I've been back from Portland!

So I went and met Scott and for some stupid reason we didn't get any pictures together! We could be lying about having met. No one will ever believe anything I say again!
We had a couple of hours until check-in time at the hotel, so we got lunch. I really wanted a drink, having had one while watching "The Prestige" on the train, but I decided to hold off since I planned to drink a lot later. We went to a cafe creativley named "John's." The best section of the menu was the Dessert. It read:

Dessert
Ice cream sandwich....$1.00
That was it. We wondered if they unwrapped it for you or put it on a plate or anything. The waitress, an older woman with a Russian(?)accent, was clearly one of the owners. She was a weird sort of friendly and bitchy at the same time. We shot the shit for a while there.
We went to Reading Frenzy, an honest to goodness zine store. A lot of them were Portland-centric, but that's to be expected. I picked up a handful of painfully indie comics, as well as the first two issues of Optic Nerve. I really should have gotten more. A lot more. I read ALL of them on the train ride home.
We also went to a monstorous bookstore that had a condom despenser in the men's room. I suppose it makes sense that whoever runs that place is well-informed. This bathroom was also on the same level as the gay books. hmmm....

This is Scott in the graphic novel section wich was, of course, in the last section of the place we looked. It was in the gorram coffe shop. My stupid camera phone was on the small setting :(

After that we went out to get some grub as well as find some gay bars. There were supposed to be a few all in the same area butI'll be damned if we only saw two or three. One was what seemed to be a leather bar and we opted not to go to that one. The one bar/restaurant we did go to was suprisingly unfriendly. There were a lot of middle aged men at the bar all involved in their own conversations, wich is totally fine, but it was the servers that gave us the cold welcome. It seemed as though they couldn't get rid of us fast enough. There were several attempts to clear our plates well before we ewre finished eating, and when we were done, the waitress says "I assume you want the check." Well, yeah, after the watery drinks and lack of warmth, I think we were ready to go. I did smoke a cigarette in there, missing the few months in Seattle where I could actually do that in a bar, but it was bittersweet. The friendliest person there was the old guy who tried to sell us roses. Scott tried to take comfort in the fact that he thought we were handsome, turning a deaf ear to my explanation that he just wanted to sell us something.

We walked around for a bit before deciding on a decidedly-not-gay bar. That place was way better. The waitress was super friendly, the drinks were stiff, and the music was better, if not a little too loud. We sat there for two or three hours getting to know each other outside of the ones and zeroes that had represented us until that day. I feel like I know Danielle, Scott's Jew-Hag, personally already. Scott even managed to get a picture of me smiling. Rare, indeed.
Then it was back to the hotel, but not before stopping by 7-11 for more beer. Thank god we had a smoking room. Scott and I talked a long time about comics. I've found a few people latley that I can finally talk comics with, but I always know more than them. Not in this case. Scott has been around the industry for a while and has been reading a lot longer than I have, so if there were a triva contest, he'd pretty much kill me. I think I held my own pretty well, though.
So, Portland is really nice but I didn't see much of a night life. Yeah, it was a Thursday and really cold, but it's also a big city. I would expect more. Oh, yeah, when we were looking for the bookstores, there was a really helpful, femmy guy who told us how to get there. That was his job, he works for the city. He looked kinda like a meter maid.

I'm off to Portland!

I'm leaving for Portland tomorrow morning. I'm just staying overnight, but a trip like this is a big deal for me. Like going over to a friends to sleep over when I was five.
I'm going to meet my internet-geek friend Scott. Scott wants to do it with me, but I'm so very taken. If we had met this summer we'd probably have done it a whole bunch.

The best picture of Scott I could find.

The plan is to go to a bunch of comic book stores and some gay bars where I'll drink myself into oblivion. No reason why, I just usually do that. Then we'll share a hotel room where I'll fight off Scotts advances all night, stumble to the train station in the morning and come back to Seattle.
I'll have tons of pictures and hopefully some rad stories. Also some video, but im lame and don't have a firewire port.

This is just a ploy

Britney Spears shaved her head!




Do I really care?


No, I'm just hoping to increase traffic on my blog. I doubt it's going to work.

Rad Wedding (or parts of it, anyway)

I went to a rad wedding, or at least the best parts with all the drinking. The rehersal dinner and the reception. I met a lot of cool people. I was suprised with how easy it was to talk to most of them, considering I only knew the bride, the groom, and the minister(biblically) before this weekend.
During dinner, the groom even took the time to find out the band who played a song that was on the PA. for me. See, it had ben stuck in my head for something like 3 days and I could not remember who did it(it was Wilco).
The whole shebang was at Marco's Supper Club and the dinner was excellent. I have never had bacon wrapped steak before and naturaly one would think it would be delicious. Still, I think Marco's was probably excellent in it's own right.
Jeremy got us a room at the Ace Hotel, a very design-oriented joint. It was something else! The room had what the desk guy called an "interesting design feature." At the head of the bed was a huge pane of glass. On the other side was the shower. So you could totally watch someone. Take a shower. And yes, the room was a cool as it sounds.

So, yeah, I had a pretty rad weekend. Although because of all the drinking, as usual when i drink so much, I feel like i forgot a bunch of stuff to do or bills to pay or something. When i got home this afternoon my room smelled quite literaly like something was rotting in it (and I know exactly what it was). That prompted me to clean the whole thing so now that I have a clean room, my weekend was even better!

My Neuroses

One of the definitions for neurosis at Dictionary.com is:
a relatively mild personality disorder typified by excessive anxiety or indecision and a degree of social or interpersonal maladjustment
Yup. That's me.
I have a lot of trouble making decisions, comfortably talking to people, and I think I'm a little afraid of just about everything. My trouble making decisions leads to a kind of lethargy; you know, I can't decide what to do so I don't do anything. This is a big part of why I didn't finish college, or even make any headway when I did try to go. Is it also because I'm lazy? Probably.
What is it about making a decision that causes me to freeze like a deer caught in the headlights? Am I afraid of making the wrong decision? Is it that I don't want to put any effort into thoroughly thinking out any major decisions like changing jobs, moving, or going back to school? I think I've done okay so far. I moved from California to Seattle, far away from my family and my best friend wich was probably one of the biggest decisions I've made in my life. And it was a good decision, one for wich I have absolutley no regrets.
That move took a lot of balls, but I think it's just because I hit a breaking point; I couldn't stand where I was living anymore and leaving California all together seemed like a really good idea. That was a change in my life that practically made itself for me.
Something like changing jobs is a little different for me. This is where both the fear of everything and my discomfort with interpersonal communicating comes into play. Job searching requires me to be able to sell myself to a potential employer. For me to do that I would not only want the job I would also have to have enough faith in myself to do that job. As it goes now I feel that I wouldn't fare very well in finding a job that wasn't in customer service. Not just any customer service, but the kind where anyone can walk into your place of buisness and you have to do whatever they want, ie: retail, grocery, restaurant. Shit, I can't even do a restaurant. This wouldn't be much of a change from what I'm doing now so I don't really see a point in making the change. The job I have now isn't that bad aside from having absolutley no control over who I have to deal with at any random point of any day. For instance, I now live in fear that that crazy lady from the previous posts will drop in at any time.
And what is it about talking to people all day that makes me so uncomfortable? I don't know...I just have this image in my mind of all the people I've come into contact with throughout the day gathering together when I finally go to sleep and discussing what a horrible person I am, all the stupid things I said, and how wrong I did everything.
I don't know why I'm writing all this. Certainly not for pity. I'm just trying to state matter-of-factly how I feel, even if I know I'm dead wrong. Not only can I not think of anybody who doesn't like me, I know there are lots of people out there who like me a lot even though they shouldn't. Oh my god, do I not like people because I don't like myself? Wait, no...I think I'm awesome.
Anyway, as the defention above said, it's a "realativley mild" condition and I'm always trying to overcome it. Writing it all down probably helps me evaluate the situation.

NO, really, I'm NOT your friend!

I've dealt with my fair share of crazies. There was the guy who I worked with in the cash office of a WalMArt who didn't like to be touched, would swat at imaginary flies, and mutter things at me like "Don't look at me, fag." There was the constantly-talking-to-himself hobo Sapphire in Arcata, CA who became an active member of the community trying to put together a homeless task force(go to the link to read his enlightening speech at a town meeting.)At my job now, there's the guy who is rude to everyone, save a select few people. I am not one of them. I don't' know how he picks his friends. He comes in and says "Woo-Hoo!" to announce his presence, sometimes laughs to himself a lot, and once bit one of our baggers on the shoulder. There's also a woman who comes in and loudly insists that our produce guy sing with her. Usually songs no one has ever heard of.

Now, of course, we have a new one. The lady from the previous post. She came in again tonight. My coworker, Seth, had already had the lights in the vestibule and on the readerboard turned off. I'm standing at a register, discussing with the girl who was checking that night whether anyone else was coming in (I'd seen the silhouette of a car door opening outside). She hates late customers with a passion, and she REALLY doesn't like this lady. When she came in, I think both of our stomachs sunk. The woman looked all serious and said "You know...you know, you really shouldn't turn the lights out...if you're not closed,three or four minutes early..." Something like that. I look at the clock and say "Actually it's one minute after ten." I'm not sure what happened exactly after that because I was doing what I had learned to do with crazies in the past, even in a customer service position...IGNORE THEM.

Here's what I do know. She said something about it being our civic duty to honor the hours we post, Seth says we have the right to refuse service to anyone, she gets more upset, Seth points out that he let her in and didn't say she couldn't, she keeps at it, starts crying because her mom is dying or something...I eventually ring her up because the cashier girl had left. She actually wanted to stay and listen, but I made her leave. While she's at the checkstand she's talking about the dark souls on the astral plane that are causing her all this trouble, and that with our clocks, we need to "get with the twentieth century." I hastily made my way to the back to get the mop, leaving Seth to his own people-dealing devices. Upon leaving I hear her say "Pardon me for being a Virgo." Look, I'm all for spirituality. I'm agnostic, so I'm open to all kinds of it. Astrology, Catholicism, it all interests me. But I know spirituality and then I know crazy. Seth later told me that he had to keep telling her to leave, but she was saying things like "I'm so confused right now," and wouldn't move. This woman was obviously dealing with some other issue and projected them all on us. She's just crazy, and I will avoid her like the plague.
Oh, she also kept mentioning talking to a manager. God, I really hope she does. My boss will totally have our backs.

I'm NOT your friend

This may sound a bit cruel, but I hate when crazy, lonley people think it's okay to just talk to you unceasingly. There's a woman who comes into my work maybe once a week and just goes on and on about,...well, I don't know, I try to tune her out. Yes, she's really nice, but she'll overstay her welcome, talking to us as we're trying to work, or help other customers. I never even humor her anymore. If I ask how she is, I'll never hear the end of it. Once a co-worker just asked "How're you?"
Her response: "Well, I wouln't say I'm SUICIDAL,..." and went on to talk about some dispute within her family about someone's estate.
One time she mentioned that she had lived in Arcata, CA. This explains quite a bit.

Soaps02/08/07:Passions-The good with the bad

The stupidest thing about today's episode of Passions was the product placement for KY 2in1 Tingling massage liquid. Theresa was having a FANTASY about Ethan and in that fantasy, they pitched the massage/lubricant to the viewer. My immediate reaction to this kind of advertisment is a bad one, but when I think about it I guess it's not so bad. I mean, wasn't Jack Benny selling Lucky Strike cigarettes on his show back in the 50's? It's TV history.

Even if the K-Y thing was to be viewed in a negative light, it is made up for by the guest appearence by the Scissor Sisters . I'm not a big SS fan, in fact I've only heard the song Filthy Gorgeous. Their performance on Passions was really good, though, if only because it was a live performance. No lip synching! And they get to act a little bit. Since Endora conjured them up, they are confused and get mad at the witches. I especially like how they are about to beat up and old lady and an infant. Rad.

Plot-wise, I'm liking the fake Charity. Julian has hired a blonde to wear a mask and pretend to be Charity. I always like dual personalities as a plot device. Posing as someone else isn't as cool as evil twins, though. I have an evil twin. His name's Ted.

I'm getting sick.

Today (wednesday)at work I had a headache all day and felt like shit. I though it was just because I had some beer with lunch then missed my bus while getting bus fare at a store. my mood improved, but the headache never went away. a little more than halfway through my shift I noticed I was stuffed up and my head was hot. I concluded that I was getting sick. It was difficult to figure it out because I rarely get sick.

I drank a bunch of orange juice, took some nigh-time Alka Seltzer cold medicine and tried a folk remedy that someone at work told me about. I boiled garlic and ginger root in water then added lemon juice and finally the whole lemon wedge. It was actually pretty good. Between that and the cold medicine I was feeling really loopy.


Fast forward to Thursday. I wake up about noon, having slept quite soundly. I still had a headach and I was still stuffy, but my mood is fantastic. For some reason I'm thinking it was the cold medicine. I REALLY want to take some more. I stumbled off to 7-11 to get more orange juice and food and beer and stuff. I'm feeling much better. I hardly ever get sick. If I do, it's not for very long.

Soaps:2/05/07- All My Children acusations

So some guy grabs Kendal's arm and all of a sudden, just like with Zarf/Zowie, every one in town is in the room and ready to beat the shit out of this guy because he is clearly the serial killer they are looking for. They bully him and yell at him, forgetting that every time they do this...they are wrong.

An Art Project

I text messaged a bunch of my friends asking them to send me one-word responses as inspiration for artwork. All replied, but I've only gotten around to a few of them.
The first one was from Nate, Who sent me "Scoundrel".

I did this while wasted on vodka. There's a sneer in there, but I dont know how clear that is in the photo. Sadly, I dont currently have a flatbed scanner. The roughly geometric background shapes are something I like to do, inspired by Sam Keith.
Another was Chelsea who sent me "Mice." Once she figured out it was me texting her, she elaborated. "Mutant mice with handguns battling dragons." I think this will be another ink drawing with watercolor. I did a quick one (still drunk) but it looked crappy.

I've been practicing dragons. Here's a drawing of me feeling the dragon out:

I want him to look real mean. I have a better doodle in my notepad at work.
Another one I got was from Tony. He sent me "stilts". This will probably just be a line drawing. I have a thumbnail for it, but thats about it:

My man, Jeremy, sent me "technophobe." I have a good idea for this one, but no sketches yet. I want to finish one or more of the other ideas before I start on that one.

I never commit

If anyone is familiar with my  Review Blog, It wasn't originaly intend to be a review blog. I did a few initial post that were attempting to tell long stories about things that happened to me. I got bored of that and started the reviews, remembering that I always wanted to do a print zine of random reviews. but was always way too lazy to make a photocopied print zine. Yeah, I'm pretty lazy. Blogging reviews is much easier than cutting, pasting, writing and heading down to Kinkos to spend twenty bucks.
So I started this here blog to bitch about soap operas wich quite frequently piss me off. However, I haven't been getting to see them much and they don't seem to be pissing me off that much latley, especially since I'm looking for it. I keep thinking of things I want to write about that fall into neither the review nor soap category. I thought of starting a new blog, but I can't just go making a new blog every time I think of a new topic. That's retarded.
So, I am revamping again, making this my personal blog. Anything goes either here, or in the Boontdusties.com review blog
So. Enjoy.

1-30-07: AMC- Dixie's Dead

She’s the Jean Grey of the All My Children world. That’s right, folks. Dixie Cooney is dead. Again. Unlike last time when she died off screen, this time around we see everyone paying respects to the body lying in the hospital as well as showing her as a ghost.. Anytime a major character dies in a comic book or soap opera all I think about is how they are going to come back, feeling that their death is a cheap ploy to unimaginatively develop some plot. When Marlena died on Days a few years ago and they even showed her being embalmed. I was irate when she and everyone she killed ended up on a poorly explained island. Now I’m wondering how they will explain the return of Dixie, when it happens and I’m sure it will. I’m also wondering if she will help solve the murders post mortem they way Gillian did when she died back in the day. It should be noted that Gillian never came back from the dead.

Within the last month: Days' Stephaine

At some point while I didn't have the internet, Stephanie, the daughter of Steve and Kayla, was written off the show. I don't know why, although I'm sure I could look it up. I really liked her. She was by no means ugly, but she wasn't "soap opera pretty." Now she's off to Daytona or something, what with her being a racecar driver. That's pretty cool, too.

2-1-07: Passions- product placement

Passions just came on and within 10 seconds of the first shot we get a full blown advertisment for the new movie "Because I Said So."Jessica says "Why don't we go see that new Diane Keaton movie?" Paloma excitedly says that she had wanted to see it, too, right before she unfolds a newspaper with a full page ad for the movie and states the title of it aloud.