trees have grown tall birds have flown high, higher and higher goodbye goodbye goodbye

i have never imagined myself as one who gets star-struck. i imagine myself as someone who acknowledges the fact that famous people are just doing what they know as life. and what would i acomplish if i was slackjawed in the face of a star? nothing as far as i am concerned.
visitors are nice. they are a break from the ordinary they are a release from the same faces, the same people, the same things that consume us daily. two weekends ago i got to visit kylie and eric in ft. worth, then i made it over to visit camille and marcos in euless. a few weeks prior to that lindsay came and visited rosalyn and i in austin. this weekend david and vonnie (rose) perry are in town, along with heather, marcos, and camille. sometimes gail, (abby thompson) her sister meagan and their mom kath come see me at work. on sunday my sister is coming to see me. i truly believe that these visitations are what sustain me. and not even just them, but the anticipation of them.
there were three visitors in my store this past week. two (three i guess) saturday and one on friday. i am going to jump around in chronology a bit on these habitues, because it will make my story stronger.
saturday before opening the store i was assigned to vacuum the front portion. i was using shop vac, who is missing an attachment, so you either get tapered hose or rubber squeegee (oh my word i had to look that one up, and i love it!) for liquid clean up. i naturally chose tapered hose because rubber squeegee just could not cut it for a dry surface.
i come to the bottom of a chair and i see a little cruiser. she is not moving or scurrying away. she is just, just. so i shut off shop vac and inspect her. she looks ill, i get a second opinion, sydney agrees. we decide to take liz, the gecko outside. after some intense persuasion we get her into a cup and take her to the sun. she found comfort in the cup and i littered so she could have a home facing the morning brightness. i do not know where she went from here, but she was a great little addition to my morning and i loved her.
going back to friday, in my store, a co-worker approached me ecstatic. my hero is in the store, oh my goodness! who was her hero i implored? none other than miss patty griffin, who i love. i kept a watchful eye on her and was giddy and told all the other employees that she was with us. what could have possibly been wrong with me? i did finally talk to her, i had to go get her a new size in some pants from the back. she was great.
and on the the third guest (i suppose it was more like thrid and fourth but they were in a pack so i am not sure on this one). i was working up at the cash register and i see an arm like this,and then i hear a very familiar voice. a voice that can only belong to one person, i look up and the owner is removing her sunglasses and its her:jesse james and sandra bullock are buying tiffany's table manners for teenagers. a great gift might i suggest.
sandra then flips through the catalog we have setting out at each register and points to our lovely stocking. jesse then asks me if we have these in our store (whilst pointing to them), i say "yes we do they are just right up there in the front hanging on that tree there." sandra goes and checks them out. while she is gone i complete jesse's transaction, he paid in cash and i foolishly dropped the dime as i counted back his change to make dad proud. and when i say dropped the dime i mean i basically threw it at him. sandra returned empty handed and said, "i love them but they are just too small" referring to the stockings. then they left and i was put away by the whole incident that i had the hardest time with the next transaction.
all this to say, i was star-struck and taken by the three famous people that came into my store. but i feel guilty. i feel like i should be equally excited and expressive about my excitement when i have other visitors. okay maybe not a gecko, but at least my loved ones. i mean they are what get me through. should they not be able to tell that when i see them? i believe they should so i will work on that.

in the end, in the grand scheme of things, it is not like patty, jesse, sandra and even liz have done anything for me. surely the other visitors that i have had since i have moved back to texas have been greater to me, and infinitely more meaningful. so why is it that i will be more likely to tell you about the later three (four) encounters?

the farther i come the farther i fall whatever i knew it was nothing at all nothing at all, just making me small smaller and smaller i fall back.

i turn my camera on i cut my fingers on the way

i am at it again. driving myself halfway across the country, car full of all my belongings, mainly clothes.
the last time i did this i made a sort of photo journal. i am not sure i will do it again, although, i am going different routes and it kept me entertained.
i will however be needing your help. i am compiling ideas of what the heck i am going to listen to as a drive and what you think i should listen to and where and when would be greatly appreciated. in order to not go crazy, i'll need the album, not just a single song, but if it is dire please tell me.
just so you know i will be driving I5 straight down to I10 and into phoenix from there. the next day i will be shooting myself for continuing on I10 and driving through el paso and off at 290 bringing me on in to austin.
your suggestions are greatly appreciated and since i know that my good friends read this i know i won't be left with some lame proffer. and if i am i will reconsider our friendship. feel free also, to leave more than one. thanks friends, i can't wait.

ps: did i tell you the story about the womens club? or the man with the pink slippers?

straight i wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;

i have a friend at work, ed, he is a funny person. funny in the way he thinks, the things he says, and the way he lives his life. a good person to have around, in my opinion. when some people get fustrated it is annoying or even frightening. but ed is even funny when he is fustrated, i am sure it is not funny to him, but funny to me.
i am not even sure how to describe ed to you. he enjoys a good argument, but his positions in them are often ridiculous. he also likes to think that he can pursuede people into doing ludicris things, like abandoning my prior engagements, jobs, responsibilities, plans, etc., to hitch hike halfway across the country to go see a concert that is sold out and sell grilled cheese sandwiches in the parking lot to get in (a greatful dead fan base tradition, ed is a deadhead, but i'd rather leave traditions with the prospective bands, cherry garcia is my all time favorite flavor of ice cream though). he has tried to talk me into doing this at least three times since april and each time he suggests i do it alone. yes, it would be fun, but honestly i will never do that exactly.
so now that you possibly have some sort of impression of ed, i will tell you what he did upon my suggestion.
for three weeks now ed has been looking for a third roommate. i am not sure what kind of add he put out or how he was looking for this third cohort but it might envolve telephone poles and a staple gun, again something i would never do but i'm not a deadhead so maybe i just don't understand.
he recieved a phone call from someone who was looking for a room for his girlfriend, not himself, but his girlfriend (again i lack faresightedness here). ed set up a time and date when they could meet and come check out the house. ed asked his name and upon hearing it laughed hysterically. he aksed again only to find out his ears did not deceive him. "raisin" he reapeated, "who has the name raisin?" all in a fury of laughter. the guy repeated his name two more times then he spelled it out for ed, r-a-v-e-n. still ed continued to laugh and they moved on from there.
now, ed told me this story and immediately i get this bass line in my head and see this
after laughing and trying to gain even just a little bit of composure my only verbal response was, "who names their kid raven?" ed replies with a, "i thought raisin was funny, but now all i see is a black bird." we talked a little more about the oddity of the name and i asked if raven what offended when he thought it was raisin. ed told me that he was annoyed a little and wanted to end the conversation fairly quickly. i told ed he had to do one of two things, at least, when raven came to see his house...either have marvin gaye singing in the background, or find some old vhs of the california raisins cartoon (i cannot believe the actually had a television show). ed of course agreed to this lunacy and followed through (now i am indebted to follow through on one of his suggestions...great). only he played the melody on his harmonica as not to be so obvious. which i like even more because raven might or might not get it.
the rest of the story is not fun, raven spent about five minutes looking at the house sans girlfriend, who was pregnant with his child, and said no thank you.
a sense of humor he did not implore
quoth the raven, "nevermore"

you know that i could be in love with almost everyone

what would you say if i told you that i saw a burning recliner in the middle of the road?
well i would tell you that i thought you were crazy and that sounded like a stupid story and that only people who drop acid see things like that.
well then i'd laugh and kick you in the face because its true. as i was driving down pleasant hill blvd. the other night, through the trees, i saw a flame. as i drove nearer the flame grew larger and i slowed down so i could see what it was. either a garbage can or a recliner.
it was on the opposite side of the street from me. so i didn't have the best view. but it was right in the middle of two lanes. the worst part was that there was not any one else around. i was alone. so how will anyone know if i am telling the truth or not?
the next day i drove by it and for sure, springs and wood supports. the only parts that did not burn. i was not dreaming and i was not dropping acid. amazing. i should have crashed my car in laughter.
i should have photographed it.
on this same road months ago i saw a dump truck flip over and block two full lanes of traffic. it was one of those dumpish trucks that a lot of maintenance companies use to put their lawn clippings in, the truck was upwright, the metal lawn clipping holder was not.
i cannot wait to see what else i can see on this road. its due time for another travesty or desultory happening.
i love robot chicken, voltron just got served.

this isn't christmas this is chinatown and those are pretty lights

i was visiting my grandpa (harold) and grandma (fern) a couple of weekends ago. they are both getting older in age and the stories seem to loop. my sister and i sat in for 1.5 loops of grandpas stories and i held hands with grandma so she knew that i loved her.
as we were leaving my grandfather said something i do not ever want to forget. so i'll catalogue it here in hopes that it will last an eternity.
he was telling meredith and i how much he loved to travel and visit people and relatives and so on, then he said, "we used to go see the people we know, now we don't know the people we go see." we laughed, then harold realized somewhere in his mind that his comment might be a little off color and he said, "oh i just added that in there," instead of something like, "oh, i'm just kidding." we laughed some more and i made a point to engrave what he said in the back of my mind and try not to screw it up.
then i decided that i would no longer say, "i'm just playing around (or something of the like)," and instead i'll start saying, "i just added that in there."

we gotta install microwave ovens, custom kitchen deliveries, we gotta move these refrigerators, we gotta move these colour tvs

there is a new saga in my life that has finally come to an end. a conquest that took my sister and i from march till now to complete.
the epic i am referring to is the one of the microwave oven. and thanks to dire straits every time i think about the soap opera i get money for nothing stuck in my head. and i think about it every time i take the trash out, pull the trash bins to the curb, or open my trunk.
it begins when i move here, to california. the first week i lived here i had not much to do when derek and meredith were at work. so i volunteered to make a run to the thrift store to make a donation. so we loaded my trunk with tons of junk. and for the first time in the history between my car and i, hym pinkerton had someone elses junk in his trunk. most of this junk stayed in my car for about a month. one day i finally made it to st. vincent de pauls to give my (not really my) junk away. i was so relieved when the little man was finished emptying my trunk of his burden. only to my suprise he picked his way through all the bags i had given away so freely to tell me that they did not accept electronics. the reason being they did not want to check to see if they worked. so i drove away head hung low. a trunk full , still, of a toaster, a toaster oven, two telephones, some speakers, and thee microwave oven.
quite some time later my sister and i were at the anthropologie in berkeley, abusing my discount no doubt, and as we were putting valuables into my trunk, she was astonished to find her junk still in there. we then decided to just put them in the dumpter at the back of the store near the parking lot. so we tossed the toaster, the toaster oven, the telephones, the speakers, the...oh wait please, this yarn does not end here.
we left the microwave oven because we felt it was too large to toss into the large metal dumpster. WHAT? well its true. since i worked there, and someone did see us throwing things away, we did not toss there. so the microwave stayed. and i should have named it. the weeks passed on and every time i errked on my brakes because someone cut me off it slamed into the back seats. when i turned corners too fast like i like to do, it banged against either side of the car. life went on like this for far too long. till about a week ago actually.
meredith and i had the brilliant idea to throw the microwave into our neighbors trash. they had just moved out and had quite a heap. so we did. and what happened later that day when we came home to roll in the dumpsters? well, we found our microwave on the curb. alone, hot, and still there. so the next week we put it on top of our trash. came home and found it there, hot, and alone.
the end of this chronicle comes just last week when after finding the microwave oven on the curb for the second time, we hoisted it into the bottom of the trash dumpster and prayed it did not get stuck. there it sat for one week trash piling on top of it, me hopeing this would be the end of our relationship.
tuesday came, the dumpster was rolled to the curb, i went to work, meredith went to work, we came home. we ate dinner, we went for a run, we forgot about our now friend, that we tossed to the curb. as we returned from our run we approached the trash dumpster, i was nervous. i did not open the lid. i just began to roll it back to its position at the side of the house. i found it light, without burden, free of the microwave, just like my trunk, just like the curb, just like our lives. the time had finally come. the end is here.
money for nothing and chicks for free.

fat bottomed girls they'll be riding today

cody nobody here knows what a pump is. and i work in a store where we sell bicycles. and everyone rides their bikes to work. and nobody knows what a pump is.

you say black I say white
you say bark I say bite
you say shark I say hey man
jaws was never my scene
and I dont like star wars
you say rolls I say royce
you say God give me a choice
you say lord I say christ
i dont believe in peter pan
frankenstein or superman
all I wanna do is
bicycle bicycle bicycle
i want to ride my bicycle bicycle bicycle

i stubled upon you and greatfully basked in your rays

i do not remember the first time i met him. it is more like i have always known him. i do not remember the last time i saw him and i cannot pick out a favorite memory. i know that everytime i did see him he blessed my life with a sense of light and love and friendship that lasts. there was a real genuine quality about him. everyone knew who he was and he loved everyone who knew him. and he really did.
when he came to town there were lists of people that he would go visit. i felt honored that my couch was the one he chose to sleep on. i remember one visit he was unable, for one reason or another, to stay on my couch for one night and i felt cheated of something. how selfish could i possibly be? the verdict is still out. when neal would visit i felt the need to erase any agenda i had and relish in his presence. we could go eat greasy food, he could drive my car, we would listen to music impossibly loud. kylie and i would make sure his shirt was ironed for church in the morning. we would make sure he left some of his empty baxter boxes (for his dialyis) at our house, perfect for packing books and movies in. even after 3 moves i know i still have stuff stowed away in those boxes, thank you.
i found out friday night that sweet baby neal (as i would call him and he would let me) had left us to go home. as i listened to the voice mail driving down the road i instantly turned on dashboard confessional and started my car from a complete stop in second gear just for him. i could hear his infectuous laughter as he undoubtedly looked down on me. i laughed right back through tears and luckily did not crash my car. such a feeling of release and rue filled my heart at the same time.
neal was such a beautiful soul, strong willed and courageous. i remember when he was very young, playing basketball on the uneven courts at blue haven up against men nearly three times his hight, absolutely fearless. nine times out of ten he was better than those men. mostly i remember love. i remember that neal had love. not only did eveyone love him, but he loved everyone. he showed love and determination in every little thing he did. and now he is home. and that is what it takes to go home. i hope that your hearts always warm.