Why I feel misunderstood.

I take things personally a lot.  I feel misunderstood a lot.  I'd like to post on this topic about once a week with little reasons why I think that happens, and why it's okay.  Something just came to me on the subject.

I was thinking about getting my new tattoo.  It's a laborious process that involves me actually drawing the image for it and getting used to it hanging next to my bathroom mirror for a few weeks, then revising it and looking at it for another month, forgetting about it, drawing it on myself in various areas, lots of stuff. It takes years.  All so that when the image is committed to my flesh for the duration of my natural life, if I find fault with it, I can only blame myself.  I can't explain why this is an important component.  If I should look down in the shower one day when I am sixty and suddenly hate my tatoo, if I should be able to trace my discontent to the oversight of some anonymous tattoo artist I should never have trusted with my future in the first place; this is the moment that I will despair.  However, if I can follow the train of events that led me to imprint myself with this regrettable stamp, step by torturous step through every fail-safe of concept and design and execution, I will accept my decision and live with it in happiness.  

Yes, I actually live that far in the future sometimes.  No, I don't understand how I cope with it either.  Yes, I think it is why I'm so anxious and nervy.  I'm working on it.  It's hard.  I'm doing the best I can, each moment.  Some moments I can be a total cunt about it.  Write me a postcard from tomorrow and we'll figure out the answer.

Anyway, I was thinking about all that (yes, that was just the setup, now I'm going to tell the actual story.  This is how I've always been, and yet you're so surprised every time.  And I'm so surprised that you're surprised.  What a world).  There's a conversation you have with "the non-tattooed" if you have one, even a tiny one.  The, "but what does it FEEL like?" conversation.  Because they ask if it hurts, and you can't answer properly, because it does, but it does so much more than hurt that hurting is kind of irrelevant.  Your skin is suddenly and repeatedly invaded by irritant-clogged needles, much too quickly for your brain to mount any kind of response.  It's a shock response, and the pain isn't so much dulled or killed as put in a waiting area.  It's fully visible, and you can experience everything that it's doing, but it doesn't matter as much as what is actually going on right in you.  Which is weirdly unexplainable.  Like in "Pattern Recognition" by William Gibson, when he talks about the sensation of, "It's almost just like...but it's not."

The two analogies that pop most readily to mind for me are, "it's like when you're on fire, or being electrocuted."  The first problem is, it doesn't exactly feel like either of those things, it feels more like what those two things have in common.  Also, it feels kind of like when you're really cold, like you've been out in freezing weather for longer than you should have been, and you come inside and lean up against a hot surface and don't realize that it's burning your skin through your clothes until it is too late.  But not exactly like that.  More like what that has in common with what the first two have in common.

Which leads us to the second problem.  "Have you BEEN on fire?" the person I'm talking to asks with alarm?  "Have you BEEN electrocuted and frozen and then burned upon defrost?"  I am nonplussed.  "Yes," I mildly answer.  "Which time?"   

Too much iTunes?

I'm going to start a band.  We're going to be pretty good, and really popular, and we will put out a single about every other week with some amazing guest star you won't even believe, and the songs will be so good and new and cheap you and everyone else will be buying every one.  You'll feel like a champ when you turn people on to us because it will change their lives and you'll feel a little responsible for the fact that they're a slightly better person than they were before.  However, I've been looking at a little too much iTunes today, so I'll be naming the band "feat." just to fuck with everybody, just a little.

buythisbuythisbuythis

Please, for the love of god, buy and wear one of these, everyone!  I'm begging you, down on my knees.  You have to do it!  I am!  You might have to click on "view larger" to understand my agitation, but once you do, I swear you'll be stealing someone's identity and buying a gross of them to give to your friends and family.

oh, p.s.

my Red Bike came back!  about a week and a half, maybe two weeks after it was taken, I rode past it (on Blue Bike, my new love) on the way back from the beer store, about a block and a half (if that) from my house.  I rode into the driveway (after taking two turns past it to make sure the huge red-white-and-black beach cruiser with red panniers and lots of red-and-white reflective tape that could only be my bike was ACTUALLY my bike) and tearfully asked for it back.  

The man in the driveway was a little non-plussed so I asked him if he was the one who took it, and explained that I had another bike, and that I would give Red Bike to him if he had taken it because he needed it, because I had tried so hard to give it up after it was taken.  I'm still crying, you understand, while I'm explaining this.  

He quickly explained that this was his mother's house, and he and his wife were spiffing up the yard before she came back from a long trip, and had found the bike in the yard.  The neighbors had shortly come over to explain that they found the bike, the morning after it was stolen or roundabout, and were afraid someone had knocked the old lady off of it and done something terrible to her.  Somebody is watching too much Law and Order.  But they called the cops (too bad I didn't, I might have gotten it back sooner, since I can identify it; que sera.)  

The cops somehow determined that no foul play had occurred and pushed the bike up against the house.  The nice couple (the wife of whom used to own Cycles 360) thought it looked like a cherished bike, since it had lights and panniers on it, and stuff in the panniers, put it back against the house and hoped for the best.  They've both had cycles stolen, so they knew what it felt like.  The husband even rode it back to the house with me and met Hope, and saw the house.  They were sooooooo amazing, and I just love that even after I gave it up completely to whoever had needed it badly enough to take it from my porch, it found me again.

I guess I should admit it wasn't locked up.  It was just sitting on my porch.  With the porch light on, and the bike sitting about a foot from the front door.  A bike I ride every day.  A bike that obviously, someone cares about enough to cover with personal touches.  It is NOT yellow.  I assumed a drunk had taken it, because Hope and I had been up watching cable about a foot from it until about midnight the night before it was taken.  I seriously wondered if I should call the police and report it missing, just in case someone got killed on it or committed a crime on it.  It can be easily traced back to me, you know.  Not if someone wanted to keep it, but if it was involved in a criminal investigation (Pung! Pung!  Where's Jerry Orbach?  Who's watching too much Law and Order, now?)

I was initially concerned that the drunk who had taken it would discover several blocks away that it was too much bike for them.  It's almost too much bike for me, and I've been riding it for ten years.  TEN.  YEARS.  No wonder I was crying when I found it.  I was afraid they would get really hurt trying to ride it.  Not that I would be held liable (which I'm sure I would have been--"If you'd only locked it up, I could still walk!") but that I would feel terrible for the person who got hurt, not that it was my fault.  Stealing is nasty, especially stealing bikes.  If you don't want anyone to take anything of yours (even if it's not under lock and key) you just shouldn't take anything that doesn't belong to you.  I try to live by that, kind of like I try not to rape anyone or murder anyone or commit vehicular manslaughter.  Because I wouldn't want anyone to do it to me.  Not that I'm perfect, my commitment to trying not to do these things is contingent on my humanity. 

How funny, then, to find it semi-crashed (there was no obvious damage, but if you know me you know how I ride it--it wouldn't be obvious amongst all the daily wear) not two blocks from my house.  Hope will even tell you, when she woke up and looked out the window and yelled, "Where the hell is your bike!" I ran out in my nightgown, barefoot, and walked a lot of the streets in our neighborhood.  I was totally convinced I would find it nearby.  I could feel it calling me to come get it.  I just didn't walk down the right street.  Then we had a car to use for two weeks, and I was trying SO HARD to let that bike go.  I thought it was some bad karma I was burning off for being a bitch, or for stealing things  when I was younger.  I was trying so hard to pray that the person who took it would have a rich, happy, blessed life with it or without it, from here on out.

I'm still trying, you know?  No matter who took it, I still wish that for them.  Even more since they fell off the damn bike, or decided it was too much trouble to ride home.  Whenever I want to damn someone to hell or send them bad karma or wish that they would get what they deserve or die of some horrible, wasting disease, I try to turn it around and wish for god to bless them so much that their lives become a vehicle for joyful change for everyone around them.  That they receive the blessings of life so strongly that they can't help but change and become a catalyst to spread it to everyone around them.  That their problems melt before them with divine grace and allow them to be the person they deserve to be, spreading love and happiness everywhere they go.  How can I do anything else?  It's what I want for myself and the people I love.  

Not a pushy, evil kind of change, but a joyous, blessed, beautiful change that works by showing what life can be if you have love, and know that the universe needs and loves you because you are you.  Not effortless, but full of the best kind of effort.  The kind that helps form you into who you were truly meant to be, the kind that rewards itself.  The kind that changes the world, and lets you meet Oprah.

Not that I didn't initially wish for the seat (My brand new, $20 seat!) to fall off while they were riding and the asshole get what they so richly deserved.  I'm not by a long shot anywhere near perfect.  It probably took me a week or two of practicing (and a lot of love from my friends and family) to really commit to the "I hope you use it in good health, and that it transforms your life into a cornucopia of delight" camp.  Probably more like two.  

I was so astonished to find it, that I kept trying to give it back to the couple who found it.  I told you I offered it to the man, thinking maybe he had taken it and needed it.  Shit, I can't tell, just by looking at people, who is well-off and who might need my help and forbearance.  No more than anyone else can tell, just by looking at you or me.  And it might have been time for me to give it up, I told them that.  I said, "I worked so hard to forgive the person who had taken it, and to wish it a good next life!  I had really given it up!"  That was when the husband offered to ride it home with me, so I wouldn't have to come back (a little over a block) to get it back!

I don't know what the conclusion of this post is.  Life is beautiful and wonderful things happen.  Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.  Don't take bikes that don't belong to you.  But if someone takes yours, try to think about the terrible life circumstances that would have to occur before you would take one.  I know people who don't have a hard time in life take bikes, too.  I know that people make a living, sometimes, stealing bikes.  I'm not stupid.  But for god's sake, let's be kind to one another.  For my sake, let's.  

I can't handle a world where we don't, because, you know, I'm sensitive.  I can't live in a "devil take the hindmost" world, because that would leave out the people who are not only the most annoying and time-consuming, but who need the most help to get along in our world.  Let's give people the benefit of the doubt.  Let's assume that no one thinks that he or she is being evil, or would take the actions they are taking if they had the wide view.  People who do antisocial things like stealing usually can justify it, some way, just like everyone else tries to justify what they do.  They have a reason, most of the time.  It doesn't excuse them, but it is a reason, and if you think you wouldn't do the same thing in that person's circumstances, I want to be on the drugs they have you on. 

often I am

sure this whole dirty, messy process is worth it, if only for the color green

ye gods i am a shit

some movie is on tv

meg ryan has taken her daughter for ice cream

the little girl is glumly stirring her ice cream

as mommy tells her about mommy's cancer

"does it hurt you?" the little girl asks

there is a sense of betrayal in her eyes

she won't understand the pain for years

but nothing will ever be the same again

and how can she trust god, now?

i think, damn, now i want some ice cream

god bless the internet

and god bless youtoob.

I just watched an octopus eat a shark.

often I am

abrasive when frightened or confused

End the ultimatums!

No more ultimatums!  Ever!  Or else!

very sad, but calm day today

I'm taking this class called The Execptional Person.  It's so awful.  "The Exceptional Person" is the new euphemism for weirdos and j.d.'s and gimps and simps and 'tards.  Of course, we can't use any of those words, anymore, because we're so fucking thoughtful and sensitive.  We wouldn't want to use any words that would make the troublesome little fuckers feel bad about themselves.  

Please understand, this animosity is directed towards the smug, sanctimonious people who decide who is the exception and what we're all going to do about it, not the victims.  I'm having a really hard time with the last few chapters, because we're discussing the kinds of processing problems that I had as a kid, that made my life torture.  Things that it was adamantly denied I had.  There was nothing wrong with me, nosirree-Bob, that a little trying harder wouldn't help.  Even now my parents deny that I'm anything but exceptionally bright.  And a little, "awkward."

They think they're helping me.  Don't want me to get a label that would make people treat me differently.  No, it's just my personality/most intimate self that makes people run screaming for the hills.  

And then my teacher says, "Let me describe to you how a kid like this would look to a teacher or schoolmate..." and describes me at age 5 or age ten or age 15.  She sounds like she's quoting from letters my teachers sent home.  I cry and cry when I'm reading the chapter, and then I sit through the lecture and pretend I'm fine.  Wouldn't want to do anything exceptional.

Today was a really hard lecture.  I felt totally vulnerable and exposed, and the whole discussion was like, "Why are these people so weird?  Why don't they just do what everybody else does?  That sounds crazy and dangerous.  I wouldn't want to be around that person."  I really wanted to tell them, but I was so emotional I knew I was going to seem crazy and dangerous if I tried to explain.

Maybe I'm just paranoid, but I didn't feel understood and supported, and I didn't want to be there.  Maybe I just have a persecution complex, but I didn't feel that today's topic was being discussed with the same kind of sympathy that the discussions on other exeptionalities included.  It's probable that I'm just much too sensitive, and overtired, but I felt that a class which had heretofore been painfully aware of everyone's viewpoint turned into a mildly malicious gossip session about someone absent.  

The best I can do is to say this.  I seem to make a lot of people uncomfortable.  If you are one of these people, I am sorry, and I think I can explain why it is.  I perceive life a lot differently than you do.  Nobody knows why.  There are hundreds of reasons, from genetics to environment to brain lesions, and almost everyone has an opninion.  But perceive it differently I do, and part of that makes me into a really intense mirror.  Another part of it lets me see a lot more of the silly arbitrariness of life than most people usually do, or maybe it just makes it bother me more. 

People are basically just perceiving machines, pattern recognizing machines.  My machine just works a little different.  Like, I bought mine in Europe.  It pretty much does what yours does, but it's geared a little differently, and you have to work on it with a different kind of screwdriver.  It's missing a couple of functions yours has, but it can do these other things.  Maybe the other things are more important to me than whatever yours can do that is really important to you but that I just don't care about.

I really want to explain this lucidly and the part of my brain that knows how to do that feels like it's packed with broken glass and barbed wire.  I just can't do it.  

I'll stop trying for a moment and leave you with this final thought:

Jesus, why can't you just be like everybody else?  Would it kill you to go along to get along?

What, if everybody jumped off a cliff you would too?  Be your own person!

-took a nap, other side of brain had this for me when I woke up:

(There's a reason I'm fucked up, and it's called Human Culture.  It causes people to do crazy things and then rationalize them much more virulently than I ever thought about.  In its highly concentrated form it is poisonous, and if I make you very uncomfortable, I can be reasonably sure you are so contaminated with it as to be a danger to me, and cause you to avoid me by being rude and unkind to you.)

Thank you, other side of brain.  Sometimes you scare me, but I like your confidence!

 

wonderful words by someone else but me

I've been having a wonderful/terrible time lately with motivation and creativity.  I mean, up until about 6 months ago it was just a terrible time, so that's better.  It's just now I kind of still feel that icky feeling a lot of the time, but I find it hopelessly funny.  What?  I'll never amount to anything?  I'm a terrible artist/writer/person/friend/daughter/pet owner?  Everyone has these feelings and they never go away, no matter how hard you try to do better or ignore them?  Then I roll out of my chair in genuine, life-affirming laughter.  Which usually pisses me off.

Why?  Because I'm special.  Special as a stomach pump.  Just like everybody else.  The wonderful blogger Finslippy is special as a mysterious foreign postcard in the mail, and she has these feelings, too.  Except her can talken more betterer then mine.  Seems like everyone I know is having a hard time with the creative product coming out of their head, not just me, lately.  Read it up, and if you don't believe me or her, listen to Ira Glass.  That guy really fucken knows what he's talking about.

hey, kids! it's the usage nazi!

Dear The Internet,

Discreet and discrete are two different words. They mean two different things. Please stop using them interchangeably, especially in personal ads. "Seeking clean, discrete kinky person, no fatties." Doesn't make any sense. Discrete means, "constituting a separate entity : individually distinct."  

Maybe it's your really deep way of saying you want to be with somebody who can be their own person, who doesn't need to be with someone to feel like themselves. But I don't think so. I think the word you want is discreet, which means, "having or showing discernment or good judgment in conduct and especially in speech : prudent ; especially : capable of preserving prudent silence." "You told my wife we're fucking?! Are you insane? You agreed to be discreet." "No, I agreed to be discrete. And I wanted to tell her. That's just how I roll."

Considering how many other rules of grammar and usage (and spelling, and punctuation) I just ignore, this post might seem a little silly. Especially seeing that I (surprisingly) came down on the side of the them/they solution to the he-or-she/his-or-hers controversy. (That's right, there's trouble over it in the grammar world, and I'm playing fast and loose on the wrong side of town.) But if you're thinking that, you're probably the kind of person who misuses their and they're or hear and here. And jerks off to pictures of Ryan Seacrest holding a puppy. With your mom in the room.

why I love cell phones

I decide to go to the grocery store, right?  And it's, like, 9:30 at night on a Thursday.  I so have this, right?  It's gonna be dead, walk in and right out with the milk and butter and shit.  Then I get there and all my dreams are dead, because every single person that goes to UT is in the goddam H.E.B.  Swerving all over the aisles and being bitches.  And then there's the girls.

I keep running into this Larry the Cable Guy clone, except skinny.  You know, like "How did you know I do meth?" skinny.  He's not got a basket, he seems to just be talking on his cellphone while "I don't just live in a trailer, I manage the park!" Lady next to him is steadily packing WIC-approved items in a buggy.  I'm getting annoyed with seeing them everywhere in the store.  Larry is really clueless, and keeps standing between me and whatever I need to grab, endlessly explaining some random story on the phone.

Then it happens, the magic.  I'm leaning around the dude (again) to get the milk, when he says (clear as day), "Well, I don't know, Mama.  I guess they thought I was all cuffed up and couldn't reach it."

God Bless America, people.  Fuck you if you don't like cell phones.  When I ran into him again in the meat market, he was saying, "Well, hell, I used it to beat the shit out of the back of his car, whadda you think I did?!"   

back from a long stay in the igloo

When I was taking my year of training classes for initiation into  the Ol' Funky Order of the Sibylline Wicca they gave us all a guided meditation meant for the purpose of giving us access to the Akashic Records and some kind of wisdom shaman vision stuff.  Yeah, I was pretty painfully sincere about it back then, but that was around the time I started to realize I'm allergic to religion.  I'm also allergic to polyester and nickel.  My brain wants it to make a pattern, but I'm afraid of what it might mean if it did.

Anyway.  We go into the wonderful, transcendent world of the Akashic Records and can access any information we want about anything we need to know, and the more we practice the more wise and transformed we can become, then we come out of our meditation and have to tell everybody what our vision was.  And everybody goes around and tells and they saw beautiful guides and strong animal totems and flowing rivers and all that happy leprechaun shit, and it was so meaningful and wise and wonderful.  And here's my vision:

I'm walking in this place that isn't a place, it's all black everywhere like it's dark, but it's not dark, there's just no color anywhere.  And these two people come up to me, but (you guessed it) they're not people.  I mean...you know...they look like people but they're kind of squirmy around the edges and you know  that they are something else when they're not here, that it's just convenient for them to look like people right now.   They tell me something, whatever, I couldn't remember it as soon as I left the meditation.  One of those, "It was clear as day, it told me to..." and you never remember.  And we all go in this big room, and it looks like some kid's science fair project of what the inside of the International Space Station looks like, all made out of old plumbing parts from his dad's business.  Except, you know, it looks really, really real, and instead of looking out on space, it looks out into this huge library in a gigantic underground cavern,  and there's thousands of people in there looking at books, and this mean little girl in the control room/space station won't let me go in there.  

you know how people look at you when they all suddenly realize you're a lot weirder than they thought you were?  Like, I think a lot of people get the wrong end of the stick when they first meet me, and think I'm a harmlessly eccentric lovable nutjob, and that couldn't be farther from the truth.  I've come to the conclusion that I'm a sort of half-feral throwback to the days before anyone ever thought about manners or protocol.  Sometimes I think I just fell through the cracks of culture.  Somehow I got this weird swerve in me where I just don't understand some of ya'lls weird customs, like eating in groups, and your strange tribal dancing.  Eye contact, and letting people touch you just because they want to.  You know. 

The thing is, I am pretty much harmless (I think) but I generally prefer my way to whatever crazy shit you people come up with and put on MTV or whatever is cool now, educatin' the sheep.  YouTube.  I'm terribly curious about it, but in most cases, I do not want to play.  I'm not even sure I want a ticket.  I'll just watch through the fence for a minute.  Oh, gosh, I forgot an appointment, but the Slushee was very good, and I think I learned a lot.  Thank you.

It's not that I'm necessarily hostile to anything I don't understand, but I get so goddamned tired of being attacked for not wanting the same exact thing as the rest of the pods.  Like, if I don't want it, how can I understand how weird you feel it is that I don't want it?  If I thought and reacted and felt as you feel, and could comprehend how fuckin' weird it all is, we wouldn't be having this conversation, dude.  We'd just wander around the mall together, not saying a word and just, you know, groovin'.   I actually feel pretty normal.  I feel like me.  I want what I want, and think how I think, and a lot of the stuff that you do everyday seems pretty crazy and scary and weird and creepy to me, sometimes too.  That part, I understand how you feel.  

Stop telling me to be myself.  I'm being myself.  If you don't like it, there's nothing I can do about it.  These people, and the, "You'd be so pretty if you'd just" people.  Wear makeup.  Smile more often.  Shave.  I like to make sure I see all these people again right after I shave my head.  Oh, you meant my legs and pits?  Sorry, these things happen.  Once I shave the noggin, I tend to stop feeling I have to shave my legs and feel more free to wear my pretty dresses.  

Jesus, I'm such a child.  Why not just be goth?  Because goths are just a bunch of monkey-see, monkey-do posers.  I just randomly do the exact opposite of what anyone (including me sometimes) expects me to do, so nobody but me gets to possess me  by being able to know or appreciate me very well.  This is MY precious.  Mine!  And you can't have it, and if you want it I'm going to make you not want it, because it's mine.  All, all mine.

And all of it leads to my special unique specialness being as totally generic as everyone elses'.  Like, I guess the bald-headed chick in odd footgear and bag-sale clothes and weird jewelry and attitude on a vintage bike isn't as widespread a type as the frat dude or the rainbow person, but I'm not the only one in my zip code.  Shit, I'm not even the only one named Kelly(e) in my zip code.  And even if anyone ever was going to find a way to rebel and be unique in some way that wasn't old and busted when Plato wrote The Cave, a bunch of loser airheads would just copy it, and then you'd have to see it at Target and in the Dollar store and shit.  Nine-year-olds sportin' it.  All cheap and knock-off.  In outlet malls and chain eateries.  Wearin' it with those Ugg boots.  And then you'd have to kill yourself.

Hey kids, don't try to be special!  You're just fooling yourself.  What a wonderful sentiment.  I should put that on a greeting card.  With a little pop-up.  Of a noose.  (I'm totally going to do this.  Maybe it could be a graduation card.  It would go perfectly with the valentine's card with the popup of the handgun.)   

Anyway, despite all appearances this is actually a happy post.  Hence the morbid humour, only one of the handy and simple things you can note to give you absolutely not any idea at all what is going on in my head, ever.  

I'm a very calm lady today.  I dug a hole this week, for our new flower garden by the fence.  I'm very happy when I have holes to dig.  I think I shall dig some more!  I have a feeling our house will be surrounded by plants by the spring.  People who know where I live should come by and look at my dug-up flower bed.  It is very impressive (especially when you remember that my center of gravity is 8 inches above the ground and I have the upper body strength of a T-Rex), and my entire body hurts, so admire and compliment it, please.

My bike got stolen, but I think I was burning off some bad karma, and I can't wish evil on somebody having such a bad night they have to sink to stealing bicycles.  I mean, my personal moral compass of terrible things to do, from worst to least worst, is kind of like, Murder/Torture, Rape, Stealing Bicycles, Arson, General Greediness, Theivery, Gossip, Looking at Me Funny.  So how much does your life have to suck before you do like the third worst thing ever?  Pretty fucking bad.  Way worse than whatever bad day I had.  Go with God, ride it in good health.  I hope it's the thing that changes your life and you never have to steal again, or want for anything you need.  My new bike is neat, neat, neat.  It's fast as a rocket, and wonderful to look at, and I'm totally in love.  

Is that weird? Being in love with a bike?  Oh, well, like I give a fuck.  Have a great day!

Words I love

I've been working on this list for a long time now, maybe 6 months.  I know I'm the only one who cares about it, but these are some fucking awesome words.  All the entries are glossed from the dictionary, maybe paraphrased but any errors are mine.  I know I already use too many big words, but you can kind of understand why when you see how many great words there are.

It makes kind of a weird list, because my brain likes words for weird reasons.  I should write a little story that has all of them in it.  There are a couple for each letter of the alphabet (even x and z!) and sometimes the list of synonyms is better than the actual word.  I also really like word origins, so pretend you're interested.  

ab.ne.ga.tion, n,: the act of renouncing or rejecting something : self-denial, abjuration, surrender, relinquishment, abstemiousness, continence, asceticism, temperance, austerity

a.lac.ri.ty, n.:  brisk and cheerful readiness, from Latin "brisk"  "My major attraction to the local peep-show is the good-natured alacrity exhibited by the performers."

back.hand.ed, adj.: gesture made with the back of the hand facing the direction of movement; figurative use as of something indirect, ambiguous or insincere; a backhanded compliment delivered as teasing.

be.at.i.tude, n.:  supreme blessedness; benediction, grace, bliss, rapture, saintliness;  also a proper noun indicating the blessings listed by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, or a title given to patriarchs in the Orthodox Church

ca.tarrh, n.:  excessive discharge or buildup of mucus in the nose or throat, associated with inflammation of the mucous membranes;  from Greek "down-flow"

cre.pus.cu.lar, adj.:  of, resembling, or relating to twilight, an animal appearing or active in twilight;  from Latin crepusculum, "twilight"

de.fen.es.tra.tion, n.:  the action of throwing someone or something out of a window;  early 17th cent., from modern Latin de="down from" fenestra="window"

du.ra ma.ter, n.:  the tough outermost membrane enveloping the brain and spinal cord, from medieval Latin "hard mother" or Arabic "coarse mother"

e.bul.li.ent, adj.:  cheerful and full of energy, buoyant, merry, jaunty, elated, animated, sparkly, vivacious, perky, chirpy, bouncy, peppy;  from Latin "boiling up" or out, to boil, as a boiling pot or a boiling sea

e.pis.te.mol.o.gy, n.:  the theory of knowlege, esp. with regard to its methods, validity, and scope.  Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion.  from Greek, "know, know how to do"

fra.cas, n.:  a noisy disturbance or quarrel, from Italian fracassare, "make an uproar"; brawl, melee, rumpus, skirmish, struggle, scuffle, scrum, clash, fisticuffs, scrap, dust-up, set-to, donnybrook

fa.ce.tious, adj.: treating serious issues with deliberately inappropriate humor; flippant, glib, sardonic, jocular, sportive

gib.bous, adj.:  having the observable illuminated part greater than a semicircle and less than a circle, as of the moon; convex or protuberant, as of an eye.  from latin gibbus, "hump"

gad.a.bout, n.: a habitual wandering pleasure-seeker

hie, v.: go quickly, with haste, from Middle English for "strive or pant"

hack.neyed, adj.: of a phrase or idea, lacking significance through having been overused; unoriginal and trite, vapid, stale, tired, banal, hoary, boilerplate, old hat, cheesy, played out

in.fin.i.tesi.mal, adv.:  an indefinitely small quantity; a value approaching zero.  minute, imperceptible, teeny

i.sin.glass, n.: a kind of gelatin obtained from fish, esp. sturgeon, and used in making jellies, glue, etc., and for clarifying ale; from obsolete Dutch "sturgeon's bladder"; or mica or a similar mineral in thin transparent sheets, often used as fireproof windows in lanterns and stoves

je.june, adj.: naive, simplistic and superficial; (of ideas or writings) dry and uninteresting;  from Latin "fasting, barren" denoting "not (intellectually) nourishing"

join.er.y, n.: the wooden components of a building, such as stairs, door and door and window frames, viewed collectively

ken, n.: one's range of knowledge or sight; v.: to know, recognize, identify or be acquainted with

ki.bosh, n.: put an end to, dispose of decisively, halt, quash, block, cancel, scotch, thwart, prevent, supress, stymie, scuttle

lach.ry.mal, adj.: poetic/literary, connected with weeping or tears; Physiology/Anatomy (lacrimal) concerned with the secretion of tears;  n.: Anatomy, a small bone forming part of the eye socket, or n. archaic, a vial to hold the tears of mourners at a funeral

las.civ.i.ous, adj.: (of a person, manner or gesture) feeling or revealing an overt, confident sexual desire; lustful, wonton, salacious, lewd, smutty, naughty, licentious, concupiscent, ribald, blue, indecent, lubricious, purient, dirty

Ma.cas.sar, n.:  a kind of oil formerly used, esp. by men, to make one's hair shine and lie flat.  Also spelled Makassar, the oil was originally marketed as consisting of ingredients from Makassar; consider the "anti-macassar" doilies popular at same time to protect the backs of chairs and sofas from staining with this ubiquitous hair dressing

mus.te.lid, n.:  Zoology, a mammal of the weasel family (Mustelidae), distinguished by having a long body, short legs, and musky scent glands under the tail, from Latin "weasel"

nai.ad, n.:  a water nymph said to inhabit a river, spring or waterfall; the aquatic larva or nymph of a dragonfly, mayfly or stonefly; a submerged aquatic plant with narrow leaves and minute flowers, from Greek naein, "to flow"

nar.whal, n.: a small Arctic whale, all males and some females of which have one or two long forward-pointing spirally twisted tusks developed from one or two teeth; from the Old Norse word for "corpse" referencing the mottled grey skin color. 

oar.lock, n.: a fitting on the gunwale of a boat that serves as a fulcrum for an oar and keeps it in place

ou.bli.ette, n.: a secret dungeon with access only through a trapdoor in its ceiling, from the French word for "forget," 'oublier.'  With the diminuitive 'ette', literally a "little forgetter"

pa.ho.e.ho.e, n.: Geology, basaltic lava forming smooth undulating or ropy masses; contrasted with 'aa,' basaltic lava forming very rough jagged masses with a light frothy texture; both from contemporary Hawaiian

per.e.gri.nate, v.: travel or wander around from place to place; globe-trot, voyage, journey, treck, adventure

quin.cunx, n.:  an arrangement of five objects with four at the corners of a square or rectangle and the fifth at its center, as on the five of a die or playing cards, or in planting trees; in Astrology, an aspect of 150 degrees, equivalent to five zodiacal signs; from the Latin words for "five twelfths"

quo.tid.i.an, adj.:  occurring daily, ordinary, diurnal, average, standard, common,mainstream, unremarkable, workaday, daily, run-of-the-mill, mundane, nothing to write home about, conventional, a dime a dozen, middle of the road, unexeceptional; medical usage denoting the malignant form of malaria. 

ran.cour, n.:  bitterness or resentfulness, esp. when long-standing.  origin middle english : via Old French from the Latin words for "rank or bitter, stinking grudge."

ru.fous, adj.:reddish brown in color, used esp. in Ornithology i.e. 'rufous tit'

sa.lu.bri.ous, adj.:producing good effects, beneficial, health-giving, advantageous, productive, worthwile, timely, profitable, cushy, wholesome

syz.y.gy, n.: in Astronomy, a conjunction or opposition, esp. of the moon and sun; a pair of connected or corresponding things; via Latin from the Greek words for "paired or yoked together"

ta.lus, n: in Anatomy, the large bone in the ankle that articulates with the tibia of the leg and the calcaneum and navicular bone of the foot, also called astragalus, from the Latin words for "ankle-heel"; or a sloping mass of rock fragments at the foot of a cliff or the slopingside of an earthwork or wall that tapers to the top

ty.ro, n.:  a beginner or novice, from the Latin word for, "recruit"; neophyte, initiate, fledgling, apprentice, greenhorn, tenderfoot, rookie

u.ki.yo-e, n.: a school of Japanese art depicting subjects from everyday life, dominiant in the 17-19th centuries, from Japanese words for "fleeting world-picture"

u.vu.la, n.: a fleshy extension at the back of the soft palate that hangs above the throat, or a similar hanging structure in any organ of the body, particularly at the opening of the bladder; from the Latin word for "grape"

vac.il.late, v.:  alternate or waver between different opinions or actions; be indecisive.  from the latin word for "swayed."  dither, hesitate, blow hot and cold, fluctuate, hem and haw, shilly-shally, flip-flop

vul.pine, adj.:  of or relating to a fox or foxes; crafty and cunning, from the Latin word for "fox" or "fox-like"

wale, n.:  a ridge on a textured woven fabric such as corduroy; a plank running along the side of a wooden ship, thicker than the usual planking, and strengthening and protecting the hull; or a horizontal band around a woven basket

whore.son, n.:  archaic, an unpleasant or greatly disliked person, construction suggested by Anglo-norman French "fiz a putain," literally "son of a whore"

xan.tho.phyll, n.: a yellow or brown carotenoid plant pigment that is revealed in autumn colors of leaves when the green of chlorophyll ceases to mask it; from the Greek words for "yellow" and "leaf"

xiph.oid process, n.:  the cartilaginous section at the lower end of the sternum, which is not attached to any ribs and gradually ossifies during adult life, from the Greek word for "sword"

yawp, n.: a harsh or hoarse cry or yelp; foolish or noisy talk; v.: to make such a cry or talk

yoke, n.:  a wooden crosspiece fastened over the necks of two animals and attached to a plow or cart they are to pull in tandem, a pair of animals coupled in such a way, or achaically, the amount of land a pair so yoked could plow in a day;  a similar frame fitting over the neck and shoulders of a person to carry pails; part of a garment that fits over the shoulders, to which the main fabric of the garment is attached (the yoke of a western shirt); a crossbar at the head of a rudder, a control lever in an aircraft, a bar of soft iron between the poles of an electromagnet; in ancient Rome an arch of three spears under which a defeated army was made to march.  

zeug.ma, n.: a figure of speech in which a word applies to two others in different senses ("She checked the date on the milk, unaware that she would tragically expire before it did.") or to two others of which it semantically suits only one ("With weeping wounds and hearts they retreated.")

zo.e.trope, n.:  a 19th century optical toy consisting of a cylinder with a series of pictures on the inner surface that, when viewed from outside through slits with the cylinder rotating, give an impression of continuous motion, from the Greek words for "turning life"

oooookayyyy

school is doing well-ends thursday-and I should make a's in both classes

still don't like it much, but maybe I could learn

going to see my brother next tuesday for a couple weeks

back in time for summer session, might even go

Run! It's a poem!

Here's a poem.  I'm not saying it's good.  I'm not even saying I like it, it's just a poem I wrote.  I backdated it to when I wrote it, rather than today's date.  Enjoy.

Her Safeword is "Awesome!"

Compassion was trained into her like a Pavlovian response.

She can taste it, salivary and immediate on exposure to suffering.

It's just that she doesn't care anymore.

Her heart feels like a dry socket in a crumbling jaw,

a holy relic of her belief in the golden rule.

She's the precise opposite of a bigot;

She only hates people exactly like herself.

The weak, the selfish, the manipulative,

the broken and the timid incur her wrath:

their only offense, reflection.