Does listening to Coldplay's Everything's Not Lost make anyone else want to rip their heart out?

Where's Trixi?

I'm going to a party with Officer Benny. I am not in a partying mood but some of Dale's friends are going to be there. I wonder what they think about his disappearance. I'll find out.

I've been reading Tiny Sepuku I love him.

I think all that not sleeping is catching up to me. I can totally tell I haven't been sleeping when I read what I've written.

I've got this twisty sort of idea. I am not sure how to work it.

I got new ideas for the dummies book.

I did not buy a ticket to the powerball.

I did get sick at the grocery store again. What is that? What kind of freak throws up every time she goes shopping? What will I do when Chris moves out on his own again? I guess I'll puke a lot. Joy!

I finished Horse Heaven. I was kind of sad to finish it because it engaged me and now I am at loose ends.

I have a lot of things I should be doing and I don't want to do any of them.

My PT/INR is 1.16 I don't know how that happened or why my doctor did not call me. I had to call his office to find out what it is.

I explained again to Chris what a PT/INR is and where mine is supposed to be. I told him I should not start to clot until I had been bleeding for 25 - 30 seconds and he said there's my home testing kit right there. Funny.

Where's Trixi?

I got an email today that confused me. It was from a woman who wanted to know if Trixi and I were gay.

No we aren't. Yes I love her and she loves me but not in any kind of romantic or lusty way. Just a friendly way. We've been friends for so long it's like we are one person.

That's kind of a weird question from someone who doesn't even know us.

I watched a lot of movies with Chris this weekend. Res Dogs was one because I really couldn't remember it. After we watched I though no wonder I don't remember it. Talk about the feel good movie of the year.

We used to have this sarcasm icon. I never quite mastered it because it was complex. It would be useful though if everyone used it.

We saw the Big Labowski (sp?). That was quite interesting and funny but the ending left me flat.

Someone died in ever film we watched. It made me think of the time pao asked me why I don't ever make happy fun dancing movies. The Big L. is probably the closest to a happy fun dancing movie I have seen in awhile but it was certainly not all happy, all fun.

Since I did Hannibal that makes me one degree from the Coen brothers. Two from Tarantino. Then two or three from degrees from Fight Club because I did Runaway Bride with Richard Gere who is in Primal Fear with Ed Norton. K I am getting too tired to make any sense. I am trying to say that I am within a few degrees of every movie we watched this weekend. I bought Bowling for Columbine because I want to do that shoot with Monikka about shooters and I thought I'd better make sure nobody has done what I want already

I haven't seen it yet. Now maybe I will sleep. Stranger things have happened.

Where's Trixi?

The story of the girl who wants the red shoes and skips church to get them and then dances until her feet wear off or the woodcutter cuts them off is a gruesome story that superficially has no message for us.

That twit who wrote the introduction to Animal Farm that I read the other day had no idea what a fairy tale is or it's purpose.

My interpretation of the Red Shoes is that sometimes we long for something even though we know it's bad for us. When we give in and get the something, at whatever cost, it can take over our lives. The only way to get rid of it is to cut out the part of us that feels empty and thinks this possession is the cure.

I think that Fight Club has elements of the Red Shoes. Jack wants something, in his case a new life. He has a vasty hole that he tries to fill with possessions. When that doesn't work Durden appears and starts to do things to remake Jack.

He wears a red jacket for much of the beginning of the film. Then he wears a red shirt. The soap on the poster for the film is red.

I don't want to spoil the ending for anyone who hasn't seen it but I think that those of you who have seen it will agree that like the red shoes a character has to destroy the part of himself he can no longer control.

Although really I think he could have just become one with it. There goes all my surety.

Where's Trixi?

I am too sick to do anything. I just watched Fight Club. It's very disturbing to me. I started to think about things I shouldn't so I turned it off.

Cough medicine and then maybe sleep.

Where's Trixi?

I am so sick. I have this flu that's all over. It hurts to type. Oh God have to puke.

Writing
I finally finished the vampire part of Devil May Care. I started notes for this thing back more than two years ago when I was rehearsing for Smoke and Mirrors. I am pleased but extremely tired. Yay for me.

I also ate something with freaking shrimp in it and I am itching all over. Stupid allergies.

Sleep Stuff

I just woke up from a really weird dream. Half of the world was normal and half was post apocalyptic.

I was about 16, as I usually am in these dreams, and this tall, thin guy dressed all in black, wearing a stovepipe hat collected me and took me off the crazy part of town with the mutants.

We had to hack into wherever we went. We were always trying to move up one level to something slightly better. I am always dreaming about houses. I wish I'd gotten that dream interpretation book for Christmas.

We had to do odd things to "better ourselves." I was always confused and always doing things that are very hard. Okay something just flew across my room. Very creepy because all the kids are gone and the cats are not in sight.

Then the guy I dream about came in while the other guy was out. He was very nice to me and I could think more clearly while he was there.

I told this dream guy I love him and he was holding me really tight. He's so swoony and very hot if you get my drift.

Then it was like my vision split and I could see the tall thin guy coming back. He was doing a dance through a cemetery. He would twirl around and bend over and do this gawky, compelling dance on each grave and the inhabitant would rise up and perform like a clockwork doll. One of them sat up, put her hands at the side of her face, tilted her head, smiled and then wound herself up.

I knew I had to be gone before he got to me but I was mesmerized by him. I wanted to see what would happen. My fatal flaw I guess. But then again what happens next is what makes me a writer.

I was in the arms of my dream guy, watching the other guy, unable to anything and then the Excellent Keith called and woke me up.

I am kind of disappointed. Maybe I needed to wake up, I don't know but I want to know what happened.

I have died in dreams many times. I've read that people always wake up before they die in dreams but I don't. I've been murdered over and over times in my dreams.

I wonder if I do find out what these dreams mean if I will be let down and crabby.

I am still half asleep. I should go take a bath and get ready to go to Desi's.

I read a story recently that had a scary clockwork boneyard in it. Was it made of bones? Who wrote it and where did I find it?


Sleep in perfect blue buildings by the green apple sea...
Adam F. Duritz

Sad Stuff

I thought I would make it through the day but without crying but once again I was wrong. I am reading Jane Smiley's Horse Heaven, Sandy lent it to me, and I just got a bit where someone died and someone else is missing him a great deal and watching horses. That made me cry.

I was thinking that when I think of Danny or talk to him I always look up. That is the opposite of when he was alive. Because he was six inches shorter than me and then of course being in the wheelchair made me really tower over him.

I used to sit on the floor, or kneel or lounge around on the bed sometimes so we'd be at eye level but mostly it was me looking down at him. Which is not the same as looking down on him.

I never noticed how little he was until we flew to LA in April of last year. It was the first time he ever sat next to me. We had to kind of prop him up because he couldn't sit up on his own. I had to hold him up during take off. It was cool though, I never minded doing for him. I like it. But I looked at him and he only came up to my shoulder and I was so surprised. I'd known him for ages and I knew his statistics in my head, 5 feet tall, 70 lbs, but he always seemed larger than life. And perhaps he was. Life couldn't hold him anymore so he left.

pao and I were talking about Angels of the Silences and he said that all leaving does is hurt you til you're only good for waiting for whoever left. I know that's not really true. There's lots of things I am good for. But part of me is always waiting. Always looking and listening and never, ever finding him.

All my sins I said that I would pay for them if I could come back to you.
All on my innocence is wasted on the dead and dreaming.
Adam F. Durtiz

I just got a check for Something the Lord Made. It was for 26 bucks. I was confused until I saw it was for my fitting. Last time I was paid for a fitting I got 27 dollars. Now it is 28.50. Celebrate!

Where is Trixi?

Christmas day. I think that Trixi and I are children of the universe. We don't have specific beliefs that make us one religion. We seemed to have dipped our toes into many pools of wisdom and made our own bizarre theories.

However we were raised as Christians and some of that lingers. We love Christmas. We used to spend weeks teasing each other with threats of horrid gifts.

I bought Trixi a present. It's the only one still sitting under the tree. I made the wrapping paper myself. It's gold and silver for hope. The red of the rising sun for the future. The green of a spring leaf and the yellow of a fall leaf for the cycle of life.

She is my Persephone separated from me but not forever. I will find her.

The Wild Woman archetype

I am reading Women Who Run With the Wolves. I read it in 96 I think. At that time I was reading very little work from writers that I knew. I think it was PGL that spoiled me and makes me want to talk to an author while I read their work.

I was wild with words when I read Run With the Wolves. I had so much to say, so much to think, so much that made me yell. yes, yes, YES, YES, this is true, this is what I need.

So I bought it for myself for Christmas.

I was on page five when I started thinking about my women characters and mothers. Madwoman begins with a mother who is dead and a wild woman who is a mother to be. DTF has a mother who is stifled by everything but her children. Her story is the story of learning to reach into the dirt and find her La Loba.

There is no mother in Carnal Fear. Sutter never once mentions her mother. Did she have one? Eric doesn't. He was sentenced to an orphanage for his crimes of being crippled.

Aaron and Sarah, oh yes they have a mother. A mother who mothers Sutter when she can. A mother who cries and cares and supports even when it hurts her to let go.

The mother in Bluer Than the Night Sky vanishes when the protagonist is young. Then the protagonist becomes a mother and her children are stolen away.

In Other People's Blood the first mother throws her daughter into the street to become a prostitute. The next died in a fire.

I think I meant Trixi to be dead but now I am not so sure.

Robyn is Johanna's mother of her heart although she won't admit it.

Someone once told me that my male characters are lost and clueless. I am not sure that is true. DTF's three out of four males find what they want. Dalton is lost in Madwoman. He is lost in his grief. A wilderness I know well. But Dalton finds his madwoman to lead him back from the desert, through a maze and into himself.

Henderson is happy. Galen dies for the first time in the desert. But then Mike blooms and is born in the desert. Margory's father is a terrible person. Her wolf is a male though and he is everything she cannot get from her family. Her angels are men. They are both empowered and helpless.

Bishop is a thug.

Am I uneven in my treatment of men and women? I don't think that I am but perhaps I am blind to my own isms.

Ooh this spellcheck just pissed me off. It knows madman but not madwoman. There is an ism for you.

Shout out

To Kevin and Dennis for big help today. I must be the luckiest grrl in the world to be blessed with such good friends.

Where's Trixi?

Today was horrible. I thought this Christmas Eve would be better than last year's but I was wrong. I miss Trixi more and more every day. I'm dreaming about her all the time. I wake up at least ten times a night.

I was okay this morning. Then it hit me like a nail bomb. I was crying so hard I kept throwing up. I couldn't stop. I felt so hopeless and helpless. Finally Tim called me. He didn't even recognize my voice. He talked to me until I calmed down. He sounds as though he's given up.

I can't. I'm going to find her. I don't know how yet. I will. I feel her calling me and I will answer that call.

Where's Trixi?

We met Tim when we were in fifth grade. He transferred from a school in the south. He was a skinny, redheaded boy with a goofy accent. He wore glasses. His mother dressed him funny.

We were outside playing jacks during recess. Trixi was winning. She always does. Sometimes I think she's not of this world. I don't meant that to sound like I think she is dead because I won't think like that.

Anyway, there we were, scooping up the fives and she stiffened. She looked like a hound dog sniffing for a lost kid for a second. Then she leaned over and very dramatically said "That is the boy I am going to marry."

"What boy?" I asked.

"The one behind me."

I looked and saw the new kid. "The one with the glasses?"

She nodded. "He's the one."

"You haven't even seen him yet. He's behind you."

She smiled. "He's the one. I don't have to see him with my earthly eyes. We're destined for each other."

What happened? How did she end up with Dale? She was so sure that day and every day until suddenly Tim was never around and this guy was always around. Why didn't she marry Tim? She'd still be here with us. I know that like I know how to breathe.

Scripts and indecision

Check this out - it's a request that makes no sense. Got it from my inktip newsletter awhile back.

I am looking for a completed contemporary non-erotic, sexy thriller (no revealing sex scenes) or non-comedic romance. It must have a strong female lead. When you submit your logline in the subject line of the email, please put 'sexy thriller or romance' and the title of your script.

What the hell is non-erotic yet sexy?

I got this one yesterday:

We are looking for a writer to help with our screenplay: a dramatic, true story, based on the Holocaust. We are looking for a writer that has either written a script that involves the Holocaust and takes place during that time period or a writer with deep concern who is very knowledgeable in the history of the Holocaust period.

Please email a synopsis of your completed Holocaust screenplay or anything that best demonstrates your writing style (if interested we may contact you for your screenplay on the Holocaust or a sample of your drama script to see if your writing matches our sensibility)

Carolyn and I were just talking about how we think in our last lives we hid out and then were captured and killed in the camps.

I could write a very powerful script. I could also cry while I wrote every single word. I was meant to help Danny with his Holocaust script, Auslander Allein. I was researching for him.

The Trek, a script I started months ago, takes place during the Holocaust and has this terrible sequence where all the characters and the horses flee from the Russian tanks. It's mostly about the horses though and everyone is Prussian so they are on the wrong side.

I can't decide what I should submit as a sample of my work. What best demonstrates my writing style? I don't have just one style. Maybe the thing about the eyes of the undead from Bluer Than the Night Sky.

What is this?

I'm pretty sure it's a virus but what on earth would make anyone open it? Who thinks Usama is hot? It gives me the shivers to think about it.

Subject: The Sexy story and 4 sexy picture of BINLADEN !

Blech!

Random thoughts

I wrote a column once about where writers get their ideas. I hate when people ask me, esp. if they are looking like I must be stark raving mad. I also hate it when they offer me their ideas. I feel as though I am at a dinner party. "Oh no thank you, I'm fine. I really couldn't handle another idea."

But sometimes I wonder myself. Who are these people who appear and demand that I write about them? Demand isn't even the right word. I start to do something and I open some application that holds words, or I get one of my gazillion notebooks and I write.

Danny used to say we wrote the same way. He said he was in all my work. Even the stuff I wrote before he was born.

After he died I started wondering if his spirit is writing with me. I miss him.

I think they caught the kid who fired the gun near Cul at school last Wednesday.

Cam has pneumonia. Luckily not this dreadful flu, although I think that pneumonia is outside of enough.

I had a very nice talk with Ad today. A little confusing because he was passing on a message that neither of us understand. The mysteries of life are part of what makes it all so amazing.

I took Cul and Cam to Ocean City Saturday. We stayed at the Fenwick Inn. We saw some of the festival of lights. We saw the wild ponies. Not all of them. We saw some deer. We bought presents for the few people who I can afford to gift this year.

A great big shout out to Keith G who has been promoted from "The Good Keith" to "The Excellent Keith." Thank you once again. Keith did something very kind and generous for me.

I wonder, wonder, wonder. I've got that "I'm writing something but i am not quite sure what" daze.

Good times. Except for the pneumonia. 1:30 am and I am a tired, tired grrl.

Where's Trixi?

Trixi and I have been best friends since we beat the crap out of each other in first grade. Sometimes the strongest bonds start with the weakest of links.

My grandma gave me this wonderful present for my birthday. I have to laugh now when I think about how much I loved that thing. I wanted a dog. My dad was allergic. No dogs for me. Grandma bought me the next best thing. A toy dog with long silky hair, a comb and a radio in her belly. How I loved that dog. In a spectacular burst of creativity I named her Silky.

I took her to school for some reason. Maybe show and tell. I went to lunch and came back to find Silky was gone. I was devastated. My heart broke for the first time.

I went home crying. My parents were not sympathetic. I called Grandma and she commiserated but none of us had money to get a new doggie. I didn't really want one anyway, I wanted my Silky. I had made her fur shine by constantly brushing it and I would fall asleep listening to the pop music coming from her tummy.

That weekend I was walking down the street, pulling a stick behind me, listening to the rat a tat tat when i saw Trixi sitting on a swing brushing my dog. I think my brain melted down. I screamed "Mine!" and ran at her. Luckily I must have dropped the stick.

I knocked her off the swing and into the mud. She grunted with surprise then slugged me as hard as she could. My ear was bleeding but I didn't care. We didn't "fight like girls." We meant it. We wanted to eradicate each other. We fought to kill or possibly maim.

An older woman who was walking a dog that looked remarkably like Silky broke us up. She was appalled by our hoydenish behaviour. We weren't. We were waiting for her to leave so we could get right back to our battle. She was a wise woman. She stayed until we'd calmed down.

Silky was down in the mud. Her fur was a mess. Trixi picked her up and hugged her tight. She was a wreck. Cover with blood, both mine and hers, mud everywhere but she had a huge grin as she hugged Silky.

That just might have been the first time I did something totally unselfish that caused me pain. I said "Since you love Silky that much you can keep her."

"What?" Trixi looked at me like I was an insane slug.

"You can keep her," I said. I turned and started to walk back home.

"Dixie," she said, "Are you nuts?" I stiffened my shoulders and kept walking. I found an interesting rock and started kicking it ahead of me. I concentrated on keeping it in a straight line. "Wait up," she yelled.

I waited, not happy, dreading what my mother would say when she saw my clothes. Trixi thrust Silky into my arms. "Look at her," she said. "She's not yours. Your Silky has white feet. Mine has black."

She was quite right. This wasn't my Silky. I turned so red I burned all over. "I'm sorry," I said, refusing to look at her. I blindly held the dog out to her.

"That's okay," she said. "I would have done the same. We're meant to be best friends. We had the same dog with the same name and our names sound alike. We must have been friends in another lifetime. We were probably famous scientists. We can share Silky. "

"Dixie and Trixi. Blech," I said but she had my heart in her hand the moment she said another lifetime. I knew right then that we would have adventures and see and think things nobody else on earth could imagine.

It was her last adventure that has destroyed us both. No, I must think positively. Trixi was, is, all about PMA.

Where's Trixi?

Eighteen months, sixteen days, seven hours and five minutes ago my friend Trixi set off on vacation with her dirtbag boyfriend, Dale. I haven't seen her since. The amount of time passing changes all the time. My fear and longing for her never changes.

Part of me is always worrying, wondering and waiting. I dream of her pale face, dark hair and pleading look as she slowly backs away and vanishes into a fog. I wake up and make myself some tea. Sometimes I call Officer Benny and leave another voice mail asking if there is something new.

Nothing is new. Everything is old and hopeless. He always tries to sound cheery when he calls me back but I know he's putting it on. You see he used to date Trixi until said dirtbag made his appearance. I think he is trying to make me believe so that he can believe.

I am not at all sure that Officer Benny, as I now call him instead of just plain Tim, should be on this case. He's too close to be objective. On the other hand maybe his sheer love of her will act like a lodestone and bring her home.

I got some email that says "Manage your face." Makes me think of the constant YOUR FACE faux bickering. Manage your face, dude! And your mama's face!

I did write that song for you, baby. I write many songs for you, your task
is to seek them out.

I wonder how many I have found.

This is a good statement as well as being true.

But if the boss is an ass then I don't want the job anyway. Assy bosses are a dime a dozen, it's the good ones that are hard to find.

You better be proud of me or I'll slaughter you.

Now that's a fine sentence.

My call time is one PM! Yeah Shamus! Or is it Shamos? Dunno.

If anyone wants to see my holiday card it is here.

I love Kenneth Koskela. Check out this painting, it's called The Return of the Fifth Sister. It's brilliant.

I was lucky enough to meet him several years ago at an art show. I was on my break, wandering about, I came to his booth and I couldn't breathe. I bought everything I could, which was far too little.

I am going to change Sutter's lines when she first goes online. She's always avoided it like the plague then she finally goes online to look for Remedios Varos because, as she says, if she were a cat burglar she'd have a whole lot of Varos' work.

But you can't really find her work online anymore. I hear her "estate" is suing everyone who posts some. I don't quite get it. Her paintings are mostly in private collections from what I learned when I saw her exhibit in 2000. How does it hurt to show her work to the public when it has already made money?

I need to make some good money so I can buy a bunch of Koskela's work. Good times.

I took the geek test yesterday and then took it again today.

I got - 67.45562% - Geek God - BOOM!

Don't even try whispering to me, it has no effect on me whatsoever (I made like fifteen typos in that sentence)

Damn I am a fine actress.

There are people who hate email. I say tchaw. If it weren't for email and me hardly ever deleting anything I wouldn't remember a lot because of that meningitis. I adore email.

I used to write letters and then never mail them. This is so much better. Blogging rules. So many of my paper journals got wet and the ink ran.

I just startled myself quite a lot. I'm looking at this map of how to get to the set and where to park. On the other side is a breakdown of the set.

Some of the buildings just have letters or numbers. The one I need is the one that says holding. That is also INT. EXT. Emergency Room which I find mildly amusing. It's also got the rear entrance, no comment but then I am shocked to see "colored cafeteria".

Other buildings are marked with things like white bathroom and black bathroom. I am stunned and it takes me a minute to remember that yes, this film is set in a time when there were such things. It makes me sad.

I wonder how I coped with such things in previous lives. Probably not very well.

We find our days filled with puzzles.

Some things never change.

Ha ha ha ha ha.

Find and replace is supercool. On Port Charles (with the vampires) the one
character, Lucy, found out today she's a vampire slayer. I'm pretty sure
they bought some Buffy scripts and did a find and replace on the character
names.

It's insane how in love with my own words I can be.

I'm fascinated by that thread like I'd be fascinated by finding a cobra in my den of passion. I stare at it hypnotized, wondering what will happen next.

I like this one also.

I'm going to do Dennis' job while he's gone, so I'm trying to get him to tell me now what I need to do. He says all he does is torture me, look out at people walking past his office and listen to music all day. I'm quite sure he's lying. And if he's not, I'm going to have a hard time torturing myself while he's gone.

I love Dennis.

This is funny.


I accidently sent the news to 7570 people twice today and many of them felt compelled to point out the error of my ways.

I've been reading all this very old stuff. Cleaning out an old email account.

This is from July of 2001 when I was just stupifyingly stressed out. I told an entire elevator of people to fuck off because they insulted Dan and vorpal, you really had to be there to understand it. I told this guy off and called him a skank and I don't even remember who he is now.

Oh the days of saying what I wanted when I wanted. I so badly miss uncensored boards.

Anyway, I wrote this and it's funny because I am not sure I believe it anymore. It may have just been sheer panic because so much was going on I was overwhelmed and I think I was trying to write an entire script in about two weeks one of these weeks being a family reunion.

Why is writing so complicated? You think you've got it down, but no, it all slips through your fingers.

I'm going to work on this movie next week.

It looks fascinating.

I'm going to be a mom. I don't need to supply my own baby. John at the casting company said he'd get the baby from baby's r us. Ha!

Cullen wanted me to find a chemical that explodes on contact with air. For a "project."

I found this very oddly phrased article about a scale blowing up during an experiment.

"There is no danger to students," he said. "No freshman is going to be damaged by this."

Um why is he only concerned about freshman?

"We're pretty sure there is no risk of secondary contamination," he said. "It was contained on one person."

Pretty sure? What is that?

I was just reading The Smugglers in the bath and I got this horrid connection. Proud as Punch, pleased as Punch, etc. are not expresssions I ever questioned before.

I suddenly realized they are likely talking about that Punch, the Mr. Punch of Punch and Judy and I got the willies and had to get out of the bath. He's got to be in the top ten creepy creatures out there. *shudders* Imagine if he and Sandia Man went on a spree together. I'd have to leave the planet.

I'm listening to a live version of Round Here recorded on 6/20/2003. I haven't heard this version before. I like how he says carving out our names and then spells A D A M.

I used to say that was the project greenlight theme song. We're all carving out our names. We all do look the same because we're online. Oh so much of that song fits. Sigh.

I stayed up late reading Ashton's story. I cried at the end which is kind of peculiar given that this man died in 1831 and I knew that.

I have always said the best way to learn history is to read journals. Because a war is a war is a war but a soldier's story is going to be immediate and compelling.

I wonder what happened to Ashton's family. His wife and infant boy. When did the West Indies throw off the yoke of slavery. Why is it the yoke anyway? I see the obvious connection but why not the chains? The fetters? The cruelty? The pure evil of it?

Is yoke easier to tolerate? Does it conjure up images of bland faced oxen stolidly doing their work as if they don't care about it at all?

The truth that is slavery is too much. It was too much when it happened and it's too much now.

Still I may write a story just for Ashton. It's the least he deserves.

Ever since I started the vampire portion of Devil May Care, in the green room of the theater where I was rehearsing and then doing Smoke and Mirrors, I meant for Johanna to have no vampirific powers at all. She was going to be scammed like there is no tomorrow.

Chris, my son, not any of the others, said I needed to give her at least the power to attract men. So I said okay and I decided that since one of her perceived problems is that she is fat, she was going to meet another vampire at the end of the story who was one of Botticelli's assistants or students (I was going to do some research, I swear) and he would be the guy who is attracted to her, the real her, not just something she exudes like a pitcher plant.

I have been so close to finishing this thing for some long. I've been on page 27 for a long time. I have a terrible time finishing things.

I meant for DTF to be four short stories all with one common element, that thug Bishop.

If I do four shorts that are all 30 pages long that's a two hour film.

So going by numbers alone I should be wrapping up Johanna's story.

I'm not entirely convinced that I have tortured her enough. Have I thrown big enough rocks at her?

So here I was tonight with Johanna still suffering from misinformation and she's walking down the street and I suddenly decided that she should walk right past the guy she's going to meet and hopefully fall for.

I started looking at Botticelli's work. Then I started thinking there are a million European vampires. Why couldn't her vampire be from Hawaii?

But all this time the man I was seeing in my head is a charming, dreaded, tall, gentleman of colour.

Why couldn’t he be from the West Indies? Could a former slave fall in love with a white chick?

I would have thought no if I hadn't played Mrs. Douglas ages ago. She was white and Frederick Douglas's mistress was also white. Now my character was his second wife and her family disowned her, but still, I have solid proof that this could work.

So I start poking around and I found this diary.

Ashton Warner, age 24, died in 1831. He is attractive and if he died young he could certainly be my vampire.

I plan to read his entire diary. It will be kind of funny if he gets like one line but you never know, someday he may have his own story.

I'm listening to Warning: Contains Language and I realize it's been two years and a bit since a troll wanted to eat my life or anybody fell for me like a suicide from a bridge. It's a tad sad.

!!!!

Lydia Pinkham's patent medicine is still on the market? Did I slip through a time warp?

And my response:

You are so right!!! Thanks, I can't keep getting bitter like this, it's not not good for me.

I met a very cool guy on Monday, want to hook up for lunch tomorrow and we'll talk about him? When I told him about Planet of the Apes and Minority Report he said, so what you don't care, you want to be writing and starring and directing you don't want background work anyway.

Of course that was before the cheap bastards started grabbing winos to get the dayplayer roles.

Heh, here's a email from a friend when we were so mad about not getting any work on Minority Report and then found out they were grabbing people off the streets and giving them speaking roles.

This whole 'Minority Report' deal is such a fucking shambles - why can't they ever get anything right? Who ever heard of a minor speaking role being given out to people on the street when everybody who's busting their ass to get into a film has to sit at home and wait. Fuck them, I say....we're both better off writing books and getting published, having a loyal fan base and then letting Hollywood come to you and kiss your ass so they can buy the rights and make a shitty film version.

I wrote a column for the Shank about Marcus in Lousiana. I have strong views about that sort of thing.

I popped my knee out of the socket yesteerday and now iit s quite painful.

pao likes to call me the littlest elder god so that's my new Vine name.

I'm still exhausted. It's frustrating.

I figured out what is wrong with that winning icon. There is no absolute URL so the program is searching for the image on this site but it is not here.

I tried adding url/images before the jpg name but I got no joy.

Work on Vampyre story, read Hilary's script or start rewrite on Bluer?

Or I could go to sleep. I'm meant to go to the office party tomorrow but we're meant to get icy rain and snow and Chris is working nine to five. That means he'd get back here with my van at exactly the time I am meant to be in DC. That's with no traffic, of course.

Wish me well (You can go to Hell) is such a great song.

Urban spelunking? Is that a new term for real world hacking?

Cavers hate to be called spelunkers. Why would we want a word that's already disliked? We already have one given to us by people who just don't get it.

Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not
giving it. -William Arthur Ward, college administrator, writer (1921-1994)

Crazy stuff

I just found this. I mailed to a friend right before I got my bird's nest filter.

Both the Vena Tech LGM and Birds Nest filters are known to have a very high vena cava thrombosis rates, ranging from 8-25%.

what? Why? Huh? I'm making a noise I can't describe...

It is interesting that both the authors and the editorialist tended to gloss over the incidence of major bleeding and related deaths. With a total of 39 major bleeding events (10%) and 9 of 83 deaths from bleeding (11%), this complication was considerably more serious than recurrent DVT.

I don't even remember where the hell I got that info.

But I got my filter. Was sick for two months, had my gallbladder out and then I got terribly ill with retroperitoneal bleeding. I was in the hospital for 21 days last year, five in ICU after I got a DVT from my right knee to my hip.

Then I went to a Counting Crows concert the day I got out of the hospital because I am really fourteen. Then I got so sick I had to go to the ER in DC.

I wonder how many CC fans go from a hospital to a show, then back to the hospital.

But anyway, I'm disturbed by that info abut bleeding and DVTs because that filter is supposed to save my life.

Things I have forgotten

This thing vorpal said that I thought would make a splendid band name for Punks on Ice aka Punk Rock Mom -

the disturbingly limitless nature of love

I adore that.

It might even be a story about a stalker. Or Orpheus. Is he the right one? Don't look back?

Boy looking back will get you in trouble. Look at Lot's wife who doesn't even have a name. Do we call her Ms. Pillar of Salt?

Writing
I feel very much at sixes and sevens. After pushing so hard to write so much I am not quite sure what to do with myself.

I found a reference to the plum of forgiveness although I now think I meant it to be the plume of forgiveness. I wrote a poem about the plum.

It's not bad.

Script, short story, or Carnal Fear next? I have the next line of CF. It's "I had no way of knowing it was the kiss of death." I thought of that when I was sick at my friend's house.

I want to type up the Situational Occurrence. Or I could just relax and read for a few days. After all I did write something today and tomorrow I could write my column if I think of something to say.

Junks
I want to give my supporters some kind of present but what, I don't know.

Someone asked me to run for president and then a bunch of people said they'd vote for me. I'm thinking if I don't do it I should write about it. I have all sorts of ideas. I have my platform worked out as well as a grass roots initiative thingie. Maybe my column will be about that.

I had a nice talk with vorpal almost right after I finished Bluer.

We talked about many things but one of them was American Gods. I told him about what I think Neil is writing now and he said Neil is continuing in the god theme.

He's right but I was thinking it's not entirely new to Neil. Neverwhere had an angel in it. Murder Mysters, Cold Colours, even The Price (i hope that's the right name) have God, angels, Lucifer. Or at least they are plot points.

Sandman had gods in it. I am too tired to back up my argument.

I am so spacy. I would like to thank Mr. Duritz for singing so swoonily I wrote some great scenes in Bluer.

My "clique" at the Vine for massive encouragement. Esp. that one person who had such total faith that I was more worried about letting them down than I was letting myself down.

Hoohaw! This giddy grrl is going to get offline now.

Oh wait, ffin wants me to come visit in February. That would rock on.

K, sleep well everyone.