smile-shaped moon; cue marimba, piano

The moon is currently a half-smile... enormous and bright and deeply complicated in its moon-ness. Yesterday there was an incredibly bright star just below it-- the shape formed sort of a vintage metronome.

Appropriate, since the last two days I've celebrated the moon and my thoughts in the same way as I've celebrated music and quietly happy moments.

Last night I worked late... left exhausted... went out for coffee with Sarah and Reji and ended up in a weirdly depressing coffee shop nook for a couple hours with a lovely conversation... looked at their photos from the inauguration and their trip to D.C., and we cheered on each other's ridiculous stories about minutiae, and my dramatic stories about things that will never really amount to anything in the future, but we all pretended in the moment that maybe that wasn't the case.

At some point I realized they were both sick and we were all looking exhausted... drove them home, turned up the heat, pulled over for a badly-needed tank of gas. Rotated cds until it landed on 2 of the 3 that I made for a friend's cross-country trip... sadly, he didn't end up getting the mixes, so I burned the tracks onto a couple cds of my own to test drive around town to see if my spontaneous road trip mix skills are worth anything these days.
I dropped Sarah and Reji off around Broadway and Iris, and it was almost completely empty on the roads, so I settled on a few of the more sad/mellow tracks, turned the music up, and took all the country roads home.

Sia "Breathe Me"... deep, soulful marimba, mournful piano, and a moving string section... then Sia's throaty, expressive voice kicked in. I turned right on Jay as usual, with no street lights and no traffic... passed my favorite intersection in the world, where the Greek Orthodox church sits staunchly across from the Jehovah's Witness church (in an eternal showdown with each other)... the bass and string sections were split so beautifully between my speakers that I turned up the volume several more notches and went past the turn for my apartment complex.
Up Jay, turned right on 75th, the Foo Fighters song "Are You There" came on... wandering, contemplative guitar and dreamlike, heart-torn lyrics. I watched the half-smile of the moon and turned again onto an even darker country road-- headed dead East with the moon in my rear-view mirrors. At one point I drove under a rickety bridge that supported an endless freight train heading the opposite direction... it's a fairly amazing feeling to drive under a train that's suspended by an old, rickety bridge,with pieces of gravel and turf falling on your windshield.

Crested the hill on East Arapahoe and had a surreal and breathtaking view of the power plant that I've never seen before-- instead of dark and ominous as I'm used to seeing it, the plant was fully lit... the huge rectangular windows were glowing with a deep amber light, and endlessly long rectangular amber reflections were cast out into the water surrounding the plant. It was like something out of Terry Gilliam's "Brazil". Magical and beautiful, in a mechanical and eerie way.

Then a piano/intrumental version of Radiohead's 'Let Down'... at this point I was simply worn out, teeth chattering a little, so I hunkered down in my jacket and turned North on 95th. A coyote ran in front of me and I braked softly... he turned and looked straight into my headlights, and then gently loped parallel to my car until I lost sight of him behind me.

Turned West just in time to see the moon set behind the foothills... and as I came over the hill on Lookout Road, I realized for the first time what a truly spectacular view that can be at night. I could see the familiar shimmer of all the Boulder lights, from Longmont down to almost Table Mesa, but the lights that were scattered up through the foothills all the way to Eldorado were incredible. It looked like pollen or something that had scattered in the wind instead of homes.
(I'm the world's biggest sucker for twinkling city lights at night. Thank god I wasn't alive in the 50s, when surely all the high school boys would've discovered that about me, and driven me up to 'hangman's point' every night, just trying to get to 2nd base while I gawked at the city lights.)

Tonight I spent the evening at Meg's... she made a delicious feast of chicken/pasta/peanut sauce and a carrot-oatmeal cake... I brought a rather forgettable but endearingly tasty bottle of Chilean cabernet sauvignon. Kenai ate a large blanket and barked at us with his adorable tongue hanging sideways out of his mouth and all was right with the world. After a long and wonderfully Meg & Jane conversation, I headed home... wondering for a minute if I was the world's lamest bachelorette before turning on the same cd and heading back through the same country roads. This time I turned up the heat a little more and put down the windows... appreciating the feeling of heat encircling my legs as cold air rushed in the side windows while singing the harmony line loud and meaningfully along to Ben Folds' "Fred Jones Part II." Possibly one of my top 5 songs**.
Turned the bend in front of my apt. complex just in time to watch the brilliant ivory half-smile of a moon sink behind the craggy silhouette of the foothills, casting a brilliant halo up over the mountains.

**Maybe if I'm more awake tomorrow, I'll dig out the novel I wrote to my music-obsessed friends about "the top 5" so it won't get lost forever in my endless gmail archive.

What a beautiful place to live.
What a luxury to be able to sing harmonies with all my heart on dark, dark country roads as I peer down long driveways, looking at the one lightbulb burning in a large, haunted country house as I wonder about people's lives, people's whereabouts, people's quality of life and dreams and secrets.

To watching the crescent moon set behind the mountains, and the long coyote tails that disappear behind my headlights.
to friends. and driving. and thinking. and breathing. and singing.

*clink*

to Romania, with love

New things:
My 'blog' (bleh) is now white. Why I limit myself to hideous templates like the one I've been using the past 3 years, I do not know.

We just started composting at work. That's my workplace equivalent of a white blog. A tiny thrill goes through me every time I toss a paper towel onto a pile of coffee grounds... Yay! Recycling!

I'm being SUCH a little kid tonight. I'm having one of those days where I wish we could just take food pills instead of having to eat. I'm just looking at my stomach like a dog who wants to play... stop growling. I don't want to give you attention today.

Also, agonizing over which design to order for the huuuuge wall I have just below the vaulted ceiling in my apt.
I think I'm going to get this, in white, with dark brown birds.
I drive myself crazy. Really, I do.


I've had the craziest time trying to stay warm all week.
I can't for the *life* of me maintain a normal body heat. It's really, really odd. I'm typically sort of pathetically cold throughout the winter, but this is way different... I wouldn't feel cold to the touch, but it's like the hot water heater quit in my heart, and I'm pumping cold blood through my veins.

I think I'm being haunted.

I'd better make some serious money on my Diane Sawyer interview if that's the case.

In other news: I just put up a pathetic facebook bat signal in hopes that my Romanian will put down her PhD homework* for 20 minutes and teach me a new Romanian phrase. I enjoy the prospect of her cute face lighting up when she sees it. Facebook-- it's really just a treasure hunt for grown-ups**
(*I guess it isn't called "homework" when you get that smart. Me, I'm too simple-minded to know)
(**I also have it on good authority that if you're actually a grown-up, you only use the term 'adult'. I'm 0-2 here.)

I'm very nervous about our company meeting tomorrow at the crack of dawn. I feel a little sick about it. Bad economy + loose canon year for management giving people the axe *very* unexpectedly = bad math equation. I hope there's just some lectures. I'm ok with lectures. (I have yet to escape an all-company meeting where I didn't almost pass out from nerves. I can do stand-up in front of 400 people, but company meetings is what gives me total public performance anxiety. Somewhere in my fetal development, some important wires seem to have gotten crossed)

Also!
Dan Simmons
"Drood" tour
Coming soon to a (West coast) (or Midwest) (it's weird when they randomly rule out the East coast) bookstore near you.

Last minute, I decided to put my foot down and insist that I was going on tour with him to help out, but I was overruled by the king. I don't know how he will possibly have the stamina/health to do a tour right now. But hey-- I also still don't understand how Superman can change clothes in that tiny little phone booth. I don't know everything.

Also: http://www.timescall.com/communitytc/schools-story.asp?ID=14073
LHS is putting on Deadwood Dick this year as the '10th anniversary of Asa's death'

actually... no. I'm still too mad to write about it.

My apartment is quiet and zenlike and I have been in a quiet, peaceful state of mind all evening... why take 78 steps back?

It took me years (and almost 2000 miles) to feel liberated from this stuff. I celebrate the kindred spirits from my past who are still in my life, and I'm seeking blue skies and kindred spirits in my future. That's about as much as anyone can do when grappling with their youth. And I'm very content with that.


to blue skies. and white power lines with birds. and keeping the steps pointed forward, no matter how slowly they might move sometimes.

it's bananas, b-a-n-a-n-a... what?

Oh no we di'int.

Well today was just a little rollercoaster of excitement.

Things have been good at work this week (knock on wood), although the research I'm doing is SO GRIM right now... this morning I was reading a *horrific* story about a woman whose baby was born 'with alcohol on his breath-- already drunk'... which was upsetting enough as it was... and I turned the page to see a photo of a comparison between a normal infant's brain and a FAS baby's brain, and I (actually) almost gagged at my desk. It's a really good thing my boss was in a meeting.
I think I had 3 mugs of tea before I was restored to factory settings... I felt pale until I got home.

(*I've developed a dumb little rewards system for days like today. Survive not vomiting into trash can at my desk; indulge in a little pop music singing & dancing on my drive through dark country roads home at 10pm. Gwen Stefani's 'bananas' came on, which makes me laugh... I got taunted for watching 'the gilmore girls' but that show had the funniest, fastest references ever. Proust, Nabokov, The Bangles, the Civil War... all within 5 minutes and they'd be on to even more obscure high-brow jokes. One of the best was an episode where Sebastian Bach, playing himself, is so frustrated with his small-town rock band, and he's forced to play a girl's bat mitzvah. There's a quick scene of him in a sparkly tux or something, staring ahead with the creepiest look on his face, playing a cocktail lounge version of the song... 'it's bananas, b-a-n-a-n-a-s'... I laugh every single time I hear the real version thinking of Bach's rendition. I dare you to turn the radio station until you hit the chorus... I double dog dare you. Impossible. Because rhythmic spelling is the devil's elixir.)

Invited myself over to Justin and Dani's in lieu of taco Tuesday when I found out that JC and Ekki had rented 'Zombie Strippers'. Not really sure what I was expecting, but I was pretty darn excited about zombie strippers. And... it was... maybe in the top 8 most offensive movies I've ever seen. Definitely in the worst 10 movies I've ever seen. And I've seen a lot of bad movies.
Ugh. I might have to shower before I go to bed.
Definitely keeping a copy of that for myself just as a reminder that there IS a movie called Zombie Strippers, and this information needs to be shared with others.
(During the credits, I noticed that Jenna Jameson was in it?! Damnit... this was need-to-know information. I don't even know which zombie stripper she was. That would've totally made the movie better, had I only known)

Still in a mix cd making frenzy... some are (way) better than others, especially since my music is all chaotic and all over the place at the moment. I'm making an awesome mix for Karsten that is about a year overdue. I wish I was a better artist because I was thinking it would be fun to make a watercolor cd cover...

Mad Men continues to be a way better show than I would've guessed. I never would've watched it, even flipping past it on tv, if Tom hadn't forced me into the commitment of Netflix nights. But it's fun.

And, while I'm killing time while I wait for another mix to burn... I think I've discovered the fix for my sleep issues...
1. I stopped reading Don Delillo's "White Noise". I finally picked it up again and finished it. No more late nights writing notes in the margins. It's over and done with. Not sure how I felt about it, but like Zombie Strippers, probably more disturbing than it was emotionally satisfying

2. Sheets straight out of the dryer. I slept like a dead bug last night.

3. reading a little 'mental floss' before bed. ridiculous trivia is weirdly relaxing.

4. have a 10-14 minute sweet conversation with a friend before passing out. that's the best.

5. nope. actually, the warm dryer sheets that smell like Tide are the best. But friend conversations come in 2nd.

It's Tuesday and I'm already thinking about the weekend.
Excited for my new eccentric apartment decor to arrive... even though I'm not sure how we'll get it up there without a 700' ladder. And there's that whole 'fear of heights' thing.
Excited for my 'volunteer orientation' on Thursday. It's been two months without the kiddos and I'm eager to learn about this new opportunity... hopefully this one will have more opportunities for connection and less getting-kicked-in-the-shins.


in the words of some guy from zombie strippers...
'time to get in the *#&$^@* bread truck and drive your buns outta here"

-janekathryn

ps... this is pretty magical:
http://www.moustacheme.com/

the website's name keeps getting stuck in my head. I was stuck in traffic on the way to JC's and I kept hearing this voice in my head going 'mustache me!' at cars trying to merge unsuccessfully.

most of us need the eggs...even Bambi & Thumper

good GRIEF.

It's quarter past midnight.
I got very, very little sleep between Thursday night and this morning.
I have work in the morning.
I should be in beeeeed....

But I've been online looking for a new (amazing) funky / urban / interior design scheme of mine and it's got me all wide-awake and creative. I can't wait to put it in my apt and post pictures.

So. Awesome weekend.
Friday- post-o'brother where art thou work day- went straight down to Denver for girls night out with Katie & Lindsay Murphy and a whole gaggle of fabulous women. I had dashed out the door and had a 9 hr work day, so I arrived at a table full of women with perfectly curled and coiffed hair, fabulous out-on-the-town outfits and high heels...and I was wearing about 20 layers with a sweater over a dress over my jeans, the pink sneakers, and the craziest looking hair ever. I felt like Tim Burton arriving at a black tie event-- it was kind of awesome. We hit up LoDo... I discovered some drink that's red wine with orange soda (?!) in it, which is amazing, and then we had a long night of tapas and laughter and wandering several blocks away to the Oxford hotel's (secret) ((extremely haunted)) bar. There's a fun, friendly bar out front, and hidden in a narrow hallway in the back is this bar with red lightbulbs, 20s decor, 30s music playing... it was straight out of the shining. The cosmo I ordered was about 700% alcohol, which made our conversation that much more fun. I actually got nervous in the basement bathroom listening to the laughter warbling through the marble walls from upstairs because it felt so ghostly. Must go back post-haste.

Stopped by a friend's 80s Rockstar themed birthday party on the way home, where my sneakers and crazy hair looked much more at home. Saw the BEST George Michael impersonator I've ever seen, which is saying a *lot*. Really. Dead on. His girlfriend was Madonna, which was an inspired pairing. Derek was Loverboy, which was also a dead-on reinactment... ahhhh... 80s parties. They are my favorite thing.

Also met the sweetest dog on the planet. She reminded me SO much of Fergie, it was unreal... I woke up this morning and I could actually feel how much I missed Ferg. Sometimes I still toss a pillow down to the foot of my bed... it's 2 years later and I'm still not used to her not being there.

Saturday I had to reorganize all of my music... switching everything over to a new backup system mysteriously messed up all my mp3s and made my playlists disappear, which I had been saving for at least 2 or 3 years. I'm super bummed to have lost them... I like playing mixes I made for friends. I had all my harmony favorites bookmarked. Anyhoo. Made a bunch of mixes, which is my happy place... showered so long that there are fewer whales on the planet... went out with Erik for fajitas and $3 Jameson on the walk home (because come on... when it's raining ice and you're walking, one must stop in Connor O'Neils for a Jameson special on the way home.) We had an awesome conversation, during which I learned that Erik has never (he swears. really.) had a nightmare. Not even a bad dream. Not even that dream where you get on the school bus and you aren't wearing pants.
W.
T.
F.

We talked about how different people's lives can be due to sleep and dreams. It blew my mind a little bit. Here I am, stuck in nightmare central (not since Friday night-- knock on wood-- let's hope that's over)... and I realize that not everyone turns out the light with a faint sense of dread sometimes. Or wakes up with their heart in their mouth, terrified. Or wishes more than anything that they could rent someone at 2am when they wake up sweaty and freaked out, just to hang out in the tree bed reading calvin and hobbes so you could go back to sleep and release them from duty at 6:45am.
So crazy. No bad dreams?

Peter called on my way home, and being *ridiculously* sleep deprived and about to fall on my face at midnight, I wasn't even making coherent sentences. Peter reminded me of our last conversation, which included something along the line of:
jane: "and then, you know, I am just not in the mood for this existential crisis any more. I'm over it. If only this whole 'plus one' thing would go away and my co-workers would stop bugging me about why I don't have a date for our party... sorry, I'm snarky at the moment, and I have some image in my head as me depicting a little black rain cloud"
peter: "right... it's more like the grim reaper..."
jane: "....yeah...on the Brooklyn Bridge... that's where I am right now"
peter: "yeah, me too. totally. grim reaper on the Brooklyn Bridge"
jane: "and I'm just not in the mood to be forced to think about, you know, Bambi and Thumper's...date...of love and glory"
peter: *wheezing noises from laughing*
jane: "who the hell are we? What the hell are we even talking about?"
peter: *still laughing hysterically* "I love the pause in your voice and then you just went for 'love and glory"
jane: "yeah, well, snarkiness leads to good comedic timing, right?"
*peter and jane dissolve into hopeless laughter about what dorks they are and hang up on each other*

No one makes me laugh like Peter. Last night we were both so stupid tired that I actually fell asleep while on the phone for a second, and woke up just in time to catch the end of his frustrated anecdote to say, "I hear ya, kiddo. Dating is tough." Peter: "You know what? Taking dating advice is just stupid. And DATING is stupid." Me: (thinking about it for a second) You know, Pita, you're on to something there...

Ah honey. I know. The great thing about Peter is that his life is so parallel to mine... let's say I was coming home from an interview, sleep deprived and angsty, wondering if it was weird that the guy interviewing me had a hook for a hand and a parrot... I'd call Peter, who would be sleep deprived and snarky, driving home from an interview with someone who had a pegged leg and a long velvet jacket. These are the friends you need in your life. The ones who are having simultaneous experiences as you, and who still love you, despite knowing all of your flaws.
(obviously, I'm still totally sleep deprived and English isn't my strong point)

Fortunately, I had a lovely, decadent, exhausted, puttering-around, cold, snowy Sunday.
Tom and I watched a couple more episodes of Mad Men, which I'm really enjoying. The booze! The cigarettes! The bras that go from your neck to your knees! The affairs! The SUITS! The ties! The "chip&dip"... the rifle... the vomiting of clams & champagne after climbing 23 flights of stairs... well... nevermind. Had to be there.
It's awesome.

Tonight I took myself on a date. I smelled totally tasty after another 3-day long shower* and a new scent that I bought and all the candles in my apartment (and whatever else it is that girls are addicted to that smell good)... so I figured that I'd have a romantic date with myself. Made tacos, watched Annie Hall**, decided to buy myself a little art for the apartment, snuggled up under a blanket with myself watching the snow fall.
It's good to be happy and sleepy, home alone. It's rare that I really get to enjoy this any more.
*my hot water lasts about 10 minutes these days, which it's never done... must try to remedy problem...I can't exist without my shower epiphanies
**I hadn't seen it for a few years... it's looking OLD! Crazy. And the DVD is *terrible* quality. Awesome one-liners, though... "don't knock masterbation. It's sex with someone I love" and the one that I've quoted with much love for years..."Love is too weak a word for what I feel - I luuurve you, you know, I loave you, I luff you, two F's"

the last lines kind of got me:
I realized what a terrific person she was, and... and how much fun it was just knowing her; and I... I, I thought of that old joke, y'know, the, this... this guy goes to a psychiatrist and says, "Doc, uh, my brother's crazy; he thinks he's a chicken." And, uh, the doctor says, "Well, why don't you turn him in?" The guy says, "I would, but I need the eggs." Well, I guess that's pretty much now how I feel about relationships; y'know, they're totally irrational, and crazy, and absurd, and... but, uh, I guess we keep goin' through it because, uh, most of us... need the eggs.


off to bed I go.
this week...
*buy a tie
*purchase awesome apartment designs
*huge company meeting on thurs that I'm nervous about...please don't fire anyone... please, please don't say that the economy is forcing some of us to take a pay decrease...
*do some serious writing... no matter how hard I try to fight it, every year as it gets close to my birthday, I really get that lump in my stomach... the "i'm getting older-- am I doing a good job?" lump. I've learned that I really need to get my thoughts out close to my birthday or I internalize the anxiety/questions/blah blah blah

and, of course, make a few more mixes.
sweet dreams.

new essay up

I keep forgetting...

new essay's up online:
http://dansimmons.com/news/jane/jane.htm

in summary:
love is dead. text messages + internet = death of love.

I've made a conscious effort to actually talk to people in lieu of emails / texts etc. since publishing the essay so I don't seem like a big hypocrite, and I've been mildly surprised at the extra push I need to give myself to do so. It's so much easier to quasi-chatter than it is to formulate real dialog when you're busy...
Seriously, though.
New Year's Resolution... I'm totally over human connections that are 90% texts and 10% the real deal. I shouldn't have made that compromise in the past. If I want to date a robot, I'll give my wrists a little spritz of WD-40 and head into someone's server closet wearing my Tin Woman costume from high school.
Until that sad little day comes, I'd strongly prefer some actual conversations in my life.

Acceptable uses for texts:
1. letting someone know you're thinking about them
2. sharing a humorous anecdote
3. determining a time and place to meet

Unacceptable uses of texts:
1. wooing the person you're smitten with
2. declaring your love for the person you're smitten with for the first time
3. fights
4. lengthy explanations
5. any kind of discussion that could be easily misunderstood in a tiny, texty context
6. an attempt at replacing actual, real human connection
7. apologies (you can get a head start, but a real apology requires human-to-human follow-up)
8. major life-changing announcements
9. dumping someone
10. art criticism
11. literary theory
12. wedding vows
13. in general, anything that replaces words with numbers
14. in general, anything that replaces words with lowercase letters
15. in general, anything that doesn't say anything at ALL

Robin has encouraged me to do a short on the subject.
Robin is a genius.
Think my 'sound effects' mockumentary, except an old school silent film with text messages as caption cards.
Ohhhh, it's going to be good.

(the best thing about Friday is that I indulge once a week and get a coffee on the way to work. some dark roast, some steamed milk, a little sugar... keeps me feeling totally happy until at least 1pm.
it's the little things that keep us alive and happy. and I stand by that.)

It sounds like there should be a big girls night out in the works for tonight... my fingers are crossed that it's still on. Drinks, dancing, catching up, LoDo... A+ stuff right there. And it's been a ridiculously long time since I had a great posse of girls to hit the town with. Leave the boys at home, ladies... I'm rocking the big hair, the tacky earrings, the pink sneakers, and I have the best of Motown in my car. It's Friday night! :)

Off to the rat races for the day... with a brief pit stop to text my friends good morning and happy Friday (HEY... that one's allowed, it doesn't violate the Lists (tm)... a girl still likes to hear the little tinkle of chimes in her bag while she's slogging through a long day. jeez. I'm not anti-text, just anti-robot-love)

Addendum:
It is currently 11:08.
Not to jinx it, but so far, my work day consists of:
*the graphic designer's adorable 4 year old daughter hanging out in the art department. She likes my bright pink sneakers. Score!

*a 45 minute phone conversation with an AWESOME consultant who reviewed my script and had amazing feedback. She's been working in the diagnostic/public health realm in FAS for twenty years, so she knows her stuff. After the script consultation I started dorking out about all the 'contemporary' cognitive issues research I had questions about, and she and I went on a long, crazy-fascinating tangent about fetal brain development and childhood learning disorders and how fascinating child development is. After lunch, I'm anticipating feedback from 5-8 more experts... including the top researcher in the US, who I have a feeling would also like my pink sneakers...

*That's right. I said crazy-fascinating.

*Post-conversation, I now have the remains of my Friday Happy Coffee... at least 1-2 days' worth of revitalized script-rewriting to look forward to... new research to pursue... AND...the best thing yet...

*my boss, sitting next to me, without looking up from her project: "I watched O Brother Where Art Thou las night"
me: "No. Way. I've been playing that soundtrack non-stop in my car"
boss: "Hmm. Any chance it's still in your car?"
5 minutes later... we've rearranged our speakers so they're split between our desks. The sounds of O Brother Where Art Thou are filling what is normally a deathly silent office.
We work in silence, heads bobbing in time with the rhythm... I occasionally pause from script revisions to hum the harmony and we laugh at the bizarre lyrics.

Perhaps the best Friday morning scenario possible.
Ahhh. It all works out, little Orphan Annie. It all works out in the end.

addendum

addendum:
took a 5 minute breather to check out my boss's new bike.
a vintage British cruiser with a bell and a basket and a kickstand.
the company prez took it for a spin in the parking lot and we cheered and commented on how wonderful his posture was.

came back to the desk. re-opened my research file. took a deep breath. wiped the sleep from my face.
headphones in:
linus & lucy. vince guaraldi trio.

radioparadise has redeemed itself.
the work week is salvaged.

song covers and repetitive motion syndrome

so...

I'm at work doing my *damndest* to make a slow day into a productive day.
but oh... my... GOD. It's a brutal one.
Both of the people I'm relying on for this week's "project workflow" are running way behind. Which means that I have 50% less to do at the moment. In an economy that gives my current field about 60% less business.

I love being busy. I work hard to be busy when I'm not busy.
But today I'm dangerously close to stabbing my eyes out with thin-tipped sharpies from frustration.

I was doing ok until just now, when Johnny Cash's "Hurt" came on the podcast I listen to (radioparadise -- awesome. I even got those cloth grocery bags with 'radioparadise' on them to be a total dork and advertise good tunes. Because I live in Boulder! And I'm in my 20s! And I voted for Obama! And I'm a total stereotype that makes the polls cheer with glee!)

Then I realized that "Hurt" was acoustic, so I must be listening to NIN's cover of "Hurt". But Trent Reznor never started singing, so I had to save my script and flip over to iTunes and discover that it was some instrumental piece called "Remembrance Day" by 'God is an Astronaut'. It was the straw that broke the camel's back.
If you're going to totally plagiarize a song, don't plagiarize a cover OF a cover.
And if you're going to be all synth/instrumental band... don't have 'hearts of space' predictable names that include 'cosmos' or 'god' or 'astronaut' or any of those other 'new age' feels that makes me want to just fall over and die.

I shouldn't be doing this. But man, this work thing isn't working out. I'd leave my desk if I had to use the 'loo... and this is the only way I can symbolically leave my desk to release the unwanted thoughts out of my mind.

The economy is really fucking things up. I had a conversation last night with an ex-colleague who started crying in a coffee shop when he asked me to help him enter an international "job" contest that he will never, under any circumstances, win. This morning a friend emailed to say that she won't be visiting me in a few weeks from NYC because of the whole job/domino effect.

I'm feeling it too. After spending SO long and hard trying to find the next place to leap, jobs are disappearing like water in a drought. I've spent the last year and a half developing new market and video ideas for our company because I dislike so many of the titles that we make, and last week I was informed that they were *all* being cut. The only content we'll develop for a minimum of a year is strictly 'the most basic of the down and dirty basics' that we are known for.
I was given two options for my next video:
1. circumcision
2. a video for parents whose baby just died prenatally/in childbirth/shortly after birth

After that meeting, I did something I almost never do-- I went straight home, cracked open a beer. Stood by my window just watching the people in the park across the street and wondering how I can feel so grateful for a job, yet so freaking miserable about the prospect of watching genital mutilation or human loss for the next bachelorette, cooking-for-one year of my life.

Ironically, my current video is about "alcohol and pregnancy", so (as most women can sympathize with) on some level I'm constantly paranoid that my habits are damaging an imaginary baby that I don't know about.

(*the fetal alcohol syndrome video WAS slated for summer. Due to the economy, will not be released until December/Jan '10. Won't even be edited for months and months. And I can't even get revisions back from my boss. I have cleaned my entire desk and files-- 4 hrs of cleaning-- and gone through archived emails. Now am left anxious and twitchy at my desk, thinking about alcohol and circumcision and how much I hate this damn recession)

Ironically, my brain feels the same way that my right arm does-- I've spent so much time at this desk working overtime since last summer, I've developed an incredibly sore kink in my right bicep. I've switched the mouse over and now have to fumble around as a lefty, which results in my shoulders holding even more tension and getting more and more stiff as the work week goes on. The knot in my right arm is just as sore as it ever was.

AUGHHHHH!!!! Why do we do this? How did we get to this point?! Repetitive motion damage from desk jobs has to be the most soul-suckingly sad thing ever. The ergonomic literature makes it even worse... "try carving out 1-5 minutes for every two hours spent at a computer to look at something further away... such as out the window"

The Spaniard never walks down the hall. He speed-walks, if not runs, in big heavy footsteps that rattle the doorframe.
Boom, boom, boom, snatch something from the printer.
BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, get a glass of water, BOOMBOOMBOOMBOOM back to his office.
At his desk, I often see him just staring off into space.

Now there's a metaphor for my day.
Hurry up!
And wait...

damn. I can't believe I'm writing this.
Back to alcohol research...

at least the other person was there to shout back

Please accept from me this unpretentious bouquet of very early-blooming parentheses
(((( )))))

____________________________________________________________________

How terrible is it when you say "I love you," and the person on the other end shouts back "What?"

____________________________________________________________________

...my life story. as summarized by two franny & zooey quotations.
my nom de plume ain't janey salinger for nothing.

filled with sushi and a vague wave of confusion

Stuffed full of homemade sushi and merlot after a long day, but scared to go to bed because the past three nights have been one horrific nightmare after the next. (*although, the sushi and vino part was awesome. It was a nice but weirdly anxious/somewhat lonely 3-day weekend, which ended with a sweet spontaneous dinner party with Justin, Dani, Ekki & Justin's friend Derek. Sushi is the best thing ever. 3 mile run... hours of eating... meh. Works for me!)

So... alas... I'm stalling and checking email and blah blah blah.

There are many perfect antidotes for nightmares-- including Tom, who's a damn fine diversion and a very good sport. This weekend, he kept me company and let me indulge in Thai food,deep chats, a bottle of shitty champagne, and even brought over Season 1 of Mad Men, which is actually as awesome as everyone said. He let me talk out my angst and be angry and even cry on the down-low without making me feel like an @sshole, because Tom is the best friend ever and because he knows that sometimes you just get overwhelmed and need to cry and pretend you're fine when really you're hiding behind the sink wiping mascara off your face as you fake looking for a bottle opener or whatever.

I digress.
Tom left after our little NetFlixFest ended and I was totally confident that 2 days of some of the *worst* nightmares I've had (yes, even for me) were going to end, but alas... not so much.
The nightmares the past 3 days were just gruesome. To the point that I feel like I'm a bad person.
In one, I toss and turn in covers just to realize that the covers are an albino mental patient-- white skin, white fruit-of-the-loom t-shirt, white pajama pants, white hair. The mental patient wraps his body around my face and I start to suffocate. I flail, start to scream, then stop to preserve the air that remains in my lungs. The mental patient hisses and holds onto my face with his whole torso. I escape and try running out into the snow in bare feet, wishing that I had found my car keys or my cell phone as any form of protection. I run, become exhausted. The mental patient presses his body against the window and watches me, confident that I will crumple from exhaustion into the snow in time for him to catch up with me and end my life. I know that he will win.

In another, I am digging for weapons of mass destruction somewhere in England. The ground is clammy... thick black sod (peat-- from Ireland and my scotch obsession?)... the smell of phosphorous and ominous chemicals fills the air. "Oh, SHIT..." the CIA-whoever leader says. We unearth train tracks. Then a small cavernous bubble under the train tracks, like the little hidey-holes that people hope for when miners get trapped under the earth. Under the train tracks there's a baby in a little onesie outfit. He's covered in wet mud, eyes rolling back in his head, spit-up on his pajamas. I freak out and start crying hysterically. The rest of the 'excavators' look at me in disgust and start chanting. The baby is dead, and then alive, and then dead, and I'm in a full-out panic trying to dig him out. People start chanting in tongues, like in a Pentacostal church. I turn and run, crying, sick... I run into the house and watch the rest of the coverage on CNN as I hide behind an armchair and pretend that I'm not one of the scientists interviewed on the scene, despite the fact that they put my name on a lower third graphic and have me sign a release form on the air.

Totally f***** up, right?
Mostly it's the same recurring nightmare.
I dream about whatever it is that people dream, and as I'm waking up, I get scared to the point that the hair stands up on my arms and a cold wave of adrenaline shoots through my body.
I wake up with that pounding feeling in the hands and chest that you get when waking up from a terrible dream.
I look at my clock. I clutch the covers or my pillow, or simply tuck my thumb under my fingers and try to remind myself that I'm ok.
I look towards the door that leads to my bathroom.
Out of the blackness and the shadows, I discern a man's outline standing in the doorway.
I start shaking. Sometimes, if I'm really half-asleep, I'll say something meaningless and pathetic. "hello?" or "go away".
The shadow remains.
Every time, he raises one arm and braces it against the door frame.
I wait until morning.

Ohhhh, the life of the overactive imagination girl.
I really, really, really wish I could get these twisted dreams out of my brain.
I'm considering hiring someone to sleep over. Just for another breathing, sleeping body in the house. I think having another warm body around would take the edge off of my 4am fear. Like having a pet-- how they say people's blood pressure is significantly lowered if they have a dog or a cat around.
Not that I consider a pet a replacement for human contact...
or that I need someone hanging around the house to cure my bachelorette blues...

anyway. I'm stalling. I have to be up in exactly 7 hours, so I'm going to be a grown-up and go to bed.

sighhhh...
cheers to a great day off, with friends and new running shoes and awesome sushi and the best damn coffee in the whole damn state.

sweet dreams, and cheers on the eve of President elect Obama's inaguration...

-jane kathryn, prisoner to her own imagination