I brought in some leftover couscous I made last night. Mmmmm.

It's nice to work in a building where I am actually allowed to take the stairs to my floor instead of the elevator.

It's a lovely hazy cool morning today. I watched the sun hovering above Mt Rainier on my way across the sound, drank my coffee, listened to Spoon.

Yesterday my manager sat with me for a bit and told me again how awesome I am. Yaaay.

Being broke for five months completely cured me of my shopping habit. By that I mean shopping for anything I don't really need, like jewelry, handbags, makeup, etc. I totally don't care anymore.

Which comes just in time for us to get keys to our house today. This weekend we will be purchasing Brian's dream television. There's no furniture to place it on yet, but it should be on the way. From IKEA, natch.

Slow news day: CNN is covering a fight at a high school. Yeah. Seriously. Like a prison riot, only with teens! God help this stupid country.

Someone in the newsroom just said, "we don't cover suicides." Ruh roh.

Tags: random

Dinner tonight: jicama/mango/carrot/cucumber salad with ginger dressing; sauteed marinated chicken breasts; leftover white rice.

The Firefox dictionary does not know the word "jicama." Kinda pitiful.

I am into this whole starting dinner around 5:00 thing. Lots more prep time now that I don't have to suffer through rush hour on Muni anymore.

Body pains are still present. I am going back into yoga sauna tomorrow, in the hopes that the high heat will have a soothing effect on my muscles. For now I think I need some Advil.

I think I will need a no internet day or two every week. It's a time waster. And I don't mean no computer -- I do need to be writing, and to listen to music. Just no browser. I also need to be out of my chair and sorting through things.

For the past week I have been inserting the phrase "necessary items" into sentences in a faux New Zealand (ie Murray) accent. But only around Brian. I don't know why that cracked me up so much.

Tomorrow the pink streaks in my hair are going away. It was a fun two months. But they are too high maintenance, so I am having them lifted to blond, which shall be cute, and then sometime this fall if I feel like it I can color them auburn or light brown or whatever I fancy. My hair is really getting long.

Something I read today: "Detail is the life blood of fiction."

Tags: random

I have again been blessed by random flickr.

Look at this photoset of black and white portraits and candids taken at an English school in the late seventies. So beautiful. Would that kids still dressed so innocently, were still so un-self-conscious in their appearance. And yes, I do realize that they are probably wearing uniforms, but I still get that low-maintenance feel from the photos.

This is the best picture, obviously.



And then, same photographer, four years later:

mods, punks, something

amazing girl

Thatcher's London, 1981

ilu, flickr

Tags: flickr, random

There is a coffee shop near the ballpark called Philz. They serve Turkish coffee and each cup is prepared and pressed to order. The menu lists a variety of roasts, from light to dark, and no matter what you order, it's always rich and strong and flavorful. Addictive. At $2.75 for a small, it's not something I would do every day. But it does make for a nice coffee break with Brian, and also gets me extraordinarily high.

I was looking at this book this weekend at Anthropologie (who by the way want $30 for it while Amazon is only charging $19; I knew that place was a rip-off) and suddenly saw the end of my novel. Writing is very weird like that. It will take place in a quiet little garden, in a backyard, and involve someone planting a row of tulip bulbs. Which you do in the fall, right? I once brought tulip bulbs home with me from the Netherlands and tried to get them to grow in a wooden box on my fire escape. It didn't work out too well.

Another random anecdote: Brian and I met up for coffee together on Monday and as we waited for the train home afterward, I noticed that the woman standing nearby was holding a big framed print of Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth. I have always loved that painting. A lot. Could be partially to do with the fact that my parents had a copy hanging on the wall in our house when I was a kid. I always just loved the feelings of longing it evoked.

The woman said that some guy around the corner was selling a bunch of framed prints, but once I saw that she had snagged that one, the one I really would have wanted, I knew there was no point in checking it out.

This coffee is strong, man.

Tags: book, links, random

+ weekend was good, though mostly cold and overcast throughout. Yesterday I did some major cleaning, throwing out of junk, and redecorating.

+ I did a ton of writing, too. Mainly revisions, but a bit of new stuff also.

+ the Giants are playing like crap, are too streaky, and will finish at .500 and in 4th place. Lame.

+ I am going to try to get an appt to get my hair cut this week, as well as colored. I haven't had any non-natural color in my hair in many years. I was never too successful getting pink to stay in my hair, but I always did it myself. My hairstylist specializes in bright colors, so she should be able to make it look awesome. woo!

+ this new mascara I am using is the bomb.

+ my brother's birthday was yesterday. we had a good conversation and he is doing very well in his new job in Myrtle Beach. So happy for him! Hopefully we will get to see eachother in Sept.

+ I bought some new drinking glasses.

+ my new favorite flickr photostream.

Tags: baseball, book, flickr, links, random

I have been writing a lot about kissing lately, so having random flickr lead me to a picture like this is super great.



It slides right up to the brink of cheesy but doesn't cross the line...

Today is a typical summery day in San Francisco: cold and foggy. We went out for breakfast at the underwhelming Howard's on 9th street, and now I am sitting here having finished my laundry, and trying to work on some revisions. wheeeee.

Tags: book, flickr, kiss, random

Tags: flickr, random