Night moppin'

This kind establishment has holed me up for the moment. In the grips of my insomnia.

The "night guy" is overly nice seeing as there's only one other person in the place, one who assuredly works here and is staying perhaps to oversee changing of the guards -? Night guy has buddy holly-ish glasses and points out the milky pieces in the brew he has just poured me, but I wave it away and tell him I'll let him know if it bothers me. He asks me what I'm working on. What am I working on? This answer is difficult, more difficult than it needs to be, and I immediately feel awkward and useless. He points me to the long, windowless back room to save me from his mopping of the main coffee-partaking area.

It's comical to be sitting in such a cabin-like setting at 5am when I haven't made the trek outside of the city and when punk music blares through the speakers. So much wood. Murals of beavers and deer and logs. Didn't I like this theme when I first patronized this place? I can't remember. I left the confines of my fluorescent-lit kitchen of debauchery (someone else's debauchery, from the 80s, no doubt) only to sit here in the overly-lit fluorescent bomb shelter of a space. Sigh.

Having a dog really fucks up my life. As if my thinking-innards weren't already spiraling down an antisocial, existential pee hole already, now whenever I am anywhere besides my home, I think, I could be cuddling with dog right now. Wet motherfucking snoopy nose action lying on my thigh, glassy, uber sweet essence of life dopey eyes staring back at me with love and a twinge of need. Granted, most people find that gaze in drugs, alcohol, and desperate sloshed suitors at bars and the like. But still.

Lunch yesterday

I just have to write about my lunch yesterday. Maybe I was there on a "bad day" because my lobster roll didn't look half as good as any pics I've seen on yelp and was THIRTEEN buckers. It was cold, bland, and on an untoasted boring bun. It came with no sides. Here are the details:

Went out for a coworker's birthday to this new site for food trucks. There were, however, only two offerings available: The Seedling truck and Dock n Roll.

I've had a salad at the Seedling truck when it was over at the east side farmer's market and it was okay. My s.o. had the quail from them and said it was just okay as well. So, my coworker, who was nice enough to drive me over, and I decided to splurge on the Main Event sandwich from Dock N Roll.

The line was long, in direct 100 degree sun, but the guy at the window was nice enough. I asked for my sandwich to go and it came in a basket just like everyone else's. I thought, "I probably won't eat all of my sandwich this afternoon!" --> WRONG.

I get that lobster is more expensive than, say chicken. Particularly in Central Texas. BUT we are already paying $13!! For that we get a tiny sub bun about half the size of my cowrkers' buns (lol) who got pork and chicken sandwiches. Also, the pork (Vietnamese) sandwich had all sorts of lovely slaw on top. My lobster roll? NOTHING. Just cold lobster salad on a non-toasted blah bun. And lemon and mayo? I see you not, I taste you not. AT ALL.

To add insult to injury, my coworker got the Lobster mac 'n' cheese and paid $3 extra (or 2.50? not sure) for bacon, corn, and tater tots. I personally am not into that whole catastrophe but if you want that nonsense, you should get it! There were no signs of tater tots, truly, and a tiny bit of bacon and a few kernels of corn. When people don't want to finish mac 'n' cheese, you know it's not great.

She went up and said she didn't see any tots on the mac and the man just stared at her. Rude! So my other coworker went up and asked about it only to be *assured* (he said rudely) by the cook that the tots were BLENDED into the mac. Blended? Wtf? I could understand if the taters were sort of crushed up and crispy and sprinkled in, but blended, really? Why anyone would blend potatoes into the non-visible netherworld is beyond me. Buffing up on calories, perhaps? The coworker in question said as we were exiting the truck area "that's how I get the kids to eat their veggies, by blending it in other foods." My thoughts exactly.

Not cool. And kinda rude.

I don't have pics cuz it's weird to take pics of your coworkers food, so here's one from yelp.

Gay Paree

I am very excited to be going to Paris and Amsterdam in November.

I studied in the South of France during college and traveled to Paris to get there. My recollection of my day in Paris was running into my first Parisian on the street - a haute couture type of guy. Svelt, well-dressed, and kind of smily when he realized I was a lost and displaced young American. I think he gave me directions.

Also, I remember being totally overwhelmed at the Louvre (despite having been to many big international museums and later in life working at the Guggenheim). There was just too much to see. I remember stopping for a beverage at the cafe inside the museum (probably an Orangina; I was a bit Orangina obsessed that summer) and people watching. And calling my mother from a payphone I could barely operate. But then, I've called my mother from various payphones, both sketchy and funky, at various locales at various points in my life (9/11 being a memorable one; I called her from a payphone down the hall in a roach infested efficiency weekly "hotel" I was living in in San Francisco...it will be weird not calling her anymore, but she's in my heart always).

Right after I left the Louvre, the new "chic" shoes I bought for the trip quickly disintegrating, leaving my feet actually BLEEDING. So my biggest memory of Paris is eschewing blood on its sidewalks. Good times.

More to come...

Why are there so many awful people?

I'm not talking about your violent, hateful, ghastly offenders. (That's another rant)

I'm talking about your everyday, go-about-their-business, snooty, self-absorbed, vitriolic, nitpicky, smarmy types.
I know there are a lot of people on the planet, but does that give one person the right to shoot venom at every person they deem "invaluable"? Aren't we all mortal, singular souls who are at the very least supposed to be getting along if not unifying on some level?

No, this isn't one person or one incident I'm referring to. It's worse. It's thousands of tiny incidents I see every day.

I'm not claiming to be without reproof. I am far from perfect.

But at what point can we all claim our humanity and treat each other with kindness? Our "social norms" are separating us more and more.

love

Happy Birthday, Mom. I miss you.

Learning a new word today

I had not heard this before (or if I did, I didn't know what it referred to):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cisgender

Cisgender From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cisgender and cissexual describe related types of gender identity where an individual's self-perception of their gender matches the sex they were assigned at birth.[1] Kristen Schilt and Laurel Westbrook define cisgender as a label for "individuals who have a match between the gender they were assigned at birth, their bodies, and their personal identity," complementing transgender.[