Street sign in Los Alamos, New Mexico:
“Los Alamos. Where discoveries are made.”
Los Alamos is the place in the mountains in New Mexico where the US Government in deepest the secrecy developed the A-bomb in the 1940’s.
Friday, June 29, 2007
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
14: Me and Moustache Roadtrip: NM: Frail Light and Boiling Eggs
I wake up today at 6:40am. Two men are talking outside our window, so loud that I can't ignore it. We're in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Moustache and I went and ate Mexican food last night, and shared a carafe of Margherita. We read about Sadie's, a restaurant that serves Mexican food so good, that it's an institution among the locals here. We drove far to get there, and it was all worth it. But I feel this morning that I'm not used to Margherita.
Tequila I can do, also without a hangover. But all the sugar from last night is no good right now. What a disturbing way to drink. Now I know why I don't mix alcohol with sweet things. I like things, that are good enough in their own taste, or are made of different boozes mixed. Like a Martini; gin and vermouth, or a Negroni; gin, Martini Rosso, Campari, (and Angostura, crucial). But not rum and Coke. Yadk. Get a good rum, a Havanna 7 or 12 years, and don't even think about ruining it with sweet soda. That's how I usually drink, and I've practically never had a hangover. But the Margheritas were also famous at Sadie's, so had to try.
I lie in my bed. I would really like to sleep some more. The landscapes here in New Mexico are fantastic. We entered the state yesterday, and it was a day of great beauty and thrill. I don't want to be tired in the car, and wake up after napping, only to know how much we just passed by as I slept. The two men keep talking. What's good about being awake is, that the light and the composition of the room from the top bunk bed I'm in is very fine. I lie and think, that I could get my camera. Or get some more sleep. Or get up, the level of activity of the two men suggests that the day is fully born. The light is crazy, one window is covered with white cotton curtains, the other is not, One is half-open, the other is closed. We're in a dorm room in the basement of a hostel. The Route 66 Hostel. We're on Highway 66.
There is an antenna on top of a TV, the things point out in a big V. There is a string from the ceiling lamp, hanging down in the middle of the room. There is a floor lamp with a white shade. It's turned off, but stands like a sleeping light source, surrounded by, almost shying from, hiding from, the light falling from the one open, and from the one covered window. The TV, the lamp, the string from the ceiling are an involuntary, perfectly composed still life.
The moment is pregnant. The string can be pulled, bright light from the naked bulb in the ceiling will illuminate. The floor lamp and the TV can both be turned on, and make sudden light and brutal action come about. But right now, they're all asleep. Like dust upon them is the light. There is an arch in the doorway, that divides the room in two. There's a window in each of the rooms. One room's light is soft, the other's is a little harder. The one window has no curtains, and is half-open. The other room's window is covered in white cotton curtains, a feble bandage on the window, that the light is pressing against from the outside. It makes the window a small wound on the house, a crack in need of protection.
But the curtains can't keep the light out. The outside is somehow stronger and more present in the room, than the inside is itself. The light is a guest, taking up all the room, regardless that its furniture hosts are shy, quiet people. But it does it so elegantly, like a ballerina who must do her pirouettes, that the hosts only stand back in awe, and allow their guest to enlighten their rooms.
I get up. Get the camera. Go back to where I was to take pictures. I go upstairs to the hostel's kitchen. I find that it's not even 7am yet. Moustache is asleep downstairs. I'm in New Mexico, I want to boil eggs. The girl who works here said last night when we checked in, that there were eggs in the fridge, that we could just take for breakfast. I boil water. Make some strong coffee. I have a plan. It involves boiling eggs.
My plan is to one day write about boiling an egg. This is not it. This is merely a foreshadowing of what is to come. One day, I will write about boiling an egg. One day, I will write about boiling an egg. One day, I will write about boiling an egg. ARGGH. I'm stuck on the idea. I know, it has to be good. It's so difficult. It's the ultimate challenge, I've given myself lately. Today, I boil water. I gently put in two eggs. I let them boil for eight minutes. I take them up, flush them in cold water, crack them, they stay perfect. I put them on a small plate, divide them in halfs, salt, black pepper. I think, You're in New Mexico. It's 7am. You're alone, eating like a cowboy. Tar coffee and two hard boiled eggs. Write about it? But I know it's not it. These are not the eggs, I will write about. I have two novels in my head, and a third one in the planning. But boiling an egg is so hard. Writing about it seems even harder, if possible.
Tequila I can do, also without a hangover. But all the sugar from last night is no good right now. What a disturbing way to drink. Now I know why I don't mix alcohol with sweet things. I like things, that are good enough in their own taste, or are made of different boozes mixed. Like a Martini; gin and vermouth, or a Negroni; gin, Martini Rosso, Campari, (and Angostura, crucial). But not rum and Coke. Yadk. Get a good rum, a Havanna 7 or 12 years, and don't even think about ruining it with sweet soda. That's how I usually drink, and I've practically never had a hangover. But the Margheritas were also famous at Sadie's, so had to try.
I lie in my bed. I would really like to sleep some more. The landscapes here in New Mexico are fantastic. We entered the state yesterday, and it was a day of great beauty and thrill. I don't want to be tired in the car, and wake up after napping, only to know how much we just passed by as I slept. The two men keep talking. What's good about being awake is, that the light and the composition of the room from the top bunk bed I'm in is very fine. I lie and think, that I could get my camera. Or get some more sleep. Or get up, the level of activity of the two men suggests that the day is fully born. The light is crazy, one window is covered with white cotton curtains, the other is not, One is half-open, the other is closed. We're in a dorm room in the basement of a hostel. The Route 66 Hostel. We're on Highway 66.
There is an antenna on top of a TV, the things point out in a big V. There is a string from the ceiling lamp, hanging down in the middle of the room. There is a floor lamp with a white shade. It's turned off, but stands like a sleeping light source, surrounded by, almost shying from, hiding from, the light falling from the one open, and from the one covered window. The TV, the lamp, the string from the ceiling are an involuntary, perfectly composed still life.
The moment is pregnant. The string can be pulled, bright light from the naked bulb in the ceiling will illuminate. The floor lamp and the TV can both be turned on, and make sudden light and brutal action come about. But right now, they're all asleep. Like dust upon them is the light. There is an arch in the doorway, that divides the room in two. There's a window in each of the rooms. One room's light is soft, the other's is a little harder. The one window has no curtains, and is half-open. The other room's window is covered in white cotton curtains, a feble bandage on the window, that the light is pressing against from the outside. It makes the window a small wound on the house, a crack in need of protection.
But the curtains can't keep the light out. The outside is somehow stronger and more present in the room, than the inside is itself. The light is a guest, taking up all the room, regardless that its furniture hosts are shy, quiet people. But it does it so elegantly, like a ballerina who must do her pirouettes, that the hosts only stand back in awe, and allow their guest to enlighten their rooms.
I get up. Get the camera. Go back to where I was to take pictures. I go upstairs to the hostel's kitchen. I find that it's not even 7am yet. Moustache is asleep downstairs. I'm in New Mexico, I want to boil eggs. The girl who works here said last night when we checked in, that there were eggs in the fridge, that we could just take for breakfast. I boil water. Make some strong coffee. I have a plan. It involves boiling eggs.
My plan is to one day write about boiling an egg. This is not it. This is merely a foreshadowing of what is to come. One day, I will write about boiling an egg. One day, I will write about boiling an egg. One day, I will write about boiling an egg. ARGGH. I'm stuck on the idea. I know, it has to be good. It's so difficult. It's the ultimate challenge, I've given myself lately. Today, I boil water. I gently put in two eggs. I let them boil for eight minutes. I take them up, flush them in cold water, crack them, they stay perfect. I put them on a small plate, divide them in halfs, salt, black pepper. I think, You're in New Mexico. It's 7am. You're alone, eating like a cowboy. Tar coffee and two hard boiled eggs. Write about it? But I know it's not it. These are not the eggs, I will write about. I have two novels in my head, and a third one in the planning. But boiling an egg is so hard. Writing about it seems even harder, if possible.
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
13: Me and Moustache Roadtrip: AZ: Desert Night Driving
After a long day of some great desert driving, we end up driving dirt roads in the dark for hours, not knowing if we have enough gas to get out. I was happy to be back in the desert, I was here five years ago, and loved it back then too.
The Mojave Desert is beautiful, but we didn't feel much like spending the night, sharing the last four pieces of gum. We'd stopped for gas several times, last time was about fifty miles before The Grand Canyon. Here's where we stopped, the highly professionally looking Star Country Mini Market, Deli, and Gas Station:
I'm not allowed to fill gas on to the car, this photo is pure posing for your pleasure of it. The idiot working on the gas station says he has some system, where he from inside the market pushes a botton and fills the tank, and will do it while we enjoy a sandwich inside. You just put the pistol into the car and leave it all up to him. Moustache pays him, we're around the place for most of half an hour. Not untill we've driven several miles do we see, that the tank is still only half full. Fucking moron. Anyway, we continue, and come to the canyon. The reason we stayed so long at the market/gas station was also to call the Grand Canyon Info Center and be sure, that we could come there a bit late. They said come anytime. When we then arrived at the West point of the canyon, it could not be accessed after 6.30. It was 6.46. Nothing to do but enjoy the canyon from afar and get going.
We start crossing East over the Hualapai Indian Reservation. There is no one living along these roads. No one. It is desert. Deserted land. The dirt road has been much, much more bumpy than it is at the time, when I decide to shoot this little movie. A flat here will seriously not be fun. We have a spare tire and a flash light, but this is also a terrain of animals you don't wanna hang out with. We're in the middle of the Mojave Desert. Moustache drove this stretch, and he did a great job. It got really fun when red deers started appearing out of nowhere. These huge animals are dangerous, mainly because their legs will break off if you hit them frontally with the car. The body will rush in through the front window like a fucking refridgerator and crush us. In this darkness, you don't see them till the last minute, and they come running out of the vegetation on the sides of the road. They're beautiful, they have a clothes rack on top of their heads, and a proud big body. But I don't wanna hug it, like full speed on, last embrace, death in each other's arms.
At the point of the movie, we've speeded up and this is pretty smooth in comparison to the last hours. No more big holes and rocks on the road. Now only avoid red deers and don't run out of gas before civilization reappears ahead. I love the desert. It's beautiful.
The Mojave Desert is beautiful, but we didn't feel much like spending the night, sharing the last four pieces of gum. We'd stopped for gas several times, last time was about fifty miles before The Grand Canyon. Here's where we stopped, the highly professionally looking Star Country Mini Market, Deli, and Gas Station:
I'm not allowed to fill gas on to the car, this photo is pure posing for your pleasure of it. The idiot working on the gas station says he has some system, where he from inside the market pushes a botton and fills the tank, and will do it while we enjoy a sandwich inside. You just put the pistol into the car and leave it all up to him. Moustache pays him, we're around the place for most of half an hour. Not untill we've driven several miles do we see, that the tank is still only half full. Fucking moron. Anyway, we continue, and come to the canyon. The reason we stayed so long at the market/gas station was also to call the Grand Canyon Info Center and be sure, that we could come there a bit late. They said come anytime. When we then arrived at the West point of the canyon, it could not be accessed after 6.30. It was 6.46. Nothing to do but enjoy the canyon from afar and get going.
We start crossing East over the Hualapai Indian Reservation. There is no one living along these roads. No one. It is desert. Deserted land. The dirt road has been much, much more bumpy than it is at the time, when I decide to shoot this little movie. A flat here will seriously not be fun. We have a spare tire and a flash light, but this is also a terrain of animals you don't wanna hang out with. We're in the middle of the Mojave Desert. Moustache drove this stretch, and he did a great job. It got really fun when red deers started appearing out of nowhere. These huge animals are dangerous, mainly because their legs will break off if you hit them frontally with the car. The body will rush in through the front window like a fucking refridgerator and crush us. In this darkness, you don't see them till the last minute, and they come running out of the vegetation on the sides of the road. They're beautiful, they have a clothes rack on top of their heads, and a proud big body. But I don't wanna hug it, like full speed on, last embrace, death in each other's arms.
At the point of the movie, we've speeded up and this is pretty smooth in comparison to the last hours. No more big holes and rocks on the road. Now only avoid red deers and don't run out of gas before civilization reappears ahead. I love the desert. It's beautiful.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
My Love Goes To The Good Cop From Last Night
This is going to be a hard posting to write. It concerns something that has occupied my mind a lot lately in different ways. The American Cops. My Future. Maybe Somewhere in the Americas. Freedom.
I am in the middle of a couple of series here, that I can't wait to update you on. One is the Birth Of A Press - I have picture documentation of the entire process, and can reveal to you here a part of the result which is, that I have my books for sale in all the local book stores here now, and of course am proud and happy about that. Another one I'll get back to is the Day At The Beach, where I encountered the sleeping and then awaking baby seal, I really want to tell you more about that day. I also filmed a dead elephant seal, I'll post that movie here too. And I want to show you a series of pictures of the amazing Victorian houses from my street here, which is actually an Avenue, the Walnut Avenue, the most beautiful one in town. I leave this town in two days, I'll begin a journey towards New Orleans Thursday morning. I will write about the trip, it's a three week road trip with my Danish friend Bo Better. I want to post the video of me throwing my cap in the air from my graduation Sunday. But before I can get to any of all this, I have to write this special greeting. It's to the cop, who showed up at my house last night.
I had a graduation - goodbye party last night. I don't know how many we were, my house is huge and we have four porches, so it's hard to keep track of the number of people at the house. Some porches are placed so high on top of a corner room, that you feel hidden in a secrete place on the house, and can sit and have a private party of maybe five up there, overviewing the town and treetops. It's a fairy tale house, it's called The Beehive, and we are ten living here. All are artists, mostly photographers, musicians, and writers. People at the party did, as all do here in California, smoke outside. So groups would appear and reappear in the house throughout the night, and I guess they have been hanging out on a porch smoking or enjoying the Californian night time breezes. Or having sex. I didn't ask.
Some came for dinner at six. Some arrived with a handful of friends and a case of beers at ten. Some came for a couple of hours and then went to the bars. I think through the night we were in between twenty and fifty people there. Fun, happy, lovely people. My friends. The thing in my life, that I'm the very most proud of, is absolutely the people, I know. I look around me, and I'm proud of the people I'm able to gather. I fucking love my friends. They rock my world.
I have my reasons for loving to party. The most obvious is, that I have a very small family. Very, very small. I love them too, with all my heart. We are though at the level of three persons, up to five when we gather everyone for Christmas dinner. There have been Christmas dinners with three persons around the table. Luckily, these three will include my mother and my brother, and the three of us have great fun, so it's not sad like that at all. It's just.. that I really, really love people. I just love people. So, I've always had many parties. It's like creating my own big, wonderful family, full of hand picked lovely people, I know. I love to gather the people I love. I love to party. I love parties.
My wonderful professors here are suggesting me to come back to North America to take an MFA, a Master of Fine Arts degree in creative writing. They're so super flattering as to suggest me Ivy League schools, and say that they think I can get into the programs. The plan with my life now is, that I go back to Denmark by the end of the summer. I write my master's thesis, 80 pages of theory. I then? Doing what these professors suggest would mean, that I spend another year doing a ton of application work to get the scholarships and get the writing samples together. If I have luck, I will then get paid to learn to write for two more years, by very smart people in these schools. They will pay my education and give me money to live from while I'm there. So right now, I'm seriously considering doing that.
I also consider the MFA plan because I love the Americas. I can see myself living, at least part of the time, overhere. But I have one problem, a problem with that plan, and I've given it a lot of thought lately, because I know how every decision can turn out to be very determining for the larger life. If I choose to come back here in these years, I might hook up with that significant other one, that one you want to share the years with, and the odds of that being an American, I would say, increase by living here. And what do you know, I might suddenly live here.
I've never been nervous to fall in love with someone from whereever, because I think falling in love in itself would be so wonderful, and then the rest are just details to be worked out. Serious, hard choices, we're talking languages, living far from loved ones, far from my beloved Danish friends and family, not having the culture you're familiar with around you, all of that. But it has never worried me. If you have the kind of love, that'll make you go through that, the missing the dear ones, the longing for homely smells, foods, habits, ways, if you love someone so much that you'll do that, I think you're fucking lucky. Then you sort out the details. You find a way. To be with your love. For me the choice would also be about being where I love - to be. I would not settle anywhere for anyone, if I didn't like the place as well. Anyway, the focus here is where I could imagine living, with or without a relationship.
There is one thing, that I have known all the year, that I've been here now. One problem, that I have pondered, and known would be a problem to me, should I end up living in North America. It's the cops. The frikking police. I feel and think in many ways, that North America is a police state. And I wouldn't be happy living in one such one. I am dependent on freedom.
I love America for the fun people. For the great cities. The diversity. For the amazing nature. For the air. I dislike the money focus. I hate the relationship between the people and the police. It shocks my soul. It makes me physically uncomfortable. I've had encounters with authorities here, usually positive ones. Airports. Borders. Offices. Fun, helpful, understanding, kind people. I talked my way over the Tijuana border between Mexico and California, without my visum papers. I handed the guy my passport. The conversation that followed went like this;
Border Dude: I need to see your F-1 visum form as well.
Me: No, you don't.
Border Dude: Yes, I do.
Me: No, you don't. I have my passport right here. That's enough.
Border Dude: No, it's not. You can't re-enter The United States without a visum when you have the slip of an F-1 form in your passport.
Me: Yes, I can. I have my passport.
Border Dude: You need to bring your signed visum form with you in order to enter the United States of America.
Me: DUDE! YOU NEED TO LET ME INTO THE FUCKING COUNTRY. YOU WANT ME TO WANDER AROUND IN MEXICO FROM NOW ON BECAUSE YOU HAVE A DESK AND A UNIFORM AND I MISS A TINY PIECE OF PAPER?? WHAT KIND OF A MAN ARE YOU?? SHOW ME YOUR POWER! YOU ARE LARGER THAN THE SYSTEM! DON'T LET THE RULES GET TO YOUR HEAD! THINK OUT OF THE BOX THE LAW THE ROUTINE AND LET ME INTO THE FUCKING COUNTRY! NOW! Please. (Ok: I knew I needed the fucking form. I had been to an office and had it signed a week earlier, so that I could go to Tijuana. How I then managed to go to Tijuana without it, is another story. I think I had left it in the car, that was parked on the California side of the border, actually. In the situation, I might have left out a couple of the 'fucking' that are in this quotation.)
Border Dude: Ok. But bring it with you next time. You need to bring it with you.
Me: Thanks. Thanks, dude. Me heart you.
Ok, stuff like that. He let me in. I love people who are not stuck up on governmental structures. At the DMV, the Motor Vehicle office here, I have a fucking ball every time. The people there are so nice, we laugh a lot, they draw smileys on my papers and driver's license test results, and they have done super office tricks for me, squeezed in appointments, tried to find me a car for my test, bent corners and seen through fingers, given me phone numbers to call the right persons, speeded stuff through, and endlessly ordered and reissued licenses and permits and ID's with a smile and a wink.
But the police. I've been pulled over many times. Only time where I was driving myself, it was because they thought I was DUI, under some influence, apparently they didn't like my style of driving. Need I say, I'm a great driver, I've driven cars in Denmark, in France, in Manhattan, in Brazil, on the Moon, and of course I love to drive. That day, I was driving around in Santa Barbara, and the streets were completely empty, so I was looking more around me to see the place than focusing on driving straight. We're not talking me swaying from curb to curb, we're talking me driving very, very slowly, fully aware that I'm being followed by a cop car. After ten streets of following me like that, 10 miles per hour, they pull me over with blink and sirens, and arrive with hands on their guns and treat me like fucking terrorist. Ma'am! Arh, fuck, I just can't stand the power trip. Of course I wasn't fucking DUI, but we ended up finding that my temporary license was expired, so they could have busted me for that instead. They also claimed I almost ran a guy down, which is just plane stupid. He did stand very far out on the street, but he didn't even move from my passing by him, like, he wasn't even feeling close to the very slow moving vehicle, and I didn't feel close either. He was the first person I'd seen in five minutes, the streets were really deserted, and of course I paid attention and didn't drive too close. It was as if they looked for some reason to pull me over, and I've heard many Americans say, that they can feel the same way with the police here.
They told me I could have got a huge ticket, and they could have had the car towed away. Instead they let me get off, and let my friend in the passenger seat take over from there, and we were cool. So - good cops?
Well, I have a Californian driver's license. Back when this happened, I just hadn't got the piece of plastic yet, but only had a temporary, that had expired. And they couldn't find me in the system. But let me off anyway.
Bad cops? They came off to me as fucking drunk on power and diffuse anxiety. I didn't like their way of behaving. Why the 'tude? Why the scary way? Why behave like God giving mercy, underlining again and again, what powers they could have used against me? Warning me, what the consequences could have been? Why so condescending? Why instructing me like I'm a child, in how to behave now and any other time, about this and life in general? Why draw out this situation ad absurdum in time and manner and überchecking my possibly threatening existence? Why lecture me with a hand on your gun?
The other times I've been pulled over, my friends have been driving. It's been the same circus, hands on guns, not allowed to even get out of the car, them being very hostile and angry, not leaving any room for the dialog, that my reasonable, intelligent, friendly friends would open up.
But what really scares me, what gets to the deepest fear in me, is the police's right in this country to break up a party. That's illegal in Denmark. The people has the right to party! The police doesn't have the right to stop people from having a party! The police will come and ask you to close your windows, turn down the music, but does not, not at all, have the authority to dissolve a party like they do here. And it scares the shit out of me, that they're allowed to do that. My life is constituted of a series of parties. Why are parties considered such a threat to the peace and order here? How can I live in the States when they don't like parties, and the police has been given the right to decide over and with force realize where, when, and how people can gather in joy and celebration?
Last night, around the hour of eleven-twelve pm, the party at my house was down to seven-eight people. It was a Monday, it had started at six pm, and a big group had just left. We heard loud music. There was dancing. We had a great time. Suddenly, the word is that the cops are here. We all know that means, the neighbours have complained and the party is over. Often, there's a fine, and it can be a serious one. One of my friends recently got a $1000 fine for having had too loud music at a party. He gathered friends. They listened to music. They smiled to each other. Danced. Like we do, when we party. That situation was killed. He was fined $1000.
Last night, we turn off the music. I go downstairs, open the front door. A lady cop is standing outside.
Me: Wassup?
Lady Cop: Hey, wassup?
Me: So, wassup? Do we have a situation here?
Lady Cop: One of your neighbours is ready to file a complaint. (Here she used words I don't remember, but it was clearly about me getting fined for this).
Me: That means the fine thing?
Lady Cop: Yeah, it does.
Me: I graduated! And I'm leaving the country in a few days, so we've been celebrating and saying goodbyes.
Lady Cop: All right! Congratulations. Right on!
And we took it from there. She of course broke up the party. I guess she had to. I went upstairs and said, We're going to the bars now. A friend called and said, There're cops outside your house, we were going to come to the party? I looked out the window, and saw the friends on the sidewalk and her still in the cop car across the street. I ran to my room and wrote her a note:
Dear Cop. Thank you for being very cool. Please read my blog at www.tinebruun.blogspot.com. Love, t
I then ran out to her car. She came out of the car, and I said, Wassup? and she said, These people are about to enter your house? I said, No, they just called and we're coming out now and all going to a bar instead. Thanks for being a fucking great cop. I wrote you this note. And I gave her the note. And I hope she reads this. She's the first cop I've met, who talked to me like a normal human being, who with respect and intelligence tried to take care of this noise complaint. She wasn't trying to proof anything. She didn't make me feel bad. She was doing her job. And she was good at it. I told her that, I said, Dude, you're the coolest cop I've ever met in America.
So I'm thinking, if there were more cops like her, maybe the party hate of North America could be acceptable in my future. Like, if they at least just came and were nice when they broke up the party. I don't know. It still chills my soul, that they can do that. I don't know if I can live with it. I love freedom. I'll write about jay walking another time.
I am in the middle of a couple of series here, that I can't wait to update you on. One is the Birth Of A Press - I have picture documentation of the entire process, and can reveal to you here a part of the result which is, that I have my books for sale in all the local book stores here now, and of course am proud and happy about that. Another one I'll get back to is the Day At The Beach, where I encountered the sleeping and then awaking baby seal, I really want to tell you more about that day. I also filmed a dead elephant seal, I'll post that movie here too. And I want to show you a series of pictures of the amazing Victorian houses from my street here, which is actually an Avenue, the Walnut Avenue, the most beautiful one in town. I leave this town in two days, I'll begin a journey towards New Orleans Thursday morning. I will write about the trip, it's a three week road trip with my Danish friend Bo Better. I want to post the video of me throwing my cap in the air from my graduation Sunday. But before I can get to any of all this, I have to write this special greeting. It's to the cop, who showed up at my house last night.
I had a graduation - goodbye party last night. I don't know how many we were, my house is huge and we have four porches, so it's hard to keep track of the number of people at the house. Some porches are placed so high on top of a corner room, that you feel hidden in a secrete place on the house, and can sit and have a private party of maybe five up there, overviewing the town and treetops. It's a fairy tale house, it's called The Beehive, and we are ten living here. All are artists, mostly photographers, musicians, and writers. People at the party did, as all do here in California, smoke outside. So groups would appear and reappear in the house throughout the night, and I guess they have been hanging out on a porch smoking or enjoying the Californian night time breezes. Or having sex. I didn't ask.
Some came for dinner at six. Some arrived with a handful of friends and a case of beers at ten. Some came for a couple of hours and then went to the bars. I think through the night we were in between twenty and fifty people there. Fun, happy, lovely people. My friends. The thing in my life, that I'm the very most proud of, is absolutely the people, I know. I look around me, and I'm proud of the people I'm able to gather. I fucking love my friends. They rock my world.
I have my reasons for loving to party. The most obvious is, that I have a very small family. Very, very small. I love them too, with all my heart. We are though at the level of three persons, up to five when we gather everyone for Christmas dinner. There have been Christmas dinners with three persons around the table. Luckily, these three will include my mother and my brother, and the three of us have great fun, so it's not sad like that at all. It's just.. that I really, really love people. I just love people. So, I've always had many parties. It's like creating my own big, wonderful family, full of hand picked lovely people, I know. I love to gather the people I love. I love to party. I love parties.
My wonderful professors here are suggesting me to come back to North America to take an MFA, a Master of Fine Arts degree in creative writing. They're so super flattering as to suggest me Ivy League schools, and say that they think I can get into the programs. The plan with my life now is, that I go back to Denmark by the end of the summer. I write my master's thesis, 80 pages of theory. I then? Doing what these professors suggest would mean, that I spend another year doing a ton of application work to get the scholarships and get the writing samples together. If I have luck, I will then get paid to learn to write for two more years, by very smart people in these schools. They will pay my education and give me money to live from while I'm there. So right now, I'm seriously considering doing that.
I also consider the MFA plan because I love the Americas. I can see myself living, at least part of the time, overhere. But I have one problem, a problem with that plan, and I've given it a lot of thought lately, because I know how every decision can turn out to be very determining for the larger life. If I choose to come back here in these years, I might hook up with that significant other one, that one you want to share the years with, and the odds of that being an American, I would say, increase by living here. And what do you know, I might suddenly live here.
I've never been nervous to fall in love with someone from whereever, because I think falling in love in itself would be so wonderful, and then the rest are just details to be worked out. Serious, hard choices, we're talking languages, living far from loved ones, far from my beloved Danish friends and family, not having the culture you're familiar with around you, all of that. But it has never worried me. If you have the kind of love, that'll make you go through that, the missing the dear ones, the longing for homely smells, foods, habits, ways, if you love someone so much that you'll do that, I think you're fucking lucky. Then you sort out the details. You find a way. To be with your love. For me the choice would also be about being where I love - to be. I would not settle anywhere for anyone, if I didn't like the place as well. Anyway, the focus here is where I could imagine living, with or without a relationship.
There is one thing, that I have known all the year, that I've been here now. One problem, that I have pondered, and known would be a problem to me, should I end up living in North America. It's the cops. The frikking police. I feel and think in many ways, that North America is a police state. And I wouldn't be happy living in one such one. I am dependent on freedom.
I love America for the fun people. For the great cities. The diversity. For the amazing nature. For the air. I dislike the money focus. I hate the relationship between the people and the police. It shocks my soul. It makes me physically uncomfortable. I've had encounters with authorities here, usually positive ones. Airports. Borders. Offices. Fun, helpful, understanding, kind people. I talked my way over the Tijuana border between Mexico and California, without my visum papers. I handed the guy my passport. The conversation that followed went like this;
Border Dude: I need to see your F-1 visum form as well.
Me: No, you don't.
Border Dude: Yes, I do.
Me: No, you don't. I have my passport right here. That's enough.
Border Dude: No, it's not. You can't re-enter The United States without a visum when you have the slip of an F-1 form in your passport.
Me: Yes, I can. I have my passport.
Border Dude: You need to bring your signed visum form with you in order to enter the United States of America.
Me: DUDE! YOU NEED TO LET ME INTO THE FUCKING COUNTRY. YOU WANT ME TO WANDER AROUND IN MEXICO FROM NOW ON BECAUSE YOU HAVE A DESK AND A UNIFORM AND I MISS A TINY PIECE OF PAPER?? WHAT KIND OF A MAN ARE YOU?? SHOW ME YOUR POWER! YOU ARE LARGER THAN THE SYSTEM! DON'T LET THE RULES GET TO YOUR HEAD! THINK OUT OF THE BOX THE LAW THE ROUTINE AND LET ME INTO THE FUCKING COUNTRY! NOW! Please. (Ok: I knew I needed the fucking form. I had been to an office and had it signed a week earlier, so that I could go to Tijuana. How I then managed to go to Tijuana without it, is another story. I think I had left it in the car, that was parked on the California side of the border, actually. In the situation, I might have left out a couple of the 'fucking' that are in this quotation.)
Border Dude: Ok. But bring it with you next time. You need to bring it with you.
Me: Thanks. Thanks, dude. Me heart you.
Ok, stuff like that. He let me in. I love people who are not stuck up on governmental structures. At the DMV, the Motor Vehicle office here, I have a fucking ball every time. The people there are so nice, we laugh a lot, they draw smileys on my papers and driver's license test results, and they have done super office tricks for me, squeezed in appointments, tried to find me a car for my test, bent corners and seen through fingers, given me phone numbers to call the right persons, speeded stuff through, and endlessly ordered and reissued licenses and permits and ID's with a smile and a wink.
But the police. I've been pulled over many times. Only time where I was driving myself, it was because they thought I was DUI, under some influence, apparently they didn't like my style of driving. Need I say, I'm a great driver, I've driven cars in Denmark, in France, in Manhattan, in Brazil, on the Moon, and of course I love to drive. That day, I was driving around in Santa Barbara, and the streets were completely empty, so I was looking more around me to see the place than focusing on driving straight. We're not talking me swaying from curb to curb, we're talking me driving very, very slowly, fully aware that I'm being followed by a cop car. After ten streets of following me like that, 10 miles per hour, they pull me over with blink and sirens, and arrive with hands on their guns and treat me like fucking terrorist. Ma'am! Arh, fuck, I just can't stand the power trip. Of course I wasn't fucking DUI, but we ended up finding that my temporary license was expired, so they could have busted me for that instead. They also claimed I almost ran a guy down, which is just plane stupid. He did stand very far out on the street, but he didn't even move from my passing by him, like, he wasn't even feeling close to the very slow moving vehicle, and I didn't feel close either. He was the first person I'd seen in five minutes, the streets were really deserted, and of course I paid attention and didn't drive too close. It was as if they looked for some reason to pull me over, and I've heard many Americans say, that they can feel the same way with the police here.
They told me I could have got a huge ticket, and they could have had the car towed away. Instead they let me get off, and let my friend in the passenger seat take over from there, and we were cool. So - good cops?
Well, I have a Californian driver's license. Back when this happened, I just hadn't got the piece of plastic yet, but only had a temporary, that had expired. And they couldn't find me in the system. But let me off anyway.
Bad cops? They came off to me as fucking drunk on power and diffuse anxiety. I didn't like their way of behaving. Why the 'tude? Why the scary way? Why behave like God giving mercy, underlining again and again, what powers they could have used against me? Warning me, what the consequences could have been? Why so condescending? Why instructing me like I'm a child, in how to behave now and any other time, about this and life in general? Why draw out this situation ad absurdum in time and manner and überchecking my possibly threatening existence? Why lecture me with a hand on your gun?
The other times I've been pulled over, my friends have been driving. It's been the same circus, hands on guns, not allowed to even get out of the car, them being very hostile and angry, not leaving any room for the dialog, that my reasonable, intelligent, friendly friends would open up.
But what really scares me, what gets to the deepest fear in me, is the police's right in this country to break up a party. That's illegal in Denmark. The people has the right to party! The police doesn't have the right to stop people from having a party! The police will come and ask you to close your windows, turn down the music, but does not, not at all, have the authority to dissolve a party like they do here. And it scares the shit out of me, that they're allowed to do that. My life is constituted of a series of parties. Why are parties considered such a threat to the peace and order here? How can I live in the States when they don't like parties, and the police has been given the right to decide over and with force realize where, when, and how people can gather in joy and celebration?
Last night, around the hour of eleven-twelve pm, the party at my house was down to seven-eight people. It was a Monday, it had started at six pm, and a big group had just left. We heard loud music. There was dancing. We had a great time. Suddenly, the word is that the cops are here. We all know that means, the neighbours have complained and the party is over. Often, there's a fine, and it can be a serious one. One of my friends recently got a $1000 fine for having had too loud music at a party. He gathered friends. They listened to music. They smiled to each other. Danced. Like we do, when we party. That situation was killed. He was fined $1000.
Last night, we turn off the music. I go downstairs, open the front door. A lady cop is standing outside.
Me: Wassup?
Lady Cop: Hey, wassup?
Me: So, wassup? Do we have a situation here?
Lady Cop: One of your neighbours is ready to file a complaint. (Here she used words I don't remember, but it was clearly about me getting fined for this).
Me: That means the fine thing?
Lady Cop: Yeah, it does.
Me: I graduated! And I'm leaving the country in a few days, so we've been celebrating and saying goodbyes.
Lady Cop: All right! Congratulations. Right on!
And we took it from there. She of course broke up the party. I guess she had to. I went upstairs and said, We're going to the bars now. A friend called and said, There're cops outside your house, we were going to come to the party? I looked out the window, and saw the friends on the sidewalk and her still in the cop car across the street. I ran to my room and wrote her a note:
Dear Cop. Thank you for being very cool. Please read my blog at www.tinebruun.blogspot.com. Love, t
I then ran out to her car. She came out of the car, and I said, Wassup? and she said, These people are about to enter your house? I said, No, they just called and we're coming out now and all going to a bar instead. Thanks for being a fucking great cop. I wrote you this note. And I gave her the note. And I hope she reads this. She's the first cop I've met, who talked to me like a normal human being, who with respect and intelligence tried to take care of this noise complaint. She wasn't trying to proof anything. She didn't make me feel bad. She was doing her job. And she was good at it. I told her that, I said, Dude, you're the coolest cop I've ever met in America.
So I'm thinking, if there were more cops like her, maybe the party hate of North America could be acceptable in my future. Like, if they at least just came and were nice when they broke up the party. I don't know. It still chills my soul, that they can do that. I don't know if I can live with it. I love freedom. I'll write about jay walking another time.
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Friday, June 15, 2007
I Want..
I want Africa and air planes and dry summer heat. I want Niagara and newbornness and tourist turqoise blue. I hear a butterfly shriek as it untwirls the boring shields of spring. I smell aged food that only grows in this certain season. It’s too hot, the smell tells me the food is flaking and crumbling. I want to be there. I want to take off to leave it all behind. The wings with turqoise eye dots are mine. I have the wind under me. Right there. It smells bad. I get claustrophobic and awkward. But I want to be right there. Summer. Flying, swaying over a canyon.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
In Stores
Report on book project will follow here as soon as I have minutes to write about it. I have thorough photo documentation of book process. I have glue up to my elbows. I am now stuck to the keyboard. I will now press jfkæ
jkp publish poewiåøæ.-
,m
wiith muiy nose qa2212erweq 2
æ'øP
jkp publish poewiåøæ.-
,m
wiith muiy nose qa2212erweq 2
æ'øP
Monday, June 11, 2007
My Personal Dictionary (K)
Kinko's: Innocent cover name for a chain of copy houses. The fresh, sparkling name's pronunciation: "Kenkeos :)"
General warning: Watch out for Kinko's and do not get fooled. Do not go in. It is neither in any way kinky nor crispy fun, as the name tries to signal.
True sense of Kinko's: House of Darkness. Employer of hateful, burned out, anti-enthusiastic, xerox-hating women with thin hair and fat men with long, black, greasy hair in gross ponytails (washed approximately every fortnight, and due to trouble while reading directions for use on conditioner bottle label, it is washed only in conditioner, which is then never washed out), greasy glasses, and unfortunate compulsive head turning towards wall clock-tendencies, to all day keep up with count down to closing time.
Kinko's typical habitation: tired teenagers with too much eyeliner and too long bangs laminating their own ID cards, ground school teachers copying hand outs about dull events on compensatingly happy pink and hysteric bright yellow paper. Angry customers. Hateful people. Sad children. Expired elderly.
Some Xerox machines in Kinko's do work occasionally. Though in a state less efficient than the Russian 1926-1930 Xerox standard.
When you leave, employees can be willing to reimburse the value of 92 copies because it is obvious that the time it took to make them on 7 different machines was a joke without humor. Employees are most likely to do this, if they sense violence otherwise may be the next development of a customer complaint Saturday night close to closing time.
Be sure never to leave a Kinko's with any photo copies. It can only be a mistake.
General warning: Watch out for Kinko's and do not get fooled. Do not go in. It is neither in any way kinky nor crispy fun, as the name tries to signal.
True sense of Kinko's: House of Darkness. Employer of hateful, burned out, anti-enthusiastic, xerox-hating women with thin hair and fat men with long, black, greasy hair in gross ponytails (washed approximately every fortnight, and due to trouble while reading directions for use on conditioner bottle label, it is washed only in conditioner, which is then never washed out), greasy glasses, and unfortunate compulsive head turning towards wall clock-tendencies, to all day keep up with count down to closing time.
Kinko's typical habitation: tired teenagers with too much eyeliner and too long bangs laminating their own ID cards, ground school teachers copying hand outs about dull events on compensatingly happy pink and hysteric bright yellow paper. Angry customers. Hateful people. Sad children. Expired elderly.
Some Xerox machines in Kinko's do work occasionally. Though in a state less efficient than the Russian 1926-1930 Xerox standard.
When you leave, employees can be willing to reimburse the value of 92 copies because it is obvious that the time it took to make them on 7 different machines was a joke without humor. Employees are most likely to do this, if they sense violence otherwise may be the next development of a customer complaint Saturday night close to closing time.
Be sure never to leave a Kinko's with any photo copies. It can only be a mistake.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Madwoman. Scalpel. Book
I'm once again trapped in a madwoman's project. This time, she's decided to make a book production. I don't know how the fuck she gets in to me. Do I have doors? Are my eyes actually windows, that she climbs through when I think I'm looking out for her the most? Does she enter me through a secret back door? Eh? I don't know. But she's back. I'm captured.
My final project for my creative writing senior seminar class is equivalent to writing a thesis. I'm in the final course with all the graduating writers from the great Creative Writing Program of University of California Santa Cruz. Many things are better or more acclaimed on the other Universities of California, but we are the top of creative writing. Yeay. My teachers here are simply great, and they are famous and acclaimed for a reason. Them being great writers. The department is really something, I'm proud to come from here.
So, to graduate, every student has to put together a book of minimum 30 pages. And furthermore, bind it!
Yes, I have to bind my own little book, in minimum 2 copies, one for my teacher of the senior seminar, the wonderful poet Gary Young, whom I'm proud and happy to say that I know and have now studied under, and one for the department. The students then typically make 2-4 copies, so there's one for the parents too. And maybe the grandparents, too.
What the fuck has gone through my mind, I do not know. But I have now started out a production of 50 (fifty) books, and agreed with some of the bookstores here in town, that they will carry the book. The so far not existing book.
I have written 107 pages, and bought a shit load of stuff, that I am not quite sure how to use. I have had a one and a half hour introduction to book binding, in a room with thirty other students, all the graduating writers from both fiction and poetry. A speed intro, fold, fold, cut, sow, fold, glue, cut.
But the madwoman insists, that if we put on music, this will be superfun. Why go to the beach, when you can stay home and cut up paper, sew it together, and glue yourself to the homemade covers before you discover that every second page is copied in the opposite direction, so you have to turn the book every time you turn a page? I need the book done by TUESDAY. Otherwise, I will not graduate. Today is SATURDAY. It's 5 pm. I'm writing this instead of doing book. UAK, like Donald Duck always said in Danish. UAK. Then you know, he's up for trouble. He's about to piss off the old guy and lose the inheritance, or forget the nephews in daycare for a week.
I have for a while been writing texts for this book project. I have put together the texts and made the layout, made a horizontal page with two columns, a column on each book page. I've made a dummy of a print, and am about to carefully put together a print for a master. A book is a little complicated in the way that a folded piece of paper has four pages on it. But not pages 1-2-3-4. Nhohoho, hohoho, nho-nho. In this book, I will have five pages in each signature, that's the little unit of which a book has many, how many depends on the number of pages in the book; so, a sheet of paper in my book will (before folding and sewing together in the back with the other pages) have e.g. pages 1-20-2-19 on it. When that page is folded with the four other sheets in the signature, it all works out. I have to make five signatures for this book.
The print for the master which I'm about to make, is a story of its own. Last night I went to the print shop on campus to get a perfectly laser sharp print for the master. They said, Oh, we can do thee thing you say you have to do, the whole figuring out how a signature is to be designed, and scale it to be on half pages instead. They made me go home, change it all to one column per page, include the table of contents, the title pages, the copyright page, etc. in a new PDF. I went home (miles from campus) spent the hours altering, went back. They travelled around in the print shop with their heads up their asses for an hour. Then moved on to make my things. I was just anxious to get home and start sewing this together.
They made a test print. They fucking just scaled the thing down, so now my book was in miniminiminiature print, they jammed 110 pages into 26, and nobody with eyes older than 35 years of age could possibly read it. I just looked at it, and said, What do you think? They thought it was fine, and I was like, But, we talked about the fact, that this is a book, right? What about the layout? Who can read a book, that looks like this? It looks like a pamphlet for lawyers who excercise reading the things in small print? They made me waste four precious hours on nothing. Eventually I got prints of the first PDFs I had sent them, that I had come for in the first place, four hours earlier, when they said, Oh, we'll do the whole thing for you. Normally this print shop is great, and they were also friendly and didn't make me pay for the double copies I took home and am about to work with now. I did leave the shop in tears.
I've shopped. Darco Paper. Palace Arts on 41st. Palace Arts on Pacific. Longs Drugs. Lenz Arts. I now own 1500 pieces of cream colored paper. Glue. Photo paper for the cover. Book needles and button thread. A hole piercer for clay (it was much cheaper than the one for paper. And a hole is a hole, no?). A plastic ruler. Bad, I cut into it with the scalpel. So I also purchased a large metal ruler with a 90 degree angle. The woman in the shop will buy it back from me next week, if I don't want it. It's huge. A cutting board. A folding bone. A scalpel. A madwoman in me. But one with a plan and a far out belief in this project.
I'll try to document this process in pictures for the blog. Wish me luck and look out for the woman with the scalpel.
My final project for my creative writing senior seminar class is equivalent to writing a thesis. I'm in the final course with all the graduating writers from the great Creative Writing Program of University of California Santa Cruz. Many things are better or more acclaimed on the other Universities of California, but we are the top of creative writing. Yeay. My teachers here are simply great, and they are famous and acclaimed for a reason. Them being great writers. The department is really something, I'm proud to come from here.
So, to graduate, every student has to put together a book of minimum 30 pages. And furthermore, bind it!
Yes, I have to bind my own little book, in minimum 2 copies, one for my teacher of the senior seminar, the wonderful poet Gary Young, whom I'm proud and happy to say that I know and have now studied under, and one for the department. The students then typically make 2-4 copies, so there's one for the parents too. And maybe the grandparents, too.
What the fuck has gone through my mind, I do not know. But I have now started out a production of 50 (fifty) books, and agreed with some of the bookstores here in town, that they will carry the book. The so far not existing book.
I have written 107 pages, and bought a shit load of stuff, that I am not quite sure how to use. I have had a one and a half hour introduction to book binding, in a room with thirty other students, all the graduating writers from both fiction and poetry. A speed intro, fold, fold, cut, sow, fold, glue, cut.
But the madwoman insists, that if we put on music, this will be superfun. Why go to the beach, when you can stay home and cut up paper, sew it together, and glue yourself to the homemade covers before you discover that every second page is copied in the opposite direction, so you have to turn the book every time you turn a page? I need the book done by TUESDAY. Otherwise, I will not graduate. Today is SATURDAY. It's 5 pm. I'm writing this instead of doing book. UAK, like Donald Duck always said in Danish. UAK. Then you know, he's up for trouble. He's about to piss off the old guy and lose the inheritance, or forget the nephews in daycare for a week.
I have for a while been writing texts for this book project. I have put together the texts and made the layout, made a horizontal page with two columns, a column on each book page. I've made a dummy of a print, and am about to carefully put together a print for a master. A book is a little complicated in the way that a folded piece of paper has four pages on it. But not pages 1-2-3-4. Nhohoho, hohoho, nho-nho. In this book, I will have five pages in each signature, that's the little unit of which a book has many, how many depends on the number of pages in the book; so, a sheet of paper in my book will (before folding and sewing together in the back with the other pages) have e.g. pages 1-20-2-19 on it. When that page is folded with the four other sheets in the signature, it all works out. I have to make five signatures for this book.
The print for the master which I'm about to make, is a story of its own. Last night I went to the print shop on campus to get a perfectly laser sharp print for the master. They said, Oh, we can do thee thing you say you have to do, the whole figuring out how a signature is to be designed, and scale it to be on half pages instead. They made me go home, change it all to one column per page, include the table of contents, the title pages, the copyright page, etc. in a new PDF. I went home (miles from campus) spent the hours altering, went back. They travelled around in the print shop with their heads up their asses for an hour. Then moved on to make my things. I was just anxious to get home and start sewing this together.
They made a test print. They fucking just scaled the thing down, so now my book was in miniminiminiature print, they jammed 110 pages into 26, and nobody with eyes older than 35 years of age could possibly read it. I just looked at it, and said, What do you think? They thought it was fine, and I was like, But, we talked about the fact, that this is a book, right? What about the layout? Who can read a book, that looks like this? It looks like a pamphlet for lawyers who excercise reading the things in small print? They made me waste four precious hours on nothing. Eventually I got prints of the first PDFs I had sent them, that I had come for in the first place, four hours earlier, when they said, Oh, we'll do the whole thing for you. Normally this print shop is great, and they were also friendly and didn't make me pay for the double copies I took home and am about to work with now. I did leave the shop in tears.
I've shopped. Darco Paper. Palace Arts on 41st. Palace Arts on Pacific. Longs Drugs. Lenz Arts. I now own 1500 pieces of cream colored paper. Glue. Photo paper for the cover. Book needles and button thread. A hole piercer for clay (it was much cheaper than the one for paper. And a hole is a hole, no?). A plastic ruler. Bad, I cut into it with the scalpel. So I also purchased a large metal ruler with a 90 degree angle. The woman in the shop will buy it back from me next week, if I don't want it. It's huge. A cutting board. A folding bone. A scalpel. A madwoman in me. But one with a plan and a far out belief in this project.
I'll try to document this process in pictures for the blog. Wish me luck and look out for the woman with the scalpel.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Long Legs On Oneway Ticket Adventure - Shocking Follow-Up
Got the following email from This Person.
Imagine San Francisco. A scene from any movie you've seen that takes place in the City. There's probably a car chase involved. Some serious close-to-ground-camera work, some ups and downs. The hills are crazy, just to help you, if it's been too long, since you've seen it. I remember as a child seeing it and thinking, Why has anyone started a city there? Thinking the world was an endless reservoir of locations, it didn't make any sense to me. Well. Imagine those streets.
Of all cities in the world, This Person wrote me about this parallel occurring event during the Memorial Day Weekend I recently spent in the City: (Resumé: This Person is guiding double decker tours of San Francisco. The chocolates are small rewards thrown to the passengers after small SF-trivia quizzes on board. This is Sunday morning, where I'm enjoying the SF Carnival from a rooftop with Norman Natural Born Mailman and others.)
"By the way, while you were dancing on the rooftop, fancifully festivisizing, I was atop a double decker bus barreling down a hill through a red light. The bus LOST ITS BRAKES!!! It was so surreal, my mind refused to truly believe it was happening. In stead, I held my breath and somehow, some way, we cleared the intersection unscathed by oncoming traffic. I suddenly found myself empathizing with the captain of the Titanic, invoking a spirit of calm and leadership during a time of crisis. All I could think to say was: "Everyone gets free chocolate!" and "After this tour, I'm going to call my mother and tell her what's important to me." Most of the 64 passengers were startled and stunned, but still alive at least.
Well, I suppose that's what we're all about in the tourist industry: creating memorable experiences."
Imagine San Francisco. A scene from any movie you've seen that takes place in the City. There's probably a car chase involved. Some serious close-to-ground-camera work, some ups and downs. The hills are crazy, just to help you, if it's been too long, since you've seen it. I remember as a child seeing it and thinking, Why has anyone started a city there? Thinking the world was an endless reservoir of locations, it didn't make any sense to me. Well. Imagine those streets.
Of all cities in the world, This Person wrote me about this parallel occurring event during the Memorial Day Weekend I recently spent in the City: (Resumé: This Person is guiding double decker tours of San Francisco. The chocolates are small rewards thrown to the passengers after small SF-trivia quizzes on board. This is Sunday morning, where I'm enjoying the SF Carnival from a rooftop with Norman Natural Born Mailman and others.)
"By the way, while you were dancing on the rooftop, fancifully festivisizing, I was atop a double decker bus barreling down a hill through a red light. The bus LOST ITS BRAKES!!! It was so surreal, my mind refused to truly believe it was happening. In stead, I held my breath and somehow, some way, we cleared the intersection unscathed by oncoming traffic. I suddenly found myself empathizing with the captain of the Titanic, invoking a spirit of calm and leadership during a time of crisis. All I could think to say was: "Everyone gets free chocolate!" and "After this tour, I'm going to call my mother and tell her what's important to me." Most of the 64 passengers were startled and stunned, but still alive at least.
Well, I suppose that's what we're all about in the tourist industry: creating memorable experiences."
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
My Inner Hippie
My Inner Hippie is a mountain goat, a flower child, a treehugger, and a breath taker. A stained painter, a mug hugger, a leaf toucher, and a cotton lover. A circle smiler, a foot shower, a nut praiser, and a fire soul. I live with my eyes closed and my heart open. I live in your heart, whether you want it or not. I live there discretely, until you welcome me and embrace me as yourself. Then I come out. Then we love the world and each other, and our smells too.
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
Saturday, June 02, 2007
The Art Of Lame Titling
Yesterday, I had the most crazy five minutes. Again. The anthology called La Revista/Las Girlfriends have chosen to include a 2000 word essay of mine, which I'm really happy about. It will be in the 2007 edition, the book/literary magazine is an annual edition, which focuses on the Latino/Latina experience. I expanded a blogpost I wrote here a while ago on the Brazilian Bundas, the beautiful asses of Brazil, and my thoughts on their body ideal etc. Great, they want to publish it.
In a minute deadline panic a month ago or more, I titled the piece in a matter of seriously few seconds before a midnight online submission deadline; A Scandinaviana’s Latina Experience – The Brazilian Bundas. Quite a lame title, I think. Come on. Google "Scandinaviana". It doesn't even exist. It's a lame word my brain found somewhere in the area of bad creativity, where you try to be inventive, and that, now that, is never charming. But hey, I'll submit the word with my name to it. Of course.
Anyway, so I wrote them a month ago, just a few days after submitting, that if they wanted the piece in, I'd like to rename it. Then I didn't hear from them until two days ago, where they congratulated me; my piece is in the 2007 edition. I know they have got a ton of submissions, and this is not ungratefulness. I'm fucking happy to be included. But I figured at this late point, the title issue was long gone and too late.
Then they left me a message yesterday afternoon, saying, last chance to rename your piece is in half an hour, please call us up if you still want to. I'd been out for a walk without my phone, so when I found this message and called up, I asked, How long time have I got? Five minutes, the kind editor (Oh yes. Anyone who wants to publish me, is so far a kind person. This is just a detail) said. Five minutes? I said, Ok, I'll call you back.
What are the odds?? After a month of not spending time finding a good title, they give me another five panick attack minutes. They ended up calling me up again, and now I've changed the title to something even lamer, that I don't even know what is, because I just said ten things on the phone????? The conversation went something like this:
Editor: Hi again, it's from La Revista/Las Girlfriends.
Me: Oh, hi, yes, I'm thinking about it, I was just about to call.
Editor: It's time, we have to get this off to print now. Did you come up with anything?
Me: Eh, yes, I was thinking either something like, Beauty. Brazil. Bundas., Behind The Bundas, The Beauty of Brazilian Bundas, Body Beauty Brazil Bunda Bahia Both Sides, Both Sides of The Brazilian Beauty, Both Sides, Beauty and Bodies, Beauty and Both Sides, eeehh, I don't know, or maybe Brazi..why don't you just pick something?
Editor: Ok, thank you. We will. Thanks.
Me: Thank you so much for publishing me.
Me: Eh..
Me: Bye..?
So now it's really exciting to see, which lame title it's going to end with. Give me TTTTIIIIMMMMEEEE for f's sake.
In a minute deadline panic a month ago or more, I titled the piece in a matter of seriously few seconds before a midnight online submission deadline; A Scandinaviana’s Latina Experience – The Brazilian Bundas. Quite a lame title, I think. Come on. Google "Scandinaviana". It doesn't even exist. It's a lame word my brain found somewhere in the area of bad creativity, where you try to be inventive, and that, now that, is never charming. But hey, I'll submit the word with my name to it. Of course.
Anyway, so I wrote them a month ago, just a few days after submitting, that if they wanted the piece in, I'd like to rename it. Then I didn't hear from them until two days ago, where they congratulated me; my piece is in the 2007 edition. I know they have got a ton of submissions, and this is not ungratefulness. I'm fucking happy to be included. But I figured at this late point, the title issue was long gone and too late.
Then they left me a message yesterday afternoon, saying, last chance to rename your piece is in half an hour, please call us up if you still want to. I'd been out for a walk without my phone, so when I found this message and called up, I asked, How long time have I got? Five minutes, the kind editor (Oh yes. Anyone who wants to publish me, is so far a kind person. This is just a detail) said. Five minutes? I said, Ok, I'll call you back.
What are the odds?? After a month of not spending time finding a good title, they give me another five panick attack minutes. They ended up calling me up again, and now I've changed the title to something even lamer, that I don't even know what is, because I just said ten things on the phone????? The conversation went something like this:
Editor: Hi again, it's from La Revista/Las Girlfriends.
Me: Oh, hi, yes, I'm thinking about it, I was just about to call.
Editor: It's time, we have to get this off to print now. Did you come up with anything?
Me: Eh, yes, I was thinking either something like, Beauty. Brazil. Bundas., Behind The Bundas, The Beauty of Brazilian Bundas, Body Beauty Brazil Bunda Bahia Both Sides, Both Sides of The Brazilian Beauty, Both Sides, Beauty and Bodies, Beauty and Both Sides, eeehh, I don't know, or maybe Brazi..why don't you just pick something?
Editor: Ok, thank you. We will. Thanks.
Me: Thank you so much for publishing me.
Me: Eh..
Me: Bye..?
So now it's really exciting to see, which lame title it's going to end with. Give me TTTTIIIIMMMMEEEE for f's sake.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
