lessons

What I learned from Men's Health magazine
or as I usually think it should be called: Your Window Into the Idiotic Straight Male Psyche

Women are...interested in men who express alpha status. Accomplish this by using a loud voice, speaking often, taking up lots of space, and interrupting others.

In other words, get drunk and act like the asshole you know you are, asshole. That makes sense since I'm pretty sure men are interested in women who display omega status. Accomplish this by always agreeing, doing his laundry and keeping your dumb-ass mouth shut. What other gems can MH offer?

The message you must convey to women boils down to "I'm here, I'm male, and I won't hurt you."

That's definitely the first thing I'd like to know. (I'll have you know I didn't even add that color, HM used it on it's own.)

Maybe just one more:

Rather than what she says, how she acts is a much more reliable gauge of what she's thinking. Straightening her hair or orienting her body toward you means she's interested.

And if she says "no," she really means "Yes!"

These are just random quotes from the article printed on the accompanying photographs. I don't know if I have the wherewithal to read the entire blathering piece. Plus I might just end up quoting the entire thing on here.

What I learned last night

Semi-pleasurable sexual experiences do not provide enhanced artistic inspiration. Apparently I have to be utterly disappointed and unsatisfied to tap into my well of creativity. That uncomfortable mix of pleasure and mild shame just doesn't cut it. Maybe I'm expecting too much, it was at least a learning experience on my creative process. When it comes down to it, I'm really doing research. Where's my grant money?

What I learned right now

No matter how tired you are or how late you might be you should always check weather.com. Stupid rain. Stupid sandals.

What else I learned right now

If you're going to be at a gym for 4 hours you might as well bring some workout clothes, even if you don't feel like exercising, because you probably won't have anything better to do.

Also, this morning (at 5:30AM) I cried on the subway again from The Road. Again. I restrained myself a bit more this time. Who knows what other psychotic shit might have come spilling out that early?

math at the end of the world

l x w = ?

What's the answer? I'll give you a hint: it has to do with rectangles.

I was playing online pictionary (also called graffiti by those Yah*oo bastards, just to make it hard to find) and my "requesting to remain anonymous for this very reason" coworkers could not guess the answer. (I had actually drawn them a square as well.) I refused to start a new drawing. We sat there for over a minute while I kept saying Length times width! Length times width! I was flabbergasted. In an attempt to find someone to share my befuddlement I told this story to another coworker who also failed to provide the correct answer. How could this be?! They each justified their woefully lacking knowledge of math by pointing out that they majored in theater. Damn arts, ruining the scientific minds of our "youth."

Let's jump to a new topic.

Have you read The Road by Cormac McCarthy? It's really good. Really really good. This is my second time reading it in less than a year and it made me cry on the subway this morning. It was a pretty crowded train at 7:30AM and I was sobbing. His writing completely caught me off guard. I think it's becoming one of my favorite books ever. You should read it.

You know what's better than lukewarm V8? Probably most things.

I did send off most of the emails that I was supposed to though. It's really hard to try to keep track of 8 different people's schedules. I need a better planner. I wish I had an electronic one with an actual type schedule in it. Like the one on my computer at home. That would be great.

Ugh, I still have 3 1/2 more hours of sitting alone in the box office before I can go home and figure out what kind of food to eat, based on what currently grosses me out the least. That'll be fun, won't it?

some problems

It's funny how little things can still upset me so completely. Not so much funny "ha ha" more funny "psycho."

I just received a "thanks but no thanks" email from my pilates instructor concerning my pilates notes. The book of exercise notes she gave my "class" was written a while ago by her husband and she didn't like the way it was done. She noticed that I had been retyping all of the notes in a better format and adding notes from the DVDs she had given us. She mentioned she was interested in buying either my notes or another girl's. So I sent off my notes for her to look at and she just emailed me saying she's going with the other girl's. Now, normally that would only hurt a little bit but here's the thing. I've trained with this other girl and while she's training me she keeps consulting her notes but can't figure out what they're referring to. For instance, we'd be doing an exercise and she'd read "reach arms overhead for stretch" and she would say, "Hmm, I don't know if that means behind you or to the ceiling or what. Let's try some different things." And we did and I didn't feel a stretch so obviously her notes weren't helping. I deliberately made my notes explicitly clear so that if you couldn't exactly remember how an exercise was to be accomplished it would tell you. I don't see the point of using notes that don't make any sense. But her notes were apparently almost verbatim from the DVDs which I'll admit I didn't do because my instructor doesn't cover everything in the DVDs and rambles a lot. Anyway, the rejection just hurt and the thing is it hurt way more than it should have. That's not even much of a rejection but I really went temporarily crazy-hate in my head. Literally, it was like rage was coming out every pore of my skin. I should probably work on that with my therapist. (Who still doesn't exist sooo...I'm done!)

I know the feeling

My my. I don't know if this song is work appropriate, nevertheless it's what's playing right now. Good thing I'm alone up here.
____________________________
Once I had taste
Once I crossed the line
Once it overflowed
I lost my mind

The smell of you is sex
The thought of you is cream
The taste of you it makes me scream

Once I bit the fruit
Once I turned the key
Once is not enough when
You're deep in me
____________________________
Mmm-hmm.

accurate

Isaac was once again accusing me of lacking feelings (brought on by my desire to go to Fashion Soup for lunch, figure that connection out):

HL: Your heart is made of ice.
pause
Me (softly whimpering): It can still break.

an achievement?

When I arrived at work yesterday I had a lovely sense of satisfaction over my many accomplishments already finished that morning. What were those grand accomplishments? Waking up early, riding the subway from the south end of Brooklyn to the north end of Manhattan, showering, then riding back to midtown and only arriving to work 15 minutes late. So my accomplishments basically consisted of basic hygiene, sitting on my ass and arriving to work late. If I can keep up this awesome potential I'll be curing cancer in no time.

Did I tell you I went on a "date" the other day? I know, can you believe it? Maybe I won't be alone forever. To recount the entire "date" would be annoying so I'll just tell you this: it began with a train ride and ended with me washing his shorts. Let that titillate your imagination, you'll probably come up with something better than what really happened. Of course, we all know the real ending is my remaining alone but whatever. It kind of blows that when I finally get up the nerve to ask someone out it has to be someone who's soon to be unavailable (he's from Montreal and going back soon). Am I turning into my mother? He is originally from Normandy and speaks French so maybe I am. (See francophile blog, that's ma mere.)

gay blogilates

I haven't posted for so long that I almost forgot my blogger password.

Today's post starts off all about pilates and I think YorN might be the only person who'll be genuinely interested. You'll see why soon, I'm about to get dancer dorky. I had a session with a fellow trainee and she rocks. She has a great eye and has really helped to start balance me out. She's noticed that the right side of my body is much more developed than my left and that I totally cheat at exercises to compensate. This morning I told her that I wanted to work on a specific series because I was having a lot of trouble with my scapulae flaring out. I mentioned that my scapulae are crazy because even when I'm just standing there they start to poke out from my back and I could not figure out how to keep them down. First and only of all, in my pilates and my old dance classes, the instructors were always talking about finding the lats (the latissimus dorsi, a huge muscle of the back) and pulling them down. So today, Megan (the fellow trainee) and I started experimenting and we discovered that when I'm told to pull my lats down what I actually do is depress my scapulae by contracting my rhomboids. I couldn't access my lats at all! And this whole time that's totally what I thought I was doing! I was horribly upset that I was so lacking in body awareness. We spent the next 10 minutes just trying to get me to find my lats. I was finally able to but then keeping that awareness and performing exercises is really hard. Like, really hard. Then, after we had done some more pilates, Megan showed me some more exercises I could do just for my lats because once again, my right side is more developed than my left. I started concentrating on those and noticed that when looking in the mirror in front of me I actually had a great view of my back, it being reflected from the mirror behind me. So I of course stripped off my shirt so I could really see those lats working. It helped a lot. And really, my back looks pretty good, maybe hot even. I then became fascinated with the imbalances in my back when I was just standing still. Namely, my right scapula juts out and up much more noticeably than my left. I played with trying to bring it back into alignment but now it's 5 hours later and I must have concentrated on it too much because now all I can feel is that shouderblade poking out and it's starting to hurt and really drive me crazy.

No segue...

A few nights ago MNS and Pants had a karaoke party and I was invited. Now, I've never sang karaoke before, ever and I told MNS that I probably wasn't going to start anytime soon. She and I are pretty much on the same wavelength when it comes to karaoke. But after watching her brave a few songs I figured I'd better step up. And step up I did. I quickly drank 3 beers, which gave me an extra boost of light headed confidence (particularly since I hadn't eaten since lunch), went to the front of the room and belted out Bjork's It's Oh So Quiet. Wow bam! Zing boom! I put energy into that fucker! When I sat down MNS just looked at me for a moment then said, "I've never seen this side of you. I've known you for so long and have never seen you like this." And that was just a precursor. Later I sang Don't Tell Mama with MNS's sister, Beta, complete with ass slaps and body caresses. Upon sitting down this time MNS leaned over and whispered in a surprised, slightly conspiratorial/complimentary tone, "You are such a fag. Really faggy." Who knew? Now you do.

And finally...

More disastrous combinations

semantics

A quote from my boss at the theater:

"I know you're not calling our members hookers."

Who knew she had such good hearing?

The ability to recognize negative behavior often has no correlation with correcting that behavior. At least that's how it often is with me. I can usually easily spot when I'm being whiny, pitiful or self-destructive but do I stop? Nosirree. Even when my behavior is so secretive that the only person that knows its happening (and hence the main person it hurts) is me. Petulance reigns supreme. Why can't I just enjoy aspects of life? Why do I crumble when my plans are disrupted? Why do I feel like I deserve this loneliness? Only my therapist (who doesn't exist) can tell.

In other news, I wish I could stay at the gym all day. I love it there (right now, I'm pretty fickle when it comes to things that make me happy so we'll see how long this lasts). I love spending hours and hours exercising and stretching. Yesterday I had to go open the studio at 6AM. I then did some cardio for about 35 minutes, watched some pilates training then had an hour of a sort of personal pilates/weight/cardio class where a teacher was trying to create a new routine so she tried it out on me. I felt so tired when I left but that evening I decided to skip the closest subway stop and walk the 20 blocks to the next express stop. Then I come to work at the theater and get down down down. Enclosed in a windowless cube, I arrive and immediately begin to gorge on sugar. Perhaps someday I'll be able to do something I love. Isn't that everyone's goal? Has anyone achieved it? No one I know, it seems.

When I arrived home around 11PM last night and opened the cupboard to put away some soy milk I had bought I noticed that my peanut butter was nearly gone. That's not how I left it. I immediately went to my room, grabbed a sheet of paper, left my passive-aggressive note on the stove and went to bed. Before I fell asleep I heard one of my roommates come home and when I got up this morning the note was gone. That's too bad, because it was for both of them. I also took my chips out of my room and put them back in the kitchen, you know, as a temptation. We'll see what happens.

I had only been at the pilates studio this morning for about 10 minutes before the cops showed up. Apparently the alarm had gone off. I thought something was weird with the alarm but since I was able to deactivate it and now it says "Ready" I figured everything was fine. Guess not. After telling me that I needed to contact the alarm company one officer said, in a condescending tone, "So what, this place is filled with girls and the other one is for guys?" (There's a gritty boxing studio right across the hallway.) I gave him a mixed skeptical/incredulous look and said, "No, men come here too. What do you think I am?" Which I immediately realized was not the right thing to say. I pretty much expected him to respond, "Not a man." It was definitely in their eyes, particularly the 2nd officer's. I should have said, "And there are plenty of women at the boxing studio too, all of whom could kick your ass."

not my mom

The Earth Day website didn't make me feeling like saving ol' mother earth. Instead it made me mad, because it tried to make me feel guilty. I took the footprint quiz and yes, I could buy more non-processed foods but really, I felt like I was pretty good in the grand sweep of America. But then when I finished it hit me with the guilt: If everyone lived like you, we would need 3 planets. I think that pretty much implies: If everyone lived like you, you fucking uncaring bastard, we would need 3 planets. I understand what they're saying and that it's interesting, it just comes across as acusatory and I don't think that's the best way to get someone on your side. At least not with me; guilt usually has the opposite effect. So in honor of Earth Day I'm going to go chop down a tree, use it to kill a cow, freeze the meat and ship it off as the only cargo of a 757 to California. Now how many planets do we need, huh?

it's probably true

Prompted by a recount of my morning, a quote from HL:

It's safe to say that if you're not at work, at BAM or at DTW then you're home masturbating.

I could say nearly the same for him.

future chips

The chip wars continue at my apartment. My roommates are most definitely eating my chips. I don't think they're eating anything else I buy (at least not consistently) but the chip snacking is driving me crazy. To make doubly sure that I wasn't placing false accusations (even though I heard Horsey open my chip bag and munch away) I carefully and specifically folded the last bag and placed binder clips on the sides. When I came home the bag was haphazardly folded and the clips were not in the same place. I refolded and replaced the clips and the same thing happened the next day. When I arrived home the apartment was empty. Perfect. Since I would be heading out soon this was my chance to employ my normal passive-aggressive tactics and avoid confrontation at the same time. I wrote up a quick note:

Please stop nibbling at my food. It is incredibly inconsiderate. If you would like something please ask me first.

I was all set to put it on the fridge when suddenly both! my roommates walked in the door. Damn damn damn. So instead I sulked in my room. I thought about putting a note directly on the chip bag:

Stop. Are these yours? Then don't eat them.

But that seemed a little too snotty. I should just talk to them. The next morning I screwed my courage to the sticking place and walked into the living room to kill my roommates and become King of Scotland! I mean, Washington Heights! But of course, I chickened out. I keep thinking that to complain about something I should be the model roommate in all other areas and I'm not. Yes yes, if a friend told me that I'd say they were crazy and should stand up for themselves. But instead I just kept my chips in my room that day. Maybe I'll deal with the problem the next time I buy chips. For now, if I ever feel like I'm not the model roommate I just remember the food nibbling and the fact that I have to wash any dish before I use it, because I can't count on the roomies to thoroughly wash anything.

And speaking of gun control and weapons and stuff (see NSP's blog), has anyone seen that show Future Weapons on the Discovery channel? It's fucking creepy. It might be the most unsettling thing on television. I've only watched about 5 minutes of it but it made me extremely uncomfortable. The show is all about new weapons research and how things are becoming faster, smaller and more accurate. Part of the episode I saw featured an interview with a pilot on an aircraft carrier. He was talking about some new plane he flies and proudly pointed out the bombs it carried and talked about how great they were. What kept going through my mind was that everything featured on the show was made specifically to kill people. None of the "toys" shown had any other use. I found their pride and joy unsettling.

art schmart fart fat

It turns out that my inspiration for art comes from unsatisfying sexual experiences. Is that really a surprise? Isn't that the origin of a lot of art?

Last night was one such experience. He was attractive enough (I mean, if someone other than myself were judging him, in my opinion he could've been more attractive) and it felt good but when we were done I realized that I'd much rather be sleeping with someone I'd actually want to talk to afterwards. Anyway, while lying on his chest, experiencing the emptiness of my soul, an idea for a performance piece began to formulate in my mind. Unfortunately I can't remember much of it now but I think I've found a way to tap my creativity. This is the second time that's happened. The first time was with a different man and that experience spurned the creation of my meat cleaver piece. Coincidence or source material? You decide.

My dad and his wife were in town this weekend. Here're two new things that happened:

1. Peeing while Dad was just one urinal over...and talking to me
2. Dad's Wife pointing out men who're checking me out

And two new things I discovered:

1. Dad and Dad's Wife both take off their shoes at the theater.
2. Dad's Wife sucks mints while watching performances.

Though I have nothing against taking off your shoes, I do it too, discreetly, in other respects Dad & Dad's Wife were quickly becoming bad theater goers. Mostly it was the mints. And that she asked my dad, during the play, if he wanted one. I'll at least acknowledge that she did try to take them out of her purse as quietly as possible but still, it was a metal box with a bunch of rattling small orbs inside, those are hard to keep quiet.

We had an art filled week. On Thursday we went to the Met, which was great. After living here for nearly 3 years I'd still never been. Pathetic. I saw a self-portrait of Pablo Picasso that made me fall in love with him. Now if he were my boyfriend I'd really have some inspirational sex. We then went to the Museum of Arts & Design to see an exhibit on subversive knitting. (Thanks for the tip, MNS.) That was also awesome. One piece was a huge knitting project captured on film involving telephone poles and tractors. I could tell my dad liked that one. And then we went to see Journey's End. They liked it well enough. Their main comment, "Wow. That's certainly better than the college productions we usually see at BYU (Brigham Young University)." Good enough for me.

On Friday we went to a small movie house to watch an artsy French film, Private Fears in Public Places. We all found that to be a disappointment, not bad exactly, just not that good. Later we went to MoMA, where I rediscovered the joy of David Smith. Then we had to rush out to BAM for a performance of The Magic Flute, also a disappointment. I was so excited to take them to BAM, it feels like such a New York thing to me but the opera really was bad. The singers, professional opera singers from Belgium's national company I'm pretty sure, couldn't even fill the house with their voices. We could barely hear them. And I'm pretty sure the woman playing the Queen of the Night might have been a bird in disguise. She literally squawked out those notes.

On Saturday I had to work so Dad & Dad's Wife went to the Bodies exhibit, which they said was "good." When pressed for more they added "fine." Then that night we saw The Lion King. No, I didn't ever cry, neither did they as far as I could tell. But here's what I have to say: Julie Taymor is awesome, that grass was fucking brilliant but the basic story and many of the songs of this show are godawful boring. And tourists are weird. And fascinating up close.

And that's how it went down. Next time we're going to more experimental theater. At least they'll be expecting that to be bad.

If you had purchased tickets this morning to the theater where I work, here's part of an email you might have received:

Dear Patron:

Your Such&Such ticket order has been processed and mailed to you on (insert full date).

Please remember that there are no refunds or exchanges for any performance.

Sincerely,

What am I, a bumbling 16 year old intern? I fixed the email and sent it out again. Idiotic.

have I told you lately that I love you?

There's a reason why.

I didn't have any food in my apartment this morning for breakfast (unless I wanted to make macaroni & cheese and prune juice, which I didn't) so I headed out early to stop by Whole Foods on my way to work. I spend my time on the train fantasizing about the delicious assortment of foodstuffs I could potentially buy. These fantasies mostly centered around baked goods, scones, bagels, whathaveyou. But when I arrived and looked at the selection I remember that the Columbus Circle Whole Foods has shit ass baked goods. Everything is always too dry and overcooked, thick and hard. I was immensely disappointed. I ended up buying a champagne mango (I'd never seen one before) and some kefir. That's my breakfast and lunch. Washed down with mini peanut butter cups and some tears.

I was on the phone with a local book store and had the urge to go crazy. A specific kind of crazy. I wanted to be that person who sincerely believed he was always in the right even when making things up that never happened. I think it's called self-delusion and it's very appealing.

When I woke up this morning I decided that my task for today was would was would

I've changed my mind. My task for today is to work on my grammar.

I decided my task for today would be to make a list of what I love and what I hate about my life. Does anyone see where this is going? While I was "making" breakfast I began the list in my head but after about a minute I realized it was just going to make me unhappy. My list of pros took about 15 seconds to flesh out but my list of cons seemed unending. I had to stop. I had already been pretty upset and despondent over the role of art in my life and, more specifically, the role of my life in art. I couldn't see my life changing in any way to allow myself to become the artist I want to be. It's scary and deeply depressing. I think part of the problem is that I like to take safe "risks." I can't talk about that anymore, at least not in the blogging forum.

So here's the thing that I'm excited about and alluded to earlier. I'm going to be in a pilates machine certification course. And I don't have to pay! That's really the best part. I'm at the pilates studio right now typing this. The owner prefer to call it a fitness lab. It's not a gym (I agree) but it's more than a pilates studio so: fitness lab. That's just hard for me to say. In return for free certification I owe them 300 hours of my life, starting last Sunday. I'll be "working" here until about next December. I'm working the front desk and let me tell you, I work it, baby. Meaning I bull shit prospective clients hoping they won't discover that I don't know what I'm talking about. I really don't. I've never attending any of the classes here, nor met any of the personal trainers. The thing I'm best at is talking about pilates because even though I haven't seen anyone in action I know enough about the body in relation to pilates to sound pretty convincing. The actual classes for the certification haven't started yet, first one's this Tuesday. I'll let you know how it goes. But for now I'm enjoying myself. Sitting alone in a sunny large studio reading and listening to whatever music I want. Sounds great huh?

zen

If you spill orange colored soup on an orange colored shirt, will it leave a stain?

Ponder that question and find inner peace.

P.S. The answer is yes.

in the beginning

I've started a new project.

Here's a closer shot.

Doesn't it look complicated? And annoying? Well, it isn't one of those but is the other. It may not seem like much now but pretty soon it'll be a beautiful, though scratchy, something. And I didn't spend money on new yarn! Hence the scratchiness. I'm using yarn I bought over 11 years ago when I lived in France. That's where I learned how to knit. My first project was a sweater (a little ambitious) and I bought too much yarn by about 7 skeins*. Those skeins have since been living in my various closets. I don't remember the yarn being so scruffy when I bought it but it certainly is now. Maybe I can soften it up somehow.

During lunch today I bought yet another bag of mini eggs. HL at first made fun of my obsession but after eating about 20 he's coming around. They are so good. My little eggies. My little chocolate abortions. Tasty.

*skein: a loosely coiled length of yarn or thread wound on a reel