i was having a better day. was, of course, being the operative word. woke up this morning, got my laundry to the laundramat where H stayed with it & got it all done.. got to the lab & had a productive meeting where i helped brainstorm for other projects in my group & got compliments (or teasing) about how much i knew from the SIGGRAPH community. then i went to R’s class which was entertaining. next, had a very productive meeting with my advisor & partner where we did quite a bit of talking about our project which was good. had a fabulous time swimming with H&R and folks at the lab. rushed off to go home, made food & watched TV. giggled with R and goofed around in general. then tried to come back to the lab.. and i remembered why i hate this fucking town. ice. it is all the fault of the ice. i slipped down the stairs in front of my house and now my left side hurts and i am grumpy. erg. i hate this weather. my insides hurt, my outsides hurt.. i feel like i am done with this body – how the hell am i going to be able to grow old?? i don’t get it.. i don’t know how to deal with my body and that is irritating. and i wonder why i am so grumpy.. my mind is definitely following my body’s lead and that is not a good thing.

ok.. more absurd events in my life. all because earlier this evening, i was whining about my back/neck/hands and everything else that has stopped functioning properly.

we – R, H and R’s friend spent the day in restaurants playing Cosmic Encounter and laughing hysterically. R & his friend have known each other for 21 years and are a bloody riot together, knocking on everything; H & i couldn’t stop laughing for the life of us. we got lost in Boston, looking for a really cool cafe that has since shut down – we were very sad about this. finally, we ended up in finagle a bagle at park street. tehehe.. stayed there till they kicked us out.

back at my place, R decides that we should go hottubbing – i laugh at him, reminding him he is on the east coast now.. he putzes around, calls a bunch of different places and finds an open hot tub place in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. so we head off to the lovely state of New Hampshire. R books the tub until the place closes, which shocks the lady at the desk who says that she doesn’t know anyone who has ever stayed longer than 2 hours.. R said she doesn’t know him yet.. he’s the 6/7/8 hour type. we talk, lounge, listen to music, play scrabble. i got a massage that put me into glory heaven state. what an ecstasy nite without the drugs. fabulous conversations.. i spent most of the nite listening to R&H get to know one another and, as i predicted, they got along fabulously, babbling away about relationships and ideas for the future.. typical H happily directing R into emotional talk and i was impressed in the amount she got out of him.. it was precious. my silly friends.

everyone keeps asking me about boy. and i don’t know entirely how to respond. add that to the fact that i am in such a fucked up state right now. body very upset forcing sex drive to approach null & void. all together get emotions all fucked up making me just a pissy little thing. i think R is about to kill me over it. i am unmotivated to work, to think, to deal. i don’t want to talk to people and have been in the habit of not responding to personal emails & phone calls.. i have avoided my date from last week and by now, i am guessing she thinks i am a freak; although she may also think i am out of town since i told her i was going to portland this week. i am just not in the mood to deal and i am not quite sure how to handle that appropriately. the total emotion can be summed up to “blah.”

ok.. last nite was absurd. yesterday morning, after a nice long swim (first one in over 1.5 months!), i ran into my formal mentor from Intel at the Lab. she’s pretty darned cool but i didn’t expect to see her there; i am, afterall, flying out to Portland to spend a week with her next week. but her vacation plans got fouled up and she ended up here to work with one of my colleagues. she asked if i wanted to do dinner and of course i agreed – how can one possibly pass up free food as a freefooditarian?

so i spent the day successfully doing nothing. where the hell is my mind? why do i have no concentration or desire to work? this needs to end soon or i am fucked. i hate this weather with a passion – can i even work in winter? i was thinking back and i don’t remember a winter where i was able to concentrate on anything academic. last february, i went from taking 5 class to taking 2 classes (only one of which i passed). given, things that didn’t require thought, but required action were quite easily finished (i.e. silly concerts). the year before that, i was in Amsterdam and didn’t need to do any thinking in the early months because it was a bunch of bullshit. the year before that, i wasn’t thinking; i was doing software engineering mindlessly. the year before that, i was miserable taking thought-based classes and that was the semester i went insane and locked myself up for 2 weeks. hmm.. i think i need that i light.

anyhow.. back to dinner.. so, this kid at my lab chose the restaurant, a place called Clio; only better restaurant in Boston is the Four Seasons. ok.. sure.. whatever, i can behave and eat in the class that i definitely don’t belong to. sure. so, we order.. first, nice red wine (similar in the fruitiness and smoothness to last nite). fancy salad involving blue cheese and a vegetable that i don’t remember the name of – something like elive or something weird like that.. next, suckling pig. ok.. this is all fine and well.. dessert comes around and i order a nice port and mint mousse. no problem right? well, right before we order dessert, the kid who arranged the dinner told the waiter to say hello the chef and that we were from the lab. oh boy. next, comes this pineapple jello-like stuff with a frothy coconut topping. then, a fancy after dinner drink with citrus in it. next, a big chocolate egg filled with liqueur where the waiter poured hot chocolate liqueur on top of it until it split apart, melting. next, these funny “mints” which were slivers of a mint-like substance that melted on our tongues and were to be followed with this other fancy chocolate. by the end, i was the stuff pig and thought that you would be humored, especially given my inability to actually explain in detail any of what i ate..

can i ever actually think of this as normal? at dinner, i was constantly in awe.. and i stated that shock, mostly in my expression. the think is that my mentor joked that it is now her goal to teach me how to spend industry money and not think about it. ::the table laughs:: the thing is – will that ever just settle well with me? do i really want it to be a no-brainer? it goes against everything that i think of as normal, all of my goals for doing this grad school / elite class bullshit. i don’t want to be a part of the system, as much as get inside, behave as i should in order to change things. that’s always been my goal. what will the impact of the greed into normalcy type thing be? will i just think of it as normal to have a $40 dinner a nite as so many of my advisors and friends seem to encourage? maybe this is why all of my housemates were so appalled that i would go on to academia in the hopes of changing industry. or even the thought of me going to industry.. erg. mental debate.

my hands hurt. i really wish they didn’t – its almost as though they are my primary nemesis, as though they intend to thwart my thinking, my life, my goals. i often wonder if i think through my hands, use them as something beyond a tool, a way of life. they are my livelihood, because they are the way i can best express myself. they allow me to think. i remember reading an article by sherry turkle, explaining how when graphical programs for word processing became the norm, she was no longer able to edit or write without her computer in front of her. this always made sense to me. i feel stifled without my computer and my life feels like its on the brink of only being virtual, and i am not so thrilled.

i used to crave things that i wish i didn’t remember that i did. now, a day without being plugged in and i crave email with the intensity of heroin. i ache for it and i feel on edge and uncomfortable.. my mind wanders to what messages i might have and i fail to pay attention to the subject matter at hand. only i rarely go long with any feeling of withdrawal symptoms before plugging in. maybe there should be a computer addicts anonymous. only, because it is my work and my pleasure, i am excused. hrmpft.

last nite, i spent the evening with my former advisor, Andy, another tech addict. only he is fascinated with what might possibly be, with an eye on whatever has already been. that’s what you get when you live through the entire span of computing history! he told me stories about being on TV in a program right before a ridiculous, unknown, crazy, disrespected French chef named Julia Childs. he was talking about the state of hypertext and the future that it would mean for literature and fiction. only today, he is upset with the likes of Robert Coover for destroying any ideas he had and calling HTML hypertext. i guess that’s what you get when you are a hypertext pioneer and your ideas are only still ideas 30 years later. at least you aren’t Ted Nelson poor Ted Nelson…

but what a fabulous evening with Andy.. reminded me how much i love him. we talked about people, about research, about my ideas (including about me), and about how i am not going to work on my ugrad thesis any longer – and he even bought it! he tried to teach me to be a lady and do things proper – helping me order the “appropriate” entree and learn to drink & enjoy wine. he was adorable. just like a good father. he gave good advice and we had great brainstorming sessions. ah…

arrived in venice today after flying through de gaulle. somehow, i was just utterly confused about the entire process. but that is also me… i crashed pretty hard at the hotel upon arrival (figures) because i just preferred to sleep than to be tired and touring. besides, it was raining and i still don’t like rain. i listed to ani’s new album over and over again; i think i will have it memorized soon.

so i am spending large amounts of time with my partner for the first time since our big fight and i am starting to realize something about him. i think what drives me nuts about him is that he brings out so many things about me that i don’t like. for example, around him, i feel lazy and clueless, confused and disinterested, generally inadequate. i don’t know what about his presence does that to me but i recognize it more and more that this is what has been driving me nuts. what is it about his mannerisms, his way of action that makes me feel this way? i find it so peculiar, and quite disturbing within me.

so, we awoke at 7pm this time and decided to wander for food. we wandered for a long time, only finding snack shops and mc’ds and a really expensive restaurant. i started noticing how much i glared at the italian men and avoided their glaze. i think that italian men sketch me out in such a big way. part of me wants to look like a big dyke so that they will leave me alone but i am also afraid of the consequences of that decision. either way, i want to avoid the italian men. eek! i don’t get why i think they are so repulsive but they really really bother me… damn, all of my negatives are just seeping out of my pores!

so, my partner and i found a place to eat, a little caffeteria type place and we went in and got really good pizza and other foods. as we tried to pay, the lady kept trying to tell us something in italian but both of us looked sooo clueless. apparently, it was 1/2 off day if a boy brought a girl. and there i was, a girl, trying to pay for the two of us. to make matters worse, i tried to pay 10 times as much since these liras confuse the hell outa me. so, only hours into being in italy and i have to deal with machismo! i looked around and realized that not a single woman was there alone or with other women; they were all there with men! i don’t know if i am prepared to be in a male male male culture, as if mine is not.

so, strange days emerged and there are more to come, i am certain. for now, i think it is bedtime!

i called my grandfather today and i started crying. i don’t think he realized that i was crying but i was. see, as much as i tell myself over and over again that everything is going to be all right, i am partially afraid that it is not going to be. i am afraid that he won’t make it and i don’t think that i could handle that. what if that was the last time that i heard his voice?

to make matters worse, it think he is scared too. i have never heard him mention the crash from the war but when i asked if he was nervous, he said that he learned a lot from the crash about how to deal with hospitals and what to think. thus, he is not nervous, just ready. well, i am glad he is being at least verbally sane because i don’t think he is as calm as he is pretending to be.

anyhow, surgery in two days. let’s pray.

I HATE COMPUTERS

Today has been a bad computer day. My keys are now broken; I have to send my computer back to the manufacturer. How annoying is that? Frankly, it annoys me oh-so-much. I just want to have a working happy computer.

And computer companies piss me off. I lose my warranty if I open my computer up. I lose my warrenty for practically everything. How irritating. They won’t send me a new computer; I have to wait forever to get one.

Grr.. damn computers.

what an amazing weekend i had! i went to new york for the conference on vagina monologues. there were 100 women and 4 gay guys there which was great. i arrived in new york all tired and cranky, not so thrilled that i was having to be there.. but things changed.

at one point, i was sitting outside smoking a cigarette. a crazy girl came up and asked if i could share. of course. we started talking and she already knew everything about me! one thing led to another and she came with me to meet various friends downtown for some drinks. we went, had a good time, chilled out. at one point, this icky boy tried to hit on me and the girl just kissed me and got him off my back. teheh. so we bar hopped and got drunk and got to know each other really well. she is super super cool. we had a great time.

next day, organizational events actually start. craziness begins. i met some wonderful people instantaneously. talked to a gonna-be-lawyer dyke over a cigarette. she was crazy, following the system just in order to change it. tremendous.

the dykes teamed up… slowly all of the dykes were friends and we just started hanging out. at one point, eve has us all moan. that was the end.. now a lot of horny dykes.

we went to see the broadway version of the play (i cried in bosnia, of course). then we headed to the dinner with everyone and the dykes sat together getting to know one another. intense. i lusted after a girl with an amazing body.

we headed to the meow mix, a lesbian bar downtown. the girl that i thought was so unbelievable starting flirting with me. we danced and played, relaxed and drank. it was beautiful. not too long later, we were kissing and she was so amazing. i couldn’t believe it. we talked all nite, got to know each other and have a blast. it was amazing. we took a shower together and curled up in bed together. ah.. so nice.