i can never find my metro cards...even in my dreams.

this is going to sound very incoherent because i just woke up and i'm actually typing with my eyes closed because the screen is so bright. but i had another one of those 'wtf!' dreams with people who i haven't talked to in quite some time. or at all.

so, i'm attending some conference in dc. i'm on the metro with some other conference-goers, and i'm trying to get back to columbia heights. i'm looking out the window and talking out the time, but unbeknown to me, the columbia heights stop is all of a sudden above ground and i don't recognize it. instead, i end up taking the same train for about 3 hours, and end up in montmartre (!!!). it's beautiful. like something straight out of a movie...but the city looks like it just passed industrial age...everything looks so steampunk. the eiffel tower is in the background, and there are so many bridges (a la amsterdam)...and even the sun is setting. and i swear to you, there are newspaper boys wearing berets.

i haven't gotten off the metro yet, but it seems like montmartre runs forever. i find one of my conference goer friends on the train. and he is actually someone i met at a conference in honolulu and with whom i wish i had actually exchanged contact info. (real life note: all i remember about him is he worked in cleveland...i think as some kind of academic counselor. and he had his layover in denver. and he had glasses. he was pretty nice though. and i had all these work related questions for him...anyyyyyways.) but there he is, he tells me that i can just get off at the next station and take the train back to dc, and i kinda get pissed because obviously, that would have crossed my mind...undoing the last action and all. i say goodbye to montmartre, get off the train to get on the platform to get back to columbia heights. by myself.

only, as soon as i get off, i scream 'waait!!!' and i see the honolulu-conference-dude look sadly back at me from the last metro window. in my haste, i had forgotten my stupid metro card on my seat. i stand on the platform, shuffling through my cards: driver's license, student ID, and insurance card. no sign of my credit card in my wallet...but in an extra dose of reality, i reach into my jeans pocket and there it is...enveloped with a michaels' crushed coupon shield for 40% off of any regular item. i quickly buy a new smart trip, which looks like a regular metro ticket...well regular, plus the alterations bryan used to make to them. and i get on the train and fall asleep.

and end up. in. hawaii. so i wake up and am so confused on how i even get from france to hawaii, but it's no big deal. the train is passing over rickety bridges with skeletons scattered in the tropical waters, and with my 'well, i guess i'm asian, i can answer' omniscience, i start answering metro riders' questions about why there are dead bodies in the shallow pools. i tell them that these are no ordinary bodies..these are tainted bodies. and you can't go outside after a certain time around this part of hawaii. if you touch them, they'll remember (through osmosis, of course) what it was like to be human and envy you for it...envy you for your memories. and they'll find you. and this is why no one wanted to touch them. they are in awe. and very scared. the sun has almost set, and this is when zombie/skeleton armies wake up and try and remember.

then, i realize, i have nowhere to stay. i get off at the next stop, which seems to be slightly touristy, and stay at the nearest inn, which thankfully and predictably has a gift shop. the inn locks and puts up bars on their windows (i help a little), and i wander into the gift shop, which is about the size of my room. the shop/inn ladies are very friendly and laugh when they see me dropping 2 lb bags of macadamia nuts into a basket. 'it's 7 dollars for a sixteenth of this back home,' i say. they ask about dc and what other prices are around there. we're having a pretty long conversation, and i haven't stopped piling 2 lbers into my basket. then, in a stroke of weird, one of the shopkeepers who is stocking more macadamia nuts and chocolates on the shelves asks me about my dad and how the family is. i don't recognize the woman but she asks all about our family. i update her...with real information. my dad recently was reunited with his sister...whom he hadn't seen in 20 years. jeanie is married now and lives in dallas. etc. etc. it was just very strange that i was giving this woman all this information and didn't recognize her.

well, until she turned around. not completely....just enough so see a partial profile. it was my father's mom. whom i had never met before she passed away when i was little. whose voice and hands, i obviously wouldn't remember. but i never acknowledged that in my dream. i just smiled. she never aged from my mental picture of her. she was in her 40s, with a bun in her hair. she has very smooth hands...unlike most old folks. she is very kind, and i don't mind filling her in on what everyone has been up to. it's very strange. i feel like i should feel weird about this part, but i don't.

i and told the shopkeepers i would need to buy a plane ticket back to dc. and i fretted about how the hell i was going to stay asleep on the plane since i forgot my ipod. after purchasing bags of coconuts, i went back to my hotel room and snuggled in my bed to sleep. and when i finally dozed off, i woke up.

and wanted to type this all out before i forgot. so, here i am.

weird, eh?

sir, it's only a tomato

i recently decided to repurchase (for the third time) my favorite shins' album "chutes too narrow." and inevitably, as i listen to it and jam out, a story comes to mind.

it was end of the spring semester, and andrew had come to pick me up with his little neon. for some reason, we both thought that there was no way in hell i had a lot of stuff. but there it was. a pile of random crap that i had accrued throughout the year: cans of peaches, several buckets filled with pens, post-it notes, a lamp that should have gotten recalled, a duffel bag, a mini fridge, hawaiian print sheets, a giant polar bear, several tumblers, several semesters worth of books, sketchbooks, and alcohol that hadn't been opened. there was also a decent rug that was left on the corner venable and high st. right across from the weird guy who was stabbed my first year at longwood. you know, the guy who waved to us. anyways, we grumbled, fought, and managed to shove all of my belongings into his neon. the polar bear ended up riding up front with me. along with one of the buckets with assorted trash.

we stopped somewhere in orange...this amazingly cramped and sweet town. sweet looking, i should say. i had a sandwich with tomatoes. andrew had something else. i was happy. estatic. i was getting the hell out of the south. staying with people i cared about. yadda, yadda, yadda. andrew was driving like a fucking maniac. and i got really sick. so sick i made him pull the boat over so i could puke out tomatoes. and everything else that was in that sandwich.

it should be noted here that andrew does not deal with vomit or vomiters. so instead of holding my hair back or rubbing my back or do whatever it is that people are supposed to do, he looked away and covered his nose.

as i had my head hanging out the car door, i looked to the right and saw flashing cop lights and a cop with a flashlight walking towards me (it should also be noted that i have a very uneasy relationship with the police and any kind of law enforcement...even if one of my good friends is a cop.) he, of course, starts pointing that damn flashlight in my face and in andrew's face. asks if we've been drinking, yadda yadda. and then. he goes for it, he takes a whiff of my vomit - doesn't smell anything but tomatoes. and lets us go on our way. and we do. we head home and go do something we weren't supposed to do. but i felt weird, even now i feel weird about the entire thing.

this experience was a) the first time i'd been pulled over and not actually done anything wrong and b) when i developed car motion sickness. since then, it seems i'm pulled over (or the person i'm with)...(or the person who is with me) is pulled over or taken aside on an annual/biannual basis.

and this is the memory that first pops into my head when i put on the shins.

i love interviews that end in strewn expletives.

nate silver's interview with john ziegler

did i mention i have a secret (not-so-secret now) crush on nate silver?

who does this?

the best thing about halloween is what happens to all that delicious, fattening, coma inducing candy the day afterwards...

75% off!

so, i made my usual round to the usual suspects to pick up some reese's peanut butter cups to throw in the freezer. i ended up walking through aisles filled with inedible crap and those orange and black Mary Jane candies*. but i was about to leave when i saw this woman waving around a box of summer's eve**. i had to take a double take because i didn't think that douche was actually a sought after product (especially since all the vagina doctors tell you NOT to use it)....but there was something kinda amusing about a woman walking hand in hand with her husband...and in the other hand...douche.

i can't even imagine that conversation.

woman - hold on, babe, i have to pick up some summer's eve.
man - good thing because your jank is not fresh at all.
woman - that's messed up! if you're going to be like that, i'm going to wave it like this...so as to embarrass the hell out of you.
man - spot on, wife, spot on.

sigh.
ahhhhh...hehe.

i'll definitely be including this in a comic strip soon.

- c

*you know, the gross peanut butter ones that people hand out if they hate children.
** DOUCHE.