I'm back in Georgia. I've been here 3 days. It's pretty much the same. My Daddy got rid of the dog that bit me and got himself a new red coon dog. I like this dog better. There is a new cat that comes up onto the porch at night. He's a solid black tomcat that my niece named Pudding. I'm trying to get my bearings. All the moving around in the past 3 months has gotten me a little mixed up.
My last night in Portland I drank half a bottle of Stolis and went to "the bitter" where two of the boys I'd met gave one last attempt to fuck me. One of them was a total creep. The other was a sweet little boy who I just may have given the chance if I hadn't been so drunk. I ended up leaving the bar alone and walking to the store to get smokes. Once I left the store I started sobbing, loudly, all the way home. It's was weird. I've never walked down the street weeping so loudly.
I was worried about leaving Courtney there so far from her family with all these drunken losers, not that there is anything wrong with drunkenness. It's the loser part that bothers me. My Granny always had a couple sayings. One was "You are who you hang around with" and another was "Always be aware of your surroundings." My Mawmaw has a saying "A whistling woman and a cackling hen both come to no good in the end." I can't forget.
Now I'm here in the office, slowly trying to get my shit together. I went out a took a few photos. I'm sure more will come later. There are a few great things about being here, like the use of my Mama's digital camera and the sunny blue sky. It's also good to have food again. I lost 10 lbs in Portland. Granted I still weigh 128 lbs and my
Mama teases me saying she never weighed so much when she was single but I tell her I'd rather be a little fat and eat the foods I like than be skinny and deprived. Then my Dad chimes in telling me I'm going to be diabetic if I don't watch it.

I used to date this guy who had a scar on his thigh, right beside his genitals. He'd had the scar since childhood and didn't know where it came from but he was to embarrassed to ask his parents. What if he was lying to me. Maybe he was a hermaphrodite at birth (he is kind of pretty). Maybe he was burned badly and had skin from his thigh removed to his arms, maybe he had an accident on a pogo stick. I'd die of curiosity if I had a mystery scar in such an intimate space.

I've been reading Kathy Acker. She's seems to be a lunatic writer but at least she understands the dilemma of being a woman who wants to get what she wants.

oh my god! I hate PCs.
A woman gave me a free small latte with a double shot of espresso and an oatmeal cookie. That made me feel better than anything else all night/day. I mean the 4 dollars is kind of meaningless. It was just a sweet thing for a stranger to do.

I'm annoyed with courtney because she always goes out with these people who work at the bitter end pub but doesn't invite me along because the "after hours" places are for special people and in their eyes I'm not. When I was 8 years old I played softball. After a game one day I went to the pizza place with my Mama. There was my whole team celebrating the birthday of one of my teammates, Melissa. She was teribbly embarassed to see me there and came up and said her Mama would only let her invite so many people. Suprisingly enough Courtney and Melissa were friends. What is it with cliques? I'm 25 years old for christ's sake and totally wealthy in cultural capital but these bitter barflies sure don't give a shit. It hurts to be excluded but makes my parent's couch look that much better. What I really want is to go back to New York state where "after hours" is neverever at 2 in the morning. (WIKIPEDIA - last call) but hey in Neveda there is no closing time Berlin to for that matter.

I have a bizzarre sleeping pattern. I woke up at 1 am last night and have been awake since. I went to buy a pack of smokes, called Courtney a million times and she didn't answer. Which was unfortunate because that meant I was locked out. I went to "the bitter" around 1:50 and they had already locked the doors. I saw a bunch of Courtney's bar friends and got them to open the door and one of them said Courtney was with Rose(a young blonde bartender with a harsh mouth and sullen demeanor) so the guy called Rose and she amazingly enough answered her phone. She said something bitchy that I didn't hear but could see on the guys face. Then he hung up told me where they were and said Courteny would call me.

I started waking downtown toward the strip club where "after hours" is held. Courtney called and said that she would leave the keys with the bouncer. I told her I'd appriciate that and hung up. Then she called back and said she'd come out. I walked down one street too far and there were all these bums around. One man started walking with me but stopped after I told him where I was going. One woman asked for some money after I told her good evening.

Then I passed by a fierce looking woman with GIANT saggy boobs. She was standing by a man. As is customary with me I glanced in her eyes as I passed by. I realized I'd walked to far and turned around. Then boobs woman started talking shit to me about how I was after her man. She threaned to punch me. I walked away and she walked behind me (to close) telling me to wait. I've been mugged before and I knew this woman was the same kind of crazy. I started running and screaming "leave me alone you crazy bitch." She laughed at me but didn't follow (like her fat ass could have caught up with me.) Then the woman I passed eairlerr asked if boobs was going on about her man again and said "come here honey" but I kept walking.

I found the place and there were two people who I'd just seen 15 minutes eairler at "the bitter." thanks for the ride assholes! Some singer named Risky was there. I'd met him before and I liked him but I was in a freaked out pissed off mood by then so his "calm down everything is great" bullshit only served to make me more annoyed. Although i tried to mask it. Courtney came out and gave me the keys, acting all lovely wanting a kiss but I've got to tell ya. all I could think about how gracious Anna Lavatelli seems compared with Courtney. It's not fair to compare subjective beings but I can't help it sometimes. So I walked to Roxy's diner glowering and feeling sorry for my lonely self.

Then at the diner some guy came up to me and told me "you've got great hair" and asked where I get it done. He told me to come sit with him if I wanted to have a converrsation. I was in a pissy mood and told him I needed to think about things. I played the addams family theme song and thought about how i miss Dr. Know. Then I went back to the apartemnt and started watching a shitty movie. Courtney showed up with Adam, the 22 yr old barback from "the bitter" in tow.

They sat there and played chess untill 6 in the morning. Adam is a mumbler. His voice reminds me of Keith Hesson but he does not have any of Keith's necked dance party charisma. There will be no tricking Harrington into sniffing Adam's necked balls.

On a happier note. Last week Arzu sent me a picture from a year or so ago. It's me, her, Tony and Joe Gibbon's at the Lenox Hotel painting with gun powder.

i read a book last night titled Lizard Club. It was about a homosaurian that had a problem with eating the boys he made love to. i was sucked in by the name dropping on the back cover, John Waters and Kenneth Anger are idols of mine. I'm not sure why I love gay men but i do, both friends and celebrities. I love them, god no, not all gay men but their stats average out higher than straight guys on my scale of love and admiration.

I've got a ticket to fly this Friday. please dear god don't let me be stuck in Georgia forever! my entire family lives there. my sister lives with my parents. my brother built his house practically in their back yard. lots of family. mawmaw lives a 5 minute walk down the road. a little ways on out you'll find various aunts, uncles, cousins, second cousins and so on. we are a tribal people in northwest Georgia.

wow. I'm excited to enjoy my last few days of freedom before bitter reality sets in through day in and day out parental bitching. i'm too old for that shit. Liz and Arzu tried to get me out of it but there are some things in this life people gotta face. i wish I had a horse and I'd ride off into the bathwater.

this Saturday is big D's birthday. shit, some yuppie bitch is walking around on her cellphone. i'm in a coffee shop/retail store. i read that aloud as i typed it and she left, hahaha.
so big-D's birthday.

When I was 14 I used to sneak out of my house at 1 in the morning to hang around with big D, Slim and Beeker. I'd drink wine coolers and later the beast. Sometimes we would go to the super wal-mart and be followed around by the employees. no pano's in Adairsville. i wonder if I've written about the cow suit story on this journal. I'm sure I must have. I'll look it up.... ah hell, i can't find anything but i'll tell you it has to do with a stuck Monte Carlo and a spirit walker who was this redneck who must have been on PCP.

I'm feeling better. I can't wait to see my Mawmaw, surely you can tell by my user pic what a sweetie she is. I told her I had the luck of the Irish because I always find four-leave clovers and not to worry about me. she told me yeah, her Mama always said we were black Irish. I told that to Courtney and Courtney said the Irish were called that because they fled from the Black Famine to the States but I like to think of it in Hakim Bey terms and imagiane that I have some distant ancestors who were all about Islam on that fucked up green lil island.

Yawl go to church this mornin'?

Everything sucks. I want to be at that god damn house warming party sooooooooooooo bad although I'm skeptical if people could hang with a nocturnal one like myself. Last stripper party I went to one of my favorites was incapacitated on the stairwell by the time I arrived.

Lord knows I ain't made any friends in this city. I almost did one night. The night I got fed up with the "all ages show" Courtney got us into. I left and ended up at a girlie dancin' bar called Outlaws and some old man came up and asked me "why don't you go home where people love you?" He gave me ruby slippers and now... I've decided to go to Georgia.

Atlanta is at least as interesting as Portland, not quite as foreign to me and full of old memories but still... interesting.
All I want is a big and juicy steak. I'd fry it up with some Worcestershire sauce and butter, leave it pink in the middle. Oh and some okra, yeah and squash.

I talked to Kiah (the kinder-gardener) when I was in Brooklyn. I told her I was hungry and she told me she'd send me a plate of food. Said she'd send fish and potatoes and even a dessert of chocolate pie. It sounded great but unfortunately five-year-olds are not good at following through with the ideas they conceptualize.

and I'm off to enter another hell. At least it's a hell where all of my clothes and books are. I've been living with the same clothes all summer and losing panties along the way. In the old days I would write more about the panties but this estrip thing has grown to frightening proportions. I'll have to save some stories for when I visit Buffalo.


What's sad is I have Courtney's apartment to myself this weekend and I'm not even enjoying it. I've been depressed. Every movie I watch or book I read makes me tear up. Faulkner's Two Soldiers almost killed me. Anything that involves the disillusionment of children, I find especially upsetting. Usually media bounces right off of me but lately all that emotional shit, I've been absorbing it like a maxi pad and the illusion of pain, whether masterfully rendered or poorly, briefly becomes my own real pain..

and no, it's not PMS. I'm just crazy. It must be that I miss my vibrator. Water pressure is getting boring. maybe I just miss my space and solitude. yeah, I really miss those things. I dreamed I was being chased by these two men last night. I had to do all this ninja shit to get rid of them. Then I had to explain to Donnie and Chante what I was doing in their house watching the flat screen. and for some oddly disturbing reason Marc Bohlen was there.

The saddest part... I lost Bruce here in Portland. He was a little yellow action figure who followed me from elsewhere. I plan on making a commemorative video.

my sister-in-law, Dee, sent some photos of my nieces. talking about how damn hard it is to get a good picture of all three of them. Gracie's face in the bottem picture is my favorite.

I'm about to have a nicotine fit but there is no one around to witness it. I would like to say that I am totally angry with Liz and Arzu at this point, for dragging my ass out of North Carolina all those months ago. Adairsville is boring but at least I'd be around my family. The old ones drive me up the wall but the little one coax me back down again. Kiah, my little angel, started kindergarten this year. It's weird to sleep in a 5 years olds room (Kiah always sleeps with her mama or granny) but hell, the have movies on demand.

Ok enough

I'll try to think of something relevant rather that incessant bitching and whining.

Books

I've read three this week.
Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
Tim Robbins, Villa Incognito
and
Dorothy Allison, Bastard out of Carolina


The Sun Also Rises was the best. pulled me in... made me like the author. Lady Brett Ashely was an awesome character who fucked all these dudes and got drunk all the time. So did everyone... get drunk.


Villa Incognito, was a fucked up fairy tale about bestiality. It was good but I like 1st person writing more.



Bastard out of Carolina, was depressing as all get out. I've read essays by Dorothy Allison that are more empowering and uplifting. This book made me tear up. It's about this kid who gets kicked (among other things) around by her step dad. She has a great crazy extended family but she's poor, called trash and... it's just fucking sad.

Well, here I am in Oregon. Still flat broke... still no job. I'm staying with Courtney. We are like a married couple. She's cheating on me with a guy with a mustache. Let's call him John Waters. I encourage her with Mr. Waters so I guess it's not cheating. I say, go and get that ass but she likes to think of it in more emotional terms.
I like a man in Brooklyn. I also don't like him and even more I'm apathetic. What kills me is his intelligence, yes, it's right smack dab in the middle of stupid reckless decisions but it's there. I meet so many idiots... l sweet, cute and good-natured idiots but boring due to bland predictability. That one was different, one of those rare good Georgians, like myself. I'll never see him again. That's my assumption.
The way I miss Buffalo is like a slap in the face. I want to come rest my head on Liz Knipe's tittys and sigh. What am I doing with my life? Sitting in a coffee shop locked out of the apartment waiting for my wife to get out of her damn baking class, not that she ever bakes in the apartment. She can't, despite the 650$ a month the oven leaks gas and is therefore scary. What is this real world? Should I have went to engineering school so this job thing would not be such an issue? Who am I kidding, I would have lost patience with that before i'd set my foot in a classroom. Still... I need to work. I want to work. Ok, I'm lying, all I want to do is travel the world and be jolly, is that to much to ask? No, I do want to work. I can't work right now. I'm to worried about finance. I need to labor and that's what really gets to me.

Now that I've finally acquired a job at a fine coffee selling establishment (thanks to Nancy King) I'll be leaving this city of squandered time amidst forced productivity. The Lavatelli sisters are great. I am getting out of their hair before they start beating me with the fly swatter screaming "get off that lazy ass." It looks like Courtney Jean Anne will be my new encounter and temporary benefactor. She's been in Portland for 2 months. I'm fairly certain we will drive each other insane(sleeping in the same bed and all) but where could a better place be to go insane than a place that's thousands of miles from home.
I've never been so far west. Portland is rainy so I'll be ok. I like my health teas. I'm homesick for the old pink and I have to wonder who was that ever elusive Bert? When again will I see Soybean, Sarah Paul, Liz, Julie, Tony, Paul, Matt, Terry, Mike, Meg, Brian, Tom, Steve and so on. Who the fuck am I going to find in Portland? I hope they are chill. I need some mellow pace after walking around this place. Some big bitch yelled at me today because we brushed shoulders while my head was bowed lighting a smoke. I said "excuse me" and kept going. That woman could have kicked my soft ass.
19 Guest. Who are all the God Damn guest on this site? What happened to old elmwoodstrip where there were about 15 of us? Paul did you ever get my message about finding Chris? Zoe needs a place to crash in San Francisco come September. She's been working her ass off for some stodgy painter and he's going to fly her out there for his opening.
I wonder if I should feel excited. I'm about to make a big change of location, to a place I've never been. I know I will need some bologna and pringles but no blow-pops. That hobag will eat it right when it gets to the gum. Never forgets a god damn thing.

My fucking hands hurt. I just read Pauls post about his bathroom floor. I really feel for him because that is what I did this morning. I ripped out old tiles off a floor. It wasn't a bathroom. It was a bedroom. It's about to become the bedroom of a 12 year old girl. The girl wants us to paint the floor 12 year old purple. That is what I get to do in the morning, sand the floors and and paint them purple. It actually sounds allot more fun than ripping out tile again. Paul, you needed a scraper, one of those things you put spackle on with.