Month: August 2004

um – yeah – let’s not take our history from comic book, ‘kay guys? Please?

The painful idiocy of the war situation has finally grown to enough of a sore that Bush has begun hint at apologies. Still, note, without any word of wrong-doing. Everything has been mis-calculation and the Iraq invasion is still perfectly justified.

However, the up-coming Republican influx into New York isn’t going too well. Apparently so many people are trying to leave town in time that it’s making head-lines. There’s also been hints at blockades which “shouldn’t affect those leaving the city” due to a possible raising of the cities level of TerrorAlert from orange to red.

As well, the police response is looking rather, well, creepy.

from here: The New York City Police Department (NYPD) has dispatched hundreds of cops around the country to put some 56 people under 24-hour surveillance in advance of the Republican National Convention (RNC)… According to a report issued by WABC News in New York City, the subjects of this spying operation have been identified as “primary anarchists” by the NYPD. They are each being watched by teams of five detectives plus one supervisor, according to the television news report. The surveillance teams are being sent as far away as California, North Carolina, Washington DC and Boston… Another group of 20 police officers have been masquerading as anarchist protesters as part of a deep undercover operation. 

…The NYPD showed off to reporters last week some of the latest hardware it has developed to use against protesters. Devices include an Italian-made helicopter with a ‘night sun’ floodlight, small handsaws that can cut through chains linking protesters, and a new 45-pound mega-megaphone that can be heard by demonstrators several blocks away. Known as a ‘long range acoustic device,’ the megaphone also can emit a piercing sound—like a smoke detector, only much louder—designed to break up crowds. Such devices were sent to Iraq for use by troops earlier this year… Police assigned to play the role of protesters were swarmed by cops—on foot, in police cars, on motorcycles and on bicycles—and the ‘protesters’ were herded away.

…Helmeted paramilitary police armed with assault rifles have already been deployed in nearby Pennsylvania Station and subways, along with National Guard troops, NYPD canine units and regular beat cops. Other police have mounted stepped-up street patrols.

…By denying a permit for Central Park, the city administration of Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the NYPD are inviting the kind of chaos and disruption they claim they are trying to prevent… Given the acknowledged infiltration of protest groups by New York City police, the danger of violent confrontations sparked by agents provocateurs is very real.

I walked home 50 blocks to save on busfare.

I love complicated whimsical music late at night. It’s possible to imagine dancing spontaneously occurring under a hundred streetlamps just out of view. I will never understand why more of the world is not awake these precious hours of early morning. The lack of humans makes it a lonely time to be aware, but oh the darkness is so nice outside my window. Just black with the occasional wail of dying alone frieght train brakes. My favorite time for that sound is the middle of the hot afternoon, when the sun is harshly burning images of everything white into your retinas. Heat rising off the pavement in blurry waves and a group of kids in shorts are learning how to skateboard when suddenly -that sound-. That wrenching at the human spirit artificial howl. It’s misplacement makes it precious in a way that it isn’t at night. On a basic level, like seeing the face of who you’re talking to, like having a voice, such sounds are allowable at night. Being alone belongs to the darkness.

I move like water when I’m dancing? You’re on drugs.

Another day of nothing in particular but happy conversation. Not wasted time per se, but nothing tangible has been aquired. Arguing with the webcam for an hour got me nothing but error messages, and really, when one uses windows, those aren’t very rare. I’ve mucked with my resume as much as humanly possible as well. Now to fix the printer black. Try a pin to unglue the ink. I’m beginning to be in dire need for a second job. I managed this week with only $10, but I’m uncertain how many weeks more I can do it for.

My obscenely odd wish to go for drinks has at last come to fruition. There’s a first time for everything. No beach yet. Dominique has me snagged for fruity rum drinks. Perfect timing as the desire has faded with the rain. The sun has come out just in time for evening and burned it all away. Perhaps, I’m thinking, we could catch the foggiest edge of want. I’m going to bring the cherry kircsh because it’s nasty. Cruelty to oneself might tone down the bubbly. If this were a film, I’d wear a black and white dress and swing my arms when I walked. If this were a book, the detail would be higher to make up for the lack of content and if this were a song, I’d be singing about love like The Cranberries do. “You’re so pretty, the wa-ay you are”

Love, however, is not so much on my mind.

I am thinking about how utterly ridiculous my life can be. How it’s best when nothing ends, when moments roll after moment and there is no stillness that isn’t full. For instance, it’s possible that somewhere it’s a good idea, taking a ferret in the shower. In my head, it might be, and that was a miniature adventure. I need to live in a studio again for it really to work, I think. Somewhere with an open room watercloset. Ghods – now the furboy is knocking everything off my shelves in his excitement. He wants to curl up with me to groom but as I’ve no clothes for him to burrow in. We’re having a hard time finding middle ground.

I’m kicking him out before this degenerates into furry comments.

Tomorrow world, tomorrow I change you. Tomorrow I stand on the hood of a car and yell at people. Promise.

I’m thinking… flames.

geek dot

For the basic geek appreciation, I present Curser and Spam Amusement.

Also: the future is happening too slowly. Again. Police to have live-feed cameras in thier helmets. The fact they then send the data back to the ground to a wifi handheld, rather than just being viewable makes it interesting. Think we the people will get to find out how well it works? I want the feed. 

curser found thanks to 

perhaps a non-geisha : excuse the goth

In spite of myself, I’m fascinated. It’s like gamelan, this ripple of technology weaving notes into a complicated person on the other end. Vapour trail of tiny notes. Letters turning into words, letters turning into a conversation between them back and forth. With the last sound I get the distinct feeling that I’m caught. Hooked on this tiny music, snared. I wish you dreaming of silk.

I booted off the boy who wanted my company this evening. Told him pipe dreams aren’t allowed wednesdays. The wind-down effect is still on though. We’re messaging over his phone and I’m out-lining what his night gets to be. Taking the weight of thinking off after ten hours at the office being in charge of sheaves of crew. I decided today it’s time to go through the distressing pictures. I’ve pulled out the scanner from under the movie shelf in the livingroom. My roommate has handed me over the webcam, though I’m not certain why. I suppose this means I can try my hand at creating images again. Vignettes for the world to stumble onto. The tech is creeping into my room, hooked up to my glowing life.

I’ve run out of Flickr space this month and Fotobuilder is glitching again. Bastard things. I think I’ll use Multiply, as it seems to work, though Warren and I managed to break it yesterday. Watch me find a bloody limit on how many pictures it will let you host. The hands of angels can’t keep up with my multi-tasking some days.

haven’t taken apart these scans yet

this one will keep you back

I love meeting people over the internet. There’s something inherently different, something new in it that I hope some day will be taken for granted. It’s different from pen-pals, there’s the option of geek bonding. Sending letter, then links, then pictures. I’ve got a webshot picture sitting in the corner of my screen now and I smile when I look at it. That image was just clicked thousands of miles away and whisked with a button over millions of miles of wires to sit on my desktop and make me grin. How surreal. How wonderful. How utterly this needs to be thought of everywhere.

EDIT: Alrighty – I’m in sick trouble. *laughter* Being wished an full english-accented dark goodnight from across the planet wins.

turning bottled water into wine

Sometimes I think to myself that I accept too much. That I should argue less and about different things. These gray skies days tell me nothing. One after another they reinforce the end of summer. There are no girls singing when I walk by the houses at night. The cloud cover smothered them and stole their voices. The wind has them now, it’s off sweetly singing to creatures in Nepal.

Woke up this morning not quite rested. Occasionally my friend stays awake too much, his hands thinking about me. I wake up with the breathing changing and the feeling that somehow I’ve given back teenaged youth to a man in his forties. There’s a mutter in the dark, I appreciate using communication to avoid sexuality. Shut that off. Snap close case close, end that bloody thier desire thing. It’s a pressure and it doesn’t bode well for dreaming. I don’t mind though, because really, what have I got happening today? I dropped off my film before noon and that was my only errand to run. Sleep when I drop, when I can no longer type, no longer write. Sleep when the world has gone to bed.

Walking to his house last night, it was warm and wet. Air thick and I let my coat drop to my waist within a block of my house. I took off my shirt, rolling the velvet up to tuck into my waistband. Too pale these days, as always, I glow in the dark. So lovely to feel the rain sprinkle on my skin. I had to change my route to avoid the still open shops on Commercial Drive. Felt strange to be outside walking before midnight. People were still sitting in the coffee shops. A street back and I almost didn’t see anyone. Only a pair of almost elderly italian who gentleman bowed to me as I walked past them. They said something to me, but I don’t know what. I’m going to choose to think it was on my violet tophat rather on my lack of reasonable clothing. They were to gracious to be talking D-cup, right?

The ocean is trying to claim Vancouver by sky. It’s hard coming down, step outside and it hits. There is no mistaking this for anything but water. I said yesterday that there is no glory in this rain, it’s only wet. Well, it’s worse today. This is rain that would depress Susan Vega. I love it. Drenching, but not in torrents. It’s possible to see the knife edge of every drop. I don’t know what’s shifted, it could be there’s an alcoholic in my genes, but I want to be loud on a beach with a bottle of something. All I have is cherry kirsch and that’s just nasty. It’s the booze that diabetics use to suicide. Not appropriate for shouting at the incoming waves in the slightest. Not even appropriate for drinking, really. Plus I’d rather a bottle I could slip a note inside and toss spinning into the ocean.

{insert acoustic guitar solo here}

There’s to be a jam at wreck beach this friday night. Cellos and violins on the nudist beach. Mishka wants me to sing, but I think I’m going to decline. It’s going to depend quite a bit on the weather if it even happens at all. I may volunteer my apartment box and attempt to piss off the neighbours with rowdy wine-drinking artists, but I also may have another Global Freeloader on the couch. Another young woman and I’m liking the trend.

because a good meme… who likes me enough to say

water balloons marked PROPERTY OF ENOLA GAY

I’m feeling a little like an amateur magician whose tricks have come real. My mailbox is a battered black hat from which I pull out little glittering treasures. Somewhere there has to be a catch. I look at the time and it’s hours later than I thought it was. The sky has been the same pale null all day so there’s no shift of light to warn it’s evening. I jumped when the buzzer hummed. Who would be coming over? My boxmate back from work already. I meet him at the door to warn him the ferret is out and consider how many hours have been sucked away by a surprise from the other side of the planet. The internet strikes again, lashing out to amuse. Synchronicity. Speak and the demons will appear. Called into being with chance words. Why are all the charming men so very far away?

Shaw is offering a months free cable and so as Gavin is a telly watcher, I’m writing this as the cable guy prods at the back of the dying set. Internet is down for a few minutes. Scaring the ferret as well, no doubt. At some point I really should turn off the Madras orchestral music I’ve become enamoured of today and leave the apartment. Get some real clothes on and simply walk out of the box. Ferry my latest film to the developers out in Richmond. Sooner than later as later I know I’ll be using my energy in deflection. Two of the fellows are hoping for my particular talents tonight. Winding them down after work, I should almost start charging. Kneading out the knots they get from thier long days. Whomever calls first, I suppose. I don’t know who I would prefer to spend time with. The frenchman actor knows better but plays persistant and the tomcat director’s just discovered me. He doesn’t know any better yet than to like me.

teeth

claws

I need to get shoes whose entire purpose is to look incriminating when carefully left in the lighting. I’m thinking red.