I just packed four more boxes of books. I now have six total. I figured out it's half as cheap to mail them book rate than to put them on the moving truck, so that will be a fun day at the post office.

As I went through my bookcase I found my collection of "Murder Can Be Fun" fanzines. This was a great zine from the 1990s, based here in SF, and full of nothing but stories of freak accidents, bizarre murders, and other true crime, all of it written from a comedic angle. Loved that zine. Glad I still have them all. "Death at Disneyland" was a good issue.

Anyway, hidden within this stack was a copy of "Hex" #4, yes, my own zine. This one came out in spring of 1996. It was fantastically printed with a full color cover and extremely high-quality black and white pages within. This was the period when I had my Kinko's graveyard shift hookup -- my old friend Lisa. I would drive over the bridge at midnight and stay until dawn working on this thing.

This was a good issue, short and sweet. But I am still amazed at how candid I was, almost daring someone to accuse me of talking shit. This was right after I made a trip back to Olympia for a visit, and so there is a whole story within about how much I fuckin hated that place. I never named any names, of course, but I basically said the town was full of hipsters and assholes. Which it was, but still. Ballsy of me, no?

This was also a period when I was heavy into Britpop and was about to leave the US for the first time for my first trip to England. I had been fetishizing the place since high school so this was a pretty big deal. But all that is discussed in issue five.

Here is some stuff I wrote when I was twenty-three:

"I remember walking across the roof of the State Theater some May day ages ago at dusk, drinking hot chocolate and picking up sea shells... Wandering the frosty streets of Olympia in the middle of the night with a paper bag of beer, sitting in a cavernous parking garage, typing on my Royal just to hear the hollow hammer of the keys on paper. And looking across the pavement to see him facing me doing the same thing on the typewriter we found behind the thrift shop. If I don't think about him breaking my heart a few weeks later, things like this stay as sweet as candy."

I think reading this old issue has solidified something that has been on my mind this week with regard to the novel I am writing.

I can't use a made-up, fictionalized town. That is the coward's way; a lie. I have to be truthful, which ironically is one of the more important things about writing fiction. So, Olympia it is. Damn the torpedoes.

Tags: book, olympia, writing

I'm sharing music with husband tonight and I see that he has the Slant-6 record. MEMORIES!!!


I snapped this polaroid of them in a tri-cities parking lot

They put out a great 7" which I listened to a hundred times back then. There was a song called "Semi-Blue Tile" that clocked in just under a minute. Another called "Thirty-Thirty Vision" that almost sounded like Blur would sound a few years later. "What Kind of Monster Are You?" which just rocked.

Sure they were snotty bitches from DC but unlike a lot of the other "riot grrrl" groups of that era, their music was good! And no token boys in the band! *cough*bikinikill*cough*

Tags: music, olympia

I skimmed my journal from 19 this morning. I could barely even read it. I literally looked away from some of it, quickly turning the page over. I thought to myself as I read my own handwriting, "no, don't do that! NOOO!!!" But oh yes, I did it. I did all of that.

I seem to have so many regrets about my life back then, things I wish I had done so differently. Do not call that boy, do not ask him out (still the worst date of my entire life, ended with a limp handshake, and I still wouldn't get over him). Please relax Jane, just be yourself. Do not worry what they think. They are just like you. They are not as cool as you think they are.

But I was so shy, I was cripplingly shy. I was paralyzed. I would sit there in the Smithfield Cafe every day, writing in this little notebook about what was going on around me, speculating, do they know my name? And then tearing myself to pieces. Merciless. I felt small and ugly and fake. This went on for a year.

But I really cared. I really cared about those people I knew, those people who barely remember me now. I rarely said a word. I didn't think anything I felt or thought was worth saying out loud.

I wonder where it all came from. I guess I can chalk it up to my loneliness as a girl, feeling different and alienated because I was smart and naive and shy. Nothing really changed when I went to college, except my hormones kicked into high gear. I had a different crush every month, but I dated no one, I got close to no one, I kissed no one until summer's end, and he was just passing through town. When a guy actually did pursue me, I ran as fast as I could in the other direction. It was so much safer to obsess over someone I would never have, or choose a long-distance "boyfriend," than to find out what a real relationship was.

I didn't find myself until I came here. And when I came here, the first thing I found was a punk scene full of genuinely nice people, people who embraced me and smiled at me. Or was it just that I was 21 and had done some growing up by then? Maybe both.

I lived in Olympia for twenty-seven months, and it haunts me to this day.

Tags: olympia, punk

I have issues #1, #2, and #3 of the fanzine "Joe Preston's Legs", produced in 1992 by Justin Trosper, four to six photocopied pages each, no staples. Still in pristine condition, having been stored in a dark dry box for years upon years.

I cracked a couple of them open tonight and was instantly transported back to that singular and unique moment in my life, that summer of 19.

The thing was all tiny crowded type and a bit of handwriting, not ambitious, but very sincere and strange. Loaded from top to bottom with inside info and secret words and what was cool at the time in that place where we lived. But I was not cool at all, not at all.

He was so young and so was I. So it's all forgivable now.

Tags: olympia

It's 42°. Wool coat again today!

It is January 17. Fifteen years ago tonight, I attended my first ever real punk rock show.

Two bands from Portland, two from Olympia. Heavens to Betsy played first, I think we missed part of their set. Singing about having their periods, which to me, was revolutionary. Riot Grrrl had recently been born in our town. Unwound after them, wearing dresses, changing my ears forever, lighting a spark that would turn into a deep and disasterous crush. The Spinanes played next, sounding nothing like the band before them. Crackerbash finished, very loud and chaotic and fun. I sat up on a high ledge with Leilani, looking down at the mass of people below. There was no stage. The audience and bands stood together on the same level. It was the first time I had seen such a thing.

I remember so little about that night, visually. In fact, what stands out most is Justin's yellow dress, though it may not have been yellow, and it may not have even been him.

Tags: music, olympia

Tonight I watched about ten minutes of "Deal or No Deal." Wow. Alec Baldwin was right; it really is just bimbos opening suitcases for an hour.

Then we watched eight minutes of a holiday TV movie directly after the suitcase show. It "starred" John Goodman, whose exhaustion and annoyance did not seem like acting; Chris Kattan, playing the little bitch only too well; Carson Kressley, doing a poor job of doing basically what he did on "Queer Eye,"; Eddie Griffin, whom I once met in a bar; and Delta Burke, who was truly just collecting a paycheck. I think they did the opening credits in Photoshop. It was a cavalcade of b-listers and slumming. Ahhhh.

I had to switch over to Sportscenter at the 8-minute mark. I couldn't bear it anymore. I did some arm lifts with the new weights Brian bought. They are the kind that you strap to your wrists. Two and a half pounds each.

I have been working quite a lot on Part One of me "novel." Feels good to be in the "zone." And use "scare quotes" around words.

But seriously. This one chapter I have been writing is about seduction, specifically in the punk rock world. It is something I am intimately familiar with. Well, was, long ago. In a scene similar (but not quite) to the one I am writing, I once met a boy who was a very prominent (and slutty) figure in the East Bay music scene, and on the night we met, well. He decided that I was going to be his for the night. But the way he did it was so cute and charming and nice. He didn't take advantage of me or anything. But I do think he knew exactly what he was doing. It was fun, and he said something to me that night that was so blunt and yet so casually uttered, that I actually lifted it for use in a completely different part of the book:

"Do you wanna mess around?"

Tags: book, olympia

I am only three pages into Joshua's flyer fanzine and already I am laughing my ass off. I swear he is one of the funniest writers I know. He also has the most airtight memory of anyone I have ever met. It's a fucking gift.

The zine is one of three he gave me when we were up in Oly a couple weeks ago. It's a collection of flyers he's carried around for shows his band played, or shows he put on, or just shows he attended. Mostly taking place around Seattle or Oly, in the mid-late 90s, some from early 00s. Each flyer is accompanied by a story about the show. A sample:

"This was Behead The Prophet's last show. Most of us knew it was going to be... I dubbed it a queer show because everyone either had queer members or at least seemed gay. All who played were excellent that evening. I dressed as Robin Hood and had a little bow and arrow. There was a giant mushroom. Twas whimiscal. The light got knocked out but we sort of finished the song anyway.

"Jeff Biallo got kicked out for cutting people's hair in the pit with a pair of scissors, which as far as I know is a one of a kind activity. After he snuck back in, I accidentally kicked him in the face. Right after that, he had one of the most awesome looks I have ever seen on someone's face, like he had just eaten the biggest piece of shit in the world."

Also:

"A HISTORY OF QUEERCORE, BY JOSHUA PLAGUE
JOURNALIST, GAY

"At first there was no gay person anywhere in the Universe. Then all of a sudden I came along and everything was much better ever since."

Joshua is the raddest.

The other two zines are about taking Greyhound buses and being a chef. If you would like to have these zines or find out more about this amazing person, visit his little web page why not? He spends most of his time doing personal cheffing tours now, so if you enjoy absolutely heavenly gourmet vegan food, hire Joshua!

CONFIDENTIAL TO ALLISON: He is going to be in Milwaukee in mid-October, you seriously need to hook up with him for a dinner. If you don't I will be very sad for you! Let me know if you'd like his email address...

Tags: music, olympia

Last night I unearthed a stack of typed pages that I wrote when I was twenty. They appeared to be, for the most part, journals I kept between May and August of 1993.

I read through them and was astonished at how detailed I was in my recollections of almost every day. It was around the time that I was moving from campus housing to my first real apartment in Olympia, with Joshua P. I was unemployed but looking for work. I was taking road trips, going to and putting on shows, including Rancid's first show outside of California. They stayed at my house and I managed to recount just about every detail and conversation.



My writing seemed so much better back then. But I was practiced, I wrote every day. I devoted a couple hours to it each day probably, mostly done at the Smithfield.

As I read through tales of my adventures, the memories of small details unfolded slowly. It's funny the way these things remain stored there, no matter how tiny. Like the time me and Aaron Cometbus went to the Olympia Brewery to get free beer (I wasn't 21 yet, so I had Pepsi), then snuck off through some side door in the brewery and ended up in this tiny room underneath a gigantic boiler. I took handfuls of stickers I found there, and when we were done exploring, we left and walked all the way back to town, but not before scamming a couple free calls from a pay phone.

I was really quite the criminal back then.

Tags: music, olympia

When we got home, one of the first things I did was get one of my old big boxes down off the shelf in the closet. I wanted to ensure that I did indeed still have my flyer collection. And I do, whew. I have the flyer for my very first punk show, 1/17/92. I have a bunch of Unwound, Jawbreaker, and Screw 32 flyers. I discovered that my band did play with AFI, and that the Gr'ups show I organized was indeed at the Lucky 7 house, not the Central house, and that KARP played as well.

I am going to scan all of these flyers, partially for me and partially for Joshua P.

I dug up a few more photos as well, and of course the prized remains of my zine collection too, which includes Hessian Obsession #1, a large number of Joshua's zines, a bunch of Cometbus issues, and of course every issue of Hex.

It's odd that the Red house is now gray, but is still called the Red house.

Tags: olympia, travel

So yesterday I went to Olympia. I lived there from ages 18-21, and it was fairly life-altering, as those ages inevitably are. I ran into several people I knew back then, and happily they all recognized me, though I look pretty different now. The whole visit made me happy.

Except perhaps for the part where I went to the place where the Smithfield Cafe used to be. It's now a Thai restaurant. The Smithfield was "our" place, the coffee house where all the punk kids would go every. single. day. It was basically our clubhouse, our homebase.

So I went directly there as soon as we got into town, almost as though a magnet was pulling me. And I knew years ago that it had closed down. But I had to go anyway. I just stood in front of it for awhile. I peered in the windows, everything inside is different, I guess all that remains is the shape of the room and the windows, and remnants of seafoam green paint on the outside. I sat there on a metal chair out front, which was supposed to be a wooden bench, and gazed across the street at a view of the buildings across Fourth I had seen a million times before.

And I started crying. The kind of crying that feels good somehow.

Tags: olympia, travel