hello toxins!

big party last night. many many people. not remembering a lot.

happy though. :)

1) i am doing a fairly good job of being happier, i think.

2) i must say again how much i love my new shoes. i haven't had shoes like this in so long. i have my steel-capped big black boots, i have my birkenstocks, both specially bought because they are made of vegetarian leather alternatives. but these new shoes are shoes to go places in! i have shoes to walk and lift weights in, and i have really really cute new adidas that i love to bits. yay.

3) i really bonded with someone last night. i saw her arm; she knew i saw her arm, and she knew that i knew what had happened, and i tried to protect her from a nosy guy who saw her arm as well. we talked about it later when she felt like bringing it up. she and i drove around for an hour waiting for a girl who never called us. then we sat on the couch and drank espresso. i had one beer. i am a good girl. i didn't even like it that much. and i turned down some guy who tried to buy me a drink earlier in the evening. good me. got home in the dawn hours again, but sober and pleased with life.

4) jennylee is gone, which is sad. but we had a nice time drinking green tea and riding around and trying to reconstruct last saturday night. and we ate bread and petted the cat at my ex-crush's house. it was nice. i also have naomi, who grew up near oxford, as a new friend. yay for new friends.

5) i am going to see a musical version of cinderella tonight, i guess. i don't want to go. but maybe i will like it.

6) just found out one of my friends was in the hospital this week. i wish he were happy. i think all my friends deserve to be happy.

7) TV is boring. i am trying to read a book about chemistry.

8) i got the job!!! i don't start for another week, but i think that's a positive thing because i can spend more time here at home getting settled: unpacking (i am slow at this) and starting the garden and working on the techniques that i am trying to perfect at the moment (bread, traditional chinese vegetarian dishes, taming the chipotles en adobo). and soon i will have money. i have to take a TB test for my job. i guess they don't want any tuberculosis in the food, for some reason. i bet it kills old people or something. tee. i'm glad it's only a TB test i have to pass... and soon i will have money. sigh of relief.

oh dear. i seem to have put back all the toxins. nevertheless, last night was great.

from me telling myself "just one beer and then i'll go home and watch TV" to an epic adventure including really amazing girls to hang out with (one of whom is from my part of england!), an ex-crush who is a really fun and intelligent guy, two brothers from my high school (long-losts!), a mad iranian, smoking on someone's lawn, and making some kind of egg-bean-ricotta burritos for everyone. i got home at 6:30 am. i am still hungover. but it was a fitting going-away party for jennylee.

highlights:

* when i accidentally said i was going to buy jennylee a "go-away drink" and then five minutes later i told her she sure was bossy!
* jennylee trying on the lawnmowing wife outfit i gave her, a little red terrycloth combination tube top & hot pants. and the looks we all were getting in the girls' bathroom.
* naomi and i bonding over eastenders and julie and i bonding over boys.
* not remembering how we got all over town....actually, not remembering some of the places we went all that well. still a good time.

today my mom and i got kick-ass shoes. i feel great in my new shoes. i will walk everywhere in them. also we got yummy chocolates.

K and i are not really talking again. i guess. that's probably why i drank a lot last night. but i am glad it was a positive time for once. i just wish i could change the dissociated feelings.

last night was great--sonyl and jennylee and i made vietnamese spring rolls and thai curry and we watched the ted bundy movie on USA. all very hyper. i found 10-packs of clove cigarettes for a dollar each at the asian market. woo-hoo! this is the "other" asian market in town and this one has loads of indian, thai, and vietnamese stuff. the other one is all chinese, which is great, but i was having trouble finding some of the things i needed. now i am set. two markets to choose from.

now i am again weepy. K is being nasty to me over the email and so i had nothing to do but go outside and prune the hedges. now my arms are all scratched, which is sad, and i don't really feel that much better.

this morning i had my interview for a position as cook at a nursing home. i think i am hired. which is good...i can stop drinking so much water. also, it's a much shorter drive and pays a dollar more an hour than plasmapheresis does.

that bread i made yesterday is gone already. i guess that means it was good. today i am baking (again by machine--too tired for all the kneading) semolina bread.

weeping some more. insomnia some more. maybe i am purging my toxins? could be, could be. all i know is that i am in a really nasty mood and my dad made me cry just by asking me a question. i mean, yeah, it was one of those questions that implies that i am not doing Enough, but i know that's more the way i read it than the way he means it. now i'm too tired to finish a sentence. i would watch some TV but i'll just cry through the whole thing, so i guess it's nap time. i hardly slept last night.

i have overloaded on water. but i must persist. i am applying for a job working with blood, and i will have to take a piss test if i get hired. i feel like i am floating downstream....oooooof.

i have just baked my first loaf of real real real bread. like with a baking stone and steam in the oven and everything. it looks amazing on the outside. i hope it looks amazing on the inside as well! i have gorgeous organic tomatoes and some buffalo mozzarella. mmmmmmm. salad and bread for supper tonight.

i am reading my first self-help book. i hope it's my last self-help book.

i am weepy weepy weepy. i watched ally mcbeal today and cried through the whole damn thing. hormones, feh!

not much else....one job interview down, two to go. no income yet. slightly disheartening, but i think i am making up for it in homemaking productivity. yesterday i dusted all the rooms upstairs. today i cleaned and polished the kitchen cupboards. and baked that bread.

i will be at kenyon for passover, which is really good news. i think.

had good dreams last night for the first time since i've been home. they were amazing. i wish i could remember more about them. but i slept in too late.....another reason why i need a job. my parents and i are all suffering from insomnia at the moment. bleh.

i miss K soooo much. poo. also, one of my friends here is moving to texas in a week. at least i called her in time for us to go do a few fun things together.

last night was really good. i saw almost every single one of my iowa-friends. i was getting really jet-lagged finally, in the delirium stage of exhaustion, so i don't know what we talked about, but it was really nice. i was a very good girl and consumed exactly one-half of a gin-and-tonic. then i had a hazelnut hot chocolate.

problem which is not really a problem: two of the people i am really drawn to were there. and one of them has undergone a complete physical transformation. i always liked her for who she is, but goddamn it, she's gotten all pretty and shit. and was being really touchy-feely, which is NOT who she used to be. she's the cynical nasty bristly type. oh well. at least the guy i am drawn to looks the same, which is furry and adorable. but i thought about it a lot on the drive home, and i realized that it's really okay to be drawn to people. because these people will never hold the same...gravity, the same passion, that K and i have. and it's fine.

something else important i realized yesterday: i have always thought these problems, my self-destructive tendencies, were related to me being sad. but i read an article that suggested it's really all about anger. i have, apparently, buried my anger so deep that i have no clue what i might be angry about. but next time i feel like cutting or drinking too much or driving like an idiot, just because i'm depressed and sad, i'm going to look at the situation and try to figure out if i'm actually angry about something instead. i think it's a good starting point. i am here, home, to heal. i have to, or else i will fuck up my relationship and my schooling and my life.

inventory:

scratches and bruises all over body. huge healing bite mark on my left breast. scrape on my ass. let's just say my "going-away party" was interesting and horrible and i have discovered something about myself. which is that i am developing an extremely frightening tendency towards violence. i scare the shit out of myself. and alcohol is off-limits for now. i'm a monster. i don't even know who i am anymore. i mean, some guy i don't even know BIT MY BREAST! and then i found out the next day (from an eyewitness)....i bit him first. jesus. i hope i didn't break his skin, because he broke mine. through my shirt and all.

okay, on with the inventory. i am home. i have received at least ten lovely, uplifting emails from friends. that is very good. i have applied for one job already, and i've only been home a day. i am making good food. K and i sorely need time apart. i miss him but he is being very good about sending me nice little emails. i think this will be good for "us." i miss nate and jean-max and columbo and chris and all my other pals from the pub. i am happy to be home and i am taking good care of myself and drinking ten glasses of water a day and painting my toenails and watching funny movies and reading a couple books. i am going out tonight with my friends from home. hopefully i will resist the siren call of 75-cent gin-and-tonics.

i missed my flight on monday due to stupid circumstances and i got my flight on tuesday morning and i have had several panic attacks and nightmares and all of this shit. but now i am home and sleeping lots and did i mention drinking water? good.

okay: important. anyone who wants to see me while i am in ohio in april must sign my guestbook now. also sign it on behalf of other people if you like. then i will compile a master list. yes. keara made me think of this idea. good girl keara.

today i am making pea-and-garlic soup for my parents for lunch. yay! maybe i will make popovers as well. anyone who wants at least three delicious ways to use frozen peas as the basis for a meal can sign my guestbook, too. or else just buy nigella lawson's book, because that's where i learned. for the record: soup, risotto, souffle. all composed mostly of green peas.

yesterday: saw a whole arch of a rainbow, none of that crappy half-arch thing, AAAAND it was a double rainbow! i stared at it for about 5 minutes, yes, just happy. then things got worse. but that's okay. had nice indian buffet with adam and richa. had drinks with jean-max.

today: just lit a match over-zealously and it broke in half and the lit part fell on my bare leg. shit. i'm okay though. am fully booked for social obligations today, saying goodbye to friends and whatnot. they're even coming from gloucester to see me. i feel special. still, i am watching popular. it's saturday! but instead of smoking and making pancakes, i went for an hour's walk with K and then i made an omelette.

the rest of the weekend: packing packing.

i just got a junk e-mail advertising, in both english and french, their art auction database services. i opened it because the subject line was 2003: The Surrealist year - L'annee Surrealiste 2003. and how did i come to receive this ad? it was sent to my 'they might be giants' e-mail alias. someone out there knows their demographics.

i will be in iowa next week.

things are not well at the moment. that is both related and unrelated to me going home.

on an unrelated (sort of) note, check out these great lyrics to hefner's "the day that thatcher dies":

we will laugh the day that thatcher dies
even though we know it's not right
we will dance and sing all night
i was blind in 1979
by '82 i had clues
by 1986 i was mad as hell

the teachers at school
they took us for fools
they never taught us what to do
but christ we were strong
we knew all along
we taught ourselves the right from wrong

'cos the punk rock kids
and the techno kids
no it's not their fault
and those hip hop boys
and heavy metal girls
no it's not their fault

it was love
but tories don't know what that means
she was michelle cox from the lower stream
she wore high-heeled shoes while the rest wore flat soles
and the playground taught her how to be cruel
i talked politics and she called me a fool
she wrapped her ankle chain round my left-wing heart

the teachers at school
they took us for fools
they never taught us what to do
but christ we were strong
we knew all along
we taught ourselves the right from wrong

'cos the punk rock kids
and the techno kids
no it's not their fault
and those hip hop boys
and heavy metal girls
no it's not their fault

we will laugh the day that thatcher dies
even though we know it's not right
we will dance and sing all night

ding dong
the witch is dead
which old witch?
the wicked witch (repeat and fade...)

oh yes, it is a fabulous song. who wants mix CDs?

this morning i invented a caramel apple pancake. it was also high in fiber, being composed partly of all-bran cereal. :) it's now in recipe R&D, so i would be willing to share the recipe once i've perfected it.

yesterday i turned in my grad school application. i rewarded myself with the only (i think--not counting singles/EPs) hefner album i didn't have yet: we love the city.

tim: did you know that the hefner brain is part of a trilogy of EPs, the others being the hefner soul and the hefner heart? i think we should compare collections.

on a related note, i *might might might* be able to go to ohio in april. which would be really good for me. i am getting homesick and bored here. it's partly the city and partly the money problems. i feel really wasted here. i don't want to be apart from K, and he doesn't want that either, but perhaps a little time apart would improve things. i don't know. i want to be so many places now and i don't have any money. i want to be in ohio in april, back to london for may 3, i want to visit friends in both chicago and the twin cities, i want to be in iowa in august to take advantage of fun temporary work like i have the past two years, i want to be in iowa in early september for my parents' birthdays, i want to be back here starting school (god willing) in october. so that's a lot of transportation and time off work that i cannot afford, nor do i wish to ask my parents to subsidize these ventures. i am already able to get K to iowa for my birthday if things go well, but...i am going to need money for the rest of it. which suggests that i have to go back to the states ASAP. unless i suddenly get, say, an apprenticeship with a baker in a neighboring town who pays cash in hand. or something like that.