Middlesex

" persist in believing that these black marks on white paper bear the greatest significance, that if i keep writing I might be able to catch the rainbow of consciousness in a jar."

being left alone has some odd consequences (or, the return to greece)

so in an effort to regain some sanity (and mostly our own individual lives) liam and i are spending our first night apart in a month. it feels like longer.

but the whole constantly moving house/scared to be bothering flatmates/don't get anything done because all we do is hang out with each other/lack of personal space has left both our lives in absolute shambles.

so, i am home in the big empty quiet. and decided some life maintenance was in order. things like bagging up clothes for charity. throwing away the flowers he gave me weeks ago which were v. dead on the dresser. neatly stacking the book pile by the bed. etc etc.


which slowly dissolved into sorting out the collage pile. let me explain:

the sofa in my room is in a massive bay window. so around the sides and back there are large person-sized gaps between the angled walls and furniture. they tend to accumulate person-sized piles of crap that need regular purging.

the whole lefthand side became the collage pile because i used to stack old magazines or calendars or things that would come in handy for crafty projects and wrapping paper and the kinds of useless modgepodge related activities i fill dull evenings.

part of me is still 6. i know. just be glad it's the part that likes to paste things for fun, not the part that likes to eat paste for fun.

but so back there became home to magazines, newspaper clippings, postcards, flyers, photographs, ticket stubs. anything pertaining to craftiness, preserving memories or vaguely arty went down the blackhole behind the sofa.

and today was the day i craved bare floor, so i started sorting.



it was like a trip down memory lane.

notes from my dad, a weird and hilarious letter form my uncle james, sonali's wedding invitation, my carmen tickets. a postcard from spain, my pass to turnberry, my diploma.

some were hilarious. i found a rhinoceros card from phil from when we first met. back when he had a crush on maggie and when he ruptured his eardrum in a violent flu we went and took care of him. in his drug induced haze, his mother (back in canada) convinced him to send us thank you cards. i found one slid under my door with a mom and babi rhino on it reading:

"sarah -

(prewritten text) May your day be very enjoyable and the year ahead bring everything that means happiness to you (crossed out: HAPPY BIRTHDAY) (end prewritten text)

Thanks for all your help with tea and soup and stuff. My mom was relieved to know I have a few girls taking care of me.

- philip

ps I didn't know this was a birthday card when i bought it"




and of course the icing: the greece book.

in the tradition of the road trip journal of 2001, i took a little notebook with us on our fornight tour of the greek islands back when i barely knew mandy and had the money to jetset europe on someone else's dime.

it is a highly detailed account of our trip written mostly drunk in diners, bored on ferrys and hungover on beaches. that is to say, it's mostly games of MASH, diagrams of six degrees of kevin bacon and our all time best "NCAA double elimination finals" (aka bracketing all your male friends into a tournament of who you would sleep with in a table of either/or pairings leading to the ultimate fuck buddy; usually written with little hearts around it)

and a lot of stupid quotes of our insanely witty selves. i seem to remember us being giddy from sunlight, lack of sleep and too much greek beer pretty much all day. i shall record here some of the most brilliant for posterity, just in case the book falls behind the couch for another year (or twelve):

- "is loitering in god's house a sin?", mandy

- in response to a spotted pigeon: "why can't you mix a black lab and a poodle and get a dalmatian?", sara

- "we are swimming against the grain", sara

- "taste the water. it's like goat cheese or some shit", mandy

- "it's like a vermeer gone wrong", sara (on a picturesque mandy in yellow turban)

- "shafts of light sounds dirty. unless you mean like Samuel L. Jackson Shaft. SHAFT! (insert showy kate hand gesture)

- "is jesus gay?", a drunk us

- "that's fucked the fuck up", mandy

- this is heavy as fuck. it's a fucking baby", mandy (on her heavy and overpacked purse)

- "don't use that swear phrase", sara

- "everyone will be so happy to have us home. you're the crux of their social existance and i'm really fun too!", mandy

*** i am coming to realize (a little late) we sounds retarded. like kirsten dunst and michelle williams in Dick retarded. but i am really really amused so fuck off. ***

- "What the Christ?!?", sara

-"I'm getting so dark I don't even recognize myself. I look like a black lady!", mandy

- "so hold on. i am going to give you the short version of my near death experience with dolphins.", mandy

- "at worst i am my own 12th cousin", sara (on the grady-grady incest possibility)

- on a beach campsite, bored, drunk and with no tent "we don't need no stinkin' tv see? we got a cat. we just need a mouse on a string", mandy (to be fair, there really was a cat)

- "if you have'nt picked out your song what defines you as a couple?", mandy

- "because i'm a beer whore", sara

- "you could find a real mannequin with man-bits", mandy

- "back in the habit man, like sister act 2", sara



and in case you care, I am going to marrry Gerard Butler and drive a mercedes 320 in new zealand with no kids. i had a salmon wedding dress. And Mandy wed Matt Dillon. They'll have 'the square root of pi' number of children and live in North Dakota.

Our hottest friend by far was Maria's boyfriend Dave (think Chris Martin but actually attractive), I spent 787.35 euro (which at the time was £527.52) and lost my virginity.

it was a good trip.

night of the living hedgehog (an ode to gameshows gone by)

so once upon a time, i lived with lauren. when she didn't hate me for filling the kitchen with ants or forgetting to pay the phone bill, it was really really great. especially when she could get drunk off 2 sminrnoff ices or indulge ourselves in flavo-ice and temptation island 2. or that time she needed help to band-aid over her nipples because her dress was too low for a bra and lord knows she wasn't going to nip out.

but all good things have a price, and hers was the random medical scares. (though, this is not the time for the insulin scare story where we went to the hosiptal in the middle of the night and i watched "aliens in the wild wild west" on disney only to run into a friend who got a broken beer bottle in the face while watching a child throw up in the waiting room. that's a different time.)

but once, when the pump was still newish lauren had to stay awake until her bloodsugar chilled the fuck out.

i don't remember what happened or why. what time of year it was. or what inspired us to watch TBS, back when it had just nixed it's "superstation" logo. But curled in our basement hell hole cubby; lauren, bridget and i wiled away the hours with old school Family Feud.

oh yes, it was the night of crazy grandma.

Now, I am not a huge family feud fan. But years of gameshow network with the girl had taught me to find Richard funny rather than pathetic and the retro-ness (sidenote: can you have a word that is only prefix-suffix without any actual content? is this postmodern lingusitics now?) of it all had it's charm. I still of course refused to watch the ones with Al from Home Improvement (except that time there was the Stars on Ice face-off. that was amazing.) and if anyone thinks Louie Anderson should still be alive, stop reading now.

Anyway, it was 3am. And it was old school family feud with the "ooh cheek or mouth Richard?" suspense and this tiny mad woman became my hero.

I wish I remembered more of it (It is times like these I miss diary-x for having lost all such carefully recorded memories I wrote down expressly so I wouldn't have to store them in my brain any longer), but her best two were:

question: Name a favourite pet
answer: hedgehog

question: Name someone you would leave your keys with
answer: mailbox
Richard notes this is not a person and gives her a rare, possibly unprecedented, do-over while trying not to fall over in gin-soaked, coconut-oiled laughter
new answer: mailman
she may have hastened to change this to "stranger" or I may have added that in later for effect. I have a tendency to do that.

Anyway, I wish I remembered more of that night. For all the drama of lauren's brushes with sugar-less death, it did make for some good times.

And I thought of it today because I found this. A pale comparison, but a fresh reminder of those classic gameshow days gone by.

snippets of the salacious

my emotions run on a such a predictable schedule. almost to the minute i stop bleeding i want sex.

sadly, i didn't even notice this until someone else pointed it out. at a house party last night i knew no one but a co-worker, a lapse in conversation leads me to scope a room of 10 men. (what else was there to do? besides, we were the only women in the room - i stood a fair shot, having already been approached by the cute(ish) south african if i could be bothered.)

jules: it's back
me: what?
jules: the cosmic horn. you're back.
me: how can you say that? there is no one in this room even i would bother with.




i am reflecting on this after a rainy afternoon in the pub with the guys. the conversation turned to relationships.

on dating
it was a long story, but we think in hindsight a guy in high school thought we were dating until i made some off the cuff joke/comment about how it must look to other people. he gave me the puppy eyes of the crushed and never spoke to me again.

on relationships
phil (to me): what's your longest relationship?
jack : in minutes?
me: those weren't relationships
phil: no, really.
me: i think i made it three weeks once, but i'd only count two of them.

on first kisses
jack: my first girlfriend
phil: at one of those make-out parties, there were like 20 people watching
me: i was at a banquet in front of at least 200
jack: good on ya. of course you were.




to test myself, i took the tried and true 500 question purity test when i got home.

I am 10% down on last year.

i am le tired.

no, not just regular type. french apocalyptic type.






i love that in my world (namely that which my brother has forced upon me until i consider it normal) internet-cartoon references are a legitimate mode of dialog.

an excerpt from my last email to jennie:

"i have to go to bed now. i am an old woman. i am a spinster. this is the rest of my life, stretched out before me. an endless series of movie nights in and no man to pet my head during the hot desert cave sex in weird foreign films. this blows. at this point i'd even consider the emotionally unavailable and yet smitten chow yun fat to die in my arms. at least then i'd get to second base."

reasons to love the new year:

1. even numbered years are always better
2. best buy has short lines
3. banana republic clearance sale
4. quote of the day:

Girl #1: We only fucked for like 2 minutes.
Girl #2: Why?
Girl #1: He has ADD.
Girl #2: Is that, like, when the person has more than one personality?
Girl #1: No, I wish. Role playing would be a lot easier.

--Hunter College North-West bridge

overheardinnewyork is amazing.

5. oh, and asofterworld is the best it's been in weeks.

we are off to a good start when mythbusters and dune are in my near future.