo and thick corn tortillas. We ate it all. We are gluttons.

At that point, we determined that a visit to Good Vibrations was in order. Margot said it was "just up the street" from her apartment, which it was, in fact, not. That is when my toes inside my boots started screaming at me. Perhaps I really am not cut out for wearing shoes with a 2-inch heel after all. Anyway, we went to Goodwill on the way, which was amusing and somewhat productive. I found two boring shirts to wear to work; as we were heading to the register, Margot spotted a cute, hippie-ish top that fit her perfectly and was quite flattering, really. Score. Good Vibrations yielded the expected level of amusement from penis pasta, boob cake tins, flaccid dildos for sexual acts we are too young to know about, and multicolored vibrators of all shapes, sizes, and species. I don't even want to know how many high-larious google hits that last sentence is going to get me.

My feet were trying to fall off my body, so we thought about catching a movie, but our timing was all wrong, so we parted ways and I got on the next train towards home.

And here I am. Home. Happy to be barefoot.

I know it ain't gonna last.

Hello, America. Got any good weekend plans?

Me, I'm just taking advantage of the unfortunate circumstance of my sister's boyfriend's jerkiness which lead her to be in San Francisco and not scheduled to work this weekend (when she was supposed to be in Seaside, Ore.). That is, I'm going up to the city tomorrow to check out her new place and probably bug her for a few hours before coming home to rot further in front of my TV and/or stereo.

Things that are good for my ears this week: John Vanderslice, Dan Bern (thanks to the Editor), Sufjan Stevens, the Pixies, Charles Mingus, and oddly, Mercury Rev. I am just barely over the Mountain Goats obsession hump. My boss popped in a Sleep Chamber CD while we worked overtime alone in the office the other night, which was alternately interesting and creepy-hilarious.

I haven't been spending much time watching TV. It's too hot to not listen to music. Besides, even the second-rate reality crap I was watching is now ending, so it's a whole lot of who-the-fuck-cares. Besides, music is much less enraging.

I'm so fucking tired from this week. Restless and tired.

Time and a half.

Christine said something interesting in an email. She suggested we should be able to network for friends like some people do for jobs. I suppose that's ultimately what happens on the Internet, but it doesn't make what she wrote any less amusing: "Instead of saying, 'I'm looking for a job, these are my skills and interests, do you know of any' you say, 'I'm looking for friends, these are my skills and interests, do you know of any?'"

I'm going out of my head with boredom. I really am. I am so bored that I am trying once again to like Xiu Xiu. No one is talking on IRC, no one is on AIM, no one is at my house, and you know how I feel about the phone when it comes to people who are not already considered "safe." (Yeah, I have some fucking issues I need to resolve.)

I was at work until 7. It's after 9 and I can't even find my boyfriend. Not that he wants to do anything besides curl up with his musical equipment this week, so I'm not sure which is more frustrating: that he's not here, or that he probably wouldn't want much to do with me if he were here.

That's a sad fucking statement. I promise that isn't all there is to life all the time. He's a software engineer with an artistic side and a deep loner streak. These things happen.

I need some mental stimulation. I need more things to get excited about and less to whine about. I need to go out and find those things.

Category 2!

Hurricane!

Is it wrong to be amused by a destructive storm that shares my name?

Deeeeeeluxe.

Bean sprouts, that is. Stolen from my memory of the Thai-ger Room.

-1 block of firm tofu, drained of as much water as possible
-cornstarch
-oil to fry

Cut the tofu into wedges and dust it with the cornstarch. Then fry on each side until lightly browned.

In a wok or other large pan, saute:

-little oil
-tons of garlic (no, really. Tons)
-as much red pepper as you can handle

Add the fried tofu wedges and:

-soy sauce, to taste
-3 chopped scallions

Cook the wedges a little more until they are coated with flavor. Mmmm, flavor. Take out and set aside, but be sure to leave most of the scallions, garlic, and pepper in the pan. Then add:

-a whole bunch of bean sprouts
-a little extra soy sauce if you need to deglaze the pan or something

Stir the flavor and the bean sprouts quickly, being careful not to overcook the sprouts.

Serve with rice. Brown if you're a health nut like me. Hah.

Aside from the time it took to prepare the tofu, this takes maybe 10 minutes to do. And you can buy pre-cooked fried tofu from many Asian markets. Yum.

Three entries in one day? It may be a RECORD.

As fucking promised.

Without further ado, here's a list of movies. Or two lists. Or one list broken into two sub-lists. Anyway, there's 10 of 'em; I've committed.

5 for Funny

1. The Big Lebowski

But of course, it isn't great only because it's funny. I laugh and I quote, but there is so much more. If you have not seen it or you do not like it, you do not understand. If you were stoned and/or drunk for it, you might not understand. This movie makes me want to write analytical papers of LOVE.

2. Harold and Maude

Again, not an entirely hilarious movie, but the comedy is black as night. I've already made all of you watch it. I don't have to explain it.

3. Dr. Strangelove (or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb)

So many perfect lines. It's probably my favorite Kubrick (though A Clockwork Orange and Full Metal Jacket are awesome as well).

4. Rushmore

God, I have nothing intelligent to say about these movies, at least not in this context. The criteria appear to be: This movie made me laugh. This movie made me think. This movie made me watch it again and again. This movie made me force my friends to watch it. This movie made me repeat lines and situations from it. Rushmore's more oft-quoted line: “Oh, ARE you?”

5. The Princess Bride

This failed to make me think too much, but it succeeds on all other counts. It's a shared cultural experience, really. Best in Show receives an honorable mention here.


5 for Not-Funny

1. Hedwig and the Angry Inch

This is the only—ONLY—musical I have ever loved. Well, okay, The Sound of fucking Music (Nazis!), but this totally wins. I actually like the music and there is some semblance of plot and character development.

2. Rear Window

This may be only because I own it on VHS, but I've watched it many times, and it only improves with each viewing.

3. Heavenly Creatures

A Peter Jackson movie that isn't horror or fantasy? With a young Kate Winslet and disarmingly fucked-up based-on-a-true-story plot? Love it.

4. Annie Hall

I know Woody Allen is both hated and a comedian, but I don't find his movies very ha-ha funny, at least not the ones that resonate.

5. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

If for no other reason than the amazing score...but of course, the movie is at least as good as the score.

I have a hard time committing to the latter group, especially, because a lot of movies I think are amazing I've only seen once, and I don't feel comfortable plopping those down in my top 5 or 10 or whatever.

Confidential to the Editor: Happy now?

Here I am.

Rock you like a hurricane.

Notice my emphasis on LIKE A. Because right now I am only a tropical storm. But I can pick up wind speed and make landfall and fuck some shit up!

Always look on the bright side of life.

Apologies to Monty Python.

Things may be hectic and ridiculous at work, but one big headache got shoved out the door along with almost everything else by 5 p.m., and I made it through the day without shooting myself in the head. Any day where I don't actually die is probably okay on some level.

After work, I met up with the Editor again. He scored passes to the Santa Cruz Built to Spill show, but we decided to skip it in favor of not driving over the hill and getting back after midnight or worse. Instead, we saw Me and You and Everyone We Know, which was better than anticipated. I mean, I'd heard it was decent, but I enjoyed it very much. Some people, who shall remain nameless, with certain in-jokes with me about poop will enjoy its humor, though it is at times even more surprisingly crass than we could ever imagine.

Don't we all have a few in-jokes about poop with someone? No? You people live sad little lives.

AND ALSO. For those who are about to fucking ask. This is not dating. If I were to hang out with a chick and do the same things, no one would say that. This annoys me, for some reason.

When I arrived home, a USPS package containing my new boots was waiting for me. They are so cute! They will require much breaking in, but they are cute! I have cute shoes! And I did not pay $150 for them! ...Only $50. They were on sale from Nordstrom.com, and only in black and only in my size.

Okay, tomorrow I will do up the 10 movies. I made a promise. I will also make my pathetic approximation of bean sprout deluxe (a la the Thai-ger Room). That is the plan. But plans, as we all know, are wont to change.

Empty title.

I'm completely devoid of commentary this week. I've had pretty much nothing to do at work when everyone else is crazy-busy. (It was this crazy-busy-ness that cheated me out of Friday night's plans, incidentally.)

So I keep wanting to write, but I don't know what to write about (besides the movies, which I want to be in the mood to do, because right now I'm liable to be all, "I dunno, I kind of don't give a fuck about anything, here's some shit I gave 5 stars on Netflix, blah").

Lots of parentheticals. I am bored to the point of being drained.

I tried to get Kevin to go hiking today--pursuant to his desire to not use up an entire weekend or even a day on these sorts of activities, what bothers they are, I attempted to pick a moderate difficulty 2-3 hour trail in advance that is located less than an hour drive away, and I could have directions and food ready to go in the morning. The 45 minutes it would take to drive up in the hills west of here was too far, he said, as was anything around Hwy 9 in the redwoods. He said maybe something closer, but still with trees. I don't think you can get trees much closer than 45 minutes. I grew weary of this argument (mostly one-sided on my part, because he doesn't get angry, he just picks a branch of logic and goes with it) and have had a lazy Saturday to show for it.

Maybe we can go to the wildlife refuge in the early evening, after the sun goes down a little. It won't be muddy and stormy like last time we went, and it is reasonably pretty.

In happier news, my new burner rules. I burned a CD in under 5 minutes. Kevin found an app, k3b, that supports on-the-fly decoding of mp3s and OGGs for audio CDs and works very much like Easy CD Creator and all that. The interface is a little fluffy and clumsy, but user-friendly and functional. I think he also got DVD support working because he was using it earlier.

On the other hand, I have apparently lost my old homepage/blog layout graphics, and that is really annoying. I must've deleted them from everywhere I still have access to. Fuck. Redesign in the works when I fucking feel like it.

My old blog is depressing me, because even though the summer of 2002 was a crazy time, I was writing a lot and I actually like the way I wrote some things and was excited about stuff. Pretty much everything I've written lately has been so lame, it reminds me of why I quit playing guitar: it's frustrating and I don't feel like I'm getting anywhere with it. I must've lost my callouses.

People have commented that I am a very angry person. I'm not sure if I was always this angry, or if it's just been building. I take it out on things I can't control, but I know it isn't about other drivers and television commercials. I think it's okay to scream sometimes, even if it's petty, because it lets a little of the deeper anger slip out, too. But maybe I'm fooling myself on that one.

For my own amusement, may I present...

Me, at age 20. A tumultuous year, indeed.

I fixed the template so it isn't using images that have long since been deleted from UW's servers. That was a pretty, pretty layout, though.

Whine and dine.

I promised The Editor (how's that for a creative moniker?) I'd write about my top 10 movies this week, but I'm not feeling up to it today. I received M in the mail and still have my mom's copy of The Motorcycle Diaries to watch, but I've strangely not been in the mood.

This did not, however, stop me from seeing Kung Fu Hustle last night, which was exactly the kind of happy pill I needed this week. I also realized how much I fucking miss going to movies and doing things and oh man. I gotta do shit more often. Talking to cool people + seeing cool things + not sitting home on my lazy white ass on an otherwise dead weeknight = good. I even have plans for Friday night, as my coworker and I decided to go see (probably) Howl's Moving Castle and have some dinner.

I cannot stop listening to the Mountain Goats. It's sort of driving me insane, but it's all I want to hear anymore. This happens sometimes after I see a band, though, and the obsession always fades.

I don't even know what I was thinking I'd write about today. It's weird times. I woke up to the news about London, as I'm sure everyone did. I'm slowly contemplating where I want to be in life and how to get there, that sort of thing, because while I'm okay now, it certainly isn't where I want to be forever. But who is at that place at age 23? Or, for that matter, 30?

I've known since I was a teenager I could do better.

God bless America.

It gets harder every year to think of an appropriately cynical way to mark this holiday.

Instead of making a picnic and heading for a grassy knoll with 60,000 others to watch pyrotechnics in a designated locale, Kevin and I headed to the Redwoods for a stroll, where Kevin came up with a potentially brilliant idea I will discuss in a moment. After that, we headed into Santa Cruz, browsed Streetlight, noticed our favorite Thai restaurant in town had disappeared, and went to Capitola to eat dinner at Dharma's. (When I crave a salad, I crave the basic salad from Dharma's with their tahini-lemon dressing that's inexplicably good.)

Kevin's brilliant idea is to rent another place near Santa Cruz in which to spend the weekends. He wants the Redwoods. He was torn between a tiny place or a big place; considering whether or not to move his music equipment; questioning how much time he could realistically spend there. Upon checking rental availability and rates on Craigslist, I think he may be reconsidering, but it's kind of a happy thought, anyway.

The Redwoods are always lovely to visit. There's a certain serenity in the carpet of shamrocks, each on their own planes tilting toward sunlight. While younger trees stand straight and tall, the more ancient creatures and those recently passed display knots and gnarls and the gentle patterns of age as though imbued with the likeness of the divine itself. This visible spirit is awe-inspiring, really.

We never made it to the sand. Several beaches were blocked to traffic and already overrun with eager fireworks spectators, and by the time we parked somewhere in Aptos, I didn't feel like making the trek. I saw the ocean and felt the breeze; that was enough for me. Not so for Kevin, but he's sort of at my mercy as a bitchy girl.

I haven't seen a single firework today, though I've heard dozens. With or without them, these days there's little to stir the rah-rah spirit within me as far as national pride goes.

Three days of nothing.

I must have some kind of cosmic time-management problem. Only typical weekends seem to get packed with activity, while this expansive holiday weekend, I can barely find a reason to drag myself out of bed. I've been spoiled by houseguests, who always want to do things.

Sure, I've got DVDs to watch—or did, until I watched them all—and I'm in the middle of a great book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. Yesterday I found a decent pair of jeans at Ross and bought some pretty black slacks at Target. Kevin got my burner working, at least the CD capabilities and using a command line interface I'm not nearly smart enough to know how to use yet, so I can listen to Tallahassee in the car. It's been hot as hell, and yet I made soup yesterday. I'm not feeling creative enough to throw together anything else; in other dishes, overcooked vegetables are more of a detraction. My plants are almost certainly dying.

I painted my short (but not bitten) nails Vixen red, much to Kevin's amusement. He seems to find it funny whenever I do something girly. Wear a skirt; he giggles. Shave my legs; he's laughing. Go shopping for clothes; he's confused. Dye my hair; he marvels at the disgusting state of affairs while the color sets. I have never met a boy so strangely and openly beguiled by a girl's simple vanity. (And it is simple—if you've ever met me, you probably know I put minimal effort into my appearance. The hair gel is just because my hair doesn't take barrettes kindly and it sucks to have hair falling in my face all day at work.)

So today may or may not be filled by an assortment of activities from the following: thrifting at the Savers on Bascom (Savers is to California what Value Village is to Washington), visiting Kevin's coworker's holiday party, watching streaming video of Deep Impact, a round of mini-golf, seeing a movie like Me and You and Everyone We Know, going to Whole Foods for tahini to make hummus, visiting a park or one of the open spaces. So far we've agreed to exactly none of these activities, but if I don't get out of the house today, I'm going to be whiny. How this differs from the norm, I don't know.

Last night we went to Udupi Palace, which serves vegetarian South Indian food that is relatively non-greasy and tends to be yummy. I ordered a spinach masala dosa and masala tea. Because I was starving when a regular masala dosa arrived, I figured my order was misheard and dove in. A few minutes later, a spinach masala dosa arrived, followed by Kevin's order. I figured there was a mistake in the order, that the waiter thought I ordered a masala dosa instead of masala tea, but when the bill arrived, I saw that wasn't the case. I paid a little extra tip, packed up the spinach masala dosa, and went home, confused and very full. I never did get any tea.

We saw the fireworks at Great America from 237 as we went to the restaurant. I've heard events in my neighborhood since Friday night, as well as the loud POP sounds from kids playing with explosives. This is going to go on for the next week, at least. I hate the 4th of July.

One of those weeks.

Some nights, I really wish I liked the taste of alcohol. Work has been hectic, to say the least, and I'm so glad it's a 3-day weekend, despite my complete lack of plans.

Well, there's DVDs, and possibly some movies, and maybe we'll go down to Santa Cruz or a park. And my bathtub needs cleaning. My new burner arrived, so I'll have to get Kevin to work on it. There are many CDs I'd like to burn, many Mountain Goats records from emusic I want to have in my car, many fun mixes to create, many cover songs to gather for the stranger from the Internet (whose name is TOP SECRET, apparently, in my mind).

Oh, I fucked up. I was going to write, but I turned on the TV. The TV kills all writing thoughts that do not involve irrational anger toward commercials. Bad TV!

Things could be worse, though. I could be homeless and begging for money in the Whole Foods parking lot.

Foods that are making me happy today.

Besides all of them.

Breakfast of Trader Joe's California complete protein bread with almond butter and marionberry preserves, strawberry yogurt, and cranberry-orange juice.

Lunch from the Trader Joe's refrigerated section: vegetable sushi, noodles with carrots, cilantro-lime dressing, and toasted coconut and peanuts, and a protein with PZAZZ (I swear that is how they spell it, inexplicably) shake.

We picked up a box of lime juice popcicles, too, and enjoyed them later in the afternoon.

Dinner? Ethiopian again. This time with Kevin's mom and grandfather, so we were able to order pretty much every vegetarian item (and his grandfather had the lamb, thanks to Chris's previous recommendation). Gojo's vegetarian menu includes a veggie combo of the spicy red lentils, mild yellow split peas, collard greens, a mixture of cabbage, carrots, and potatoes, and a lightly dressed green salad. In addition to that, we get mitten shiro, which is a smooth gravy of pureed chickpeas and spices, and timatim fitfit, a cold, sour mixture of tomato, onion, bell peppers, and pieces of injera. It is all super delicious and I LOVE IT.

Despite my very full belly, I felt the need to break into my super dark chocolate bar. It soothes the soul. Plus, I have some sparkling lemonade.

And this is all I can think to write about today.

Fellow bloggers, avail yourselves.

The MIT Weblog Survey is cool. It's like making science!

Putting it out there.

I'm not a writer. I write, but I don't think of myself as a writer. You'd think a girl who got a degree in journalism and has a(n admittedly paltry) portfolio of published and non-published nonfiction would be a writer, but no.

But I'd like to be, I think. I'd like to be part of that process. It's enthralling.

And so, as a kind of first step in that direction, I'm going to write down why I'm not a writer now. The stupid excuses I have to get over before I can think of myself as fully realized adult and claim myself for what I want to be. My sister's the artist, my brother's the musician, and I'm the writer.

Is that self-absorbed enough to start? Good. It's about to get worse.

I need to be confident in my abilities. I can get through an interview without stuttering or making people think I'm a complete asshole; I need to stop thinking like I can't.

I need to believe in my own ideas. People read the boring shit I throw up here; surely even a half-researched and competently written story about not-me would be interesting to more people.

I need to stop thinking that the butterflies in my stomach give me an out.

I need to trust people. I missed a lot of opportunities in college because I wasn't willing to put myself out there.

I need to find a way to get the thoughts in my head out that doesn't involve waiting until I reach my destination. I also need to hope these ideas don't come out only to reveal themselves as crap.

I need to think of bedtime as flexible.

I need to value ideas and process over laziness.

I need to treat my blog as more than a schedule receptacle.

***

This isn't quite a to-do list, just a list of things I'm aware that I blame for my complacency.

Anything you want to know about? I'm accepting story requests. They can be anything that could be covered in a brief entry and wouldn't require press credentials to competently research.

It's an experiment I'm willing to try. Anyone else out there?

Ten Records I Still Love.

In no particular order, and subject to change at whim.

The Northwest Bands:

• Death Cab for Cutie, We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes
  Before I had to explain to people that the guy from the Postal Service was in this other band, which is also, believe it or not, ridiculously popular for an indie, there was this record. And it is love.
  
  
• Unwound, The Future of What?!
  Every time I try to explain why this record rocks me, all I can come up with is lyrics: “I'm on a subway to a place I can't pronounce / But at least I didn't pay. / A train of thought for a movie plot / Starring me and you, insane. / Can I tempt you with natural disasters?”
  
  
• 764-HERO, Weekends of Sound
  Great driving music from a band named after the number you call in Western Washington to report carpool lane violators.
  
  
• Quasi, Featuring 'Birds'
  A divorced couple sings dirty harmony about broken relationships, bitterness, and depression. I don't know why I wouldn't like it.
  
  
• The Gossip, Arkansas Heat
  This EP captures the essence of their live shows better than the full-length LPs (not to mention the actual length of the average show). It makes me shake my ass for 20 minutes straight, which is no small feat during traffic.

The Non-Northwest Bands:

• The Pixies, Doolittle
  This should be obvious.
  
  
• Massive Attack, Mezzanine
  So sexy, I want to die.
  
  
• Neutral Milk Hotel, In the Aeroplane over the Sea
  Again, obvious. For the uninitiated, this is a spectacle of near-perfect indie rock insanity. Not for the faint of heart.
  
  
• Talking Heads, More Songs About Buildings and Food
  I don't know if it's cool to like the Talking Heads or what, but I do. David Byrne strikes me as completely fucking nuts in a way that rivals Bjork, which is great. Plus, again, it makes me wanna dance.
  
  
• The Mountain Goats, Tallahassee
  This may be thrown on due to its freshness in my mind, and also for “No Children.” Which is not to discount its awesomeness in any way.

That's all I can commit to at this time. I should update this list every couple months, just to see how it shifts. Yes. I aspire to make list so obsessive that I can put them into a spreadsheet and create a graph. To post on my blog. That would be awesome.

Frustrations.

I want to preface this by saying I try not to talk about work, and I sure as shit don't name names. I'm easily googled and a few coworkers (friendly coworkers) know about the blog, even if they don't read it much. (I don't know why anyone reads this, actually.) But considering a majority of my wakeful hours and social interaction occurs at work, sometimes I feel like talking about it--and by it, I don't mean the work I do, just some things I think about as a result of those social interactions. So, coworkers, if you do see this, don't take it personally that I'm a dork.

That enough bullshit disclaimer for you?

On Friday, some people were giving me grief about my "date" for the evening, which did not help my nervousness in the slightest. I get nervous about meeting people. I get nervous about meeting people I think will be cool because I don't want to be a dork. I get nervous about doing things with strangers where I could get in trouble. I do not need the additional crap that is my coworkers wrongly accusing me of going on a "date."

I have no idea why I'm so sensitive about that. But making fun of me was their reaction to my nervous state, and it wasn't helping.

At 5 o'clock, I was so sick of being in the office that I just walked outside and leaned against my car, waiting for a call. It was sunny but not too warm, even in my black jacket. One coworker emerged from the office and made her way to her car, calling out, "You look like someone who's waiting for a date!"

To which I did not react kindly, though (I think) in a sarcastic enough way. I'm not very tactful.

And as she drove off, I waved.

Today at lunch, she announced with a laugh that I'd flipped her the bird. She also did an amusing impression of my body language that I hope to god was greatly exaggerated.

I'm sure I turned bright red as I leapt to my own defense. I only flip off people with whom I have the kind of relationship that we have an understanding it's a joke! Like when you tell your best friend to fuck off! You don't mean it! It isn't undercut with the severity reserved for true ire. The kind of ire I wouldn't dare direct at a coworker I hardly know in the parking lot on a Friday night when all she's done is tease me.

Sometimes I feel like such a little kid in the office. I'm not used to relating to people 5+ years my senior as peers. When I tell everyone I'm fucking 23 and a baby, I don't mean it to imply that I think they're all REAL FUCKING OLD, just that I'm really young, as if this means anything besides half of their pop culture references are meaningless to me. Anyway, it's a weird feeling. I've always had friends who were within 2 years of me, besides adults in teacher-type roles. I've also always been a student. I'm still adjusting to this new role in life. There's still cognitive dissonance to work out.

In other news, my mom and I visited Big Sur this weekend, where the gas is a good $1 more than the Bay Area (the fabled $3.50/gallon!). It was gorgeous, especially this little trail mom read about on the Internet where you drive 36 miles south of Carmel, look for a row of colorful mailboxes on your right, then go around a bend and down the hill a bit and park in a turnout near a locked iron gate (not marked "private property"). It's about 2 miles and you see some nice redwoods, a stream, and some spectacular swells crashing against the rocks.

Did I mention we were on a sailboat Saturday? It was cool.

We also visited Hot Pot City for the first time, which felt like a strange combination of fondue, Mongolian BBQ, and campfire cooking, but it was a satisfying meal.

And today I ordered a DVD-RW/CD-RW drive that supports dual layer DVDs and a bunch of other acronyms and stuff from New Egg for $50 with tax. My 7-year-old 6x Smart & Friendly CD-RW won't burn anymore, but it's had a good run.

I visited a petting zoo with a murderer.

Or, rather, went to San Francisco to see the Mountain Goats with a stranger from the Internet who could easily have been a murderer, for all I knew.

Obviously, I lived to tell the tale.

So the story is this: Last Monday, someone replied to my repeated requests for a show buddy. He said he was qualified to be my Mountain Goats friend and claimed work for a San Jose altweekly. As the editor. I looked it up and it seemed legit, so I wrote back and said he could definitely have the ticket, but I'd have to think about being show buddies with a total Internet stranger, for obvious reasons.

In subsequent emails, he came off as a cool guy, plus the whole editor thing, plus he has a girlfriend so there went that whole potentially-creepy factor. I decided to take him up on his offer to drive.

This worked out well. We had fun talking (about bands that suck, movies that are scary and give some people panic attacks, how Silicon Valley is boring, the journalism game) before and during the show, even though it was a ridiculously late night. The opening acts started at 10 and were pretty annoying, and the Mountain Goats didn't get onstage until 12.

They played for a lovely and amazing hour and 20 minutes, ending the second encore with crowd favorite "No Children." Though we all wanted a longer set, despite the late hour, "No Children" was enough to shut us all up and make us go home happy.

I'm not effectively communicating the level of hilarious good fortune involved in this encounter, but believe me, it was there.

At 2:30 a.m., I finally arrived home. I got to sleep around 3 and woke up at 9. My mom was here by 10, and we were on a sailboat by noon. It was a great day for sailing, and I learned a few things about sailing and ropes. Not much, but a little.

Now I am tired, but I cannot nap.