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| 04302003 | |
| Dinner went fairly well, which is about the best you can hope for when I'm in the kitchen. Didn't notice that the pan lid over the paella had a few steam-holes, screwing up the rice, but luckily I caught it before it was too late and managed to salvage the dish. The broth I used to cook the rice in was all fat-free vegtarian foolishness so it lacked a spot of flavor, too - but, excuses, excuses, we ate it and schnooz' and I can't see a Tuesday night much better than that. |
| Sup, nigga? Not much - just holding down the desk before my day off. Planning a meal to make E. tonight for a night schnoozlin' and watching Buffy (I know, I know - but I like it!) Trying to curb my time-wasting nature in a fool's dream of actually getting shit done here at the office - we'll see how it goes. Now it's off to the recipe books. |
| Monday monday, didn't get too much sleep last night for a variety of reasons so it was a hard haul to navigate the fifteen feet from my bed to the front door and hence to work. But made it I did, another day when I'd love to move my desk to the roof and take deliveries from pigeons. Since that doesn't look to be in the business plan, I'm watch-checking obsessively until the dinner bell rings, at which point I'm a jet to the fancy beer store and go home to wash dishes. |
| Sunday church bells rouse E. and me from our stupor-slumber, kept up later than expected by a boomin' shitstain 50 Cent party from the neighbors downstairs. hated to call in a noise complaint but it was 3am and kept gettin' louder. They didn't even invite us! So the cops show and settle them down and we slumber - the next morning we notice that they threw out their futon frame, halogen lamp and bushel of twigs painted blue home decoration system. |
| Rain falls, keeping me housebound for most of the daylight hours, but the storm lifts in time for Kaiju, and the Unholy Three are in full effect on the floor. After an hour and change of monster mayhem, we hit the streets as Ryan decided to cock-block Grimes to infinity, at one point actually punching him in the nuts before macking all over up and under on his ladyfriend. Things came to an explosive head at HoJos amidst whiskey, ice cubes down her shirt and our hapless black waitress bringing us mozarella sticks and fried ravioli. Who's the moster now? I THINK IT'S US, THE HUMANS, IN AN IRONIC TWIST! |
| Roommate goes to the Guggenheim for his third dose of the Matthew Barney only to discover that, because it's freaky free-day Friday, a posse of sixty-plus Juggalos descended upon the rotunda to wreak idiot havoc, planting messy whiteface handprints across the sculptures. Security freaked out, justifiably, but somehow I guess listening to the worst music on earth makes you too stupid to comprehend basic human behavioral principles and they kept it up until they got bored. Not to rail against "the kids," but Christ. |
| You're my car alarm, I wake up to you and burrow into your back, kissing the space between your shoulder blades, you're my Red Bull, you're my radio station that only plays the hits. You're my laundry right out of the dryer, warm and enfolding, my new bottle of whiskey, the bell on my bicycle. You're feeling self-conscious about reading this but reading it to the end anyways. You're my best traveling companion, my best sparring partner, my best partner in crime. You're that one perfect second, you are. |
| Allegedly I should have had the day off, but conspiring forces placed me in the office frantically assembling the stupid fucking documents I've been laboring under for weeks. After five hours and a terrible amount of change and whining, I'm done and staggerstep home. The last kick in the dick - I finally escape, take the subway home and I'm at my doorstep when I realize I left my keys at work, fucking work. Commute back and forth again and collapse into bed, fuckshit cursing the sun down. |
| Weather's cold and moist again, and I'm noticing a disturbing trend in my knees as the humidity rises. All these years of hard living on tha streetz has taken its toll on certain parts of my anatomy, most notably my joints. I walk a lot, run a lot, and kick a lot, and all of that jarring has loosened my tendons to the point where they pop like rubberbands being shot into the ceiling. It's getting a little worrisome, honestly, but then the weather warms up and it stops and I forget all about it. |
| Back to work, the sun shining through the bay windows of the office loft just to taunt me. I've already used up all of my reasonable excuses to steal a minute's sunlight, and now I'm down to the really ludicrous ones - heard an orphanage burning down, forgot my pacemaker at home, kittens in the ductwork, &c &c. I guess I'm just gonna have to wait out the day to steal the last vestiges of summerlight before the sun goes down on SoHo. Or quit my job, whichever seems easiest. |
| Recuperating from the Barney exhibition, I spend the day circumnavigating Astoria again, getting a little lost around Long Island City where the convicts from Riker's Island get let loose at the end of their stretches. The sun was shining too bright for me to buy any crack rocks or prison wine so I just galumphed back home and drew the night away, bound up in easter grass and tamago sushi for the occasion. |
| Spent literally all Goddamned day at the Guggenheim taking in the utterly mind-blowing exhibition of Matthew Barney's Cremaster Cycle. Five and a half hours inside the museum, accidentally stepping in the troughs of petroleum jelly that lined the walls, jigsawing together obtuse Masonic symbology and then jetting outside for a slice of pecan pie. I'm no hard-core art fag but I know what I like fag, and this is squarely and solidly in the realm of "it." So ov'rwhelmed I went home and slept for 12 solid hours. |
| Having some quality motivated time today, kicking out as many jams as possible during my nine-to-five in order to be able to let off a teakettle of steam o'er the weekend. News from Califorinia - I've got a new cousin in the hopper, all pink and babylike, courtesy my uncle Bruce, wandering librarian and general inspiration. It's a good time to be born, methinks - open your eyes to the trees blossoming. |
| Back to work, the weather's back to gray and chilly, but whatever - I've got a weekend coming in a step or two, I can last it out. Not much going on at the moment - splitting work to write a few new songs with Leela based on delerious hot-weather thoughts. Got my gitaroo strapped to my back, my mini-Marshall clipped to my waist, and I'm ready to release the rock into a world not it's own. And then I think I'll take a nap. |
| It's getting hot out here - as I'm speeding around the city a little sweat starts to form on my brow, even. This Spring has been a see-saw of meteorological tomfoolery - we'll get a day or three of utter gorgeous sunshine followed by a day of snow with no explanation. Today was thankfully in Column A, as the mercury hit the seventies and I took off my Goddamned shirt for the whole world to see. |
| Got a huge package of videos in the mail as raw material for Evil Video 3 (coming July 2003), so alas I may be spending some of these beautiful warm nights a'front the CRT logging tape. I do it all for you, my friends, taking in debauchery magnetically encoded to bring you the absolute best of the dissolute worst. And as mine eyes melt and peel like a Nazi opening the Ark of the Covenant, think of me. |
| Back to work, it's always tougher when the sun is shining so bright outside. The day's almost closed out as I write these words, though, so I'll be free to tear through the streets unfettered and unglued once more. I love the sun - late last year, somebody suggested that I may have a spot of the Seasonal Affected Disorder. I pshaw'd them off - wouldn't you? - but I'm starting to think there's a kernel of truth in there. I photosynthesize - turn carbon monoxide into something for breathing? |
| Well, Spring happened again - hopefully this time for more than two and a half days. Spent the day finally taking a full geographic survey of my new neighborhood, beating the borders with birch branches to keep the ghosts at bay. Found out where certain vital amenities (bubble tea, Cuban sandwiches, multiplex, Salvation Army) were located for future visitations. Walked the soles off of my shoes, got them resoled and walked home to an evening with the General and a general feeling of contentment. |
| GodDAMN am I in a pretty awesome rock & roll band. After a month of missed connections, we finally reconvened in the tiniest, stankiest room at Funkadelic and kicked out the jams like we were Bruce Lee and the jams were some dudes in white pajamas who worked for a ninja. We now officially have too many songs to plow through in one practice so the next step is to put together a preliminary set list and try to replicate the "live experience" without breaking any fingers. And then, finally, we'll be able to play a song for you. |
| Weekend's here, and while I'm not traveling or travailing, it's still fat-packed with fun. Tonight there's an art opening and two parties demanding my presence, tomorrow the first band practice since the war started and my thumb got all disjointed, and Sunday still a wide-open mystery, depending on what the weather decides to bring along (currently it's piss-ass rain and gloomy lameness). Maybe I'll sleep in, and maybe I won't sleep at all. |
| Stressing like ranch dressing over a bindle of work-related night terrors - half-remembered overdue bills coming back to haunt me and missing files all over the office. It's like an anxiety dream crossed with My New Filing Technique and it's ripping my poor ulcerated guts a new asshole. I've written "Keep Calm" in big letters on my to-do list, but it's surrounded by a couple million other things to do so I'm not sure if I'll get to it on time. |
| ... |
| Recovering slowly - lots of hot tea and cold sleep got me a little more able to face the day, plus the prospect of an evening in with an astounding cutecake has me motivated, stretching my tender joints on the train ride in and popping the Rice Krispies in my back. I'm still in a lot of pain, though, popping Advil like Skittles, but I have faith that I'll purge the sickness before the week's done through. |
| Well, this ain't good - I'm out of sicktime so had to drag my ass, swaddled in more layers than a Napoleon, into the office for a solid eight of keyboard pounding. All of my old injuries are acting up due to the cold (it's snowing outside, again) and the sick, so I'm hunched, wracked, pale and cranky, drinking cups and cups of herbal Chinese remedies and plagued by invisible torments. I want, desperately, to go home now, but I don't see that coming for a bit. Lord, give me strength. And an electric blanket. |
| Couldn't dodge the SARS forever - I'm officially sick. All this running around and traveling and advetures have beaten me down to the point where I can no longer fight off infection, and I'm laid up in bed with aching joints, phlegmatic throat and general disgustingness most of today. I rouse myself to run the few errands that desperately need doing but after three hours out I have to retreat again, sheets wrapped around my head as I switch between chills and sweats all night long. |
| Out to Jersey for the Enk's farewell - together with the UGO boys for our quarterly dork-out. It's weird that it's been over two years since we all worked together but whenever more than two of us get in the same room it's business as usual - the dick jokes, nerd references and assorted nose-snorting geekery flying fast as bullets. Find me another peer group where the phrase "Wes Craven's New Zapped" will yeild so much amusement and I'll call you a happy peer. Ate some quality Jersey pizza, watched some Takashi Miike lunacy and let the sun go down. |
| I've finally arrived - Red Eye, Black Eye just recieved its first negative review from the Comics Journal. A passage from the review, in issue #251: "Jensen, wallowing in his privileged-class angst and suitably bummed out, responsibly hits the road, via a Greyhound Ameripass, to visit a string of friends and acquaintances across the country. (No hitchhiking or squatting for this Dharma Bum! Are you kidding??? That's really dangerous! No sirree, this "hobo" is gonna couch surf across america.)" AWESOME! |
| Back to the grizzly grind after a day off, relaxed and refreshed to find the workplace mysteriously decimated by an early Spring plague. I'm practically alone in the office, calls coming in through miles of phlegm and 105-degree fevers, but I feel fine - a little green crud coming out when I blow my nose, but otherwise unscathed. Sometimes I really get lucky and dodge the bacterial bullet - but they all get to stay home today while I'm at work, so how lucky is that really? |
| After a night's rest I'm back to fighting strength, and it looks like I'm gonna need it, as this week is chock full of duty to be done. I've got a ton of comics to draw by the end of the month - my 12 in 12 resolution is getting a little tougher to maintain as I've exhausted a bunch of my leads. Current count: five anthologies submitted to and accepted, two on the drawing board, one I'm editing, that's a total of eight and it's already April. On schedule, but still a little antsy about making it all happen. |
| E. and I went to an amazing pizza joint last night, run by an ancient Italian man painstakingly assembling everything in front of our eager eyes. It's not often that I treat myself to a slice - my cranky complexion often rewards that kind of indulgence with a riot of face-terror, but this time I couldn't resist. Great huge pools of mozzarella melting as I finally succumb to the need to sleep, face first into her pillow barely after the sun goes down. |
MARCH
all content (c) 2003 k. thor jensen