Worst idea ever: the Pup To Go dog carrier.

People, stop and desist! Put down your dog and let it walk on its own four legs--as nature intended.

She-Wolf.

I really like Shakira's "She-Wolf" song, but lord is that video strange.

Shakira - New Music - More Music Videos

(And not that I'm a choreographer or dance critic, per se, but none of those moves look particularly wolflike to me.)

FAMOUS!

Quick braggy link to an entry on Philip Graham's (current VCFA professor) blog, wherein he quotes from my thesis draft.

La di da! Sooooo famous!

What's even better is that it wasn't the first time he quoted from it. I attended his reading up at Sarah Lawrence earlier this month, and he didn't see me in the audience, and ended up quoting the same line in answer to a Q&A about navigating the different genres he writes in. He actually whipped out a little notecard and properly attributed the quote to me and everything.

The whole thing is enough to make me want to actually work on the darn thesis. ;)

VCFA love.

Mayumi: That's the other thing about all my professors. They're always working on, like, 50 billion projects. I swear, they must have more hours in their days.

[pause]

Mayumi: Or maybe they go on Facebook less.

Dave: Yeah. You'd regain about 23 hours right there.

I know, I know.

I've sort of withdrawn from you, old friend.

I've thought of things to say to you, but sometimes in the light of morning their importance had faded or they revealed themselves to be to private to reveal.

Where have I been but here. I've been here writing, even, but not to you. Instead, I've been rewriting anthropology, or dreamscaping fiction, or puzzling out my critical thesis.

I am sorry. I'll try harder.

The specter of skinny jeans rises again.

Dave: I don't get why some girls wear such tight jeans. I mean, how do they even get into them.

May: With a shimmy and a prayer, baby.

Dave: I just don't get it.

May: It's not just girls, it's gay men, too. And they've got a package to fit in there, I mean, I think that's even more impressive.

. . . pause . . .

May: Or maybe it's not that impressive.

May: Bah-dum-pum-ching. Thank you, I'll be here all week.

Update on 2009 resolutions...

Since I am so obviously playing a bit of catch-up today, what with the pressing deadlines all behind me, let me just update you as to my 2009 New Year's Resolutions--esp. as we creep up on the last third of the year:

1. "don't give myself such a hard time. celebrate my successes and don't beat myself up too hard on my failures." Hmm. A bit of a work in progress, that one.

2. "learn to make a really good dirty martini." As of last night? Checkity-check-check-check. Holy shit, I made a really really good one. And strong, too. I knocked myself on my ass. That drink was so velvety--strong but smooth--that I could have probably taken advantage of myself, but I didn't, because evidently I am both a gentleman and a lady.

3. "learn to make creme brulee." I never fulfill this one. I've had that stupid dessert blow torch for like three years now, but frankly it always seems simpler to just go to a restaurant instead.

Random orchids.

So, here's the truth: I'm feeling a little down today, though I suspect more than anything, it's the cutting off of adrenaline after a weekend's worth of heavy deadlines.

Halfway through yesterday I finished, and it was like I didn't even know what to do with myself. Dave and I were trying to make what we could of the last of his weekend (he has Mondays and Tuesdays off right now), considering I had squandered most of it sweating my own work stuff. We talked of trying a handful of new restaurants, but in the end it was all we could do to walk the dog, buy some groceries, cook up some dinner (chicken with balsamic peaches), and curl up in front of the TV with pints of ice cream for a few mindless hours.

But earlier in the day--and here's where the title of this post comes in--I was feeling quite grumpy and irritated, even about the fact that I couldn't muster the energy to do more with the time he had off, because here we were about to head into another week, and then there'd be no fun with him for another six days, and I had fallen silent and deep into my funk when a large white van stopped at a red light while we walked in front of it. "Miss," I heard. "Miss, come here." I ignored the voice, walking past in the crosswalk. "Miss, come here," it called again. "I want to give you something." Well, hey, maybe I've been living in New York for too long, or seen the way the police cars patrol my Brooklyn neighborhood at night, but that just made me more suspicious and apt to ignore the person. "Miss!" the voice insisted.

Dave touched my arm, "I'm pretty sure that isn't for me or Nahe. Go."

So, against my better judgment and a little bit angry to not be left alone as I obviously wanted to be, I went to the passenger window where a woman sat. The driver, a man, passed a beautiful purple orchid plant to me past the woman. "I wasn't trying to scare you. I just wanted to give you this." The voice was a little hurt, and there was no way to undo having foisted my suspicions or my mood on this man. I had foisted them, but the real beauty here is that, despite how I had behaved and for whatever reason, he still wanted me to have the orchid.

Neighborliness.

It’s days like this—whistling of wind, stirring of leaves, sun so bright and warm but autumn obviously fallen—that I don’t want to be anywhere but where I am. I find myself curling around a big cup of coffee and a good book (Phil Graham’s How to Read an Unwritten Language) on the couch, and running a book back to the library (Stephen Marche’s Shining at the Bottom of the Sea), and my dog barking eagerly for me to emerge from the library so we can continue our walk, and the satisfying crunching of the leafy piles as she plunges into them, and noticing the man in his sharp suit, the old woman loaded down with groceries in her little blue cart, the young woman with a doublewide stroller veering her precious babies away from me and my dog, and then stumbling across a treasure trove of books out on a neighbor’s stoop, free for the taking.

Honestly, I have met an embarrassingly few neighbors since we moved here in March. Oh, sure, there are plenty I recognize and say hello to in the foyer, or hold the elevator door for, or who comment on Nahe. There are even a few I’ve come to adore. There is the young mother with her gorgeous new baby, who every time I see her (and I see her a lot) is looking at that baby with such astonishment and joy, like she had no idea what love was before this moment and is pleasantly surprised by it. Every time I see her, she makes me beam, really idiotically, like that expression “grinning from ear to ear,” well, that’s what her joy and love do to me. She turns entire moods around for me. There is a tall, slender, older man, slightly stooped, as if apologizing for his extreme height, although it could be just the consequence of age, the way gravity weighs heavier as the years go by. There is the lady with the other Jack Russell of the building who we avoid just as she avoids us—but in sympathetic conspiracy. There are others who live around abouts— in Fort Greene, Clinton Hill, or BedStuy—who we’ve met during offleash hours at Fort Greene Park. You can learn a lot about a person just by knowing he or she is the type who gets up by 7:30-8am to take the dog to the park.

But by met, I mean someone whose name I know. Someone who I’d have over to dinner. Someone who I’d exchange the telling of my life for theirs. That kind of thing. I don’t think we’ve “met” anyone in that way, not yet—except for one, who I already knew before I moved to the neighborhood, so I feel like that's cheating.

I have high hopes, though. If my neighbors are the kind of people who freely give for the taking all of the following books—The Bigger the Better the Tighter the Sweater, anything by Margaret Atwood, The End of Mr. Y, Best American Short Stories 2006 and 2007, Hotel Honolulu, McEwan’s Saturday, The History of Love, Eat Pray Love, Towelhead, Kaye Gibbons’s A Virtuous Woman, The Inheritance of Loss, The Bird Artist, Running with Scissors, The Memory Keeper’s Daughter, and The Reader—I feel like there is great potential for friendship.

Perhaps in 2010 we will become more neighborly. Possible future resolution?

Hahaha, UH OH/ a.k.a. NOT AGAIN!!

Says Susan Miller, in her usual long-winded monthly forecast:

When Mars enters Leo and your solar fourth house on October 16, the Red Planet will stay there until June 6, 2010. That is considered a very long time for Mars to stay in any one area of your chart, so you will surely notice the emphasis, and it will show up soon. You will become riveted on either a home / property matter or a family matter. If you need to move, lease, buy, or sell, this phase will be exactly what you need to show you mean business and get your goal finished.

There will be many possible manifestations to Mars' visit, with the most likely being that you will move or renovate, or negotiate the sale or purchase of a house. Mars brings noise, so you may be moving furniture to improve and reorganize your space, or you may be hosting more parties or houseguests in coming months. Alternatively, in an economical move, you may add another roommate to share your rent, or, if you have grown children, you might invite one child back to live with you if your child is struggling with finances.

Well. It's not like I'm surprised, per se. I've been feeling the winds of change begin to lick at my skin again. I just hope nothing major happens till after I graduate in July of 2010--well, fingers crossed, anyway!

Hear that, Universe? No good opportunities to move west till after next summer! Mmmkay?

I wouldn't even care if it were not noon.

This lady needs a STIFF drink.

I've been having a really hard time getting into my thesis at all. Been doing some reading here and there, taking copious notes, but just ... not interested, you know?

Well, today i worked all day on this stupid thesis, but accidently hit select all and "F" and all of it deleted, and in my haste to undo I hit save instead of undo.

F seems like an appropriate letter. Like: F FOR FUUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK,.

Or maybe F for the grade my one-lettered thesis deserves right about now.

Kay, i'm going to go cry

and then write a pathetic email to phil graham

and DRINK HEAVILY.

NOT IN THAT ORDER.

FUCKITY FUCK FUCK FUCKK.

Also? This is reason 20293858950403030330030 to go over to Macs. Macs have time machine.

Civic action pays off!

von Hottie won the Time Out New York Naked Contest!

Keep your eyes peeled for her nudie star turn in their pages. We'll keep you posted on when to rush the newsstands.

This breaks my heart in ways you cannot even imagine.

OK. SCARY. I just realized that, as much as I identify with being from Hawai‘i, I have now—at age 29.5 and counting—spent nearly an equivalent time living on the mainland as “home.”

age 0-2: Sacramento

age 2-18: Honolulu

age 18-25: New York

age 25-27: Pacifica/Burlingame

age 27-29.5: New York

EQUALS

16 years at home, and 13.5 years not at home.

This is fucked up.

Also? What is it with me and doing math (albeit "creative" math) today?

Sherman Alexie's writerly advice: Read, read, read.

LJ: What sort of advice do you have for aspiring poets, novelists and screenwriters?

Alexie: Read, read, read. Read 1,000 pages for every one you try to write. Everybody wants to come up and ask “What advice do you have?” and I say “What’s your favorite book?” or “What book did you last read?” If you don’t have that information…If you aren’t carrying a book around with you, then you’re doomed.

When you look at great writers, you’re looking at people who are actually better readers. Period. So that’s where you start.

(From "Sherman Alexie: The Lumberjack interview")

Magical math/Facebook status.

Lady Cap'n Mayumi Shimose Poe wonders if its possible to put in the 25 hours/week on Vermont work today? Using practical math, no. Using magical math, yes: every hour spent working and not on Facebook = 5 magical hours, which means I should be done by about 3pm. ;)

(Un)Urban(e) legend.

Dave: There's a new study that says fellating reduces risk of breast cancer.

May: Oh, yeah? Where's that study from? Maxim?*

---

* where it might be from.

A gentle reminder to self.

I know! I've gone MIA. And I don't even have time to blog right now, with two deadlines looming on October 1 and 3, respectively.

Let it just be said, though, that between sweating deadlines, this is what I am focusing on, this is what I am feeling, this is what I am gently reminding myself of over and again:

People. All the people in my life and the ways—littlest to most profound, and how often I don’t know which is which—that we touch each other’s lives. All the ways we are connected.

If I accomplish nothing else in 2009, let me just remember that.