- been to a casino before, and I'm not convinced I ever need to go back, because I really would rather just throw my money into the river and be done with it, because there's much less caked-on smoke and nasty carpeting on the river.
A list of things on which the $15 I lost would have been better spent:
groceries to make dinner for 6 friends
flowers
a new book
the children's museum donation box
two pounds of coffee
a round of drinks (that's "beverages," John)
dog toys for Leroy
a fancy-pants candle that would help cover up the smoke residue on my clothes
However, I wouldn't trade the trip for anything, because you just have to try new things sometimes. Especially to find out what exactly your parents were reproofing. Or in the name of anthropology and ethnography. And the people-watching - well, what's really to be said about that, other than it was choice. And I developed a 10-minute crush on a dealer named Elvis with jet-black pompadour-esque hair. I'm intimidated by the games involving actual live people so I never even sidled up to his table. Opportunity, like $15, wasted.
It is of note that neither the semi with "Lucky" painted on the side we passed on I-74 nor the s'more slot machine - about which we were quite excited, after having taken s'more fixin's in the car as snacks - were, in fact, good signs for me. John, Mark, and Luci all left ahead, so our group definitely walked out of there a winner.
- had a floor installed. It's really loud - I wasn't expecting that. Lots of banging and some kind of pressurized air hammer thing, I think.
- been referred to as "y'all" in the Midwest.
- noticed quite how noisy those swishy parachute/track pants can be.
I have never:
Luck, be a lady
You grow up 90 miles from some dubious, eyebrow-raising place, and what do you do once you're 30? You head right to it. Luci, John, Mark, and I are going to the riverboat casino in Peoria today after work. This is one of those things that if you told me when I was 17 that I would someday do, I wouldn't have believed you. River fronts, casinos, and Peoria all tend to be a bit seedy, so this should be a triple-whammy of good people-watching. Nickel slots, here I come.
he's good people
It is very important to have a friend whose instincts regarding other people you trust implicitly, even if you can't quite explain why you do so, even if it is never fully described or explained. Unshakeable judgment is a useful resource and you just hope you can keep yourself on the right side of it.
On another note, I am at work at 9:00 on the most beautiful Saturday morning we've had all year after staying out far past my bedtime last night (so late that Mark said "I can't believe you're still here!") - and I got here ahead of the person who requested I be here at this time. I even made coffee and read an article about some new architecture in Japan. All before 8:45!
On another note, I am at work at 9:00 on the most beautiful Saturday morning we've had all year after staying out far past my bedtime last night (so late that Mark said "I can't believe you're still here!") - and I got here ahead of the person who requested I be here at this time. I even made coffee and read an article about some new architecture in Japan. All before 8:45!
demsie of the tape
I miss tapes. Specifically I miss mix tapes and the tapes I used to make of songs off the radio, the latest of which I just found in my car. It's from 1996-7 and captures the end of my senior year in college and my first few months living in Toronto. On it I discovered "Spadina Bus" by the Shuffle Demons, which at first I fast-forwarded over because I didn't identify it from the instrumental intro but then later read the tape cover on which I had thoughtfully, for posterity, listed all of the songs. "Love Fool" is on the tape twice - you know, you couldn't remember if you had taped it, so you taped it again, or on the first take you're pretty sure that the dj talked over it. I can't wait to listen to the rest of it and discover, in 3 minute bits, what I was thinking about during that year, which was quite a big year, actually, leaving home and going abroad and meeting all new people and figuring out grad school and making lovely new friends.
The gift mix tape is of course the ultimate artifact of affection for or education of someone. Remember all of the timing that went into it? Will this all fit on one side? What should lead off the next side? Did I hit record and play at exactly the same time? Mix CDs are nice too but the effort just isn't the same.
The gift mix tape is of course the ultimate artifact of affection for or education of someone. Remember all of the timing that went into it? Will this all fit on one side? What should lead off the next side? Did I hit record and play at exactly the same time? Mix CDs are nice too but the effort just isn't the same.
42 pages in and still feeling about the same
Admission: I re-read the jacket of Olivia Joules and here is what it atually says: "a Jane Bond heroine with a wonderfully overactive imagination" (The Independent on Sunday), "a heroine for the 21st century," and "a sensational new heroine for a new era" (from the cover). So, my fault, I misinterpreted. It doesn't say she's the next Bridget at all - so as usual, it's a question of expectation management and midguided wishful thinking.
But Olivia is going on hold. I got the new David Sedaris and if there's anything to make me jettison Helen Fielding, it's David Sedaris.
But Olivia is going on hold. I got the new David Sedaris and if there's anything to make me jettison Helen Fielding, it's David Sedaris.
none of these are a whole post:
...but nevertheless, here they are.
- Raccoons are good outdoors but not as good when they have chewed a hole in your roof and live in your attic
- Due to birthday reflectivenss, the presence of old friends, and listening to pineapple-juice-and-Malibu-fuelled converations at the Esquire, it has occurred to me that the kindest, most fun, most loving, most joyful - and not to mention most compatible - "involvement" I have ever had with a boy was in my junior year of high school. That isn't right, is it? We're supposed to get better at these things as we get older, but my favorite relationship was almost half a lifetime ago. Does it have to do with knowing yourself? Or knowing other people? Or just plain ol' getting along with someone so, so well?
- I am lucky, oh-so lucky, regarding my friends. All of them. Fabulous. Thoughtful. Kind. Generous. Understanding. Challenging. Fun. Giggly.
- Being honest and professional and kind and absurdity-busting all at the same time is a skill I do not have. Yet.
- Helen Fielding's new novel, Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination, is so not what I expected reading the cover. Latley I have had a hard time finishing any books, very unlike me, and and I had thought this book would break the pattern, but no go. I am not inspired to keep reading. To be fair, I'm not so annoyed I want to put it down forever, either, and I haven't finished the book yet, so there is obviously a lot I don't know. So far the problem is that it has a clumsy mixing of the actual plot of the story and (what seem to me to be) pointless references to recent world tragedies. Based on her other novels, I assume Fielding feels deeply about certain global trends and political issues, such as hunger relief in Africa, which I totally respect. The Bridget books include these positions too but much more gracefully. I'm not going to be encouraged into social justice action by big, clunky jokey points about terrorists hiding out as Miami fashionistas. The cover said the protagonist was Bridget for the new millennium. I have been soooo burned by book jackets saying the work was "the next Bridget," that the characters "were sure to be the new best friends of Bridget," or even "the midwestern Bridget Jones." But I don't think it was unreasonable to expect a Bridget-related comment to be true when the book is by the same author! More thoughts to follow, once I've actually finished it.
- Raccoons are good outdoors but not as good when they have chewed a hole in your roof and live in your attic
- Due to birthday reflectivenss, the presence of old friends, and listening to pineapple-juice-and-Malibu-fuelled converations at the Esquire, it has occurred to me that the kindest, most fun, most loving, most joyful - and not to mention most compatible - "involvement" I have ever had with a boy was in my junior year of high school. That isn't right, is it? We're supposed to get better at these things as we get older, but my favorite relationship was almost half a lifetime ago. Does it have to do with knowing yourself? Or knowing other people? Or just plain ol' getting along with someone so, so well?
- I am lucky, oh-so lucky, regarding my friends. All of them. Fabulous. Thoughtful. Kind. Generous. Understanding. Challenging. Fun. Giggly.
- Being honest and professional and kind and absurdity-busting all at the same time is a skill I do not have. Yet.
- Helen Fielding's new novel, Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination, is so not what I expected reading the cover. Latley I have had a hard time finishing any books, very unlike me, and and I had thought this book would break the pattern, but no go. I am not inspired to keep reading. To be fair, I'm not so annoyed I want to put it down forever, either, and I haven't finished the book yet, so there is obviously a lot I don't know. So far the problem is that it has a clumsy mixing of the actual plot of the story and (what seem to me to be) pointless references to recent world tragedies. Based on her other novels, I assume Fielding feels deeply about certain global trends and political issues, such as hunger relief in Africa, which I totally respect. The Bridget books include these positions too but much more gracefully. I'm not going to be encouraged into social justice action by big, clunky jokey points about terrorists hiding out as Miami fashionistas. The cover said the protagonist was Bridget for the new millennium. I have been soooo burned by book jackets saying the work was "the next Bridget," that the characters "were sure to be the new best friends of Bridget," or even "the midwestern Bridget Jones." But I don't think it was unreasonable to expect a Bridget-related comment to be true when the book is by the same author! More thoughts to follow, once I've actually finished it.
