Just One Left

Stop making me cry, girl. Both of us can't be crying!



I love you, Michael...



Thank You, Michael...

I WOULDN'T help it even if I could.

And When The Groove Is DEAD and GONE

(Yeah...)

You Know That LOVE SURVIVES


And We Can Rock FOREVER On......

Absentee Blogging

So, it looks like I forgot I had a blog during all of May. That was partially accidental, partially not. I have been so busy with life, healthcare, sanity and the pursuit of money and shelter that I didn't really give a shit about laying it all down on E-paper. Half my utilities were cut off in the 2nd week of May, right around the time my PC gave out on me AND my health fell into a big, steaming abyss of 'Cedars Guinea-Pig Trials' and shit like that. Time Warner was suddenly the last thing from my mind.

Moving, therapy appointments (mental and physical) and trying to keep enough change in my wallet to eat at least 1 and a qtr. meals a day has been my main concern. Forgive me for not taking care of ATSWU!, but I suspect when life throws me a doggie bone or a break I will be back to my regla self, online and off.

PS: Last night I went out with Karlina & Sheila (her C. Milian-before-she-went-blonde lookalike Hova loving cousin) and saw Dance Flick (surprisingly palatable) at the Mann Chinese 6 and then had a Cadillac margarita & a Red Stripe at the White Horse on Sunset & Western poured lovingly by Vicky the kindly little old Russian bartender lady. And then she made us hot dogs. Yes, seriously.

It was a good day. After 3 weeks of 'moving' and about 2 more to come (damned Ikea Expedit pieces! Damned turntable! Damned 3 flights of steps!) I needed a day off...with Tequila. :)

-L.

I held you too tight; I can see

People misunderstand something about Lisette. There are some things I love that a lot of other people love, but I love them for entirely different reasons. The feeling they give me. The way they put me at ease and help me relax more than many other 'relaxing' things do. The hope I cling onto from the escapism they provide. I deal with a lot of rancid ass shit on the daily, so sometimes I just want to look at something that I've decided makes me smile.

Here are two.





I went on a mad Twitter rant the other day about some things, but really, its not necessary for me to rage against the hater machine in order to defend the things I love.

Things, not people.

The people (In this case, there are also TWO) I keep separated. And they need no defense, as much as they've done for me.

*sings a happy little song in a falsetto I didn't know I had*

'Cause it's a bittersweet symphony this life
Trying to make ends meet, you're a slave to the money then you die
I'll take you down the only road I've ever been down
You know the one that takes you to the places where all the veins meet, yeah
No change, I can't change, I can't change, I can't change
But I'm here in my mold , I am here in my mold
But I'm a million different people from one day to the next
I can't change my mold, no, no, no, no, no

No one ever grows old...

"Counting those days 'til we meet in a place ..willing to die for"

Don't You Ever Go Away; It'll Always Be This Way

She's trying to kill me, ya'll. She just covered one of my favorite songs in this whole WORLD on her just launched world tour. About 2 minutes and 50 seconds in, you can't wipe the smile off my face. And to think 2 years ago I was thrilled when she covered Jilly from Philly's "He Loves Me"! Trust me when I say, her Anita Baker cover takes the cake (pound, german chocolate, birthday, fruitcake...ALL them cakes) and she KEEPS getting better with age. I can even overlook that hippy ass dress.

I'm proud to admit I like this girl. *grin*

I'm Next For A Rebirth!

Jenna Jameson is now the proud Mama of Jesse & Journey Ortiz. Two boys. Healthy. I am SO inexplicably HAPPY for her.

If SHE can catch a do-over, maybe I can, too?

-L.

Yes, I love Old Music.

Something about Marilyn McCoo reminds me of my mother. Though, that's not why I love this song. Its just GOOD. Elevator music, yes....but good. And how fabulous is thinking of a breakup as simply less HOUSEWORK to do? Loves it!

Abandonment/Issues

First things first, YES, I know, I've all but 'abandoned' my blog for Twitter. See, there's a reason behind it. Twitter requires the attention span of a fruit gnat to operate/participate, while this blog here requires me to stop, sit & think about all of my madness, drama & unfortunacy (word? probably not) while I type it out. Lately, add lunacy to that stockpot of my life and there you have it. I have not been in a state to 'share', save my 140-letter or less ruminations on my lethargy, hunger, Grey's Anatomy, brokeness & evil. Christopher returned on the 9th. I slept on a pile of blankets on the floor for 3 or 4 days, and then he made a trek up to Santa Barbara county to visit his friends. I'm still in therapy with Susan Winston, & I have not found a solution to my living situation or employment situation or health situation just yet, but I'm working on all of it. After having a 4 1/2 hour conversation with Chris while lying on the floor in a fuzzy throw and violently rolling my eyes, we came to a mild understanding. Look, homie. I sublet-ted this joint in good faith that I might live here for a minimum duration of one year from the date of move in. Now you are back, i have warped credit, no proof of income and no current employment, not to mention being sick and in & out of the damn hospital while they Guinea-Pig test the shit out of me....and you want your place back. For no good reason, seeing as you aren't required to be local in order to work for paramount as a free agent/independent contractor. So, um, WTF. He saw it (partially) my way, Thank God, and so as for the immediate present, I know I can stay here in this studio, whether it be curled up on the carpet or not. I'm not above sleeping on the floor (hell, I did it voluntarily last year over on Mansfield, remember?) if it means avoiding having to try to live in a homeless shelter or some shit like that. My BCP prescription has run out. I am in the middle of having some of the worst cramps I've ever had in my life. Damn feminine reproductive system shit. (That would've worked better on Twitter.) So I'm gonna end this here, and I'll probably come back and note some other shit later. If not here, on Twitter: http://twitter.com/LeeZett And also, I have to bitch about the Pink Slip Party networking event I attended on Wednesday. THAT was a fucking riot. SMH.

PS: The 'Issues" part of this post? These two. Look at her! *swoon* You KNOW I had to get these, right? Put em right in the pile with my Barack VIBE and Rolling Stone's. *swoooooooooooooon*

Find the ironic little metaphor in it.

Tell me something I don't know.

Your Blogging Type is Unique and Avant-Garde

You're a bit ... unusual. And so is your blog. You're impulsive, and you'll often post the first thing that pops in your head. Completely uncensored, you blog tends to shock... even though that's not your intent. You tend to change your blog often, experimenting with new designs and content.

What's Your Blogging Personality?

"The Dogs Kept Me Here"

A guy with the first name of a famous mouse, made a remark about dogs, and made me think of my cat.

Confession: I don't know who Mickey Rourke is. Until recently, I can't tell you that if shown a photo of him that I would have been able to pick him out of a lineup. I don't recall ever having seen any of his films, and that includes The Wrestler. And in all honesty, seeing him sitting in the audience of the 81st annual Oscar telecast tonight, I thought he looked not unlike Heath Ledger in full Joker makeup in The Dark Knight. Greasy hair, slightly scary, off-putting facial features.

But last week, I recall hearing a news report that his chihuahua died. I wondered why that was news. Then, I heard that he thanked his dogs during his Golden Globe acceptance speech in January, and tonight, while walking the red carpet at the Kodak, was wearing a locket with the dead dog's picture in it. This is a grown ass white man, that looks like he's never heard of shampoo, and dresses like one of the members of Van Halen...with a dog locket? What?? Who IS this guy? Why have I no clue who this actor is?

Then, just a few minutes ago, i queued up my TiVo of the Barbara Walters Special. There's an interview there with Mickey Rourke, and the very first question Barbara asked him was, "Why'd you thank your dogs?"

He couldn't answer it simply. He fretted for a moment, swilled some beverage, fidgeted in his easy chair, and then told a story that included the line, "I didn't want to be here." As in, I wanted to die. What he said was, paraphrased slightly, "After my life fell apart, my money ran out, my career ended, and my wife left, I didn't want to be here. ...I didn't really want to kill myself, because its the chickenshit way out, and I'm a Catholic. But I wanted to push a button and vanish. I don't have any children. All I had was my dogs." Then he said during a period in time while he was recurrently sleeping on the floor of his closet, one of his dogs came in and looked up at him and made an 'almost human noise'. And he said the dog's expression made him think the dog was asking him, "Who's gonna take care of ME?" And he said, he saw that expression. And he couldn't do 'it'. And the dogs kept him here.

Okay. Lisette. Now YOU know, that entire story mirrors yours SO closely that if you yourself were talking to Barbara fucking Walters you might repeat it replacing wife with friend and dog with cat. Because, Lisette, you know very well that after your life fell apart in 2007, your money ran out, you got laid off and your job ended, and your friend(s) left, you DIDN'T WANT TO BE HERE. (Still don't, on occasion). You don't REALLY want to kill yourself because you think its a weak move, AND you're a Catholic (albeit a bad one.) But you wish you could push a button (or take some good, strong NyQuil) and VANISH. Not BE here. But all you have...is your CAT. You also know that there was a time last spring when you were sleeping recurrently on a pallet of blankets on the floor of your living room even though a perfectly good bed was in the neighboring room. And your cat, Lucille, would come over and sit beside you. And she would look at you with huge yellow eyes. And you would think to yourself, over and over again, "If I'm not here...who's gonna take care of her?" You don't have any children. You feel very much at the end of your rope. And that CAT is what is --still!-- keeping you here.

Damn.

See, I don't know shit about Mickey Rourke. Not a single thing besides what I've learned tonight. I don't know exactly what he did to himself to make him fall out of Hollywood favor, besides make a few bad movies in the late 80's-early 90's. But man, if there was EVER an actor I say I can relate to 100000%?! Its THAT guy. I might even have to go rent Angel Heart or Wild Orchid or The Wrestler just to see what he can do. Because man, that there? That feeling like your pets are the only thing keeping you from committing suicide? THAT SHIT IS REAL.

Damn. D A M N.

Mine Immaculate Dream

So I haven't been very talkative this month, unless you count my Twitter feed. Its just been a really BAD February. Between getting the notice on the 5th that I have to move ...somewhere... by the 7th of March, between very cryptic and vague news from my team of crock physicians, between being told to move into a homeless shelter and pressed to apply for G.R. (I refused, probably to my own detriment), between re-running in to Alicia Pearl, her telling me that she vanished back in Oct/Nov because she seriously thought I stole her demo recordings and sold her vague idea of a song with a Pacman bleep running all through it to SUSHI (All the Single Ladies... are apparently IDIOTS?), then finding myself babysitting (well, not exactly BABY) her 12 year old very smart daughter as we watch The Ring on VHS, between being constantly sick, nasally dried out and chest congested at the same time, between begging my relatives to help me find a place to store my material posessions and my CAT, between stressing out that Chris is coming back here and I have nowhere to go, between wishing that Bernardine would rent me a fucking apartment when there are several vacant in the building right now, between having the remodeling/construction workers above, below and beside this unit banging on the walls day in and day out for the better part of 2 weeks, between returning from the doctor yesterday to find my own kitchen ransacked and torn apart by the phantom workers who just let themselves in to my apartment unannounced and frightened Lucille half to death (7 lives left, kitty)...

I just haven't been in the mood to write. Or change my sheets. Or earn any money. Or eat anything besides mixed baby greens, frozen 10 for $10 Celeste suprema pizzas, and marshmallows. Or seriously do much more than stress and cry over where I'm going to go, and what will become of my head when I get there. Bout the only thing good this month is the Grey's Anatomy crossover that temporarily brough Addison back from her crappy spinoff, and my seeing miss Solange perform her trance-y 60's trip-soul thing at the Viper Room on the 5th (otherwise that was a BAD day) while downing several Cadillac margaritas. I think I had three? I didn't even care. I was trying to forget the morning's bad news.

Duran Duran doesn't really make it all better, but it DOES distract me.

Sobering Realization

It just kinda hit me that at 26, I've just gone through my very first 'normal girl' experience. As in, some shit that your average girlified female probably has gone through/done countless times since she was about, mm, fifteen years old. Something that would make most ladies grab a box of Kleenex and sob in their beds over. Its weird. Me, on the other hand? I'm just kind of mentally curious about it. There's this little voice in my head (a nice voice, actually) that's going, "Wow, Lisette. You just had something kinda REGULAR and NORMAL happen to you. Ain't that a bitch? That's a FIRST!" *eyebrow raise* Pause. *chuckle*

I kinda do but kind DON'T want to go into detail here, because A: that would be telling too much of my business and B: that would also be implying that I felt much more emotionally invested in the situation than I did or do, LMAO, but lets just say that I think I deserved, and am not at all upset about, my one foray into silly-morality-questioning-snookered-bitchness.

Its actually kind of nice to know that I could have been a normal girl If things had been a little different. I actually have it in me. Whoa. That's wild. I guess i'm less disconnected from regular people than I knew!

Yeah, and that's pretty much IT.

Well, Ha fucking ha HA. Guess that means its gone!

Today's Scorpio Horoscope
Jan 26, 2009
You of all people, dear Scorpio, will recognize and appreciate the need for structure and stability on a day like this one. Keep in mind, however, that this practical energy may be working to take some of the fun out of the equation. Though you may not recognize it at first, the fun in your life may get chipped away, little by little, if you are not careful. Make sure you hold tightly to the things that really give you passion and purpose in life. These are the keys to healthy living.

Woo!

Today's Scorpio Horoscope
Jan 25, 2009
Don't put up with anyone's shenanigans, dear Scorpio. Your time is too precious and your energy too powerful to be wasted on those who are simply using you as a fair weather friend or crutch to keep them emotionally strong and stable. Concentrate on yourself and your own problems. If someone approaches you with a sob story, don't hesitate to tell them exactly what you think. There is no need to pad the honest truth with a bunch of fluff in an effort to make the other person feel good.

****************************

Can I get an AMEN, for the good astrologer at MSN?! Woo!

I Can Has Salad? Or EDD Check?

A salad would make it all better. Or a week's stay at the Encore Las Vegas.... Hmm.

conversational English

Two things I must point out:

1: No, I have no fucking idea what they're saying, but for Gee gee gee gee baby baby baby, no no no no no, oh oh oh oh oh! gee gee gee gee gee oh yeah oh yeah yeah yeah! Despite that, I think I actually like this shit.

2: If Hello Kitty had a mouth, her voice would sound like this. Literally, all nine of these bitches are the vocal embodiment of the Sanrio. Mariah Carey would LOVE this!

Thanks to Jessica in The Wood....

...Now I look fly. And so does my Blog. Woot!

And It Hits Me.

Oh my GOD. I just all of a sudden realized while reading a blog's comments section (shut up; I KNOW...) that in 4 years I will have completely squandered my ENTIRE teens AND 20's on being an adult and doing and going through VERY adult shit way too early. Stress. Illness. Death. Unemployment. Despair. Shit like that. I'm supposed to be having FUN of some kind, not this shit! Like actual YOUTHFUL fun. This old Lil' Kim lyric popped into my head after reading a comment about amateur ghetto freaknik for married's:

"I'm not the one you sleep wit, to eat quick/Want a cheap trick? Better go down to Freak-Nik"

....(LOL!) ...And I just thought:

Waaaaah. I should be going to Freaknik!

Ok, not really. But I'm 26; I should be going down to the Essence fest and having fun with my friends (who they are, I'm not exactly sure), I should be able to run down to WeHo and go to happy hour at Saint Felix and order sangria, WITH FRIENDS, not alone. I should have good company, good food, and good times more often than not. I should've been able to look back on high school and laugh....yet I didn't go to a traditional high school, so that's out. About the only things I can 'look back on' fondly are my MJ years, KOPDinNYC and BSQinATL. And even those were slightly fraught with BS and tension before during and/or afterwards.

I want to have some damn FUN. I got 3 3/4 years left. How am I going to accomplish this shit? 3 and three-quarter years left before I jump willingly and headlong into adulthood from which there is no return (because if its 1 thing I hate, its 30 something year old people acting like fucking children. Grow the hell UP!)

I don't really want to contact Mario from DuBose Ent., but I might.
I don't really want to keep contact with J, but I probably will (I'm weak like that).
I don't really want to stay stressed out in California with my nose to the grind and my ass to the radiator, but i have to...for now. Fucking A.

Where was I going with this? Oh. Fun.

Remind me never to read too much into blog comments again, kay? Thank you YBF.

This is decidedly true. Ain't it the FUCKING truth.

Today's Scorpio Horoscope:
Jan 13, 2009
Your idea of what life is, dear dear Scorpio, is going through a radical change. None of the "givens" that you have always taken for granted apply anymore. Rather than grieving the change, grow from it. So don't drag your feet! Stand up and move ahead. This is no time for vacation. You have some rebuilding to do!

Neptunes, I got a cocker spaniel?!

Yeah, I used to have the cassette single of this here. Early Pharrell & Neptunes joint. LOVED it! The beat is still hot, even though I always thought it shoulda been called "What What" and not Super Thug. All they fucking say is "WHAT".

Seriously? Eddie?

According to MSN horoscopes, today I'm a frigid bitch who needs a laugh.

Um.

Today's Scorpio Horoscope:
Jan 07, 2009
You might decide to spend a large part of the day working
on a project that requires a lot of mental energy. Plans to spend some time with
either a close friend or lover might not work out to be quite what you'd hoped
today, dear Scorpio. Your friend could be in a rather gloomy state of mind. A
relaxing evening, perhaps going to a concert or watching an Eddie Murphy comedy
can both release tension and boost bad moods. Enjoy!

So. Which one shall it be? Trading Places, The Golden Child, Boomerang, Coming To America, or Delirious?

Australian Therapeutic Relief

I spent almost 90 minutes crying my eyes out. Laying on Lucy, getting her fur wet. Thinking bad things. She put her furry arm over my hand and let me hold her. I did just that until I had to get up to find a tissue. I had no one to talk to, no one to call. I got online and hoped Jason would be there. He was.

He listened to me. He let me talk through it. He gave me encouraging words. Generic words. Still meaningful words.

I sipped a coffee cup full of red wine while I typed. It was the only thing I could think to do to calm myself.

Jason listened. He let me talk about the bird called IT.

Then, he sent me THIS, and I stopped crying.



Freeman Aussie products were never this good to me.

J, you let me down.

Again.

I knew you would. Again.

But why do I feel so empty because of it?

You know you're over there groovin' to this shit.

Don't FRONT: You like this. Yeah, it was in Glitter, but so?!




Try not to shake yo booty when the breakdown kicks in:




As for this one: Baby, baby, bay-baaaaah. You know you love this shit.

You Old Bitch!

Geritol. Or Fuckitol. One of them mofo's is calling my name. So I'm all full of red wine chilling in the house, buzzed out to old 90's Cali hip hop, 'wishin' all I had to do NOW was finish Homework!', and then my ass decided to lie down -JUST FOR A SECOND!!!!- and snuggle up next to gorgeous fat Lucy on the furry blanket on my bed. Next thing I know I look up and it is 7:02 AM January FIRST, 2009, the cat is on the floor, my left nostril is stuffy, my half-finished 5th glass of vino is on the computer desk, and Diane Keaton is frozen on my TV screen from when I hit the PAUSE button on the DVD the night before at like 8:30.

I feel old. Who the fuck sleeps through New Year's? MY BLACK ASS, that's who.

I got up, peed, wished Lucille a happy new kibble-eating season, and laid back down. Finally got up at 1:00 PM and now I'm settled after scenting a hispanicandle of the Santa Barbara with Eucalyptus oil, washing out my mommy's old Danielle mug and making me a cup of mint tea, and uh...finishing that wine. WHAT, I can't let Cab Sauv go to waste! I'm broke! It was a hella ordeal just getting a bottle of that shit in the first place!

NO, I'm no alky, I'm no crazy crazy crazy bitch this yeeeeear. I got scenes of coastal Italy on my kitchen wall (calendar), I got half a loaf of King's Hawaiian in my fridge and a box of Hot Tamales if I ever decide to try to watch a movie on my raggedy ass LG DVD system, and I got Lucille, I got a mild headache instead of a STRONG one (yay!), and I'm supposed to get my 'results' back from the nut farm...erm, hospital later today.

Fingers and toes and eyes and wires CROSSED!

-L.

But Some Days I Sit And Wish I Was....

HEAD BANGER

Turn The Volume UP?
Turn The VOLUME up!

*******

So its' that New Year shit. Wine, Chinese and Norwalk CC/RR shit. Rainbow American Apparel t-shirt. Rainbow ball kiddie hair-tie in my pro-styl gel slicked hurr. Bored, wanted to go OUT but er'body i know is a flake like Corn.

One of them mofos is extra frosted.

2009: New president, and he black. New living quarters? I hope not immediately soon. And as far as ends, I hope I can make like a Diva and get moneeeeey.

I'm-a, I'm-a fucking SICK of being broke and sick and unemployed and shit. Lea' dat shit in 2008. I WOULD like to be funky-fresh-dressed to impress-ready to party right now, but unfortunately, NYET, I am NOT.

But you know what I can do? Suck back some red, hug Lu, and

TURN THE VOLUME UP.

Nobody else can tell 'cause I'm stuck in a spell

It comes right back, creeps up on me....

You don't know how much I miss you. Just talking to you. Having little to no conflict. I'm here full of Robin Thicke and Franzia box wine. And I'm finding it so hard to write. I'm in some pain; some residual pain. But its a pain I can get over, cause that chapter is done. (Pun.) Its manageable. I daydream. But its so hard to write. I promised a few folks I would. And I have something to publish. But it just isn't done yet. Shit.

I'm doused in my favorite Armani Code, and To The Sky is on the stereo, somewhat low. Its time to try to sleep. Hopefully it'll all be clear in the morning. But lord, I'm so grateful just for the simple act of being nice. Its amazing the way darkness falls. And the truth I bear is cold, nothing to keep me warm. ...Got a feeling the sun won't shine again. And I gotta know right now, will I be rich? Have everything I want? I stop myself and look to the sky.


This can't be my fate; its never too late.

In my brain it INJURES me, baby

I can't stop. Wilding out in my brain. I took a shower. Doused myself in Carol's Daughter Ocean scent. Put on one of my old self-made MJ shirts (one of those ones where he had a 'stache and actually looked kinda hot.)

Rinaldo Barbados rum in the cocoa. Marvin Gaye on the WMP. Singing the lyrics to ANGER at the top of my lungs. Not giving a fuck if i disturb the neighbors. I tried to type out some old shit from my childhood diaries...1995 and such. But it fucked up the blogger HTML something awful, so i hit delete. So much for archiving my juvenile crazy.

Head is pounding. Don't know what to do today. I don't really want to sleep. Lucy is running around the apartment like a mad-cat-woman. Perched in the window. Silly baby. I feel like any moment I'll start bleeding from my eardrums and just go.

Want out. I WANT OUT!

One way love is such a MOTHERFUCKING fantasy.....

Guess she isn't in enough pain, yet.

When you get caught in the rain
With nowhere to run
When you’re distraught
And in pain without anyone
When we keep crying out
To be safe
But nobody comes
And you feel so far away
That you just can't find your way home
you can get there alone
It's okay
Once you say
I can make it through the rain
I can stand up once again
On my own and I know
That I’m strong enough to mend
And every time I feel afraid
I hold tighter to my faith
And I live one more day
And I make it through the rain

Its ironic that one of her worst-sung songs is the most touching to me. At least, it is right now. I made the grave mistake of watching the film version of Bishop T.D. Jakes' Woman, Thou Art Loosed this morning, and now I'm feeling like.... I want to take a pistol, shoot my oppressors, and lie down crying on the steps of the altar. Not a good way to be feeling on a Saturday morning. So of course something in me tells me to pull out the Sad Mariah...less than 24 hours after I tell Jason that Sad Janet brings nothing but trouble.

I probably shouldn't have added that stuff into my cocoa this morning, either. But sometimes when you are down, you just find any way to cope, yes? It looks like Karen is moving to the SFValley after all. Northrop Grumm. upped their offer, and she's trying to get out here in February. That'll be nice. She deserves a new, another life.

Erica is being nice to me on our old spot. Not deliberately, just... unusually. Not saying things that turn out (un?) intentionally hurtful or stinging in random threads. Instead we just exist on the same forum and its almost like...2004? 05? Its nice. I missed that. We don't speak. At all. But...Its somehow comforting to me that just maybe she doesn't completely hate me anymore. At least not completely hating me is enough for me.

Katacia sent me groceries for Christmas. Cereal, cat treats and the aforementioned cocoa. I love her for it.

Vanessa called me sobbing and crying on Christmas day. Seems Tevana, that girl from the Ne-Yo show, went ape shit on her for something I probably would have too. She says she hates her life and everyone treats her like a slut and talks down to her. And that I'm her only friend who listens to her. And that as superficial and shallow as she's become, she could never be mean to me. I wish she didn't always call me when she's scared, confused, or in a jam. I'm not capable of being leaned on. I'm fragile myself. She wants me to come to Brandon's 5th birthday party tomorrow. I don't have a gift for him. I don't think I'll go.

I don't want to be alone on New Years this year. I asked J if he would take me somewhere, anywhere, but he won't be able to tell me (no) until Monday. Sigh. I wish I had more friends here, or something fun to do. Besides sit here.

Chris will be back in California from Illinois on January 8th. He called and told me yesterday. Which means I have to find somewhere else to go. Again. I don't know where I'm going to go.

Again.

I'm scared and at a loss and can't think of any option but to just sleep as much as I can and pretend it isn't real and its not there. I don't know what I'm gonna do with Lucy, but sometimes (most of the time now) I wish I could just incinerate all my belongings and go away. If I knew someone would love her and care for her, I'd leave. But nobody would take care of my baby.

Merry Christmas...Goodbye, Eartha. Say 'Sup to James & Jesus!

Everything in this song I want. Especially the duplex. and checks.

Okay, no, make that CASH. And can that duplex be spanish style, 2-story, and located north of Wilshire, south of 3rd St., west of Fairfax and south of San Vicente in the city of Los Angeles, CA? Okay, Santa?

Santa?

Oh, fuck. I forgot. You don't exist. RATS!!

***

What is it with our black legends dying on Christmas day? First James Brown, now this. I'm gonna have to watch BOOMERANG later just because. Lavender Hill's gonna suck without her.

My favorite song now has a video.

Makes you want to have that kind of easy love. *swoon*

I'm trying my very hardest

...to believe what the song says and stop thinking about not being here, how to leave, what to give away, what to donate and where I'm going to go if I can't do any of that in good faith. Last night was a bad night. I had to just lie down and sleep to stop crying. And again, this morning. I watched Seven Pounds, and I didn't cry, because unlike others, I completely related to that wanting-to-crawl-into-a-tub-full-of-ice-and-drop-in-a-jellyfish feeling. If I thought any of my organs could be successfully donated, shit, I'd go buy a fishtank right now. (Steal. Steal a fishtank. I forgot, I don't have any money.) I tried to make a deal with myself that as long as Lucy is alive, since I promised to take care of her when I adopted her, that I'll try to stay alive to be her mama. Lucy is six. I don't know if I can keep that promise, but I love her, so its very hard to feel this way and then look into her yellow eyes and think about abandoning her. But I'm so very tired of being here in this state, and I don't see what could possibly make 2009 better than 2008 and 2008 has definitely been the worst year of my life. If this continues, or, God forbid gets worse after January 1st (and things are sadly already starting to line up that way from the middle of January on) then, what am I going to do? How can I be sure those yellow eyes will be enough for me?

Merry merry merry....

Because I need it.

For Luck Powered By Luck!

so wrong, SO WRONG, Ru! LMAO!

RuPaul as Barack AND Michelle O. *death!*

Thyme, Rosemary, Fennel, Oregano, SAGE.

Conversations, hesitations in my mind
You got my conscience asking questions that I can't find

I'm not crazy
I'm sure I ain't done nothing wrong, no
I'm just waiting
'Cause I heard this feeling
won't last that long

Never ever have I ever felt so low
When you gonna take me out of this black hole?
Never ever have I ever felt so sad
The way I'm feeling yeah, you got me feeling really bad

Never ever have I had to find
I've had to dig away to find my own peace of mind
I've Never ever had my conscience to fight
The way I'm feeling, yeah, I just don't feel right

I'll keep searching
Deep within my soul
For all the answers
Don't wanna hurt no more

Shit, that's odd.

Why is it that when I woke up late this afternoon/evening, I could not locate either my gold hoop earrings, nor the two gold rings I ALWAYS wear? WTF? Did I dispose of them somehow during my sleep? Did the cat eat them? Where is my jewelry?

I was sick today. All day. ALL day. I knocked out during the 6AM hour and didn't feel right again until around 7:30PM Cali time. After having crazy medication reactions and such. Headaches, nausea, et cetera. I flew up to Little Armenia to cat-litter- and grocery- shop using all of my strength and little money with which to do so, and picked up a few things: treat for Lucy, cappellini and jarred pasta sauce, frozen lemonade Popsicles (sugarless), Grenache Blanc, neufchatel cheese and egg bagels. Also, a few containers of ramen noodles, mandarin oranges and Stove Top stuffing. And an O Magazine. And generic store brand breakfast cereal. And skim milk. Oh, and Barnum's animal crackers.

I wanted fish, and ground turkey, Green Giant Brussels sprouts, and other steamable vegetables, and cabbage, and Lean Cuisine dinners, and King's Hawaiian bread and turkey jerky, but right now, those things are just out of my budget. So! I can't say I'm too unhappy though, as there is food in my kitchen (finally!), my dishes are washed, I have quarters with which to do laundry Monday, and I think I might actually be embracing my illnesses and things. I keep fighting them, and they keep taking me over. Maybe if I welcomed them instead... IE, "Hello, depression! You're here again, today!", maybe then they'd be nice to me and, like, go away more often. Loosen their grip. We shall see.

I'm going to soak in the bathtub now; put this Olivina shit to good use.

I will NEVER, EVER get sick of watching this.

Diana Ross on Inside the Actors Studio
Uploaded by RichJuz

On Puran's Hillhurst and adult conversation

The blase' Irish girl I used to work with at the whorehouse 4 years ago took me out for a belated birthday dinner in Los Feliz tonight. and approximately 4 $9 glasses of River something-or-nother Pinot Noir later, and a $20 something dollar plate of salmon and grilled veggies AND a $10 Caesar salad later...and a birthday candle laden chocolate cake plate later...she ran me by the Whitley/H'wood CCC to cash my Obama pollworkers stipend check and dropped me home sufficiently relaxed & tipsy, with a bag of E! network pilfered bagels and a Petco giftcard for Lucille. And my own $10 roll of laundry quarters tucked into my Louis V papillon bag, so I can finally wash my 5 loads of clothes.

I have not seen Shannon Hillary in almost 4 years, but she was nicer to me on the occasion of 'my birthday' than anyone else I know in Southern California.

Funny, isn't it? Because of my old coworker, i'll be able to get kitty litter and eat for the next 2 days, and my 'supposed best friend' is off doing they own thaaaang. And busy asking How I Is, when they know I'm the same as I Always Is.

Funny, funny.

Thank you immensely, Shannon. I needed the wine. And the real food. And the adult conversation.

Total Irony!

How fucking crazy is it that one of my many physician's assistants, Kenisha, just showed up at my DOOR at 8:45 AM, out of breath, in scrubs, with a bottle of pills in her hands, exclaiming, "OMG, Lisette! I'm so glad you're home!"

Where would I be? I'm sick, mentally compromised, AND out of work at the moment. LOL.

"OMG, I'm so SORRY! Last night when you came in for your appointment I gave you the wrong dosage of pills! I gave you 20 milligram puvules instead of 10 mg tablets! How many did you take?!"

Um... ONE. *raises eyebrow*

"Oh, thank God! I'm so sorry! Oh MY GOD I'm sorry! I noticed this morning and I snuck out after my first patient left and came over here, I'm double parked in front of the dumpster, I-I-I even brought the bottle so you could see, these are..."

Aww. Now THAT's some fucking Patient Care for ya ass. She came ALL THE WAY to my HOUSE to fix the problem. I wanted to ask her did Dr. Molur get on her ass about it. LMAO. So anyhow, I make small talk, she tells me how nicely my apartment is decorated (heffa, its a crowded MESS! Even I know that!) and then I thank her for correcting the problem, not at all caring that i am standing braless in an old Sears floral nightgown from the early 1980's with my nappy hair all over my head. And, yes, I made her take her shoes off before stepping onto my beige carpeting. What?

So...back to the lecture at hand: Am I bad for wanting to tell her I'd gladly keep the higher dose if she liked, seeing as my Crazy Levels have been rapidly escalating anyway? *cue sad face*

Darn.

Long, grandmother-worn old Sears flannel nightgowns make you think.

I can't seem to stop alternately humming "While there's a moon, moon on high..while there are birds in the sky" and "All eyes on me in the middle of the ring just like a cirrrrcus..."

When in reality, what I wanted to write about was 'abruptly stopping Prozac' which i'm not inclined to do, seeing as I grabbed a refill last night and am thinking about asking my docs about upping my dosage from 10mg to 20...also 'why I'd like to keep a stash of Valium in my house'.

I don't think I'll be expounding on that one, lest I come off like an addict or a recreational prescription pharmaceutical abuser. That isn't me. Neither am I an alcoholic, but I do enjoy my wine (just in larger amounts than I would like to have enjoyed it all during the majority of 2008, irritably.) I chalk it up to depression, facetiousness and total, final, exasperation.

That isn't all that far out there to assume, no? There comes this point where you just get to this...point (redundancy 101) where you.. (I feel a pattern) ...just..stop trying to sell yourself to the highest Life Bidder. Its like a neverending slave auction where I'm fresh off the cross-Atlantic journey, scurvy and ricket-free, yet my potential HR massas keep glancing at the List Of Available Female Negroes, scratching their chins and thinking out loud, "Now, this here mulattress just won't do."

Sigh. Aieee. So I'm at that point. I just want to pack up my shit, tie it to a stick with a handkerchief, and go find Harriet and start along on the Railroad.

But in the meantime, the clothes need a-washin', my shoes need a-shinin', and myyyyy children need a-feedin'. And then someone's gone try to climb on top of me and do they business.

*thud*

Interestingness.

You're lookin' just a little too hard at me
Standin' just a little too CLOSE to me.

I feel odd about members of my non/extended family commenting on my life as if they've known it. There are certain people that (the argument is) I'm related to (in some way) that are friendly to me. Problems are, I don't know how to talk to them without a distance coming into play. Is that bad?

I think its bad. I think I should probably dissect and dispose of that cynical, protective, distant part of Lee Zett before I get to move forward, hmm? Problem is, I don't exactly know how. I spoke to an old coworker last night. Cool chick. Mature, but on the level of say, Kathy Griffin meets Marge Simpson's chain-smoking cynical sister, rather than, say, old and fusty. She's def. not the old, fusty type. Just extremely blunt and real. I think that's why I liked her when I worked with her. That, and the fact that she's Irish. And my black-cum-Ireland based ass is just funny about shit like that. Not like I relate, but durr.

So I get a contact ding from this relative of some sort. I don't know what to make of it. (cue confused Pug face.) OK, part of the reason I don't know what to make of it is probably related to the fact there's an inch of Cab Sauv in my glass at 10 to 3AM. But still, yeah. I just made bootleg enchiladas and I slept nearly all day after waking up mad early. Nothing runs the logical track in Lisette's world, thought you knew?

I'm wondering: Do I have to keep a connection I don't know what the fuck to do with? Or should I just start playing the lottery in hopes that I win enough to buy a house in another state with lower cost of living and stable property values?

What the fuck am I talking about anyhow? God, its almost 3AM. I should sleep, but all I really want to do is stalk around my apartment with the Christmas scented candle lit and shake my ass to Get Right.

Oh is me. No woe involved!

This shit never gets old.

jewels got no flaws

I snap.
I curse too much.
I forget things. Important things. Conversations.
I have trouble realizing when I'm emotionally leading someone down a road I can't let them travel.
I'm closed off, depressed and sad...yet non complacent about it. I am hard to stay friends with.
I cry a lot. I want more than most people are willing to give me,
I am extremely possessive and jealous when I love someone.
I hate being abandoned or forgotten.
I hate being lied to and ignored.
I tend to lie in order to protect myself from being hurt at times.
Sometimes I think I can do things, and halfway in, realize I can't. I end up hurting friends this way.
I would like to think I can depend on no one, but in all honesty, I long to be held and loved. The way a parent would.
I am afraid of sex. I've had too much of it, non fulfilling, unemotional IT, and I'm afraid it will never mean a thing to me.
I lament losses years past their original expiration dates.
I feign ignorance when it gets me ahead in life, but I'm not stupid. In any way.
I say I dislike females, but I long for a female friend I can relax around.
I say I hate men, but I have a general idea of one that does not exist in nature that I could be happy with.
I depend entirely too much on my cat, computer, Grey's Anatomy, and three message boards to keep me occupied and alive.
I drink too much when I feel alone. I know I do it, and although I don't consider myself alcoholic, I know there are other ways that don't include Cabernet Sauvignon to make me forget. Its just that I abhor drugs. So I drink red wine instead.
I hallucinate and fret and insist I am healthy and have no diagnosed illness, just thinking I can trick myself into believing I am well.

Flaws? Oh, I have many.

You know, if I didn't know better, I'd think Lucille had a YouTube account.

trust in me when THINGS go wrong

When fear or anger or any kind of suffering comes to me, HELP ME TO view it as a spectator. HELP ME to separate myself from my experiences. ALLOW ME AT ANY COST to endeavor to retain a sense of peace and happiness.

Take this darkness away! When I sit with my eyes closed, enveloped in self-created shadows, shine upon me in splendor the aura of intuition. Awaken my heart, awaken my soul, ignite my darkness, tear away the veil of silence. PLEASE DO NOT LEAVE ME ALONE! I know that I am responsible for my own welfare. ASSIST ME in discarding all useless pursuits and idle thoughts. Please help me to feel that I am loved. Please teach me to think until I find the answer. Please tell me how to hear you, so that I not be alone.

I will light the match of smiles. My gloom and sadness will disappear. Teach me how to smile even when it is difficult. Illnesses, failure, death cannot hurt me. Disaster can't touch me. I do not know the meaning of despair. Will you help me become this? To try to be happy under all circumstances? To make up my mind to be happy within myself right now, where I stand today? I recognize my illness to be the result of my transgressions in life. Help me to undo this? Allow me to obliterate it, please? Help me not to be overwhelmed by my self-created misery and darkness, unless I willfully close my eyes and ears.

I am not this body, and it is not me. I am not this pain, and it is not me. I am not broken beyond all repair. Let my soul out of this cage it lives in. Please, help me to feel free.

I ask that the ones I have hurt find forgiveness for me. I ask that I might be taught to find forgiveness for those who have caused me pain as well.

This officially makes me weird.

I always thought I had proof I was a strange child because I loved Asparagus. Most little kids won't eat anything green, especially anything woody, stringy, stalklike and prone to make you fart. But my mama got me eating them fairly young, so I always loved them. So now, I'll order extra Asparagus at restaurants, or Asparagus Tempura (OMG YUM) at Japanese restaurants and all the other black folk will eye me with that "I knew she was secretly white!" look.

You idiots. What, black people don't eat green vegetables?

Well. Apparently we don't; unless we cook em down for hours in fatback and dump a shitload of Tabasco on em. (Yay for Collard Greens...I like those too.)

But here's the rub: I'm having a love affair with brussels sprouts. Its been going on for like 6 months. Vegetables of many kinds, yeah, as in, I love sugar snap peas, edamame, carrots, red potatoes, cherry tomatoes, water chestnuts, cabbage and spinach too. But brussels sprouts always seem to lurk in my freezer. I've lately taken to eating the little Steamfresh bags that take 2 minutes in the microwave, covered in black pepper and a little margarine, no salt. OMG, yummmmmmy.

In fact, I just ate one 50 cal serving 10 minutes ago. As soon as I picked up the last one out of the teacup I chose to eat em out of (don't ask) I thought...'It wouldn't be THAT greedy if I ate another packet, right? It IS a green vegetable...'

Then I Googled them just to check their nutrient content and whoa, they help your liver, with cancer, and have fiber and shit.

So I'm NOT just a pig1 Woohoo! Now let me go get the next batch out the microwave. :D

I thought it was Brandy...but it was Mary Mary. Good shit!

K.

Ok. Uhkay. I feel better now. Alls I had to do was dance around my apartment to old Missy Elliott and Meth...or was it Redman? The Miss E album is still her hottest shit. And half a glass of wine (...plus) in yo system is just enough relax in ya glass to have me two stepping in front of the cat and trying to figure out how loud I can play the bass before Sandra on the first floor gets all aggy.

Oooooh, I don't want I don't need I can't stand no minute man....

Rotf! Good fun. Only slight nausea when I stop moving and sit. Um like to type this. Let me get up.

See, Lisette knows how to have fun with herself all alone, see? I don't need friends. I have a stereo and an exhaustively extensive record collection.

And red wine. I'ma sip it and make it last. Wraaaaaaagh! I'm a crazy ho. Blargh! Time to Lick Shots. Hey, you, why you frontin...rrrah!

Maybe not the best solution, but still one all my own.

Today I acquired a $5. More money than I've had my paws on in a minute. I thought about saving it for a Metro day pass one day this week. Thought I might hop on the #10 and ride it til' my wheels fell off. Just to get out of the house and be in forward motion. Just for the distraction. Hop on one bus, ride it until the end of the line, cross the street and, repeat. Or maybe I thought seriously about buying a box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch with it. But having regained nearly all of that 12 I lost when I was destitute and sick as a dog in August...I don't think I really needed to munch on the cinnamony goodness. So, wine. Just one cheap bottle of CS, upgraded from $2 at TJ's to $4 at the 82Mkt. Did I need it? No. Not really. I had a few glasses of Lemonaded triple-sec kitted out kitchen liquor last night over on Adams & 11th with the Ransom/Tejeda clan. But....But after my pasta debacle..I thought, what the hell, y'know? Why shouldn't I check completely out of this sitch right about now? My face hurts. Head, right jaw, back. I chew a 5mg diazepam. No water. Walk briskly in the chilly air to the 82 and I got my Cab and 2 little packs of banana Now & Laters. Sugar and liquor. No diggety no doubt. On the way back I notice two freshly planted California Palm trees by the Melrose Auto Works driveway. Freaky! Those are new. Damn, you don't leave the house for a week and shit just changes. I wonder when the Obama campaign is going to pay me. Just like a nigga to not pay you, but I stan for Malia ( I keep reiterating that) so its aight, I guess. I better get that check by Christmas. So. I come home, open the vino so it breathes, hop in the shower and scrub first with a Dove 3/4 moisturizing bar (old school!), then with a good palmful of Caress oil infusions something-or-nuther wash. Then I put the Maxwell Embrya CD on. Then i pour the wine. Half glass. Ok, lil more than half. I'm looking at it and its at half now. Hm. Then, as I deodorantize and dry myself I noticed that bottle of expired hydrocodone apap 240ML in my bathroom. I hate Vicodin. Hate Lortab. Hate Hydrocodone. It made me ridiculously nauseous in 2005, so I refused to take that shit even in pain. But you know what? It expired in August 07. And I'm in mental pain right now. I miss my fucking girlfriend. I miss talking on the phone and shit. I miss that camaraderie. I miss not worrying about surgical procedures that might vegetableize me. Do they hate/eat you? You're a vegetabllle. They eat off of youuuu. You're a vegetablllle. Yeah, Mike. Yeah.

I swig about a tbsp of the Hydro. Ick. No nausea yet. Drink a lil of the wine. (Oh don't worry, I googled any possible interactions first. I'm not trying to die tonight; I have to see the rest of the season of Grey's...and Cadillac Records to see if Ms. Sushi got better, and...some other things. Plus I ain't got my plot ready yet and why go into the ground unprepared? NO.) So, yes. Ok, here's the slight nausea. But the jaw-ache is going. Maxwell is singing about how he's me, i'm him and we are us...or something. God, too bad he's gay. Such a cute guy. Damn, my equilibrium is all off while typing this and shit. I'll turn the fan on and lie down with Miss Lucille. Maybe NOT watch Born Into Brothels and instead opt for Lady Sings The Blues? NO? Maybe something else light and fun. I know I ain't about to read. Angela's Ashes, Midnight, Dreams From My Father...not shit on Lee Zett's list tonight.

Wooo. There's that nausea. Maxwell is going off now. You know I'd like to get OUT of this, right? All the way out. So far out I was never in. That would be bomb. Why Am I like sweaty now? Fan. ON. Now. Lolz.

Night!

The yellow pot strikes again.

OH MY GOD, dude.

Why does pasta hate me? All i wanted was some pasta with butter and Parmesan cheese, and black pepper.

I boil the pasta. I melt some butter....erm..margarine, and i burn it accidentally so I dump it and start over. I toss the cold margarine with the hot drained pasta. I reach for the pepper mill. I turn.

More.

I turn again. Stir. Turn a few more times.

Damn it, I want MORE pepper. I love pepper.

I turn and turn and BAM! The top goes FLYING off and black peppercorns scattered ALL OVER MY KITCHEN FLOOR. Behind appliances. Under the fridge. Inside the stove burners. In the cat food dish. on the carpet.


MY EXPENSIVE BLACK MALABAR PEPPERCORNS!!! Like 3/4ths the jar is gone.

Do you know what I did? I swept them up on my hands and effing knees. There's still a million of them in crevices and shit and I swear the landlord is going to think those little black pellets are RAT POO or something, but shit I did the best i could.

But I'm still hungry, i have NO MONEY and i don't want to empty the pasta down the drain because i don't have any more.


What do I do?

I RINSE THE BUTTERY PASTA COVERED IN ABOUT 6 MILLION PEPPERCORNS AND GROUND PEPPER and pick EACH PIECE OF FARFALLE OUT OF A COLANDER BY HAND SHAKING the effing peppercorns off. Peppercorns stuck in the colander. Peppercorns in between my toes. Then I'm not really in the mood to even EAT this over rinsed pasta, but I'll be DAMNED if I let the kitchen win.

I tossed it in margarine and more pepper and a shitload of Parmesan.

I'm eating it now.

I want to cry. I need wine. Why? WHY ME? Why all this drama JUST for some damn pasta a kindergartner could make?

Why does my kitchen HATE ME?

I Am Thankful For....

In no particular order. These are the few things that make me happy. The first two pics combine with the third pic, BTW. (And the 5th pic, if I'm being honest.)

The last pic is a CATegory unto herself.

THANKS!!!!!! Thanks much. *smile*

This makes me so PROUD!!!!!!

Proud to be black. Proud to see the joy on those children's faces. Proud he's MY president. Proud that these kids have a role-model for what is possible. Proud my vote counted for something. Proud that a hug and a handshake inspires this kind of glee.

....I also kinda stan for Malia. ;)

UPDATE: Video!!!!!! Aieeee!

Ok, now it's just FUCKING with me.

Today's Scorpio Horoscope
Nov 25, 2008

In some ways, you may feel like a lost soul who is not quite in touch with its dreams, dear Scorpio. Although you may feel energetic and boisterous, you may also get the sense that your energy is misdirected and that you are being led in the wrong direction. The key for you now is to guide yourself. Lead yourself. Cut through the red tape of everyone else's agenda, and follow your own internal rainbow. The more you take charge, the happier you will be.

***

Question. But what if that rainbow is black?

Not Danielle

Sometimes I miss her so much, it scares me. Some mornings, like this one, I lie in my bed, half-awake, and I dream about what I would do. How I would appear, thinner and happier on her doorstep, with no hair and a concrete few months left, and how I'd tell her, "Quick, get dressed, we're going for dinner." And then I'd get us a booth in the corner, (that is, if that place I've never been to even HAS booths in corners) and all the breadsticks she wanted. Where it gets fuzzy is the fleeting --nope. Can't even write it, as I know i'd never be okay with it, as I don't like that.

I sometimes imagine how I would deliver the news. Would it be by FedEx? Would it be in an envelope, one, solitary key, and would I require she show I.D. upon reciept? Or would I be there, and show her myself? I'd say, "I won some money. I bought you a house. I wanted to thank you, somehow." Or would it be MY house, and will I have furnished it, all but a spare bedroom, with double everything like dressers and bathrobes, and I'll have got new storm doors and screens to keep the flying 'things' out. It'll be raised, so nothing crawls in, and air-conditioned and painted white. Plantation-style, with a wraparound porch (screened-in, of course.) And big trees, and breezes, and I'd cook breakfast, and it would be so lovely. One day I'd have to tell her. That I don't have a lot of time. Left. That the reason my hair is gone isn't because I willingly cut it. The reason I'm here isn't because I've decided to be perfectly who you wanted me to be. I'm dying. And I wanted to give you something back. Before I can't anymore.

Would I get a place for her in New York, or her hometown? I know she'd like to live in New York. Would I sleep (sleep) beside her, or be sick on a living room sofa? Would I try to say and do other things, but fail? My half-awake self tries to make it clear, but it can't, really. I get little clarity at all. Maybe I'd have to wake fully up. And I never seem ready to do that, because when I do, I get up, pee, wipe the sleep out of the corners of my eyes, and sit down at this here computer to write out things like this. After following the curve of the backside. After being afraid of a kiss. After not wanting that at all, but desperately missing a similar voice, the person themself. And wanting to somehow have the means, the monetary means, to get them out of there. Buy a house. Say, "What the hell, finish it, get a law degree, if you please. But just FINISH it, for me? You'll be so happy you did." Maybe go to Tulane? I don't know. Or I could say, "I've got a friend at Random House. Anything you write, she'll publish. Cast off the block, and take your time, but this IS real." And maybe names would change and fire would become heat and ice would become cold....and that would be the one to get put in print? The very oldest one? I don't know.

I wonder why it is I dream like this, if things are meant to happen for a reason. I wonder why I miss Not Danielle so much, when I don't miss the shit that came towards the ending. I wonder why Not Danielle always seems to creep up into my mind when I watch television, or read, or think about babies, or vacations, or Mint Juleps or Miss Celie or florists. I wonder just what its' going to take for Not Danielle to set free her grip on my heart and head. I wish I didn't miss her anymore.

My friend, Not Danielle.

I'm having my head chopped open while I lie awake. I win.

Its amazing how one's mood can go from light to dark overnight. Right now I want a drink so badly I could cry. Lying in blankets hugging Lucy and whining to Katacia wasn't enough; so I called Karlina and mewlingly and cryptically asked her if at some point in the next seven to ten days we might go out for drinks; at which point she asks what I'm doing tonight, at which time I tell her I'll need a few days to come up with some money to pay for said drinks, at which instant she offers to pay for them...and I hurriedly tell her HELL NO because I could never let her do that. I didn't want to mooch off of her; I just wanted to go sit and drink too much with one of my very few friends. It seems I'm literally running thin on those. Shit; now I've got to hope and pray Bobby from Street Sounds calls me so that I might submit to something awful just for the little money it would bring me. I would feel so much better had I a few dollars in my wallet right now.

And a job; that too. The Hyatt mercifully and still cruelly told me "nyet!' this morning via email...and instantly, my somewhat lighthearted despite an awful lonely weekend mood turned to shit. Funny how I wasn't missing J and feeling a hole in my heart until I read that email. Funny how I didn't feel like drowning or sleeping or dying or crying until I was turned down and passed over yet again. Funny how I was so optimistic, and then it was gone.

Funny, funny.

I miss having friends. I miss Anthony Gomes and Erica Stein and Rex and Ceil and Tina Mitchell and all the rest of them. I miss that job terribly. And most of all, I miss having something to DO.

Now, Put Your Hands UP

The entire month was scarily spot-on.

AntivirusPro 2009 trojan virus. REMOVED.
Working the election on the 3rd & 4th.
Freaking out financially midmonth-facing the CL music.
Talking about work with David. Voluntarily.
Stressed the week of the 18th. Dealing with J and our many many issues.
Applying for mad jobs on my Birthday. Lots of things I had to 'complete', yes.

Here's hoping that last week, 24th-27th is just as accurate! Thank you MSN Astrology.


Scorpio - November 2008

You'll be in the mood to work hard and prove what you're made of on November 3 and 4. Gritty determination and the desire to succeed will keep you focused. Technology will give you a few headaches and create stress on November 4 and 5. There may be a loss of data or a virus on your computer. Find some quiet time alone on November 7 through the weekend of November 8 to wind down and collect your thoughts. You may get emotional over simple things during this time. A Full Moon in Taurus on November 13 will stir up some issues regarding money, assets, or real estate. You may have been living beyond your means lately and now need to face the music. Discuss your ambitions with a partner or other family member. They will be supportive and able to give you some advice. With the Moon in Leo on November 18 and 19 you may feel stressed when dealing with someone overbearing and dramatic. This will make you irritable and out of sorts. Fully concentrate on your work on November 20 and 21. There will be a lot of outstanding tasks to complete before you can relax on the weekend. From November 24 to 26 you'll be restless but ultimately productive. Be flexible, especially when working with a team. A heavy emphasis in Sagittarius, including a New Moon on November 27, will help you focus on your goals and get you thinking about the future.

Oh, good grief.

Today's Scorpio Horoscope
Nov 23, 2008

If you admit you've made a mistake, people are more likely to forgive you for it. You have a confrontational day ahead, dear Scorpio. There is no doubt that you are in a stationary position concerning your career, and that may be cramping your style somewhat, financially speaking. But you'll make progress sooner if you assume your responsibilities and gauge what your mistakes have been. However, don't be too critical of yourself! It's all part of the learning process.

definitively something more accurate does not exist than my intuition

Today's Scorpio Horoscope
Nov 22, 2008

Today, dear Scorpio, you may feel like hiding yourself away in your ivory tower, and watching the performance that is going on before your eyes. And why not, if this allows you to get the perspective you need on things. Use this period in your life to give things their real value and to see where certain people actually fit in to your world. You're a very lucky person to be able to find this kind of balance in your life.

Now I know why I have three copies!

Wait a minute, wait a minute

I think I gotta take some time and clear my mind, cause if I don't I might scream

Scream out loud in a little bit

I'ma tell you what I'm talking about

Ladies?

If you know what I mean...

When you're in love you give your everything

(I'm tired of that happening)

This time is for me

Nigga, you been doing you

I'm gon' do me

Ladies, help me sing it

You steady telling lies

I stayed and pacified

While I kept denying the truth

You always here and there

Finally, I don't care

I'm gon' keep it real with you

Ain't no feeling like being free

When your mind's made up

And your hearts in the right place, yeah

Ain't no feeling like being free

When you've done all you could

But what's misunderstood

(It's all good, it's all good)

Ain't no feeling like being free

I'm like an eagle set free

And finally I'm looking out for me

Ain't no feeling like being free

Cause my mind's made up

And my heart is in the right place, yeah

Hold on up, wait a second

I got to get something off my chest

My happiness was your happiness

I lived and -breathed- you and all your needs

Let me speak, it's best I do what's best for me

Now ladies,

I got my mind back!

I been there and done that (no looking back, no!)

Ooh, this time is for me

Nigga, you been doing you

I'm gon' do me

I'm FREE!

Time is of the essence

And it's much too short to waste another minute on you

While you steady trying to hide

I'm packing saying 'bye!'

Thought you were my dream come true

No it ain't easy being left out

Or being forgotten about

You didn't deserve my love

I've had enough, set me free....

Can I get some loving?

Can I get some time?

Loving in the morning and in the midnight hour...

I gave you everything you wanted

I gave you everything you NEEDED

But you just didn't do right, no,

So, baby, I'm leaving

IT FEELS SO GOOD TO BE FREE

The e-Mail that I should have sent years ago. (Better late than never, right?)

Happy Realization‏
From: Lee Zett T. (bluefox1958@hotmail.com)
Sent: Sat 11/22/08 6:21 PM
To: J*** C***** IV (************@yahoo.com)

Yo.

Okay. I'm going to make this easy and simple, because, after all, it IS my decision. It shouldn't be a dramatic thing where I cry and feel miserable and have to have a drink to fall asleep. I'm done with that.

Unfortunately, that also means I'm done with us. This weird friendship we have. Its not working for me. That's the truth, plain and simple. I want you to be close to me in a way that you just can't be. I want to be as important to you as your family, and its' not really going to happen, because you have different priorities in life, and that's okay. I don't like the needy person I become when you and I are in constant contact, but what I don't like even more is the sad, abandoned, dejected person I become when you disappear and run off to live your own life. I feel very alone, because I never knew it was a requirement for being successful that you break away from your close friends in order to 'Do You'.

That's what I can't deal with, so I only think its fair that I tell you that, and calmly, and rationally, and in a very adult way...leave.

I want you to not call me. Or come by this building. Or call my family. Or try to find me. Or any of that type of thing. I know you might not even be thinking about doing that, but just in case you ever do...don't. My number is going to change on December 3rd. I'm not sending you the new one, and its NOT because I don't love you. Its because its TOO HARD for me to be your friend. Maybe that's because you happened to meet me at a low period, and you've never known me to be happy. But I have been happy, and I CAN be happy and I intend to be happy again. I just can't be happy being your friend, because I want so much more than you know how or even want to give me.

So, now I think i'll take a page out of your playbook, and do for ME. You can keep whatever money you don't really want to give me that you thought about giving me for my birthday. Its not my birthday anymore, and a gift after the fact, that the birthday girl has to beg for...isn't really worth it. So, you keep it. Put it in your gas tank, and use it to get to the next audition that might change your life. I love you dearly, and i'm not mad (disappointed, yes, but not mad), but I really feel, me not knowing you anymore is the only way I know how to keep myself from hurting when you don't have time for me.

I will call Chris and i'll give him back his apartment. I owe him a few months rent and utilities, and I don't have a cent of that right now, so me and him will have to work something out. But I'll tell him not to go calling your house about it. It has nothing to do with you. I'll let him know that.

In closing, know that i care about you, i'll miss you, and I wish you all the luck in the world with your career and your love life. I will be happy years from now to brag that I knew you before you were who you are going to become. But for now, we just can't be the kind of 'friends' we are. It causes me pain. And I've got enough pain in my life right now.

I hope you understand that this letter is sincere. And there will be no talking things over; I won't call. Tell Lynne I love her, Daine too, and PLEASE name that damn dog something. For me? Name the dog. He needs a name.

Love you! I've loved you for all these years, ain't no changing that now! I'm just choosing to love you from a distance. That's easier for me.

Love.


-Lisette.

Toilet of Dreams

I'm dreaming of a Spanish duplex
just like the ones I long to own
With a galley kitchen and hardwoods that glisten
And tile round the tub that's Art Deco

I'm dreaming of a Spanish duplex
with every click on the MLS site
Will I one day have one? I might...
That is all I dream about at night.

Midnight and stars and a martini

Kat sent me a book! A brand new book! I had no idea what it was, but then I opened the box and it was a wrapped gift.

This is the first real birthday present I have gotten in 20 years.

***

I had a lemon drop martini today. Just one. And I didn't have to pay for it, and afterwards I shivered in the kitchen of my grandmother's old house (my old house) wrapped in throw blankets until I couls find a ride home.

I had a job interview this morning at a hotel. It went ...well. Let me pray.

PS:

Today's Scorpio Horoscope
Nov 21, 2008

It's on days like today that it's important to take time out to reflect upon the events of the past few days, dear Scorpio. Is it possible you've decided to change certain things about yourself and your behavior? If you could just devote a few minutes a day to all the little details in your personality, the changes will go much more smoothly. The atmosphere today may help you think about this.

Save Me From Myself

Today's Scorpio Horoscope
Nov 18, 2008

If you've been feeling a little under the weather lately, dear Scorpio, today's planetary configuration will make you feel a whole lot better. In a few days, you will have the strength to pick up where you left off on the projects you may have begun last month. A lot of things are changing in your life. Your motivations are evolving and your ambitions may be taking, different directions.

*****

So, basically, I shouldn'tve just taken that large dose of NyQuil in order to fall asleep at 4'o clock? Hm. Oh.

HOPE (I Can't Believe In)

That wasn't a typo. I'm sick to death of change.

Yesterday. Hospital. Before hospital ordeal, DASH early morning to a bookstore to return a book I have now purchased TWICE in order to have enough money to get to both an interview and the hospital. I got $12 for it. More money than I've had since October 30th. (and I still owe Katacia $90 for helping turn my phone back on). Turns out, i was turned down for the Farmer's again, and i will be quickly weeded out from the temp job at Aaron Bros. that I thought was in the bag. They say they have to do a background check. Really? What when I divulged my past history on the application? Why can't someone just let me work? Let me work! I get so hopeful that I'll find something and then, ...I just don't. I am not going to be hopeful anymore. I'm wary of speaking to J right now, as well. He's on a new path, got new experiences to have, and as I told him night before last, I'm just left behind. Extraordinarily left behind.

Then to the cemetery. I sat on my mother's grave, and then went to the funeral office to change the records so that when I die I can be buried alongside my mother. After I had to sell Sandra back my plot last year to keep from being evicted, she says I can't be buried there anymore. So now I have to go in with my mother. A great day, great activities, the morning after doing Google searches for Nembutal and white barbiturate and Carisoprodol and how Fluoxetine interacts with it and would it kill me and how much would i need to get and could I get it without prescription from somewhere online and... yes. Cemetery day. Wonderful.

Turns out that since Holy Cross is a devoutly Catholic cemetery, they won't allow me to be buried with my mother because she was married at the time of her death. They would need a signed, notarized letter from her husband stating that he turns the burial plot over to me, her surviving child...even though I PAID for it in its entirety and he told me when she died that he didn't want it. So, I called him from the funeral preplanning offices yesterday, to ask if he would do that for me, since I don't know if I'll survive well into the new year, and he says to me, paraphrased, 'no.' So isn't that special. I don't have a sure, paid-for place to lay my head even in death.

Then to the grocery store. I begged my aunt to buy me a few things, in lieu of a 'birthday gift', from her which i haven't received since about age 9 anyhow. She bought me a box of cereal, Albers' grits, margarine, a quart of skim milk and a carton of Tropicana orange juice. And four Lean Cuisine frozen dinners.

That is more food than I've had in my house in a month. Oh, I also convinced her to get Lucy a bag of cat food. Because, naturally, the cat always comes first with me. She guilt-tripped me all the way home, and yelled at me about how she can't buy me things because she has no money (says the woman who just spent $140 on an alabaster statue of a praying angel from some antiques shop in Culver City the same day). God, I wish my family could just be kind to me for 5 minutes without trying to make me feel like a USER because every once in awhile I need a hand or a fucking hug. Its my birthday for God's sake, and I may not make it to my next one, so could you just be NICE to me? I have nothing in this world, but you can't spend $20 on a few food items without screaming about how I'm railroading you? Why? Haven't I done for you in the past? Without a lecture? Haven't I?

Groceries, I got. The hug, I did not. But when I got home and showered the prickly feel of the cemetery lawn-grass off of me, I climbed into bed, took some NyQuil so I could fall quickly asleep, and then I hugged my cat. She always hugs back, you know.

Touch faith.

A Fever You Can't Sweat Out

Just for a moment, consider that you might be crazy.

I'm not saying you're crazy, Lisette. Just consider it a possibility. It doesn't mean anything bad if you are; just that there's something else there. Or not all there, depending on how you want to look at it.

You've been spending the past three years wondering why she isn't talking to you. Wishing that a little tiny bit of the never ending luck and good-fortune that permeates J's life could come on over and swing towards your way. But that doesn't seem to be working. You clench your jaw at night, wake up with excruciating jaw and headache pain, and then start mainlining the anti-depressant you take in a (too?) low dose, along with the ineffectual Tylenol rapid release, and a wineglass or two full of, no, not wine, but Crystal Light.

Its the only thing that makes the filtered Hollywood tap water taste good.

So, today. You told your friend you were happy for them, but you also told them how very hard it was for you to admit that you are happy for them, when nothing in your life is going right. When good things seem to drop into their lap with regularity (and minimal effort), yet no matter how vigorously you pray, how many Inner Peace books you read and Secrets you take in and pictures you cut out and managers you charm and dollars you spare to the less fortunate or vision boards you gaze longingly at...things stagnate. None of that good fortune knows the directions to my home, my head, my heart, my health. Now with a strange tinge of maturity and resignation, i contemplate the possibility that A: I might've brought on the demise of my method of 'income' by my own design, by fervently wishing and praying that I would no longer have to do those things in order to survive, or keep a little green in my Target brand Mizrahi change purse, and B: that i might be crazy.

Did I do it? A part of me is terrified, yet so relieved that that 'work' is no longer an option. At all. Yet I look in my freezer and cupboards and cat food bag and litter pail and laundry hamper and wonder how I'm going to get by without that 'work', and how I'll eventually be able to get me a new Voluspa candle and go grocery shopping and restart my gym membership, and..also, get a job that i apply for and actually want.

But the crazy, its there under the surface. For could I not be crazy, although I desperately wish the dead would project their voice into my head and speak to me, whether in my dreams or awake? Mildred, Danielle, my grandfather, any of those who kind of loved me. I want to hear them. Especially my mother. I don't think I'm going to have the luxury of dying soon to escape my problems and miseries, but maybe I could make this thing work if my mother would make a cameo in my head one night. Just a guest appearance, really. Not like Heather Locklear on Melrose Place, who stayed on for years as a 'special guest star'. Just, Danielle, maybe pull a Stevie Wonder on The Cosby Show instead?

Jammin' on the 1.

PS: My birthday is next Friday. Twenty-six.

Broken Ties (...Better?)

Lisette.

I want you to re-read this, and think of it every time you want to beat yourself, your sick-self, up for what happened last summer/early fall. Its' something that you can't undo. And it was big, very big, and you don't regret the IT of it, just the HOW of it, and the not-knowing-the-WHY of it until IT was too late to fix (it).

Stacy McKee on "These Ties That Bind"...
Original Airdate: 11-13-08
I have this vase. It has its very own spot, right in the center of my breakfast room table, directly in front of the window, where the light will shine through it. It’s beautiful – Murano glass with
multicolored stripes of orange and yellow and pink and blue… I love this vase.

It was an engagement gift, and it’s one of a kind. Irreplaceable. And a few
weeks ago, my kitten figured out how to jump up onto my breakfast room table
(but he couldn’t figure out how to STAY on the table) so my new little kitten
skidded all the way across the top of the table and crashed onto the floor
below… taking my vase with him.

I jumped into action – first making sure my kitten wasn’t hurt, then starting the task of carefully sweeping up every last shard of broken glass… Only, as I stood there, broom in hand, staring down at all those beautiful broken shards, I started to cry. And cry. And cry and cry
and cry and cry and pretty soon my husband was there, trying to figure out how I
could possibly be sobbing – SOBBING – over what was, let’s face it, a PIECE OF
GLASS. And through my crazy, slightly manic tears, I managed to blurt out that
it wasn’t just a piece of glass! It was a beautiful vase. A beautiful vase that
made me happy every time I looked at it and that was important because sometimes
we all need reminders of things that make us happy. That vase was from a time in
our life when things were new and bright and just beginning and now it’s gone.
The vase is gone forever, there’s no way to bring it back. I felt connected to
that vase, and I already missed it. I MISSED THE DAMN VASE.

Is what I said.

Through my tears. Gesturing with my broom. Which was pretty ridiculous. Only,
not – because what you don’t know is that over the summer, my dad passed away.
Then a couple of weeks later, my cat passed away. Which is the only reason I
have a new kitten in the first place. And the truth is – this was probably the
first time I’d really – REALLY – let myself cry. I finally let myself start to
feel that incredible mish mash of feelings we all have when we lose people who
are important to us. I was crying for all the loss I’d been feeling for months.

And it took a shattered vase to help me let it out.
In Callie Torres’s case… all it takes is some shattered bones.

I know, I know – Hahn isn’t dead. But she IS gone. And Callie is feeling it – sort of. Callie’s diving into work. She wants bones to break, skeletons to build, SOMETHING to keep her from thinking
about Erica. Erica played an unbelievably important role in Callie’s life; Erica’s relationship with Callie has completely redefined how Callie sees herself. That’s something you can’t undo. Erica’s departure has left Callie with this big gaping hole that she has no idea how to fill. Callie had just started to figure out her own feelings, her own identity and now – Hahn’s gone. Without a goodbye.

Whether or not Callie and Erica were ever soul mates, you can’t deny that they played irreplaceable roles in each other’s lives. The heartbreak that Callie is feeling is very very real. And very very private until – she starts to cry, and cry and cry and cry, in the OR, over the bones that she built from scratch. She’s crying for all the loss and heartbreak and sadness she hasn’t allowed herself to really feel yet. Which is why it’s so lovely that Callie’s friends – Yang, Sloan, and even Owen – recognize the moment for what it is and try to give her the privacy she needs to mourn.

Kinda like me with my vase.

-(Grey's Anatomy Blog)

Light

Today's Scorpio Horoscope:
Nov 11, 2008

Whatever you want, dear Scorpio, you need only ask for it and there is a good chance you will get it. And it's about time, too. It seems you have been working exceptionally hard lately. You are certainly due for a raise, if not a promotion. Gather your thoughts, collect your supporting evidence and ask for what you deserve. If your yen for more public recognition is nagging at you, then take steps today to ensure that you get more time in the spotlight.

After this, I just might name my unborn child Keith

I am so Inspired

As I sit here drinking this Maker's spiked lemonade, watching Oprah's post-election special, listening to my "Halo" theme song. I feel so inspired. I feel sad that I didn't get a newspaper, yea, but I'm so lucky that I live in this time. Someone of at least half of my coloring is the ruler of all the land. That is so amazing to me! Lisette, isn't it surreal? That it happened in your lifetime?

I almost feel the will to live. I want to see what happens next. I want to have a child, desperately, so that My son or daughter will come of age in an era where we truly know equality exists.

Is that weird? That I can see his halo?

Dear Erica,

You helped her so much. I sit and I realize just how much you helped the both of us last year, even through secondary means. You helped give me the strength to tell her, the advice to whisper to her, the confidence to be there for her after as she fell apart, and the... well, ok, not all of it was great. *laughing* I probably shouldn't have done a LOT of it. Most of it. Damn near ALL of it. But that wasn't hardly your doing. *smile* If I had known then how you truly felt, I doubt I would have ever been able to go there. I could tell you that while it killed our association, yours and mine, that is, it almost murked the one I have with the Camzelle. I could tell you that, but that isn't the truth at all. It was a very thin, shaky, rickety-ass line I walked last summer and fall with those two, but I'm happy to say that out of the ashes of all that, we are still close, she is healing, he is knowledgeable and more receptive to her, and the only friend I lost in this whole mess was you. I'm not at all happy about that. It still makes me lose sleep some nights. I still have to fight the urge to dial your number and gossip and yelp about the unfair things on Grey's and our other usual shit. I still miss my cynical, sarcastic Leo friend.

But I have to thank you now. You are not a shrink by any means, but you helped ME give my friend the tools to heal herself, and confide her deepest secrets and fears to someone she loves more than you and I love Michael Jackson and tequila combined. I read the lyrics now, and see that Disappear is about the night she told him and he ran out of the room and ended up crying in the backseat of the car. Brokenhearted Girl was written as a long-awaited confrontation and realization of the BAD that happened, and a step toward real forgive- but-not-forget -ness. And some of the others are literal diary entries about working through her demons last year. Needing someone to love her in spite of her frailties and collateral internal and mental damage.

YOU helped do this. YOU did. You helped a girl you don't even like or know recover from something horrifying; something you yourself experienced, though milder, in a way.

Do you know how BIG that is? That's huge. And you should be SO proud. I'm proud of you.

America files for divorce from GW Bush; cites irreconcilable differences

Oooooooooh. America done up and filed for divorce from George W. Bush last night. After 8 miserable years in this arranged marriage shit, we up and left his ass-and FOR A BLACK MAN.

Yes We Can? Word?! YES WE DID.

And I helped! Yeah, I'm serious. My sick, broke, cellphoneally challenged, brain-injury ridden, out-of-work, no-income having, ain't-had-enough-for-bus-fare-to-get-to-the-Van Ness Elem School-polling-place ass WENT AND WORKED THE POLLS YESTERDAY. Yours truly, for the second time in 4 years, was a certified pollworker alongside Ken 'The Asshole" Younger and J. I slept over in J's living room, went to bed at 3 after a harrowing experience with an ex-war veteran named Brian Alexander (fresh off the return from Kabul boat last Friday), woke up at 5:15, was at the polls at 6, stayed until the dark of night helping giddy, eager young black first-time voters, and inSANELY elderly voters with everything from arthritis to incontinence to Parkinson's disease cast their wheelchair- and walker-bound ballots. It seems like everybody that walked through the doors of St. Elmo Village yesterday was for Barack Obama. And shit....after leaving, rescheduling an after-polling job interview for today (missed it though; i slept right through my alarm, damnnit!) and going with J to try to find my aunt at my 44 year old Birthday Cousin's house, i watched on CNN as Barack, Michelle, and two little girls with the most BOMB press & curled hairstyles EVER walked out onto a podium in Chicago and spoke to a nation astounded and inspired.

And Oprah. She was there crying on some white man's shoulder, and all me and J wanted to do was join the honking in the streets and the parties all over the city with the drunk girls screaming "Woooo Oba-maaaa!" (Or was that his half-sister Menisha?) and after leaving and going to the gym at midnight so I could soak in the whirlpool and pedal to the hum of CNN on the stationary bike, J felt the strong urge to give a black chick on a treadmill a dap and say, "We did it!" But alas, our in-checkness made us pause.

I have never felt more happy to be black and american in my life.

THEN I come home and Sushi's shit hath leaked. After noting what was about bad Daddy, what was about hubby's baby-begging and pleas of ignorance, and what was about the lil' Bajan protege ("Where YO boss at?"), I sat grinning wildly at how good the girl has done. I'm not talking about the melodies. Not the production. Not even her voice, although that was very improved and controlled and smooth and lilting and adult. No, I am so proud of her therapy-seeking ass because she LET A LOT OF HER SHIT OUT. All that very dark shit. She let it out. And its so nice to hear, because now that its OUT she can truly let it go. And stay happy.

My God, wouldn't it be nice if I myself had a way to do that??!

***

I can't be as suicidal as I have been this week again for awhile. No more red wine. No more crying. I'll just obsessively watch The Secret, read my many, many, many books, search for a job, eat less again, work hard to pay my debt down, and keep grinning everytime I hear Halo or think of how beautiful our new First Family is. Gorgeous little girls in our white house. A tall, skinny, articulate, multinational, biracial Black guy running the country. His just as articulate, blunt, and full-of-the-power-of-reasoning brownskinned cover-girl pretty wife right next to him. And soon, a puppy. (LOL) Is this how my grandparents felt when the Kennedy's took it in the 1960's?

I so totally get it now.

I can't die; the black man won. I can't die; I have to tell my homegirl how proud I am of her. I can't die; I have to give it another go come January. I have to get healthy and get right, or get left.

Isn't it funny how politics makes a girl so GIDDY today? I even nudged the cat this morning and said, "Lucy! Guess what? My President is BLACK! The cost of cat-food is coming down!" She just purred and ate at her foot fur. That's my fat orange baby!

Signs off humming, "I can see your halo, halo, halo..."

Internet Addict

Hi from the hospital of horreurs! Dr. Molur let me use her Macbook. Cause i'm coherent and just had to check my spots for developments and shit.

I think they're gonna have to give it a second go tomorrow. Some clip-off issues during the slicing and dicing went down. Like, we wouldn't want to clip the thing WRONG and make it rupture. Cause that would suck.

My murses are gay men. Cute ones. Isn't that neat?

Put A Craniotomy On It (I Am....Lee Zett FIERCE!)

My Atlanta ladies

Up in the hospital
Just walked up (to the O.R.)
I'm doing my aneurysm thang
You decided to trip
But i'm not gonna flip
Cause i need to focus just on ME
I'm up in here
The doc's have shears
Don't pay me any attention
Cause I cried my tears
After 5 good years
But you're still mad at me

Cause if you like me then you should apologize for me
If you like me then you should apologize for me
Don't be mad and refuse to sympathize for me
Cause if you liked me then you would have teared your eyes for me

Electrodes on my ears
Disregarding my fears
Chest tighter than our crew used to be
Choking up
Anaesthetic queued up
I could care less if it stings
I needed attention
Did i mention?
Your cruelty affected my vision
But you spoke your turn
And I had to learn
How it really feels to be lonely

Cause if you like me then you should apologize for me
If you like me then you should apologize for me
Don't be mad and refuse to sympathize for me
Cause if you liked me then you would have teared your eyes for me

Don't treat me like the Stans of the world
I'm not that kind of girl
Fairness is what I prefer
What I deserve
Is good friends who help me, and lift me
In my misery, and show empathy and comradery when I'm down
Hug me mentally, in your arms
Say I'm your friend although
We don't always get along
On things we can't agree upon

My Atlanta ladies

Build from there?

Today's Scorpio Horoscope:Oct 27, 2008

It is time to loosen up a bit, dear Scorpio. The current planetary aspects will bring a new cycle of tolerance and understanding you way. You could use a little of both, if you don't mind our saying so. Take baby-steps as you begin to introduce the kinder and gentler YOU to your friends and coworkers. They won't accept a rapid transformation, but they will be agreeable to gradual changes. Start by listening more and speaking less. This little step can make a big difference in a relationship. Build from there!

Sometimes I'm so despondent, that I feel the need to...

Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning
Trust him.

Somehow I know that
There's a place up above
With no more hurt and struggling
Free of all atrocities and suffering

Because I feel the unconditional love
From one who cares enough for me
To erase all my burdens
And let me be free to

Fly like a bird
Take to the sky
I need you now
Lord, Carry me high
Don't let the world break me tonight
I need the strength of you by my side
Sometimes this life can be so cold
I pray you'll come and carry me home

Can we recover
Will the world ever be
A place of peace and harmony?
With no war and with no brutality

If we loved each other
We would find victory
But in this harsh reality
Sometimes I'm so despondent
That I feel the need to

Fly like a bird
Take to the sky
I need You now, Lord
Carry me high
Don't let the world break me tonight
I need the strength of
You by my side
Sometimes this life can be so cold
I pray You'll come and carry me home

He says he will never forsake you
Or leave you alone
Trust him


Keep your head to the sky
With God's love you'll survive

Fly like a bird
Take to the sky
I need you now
Lord. Carry me high
Don't let the world break me tonight
I need the strength of
You by my side
Sometimes this life can be so cold
I pray You'll come and carry me home

Carry me higher, higher, higher
Carry me higher, higher, higher
Carry me home
Higher Jesus
Carry me higher, Lord

A Thrill That I Have Never Known

I don't think I've ever been more miserable and alone of late, than I am right now, tonight.

I really wish God would release me. And let me fly.

Ouch. Ow. Hurts.

The last couple days have been a mess of uncomfortableness. Something's wrong with my inner eye, and the whole left side of my face is swollen, red and painful from my lower eyelid up. I have my final checks before my impending surgery to get through on Thursday, and then on the 30th, they'll be chopping my head open again. So right now i can't see out of my left eye, my hands are still recovering, i'm living off of Lean Cuisines (all I have to do is press the button on the microwave, lol) and I've GOT to get up the strength to re-contact my contacts at the HRCP so I can get my fat foot back in that door. My hair is dank and lifeless. I need to change my sheets, but am ridiculously unmotivated to do so. And i can't stop reading. Books, books, books. Yesterday (right before my life was threatened by my cousin's thug 'friend' Stanbury -not going into details on THAT one-) I bought a French textbook called Vis a Vis by McGraw-Hill company. Like really. A TEXTBOOK. And today, I got a memoir by David Sedaris and another book on homosexuality studies in America.

Weird, I know. But I had to return "Dewey" and my two impossibly cool calendars of Italy's coastal regions to Borders in order to afford to buy some homeopathic opthalmic medication and another box of Vella red, this time a cabernet sauv.

I'll be alright. If I could just stop feeling all this Ouchness for a few days so I could get me that Telecommunications spot.

Crap, I need to put it on my V Board.

I couldn't love you more, if time was running out

J told me he loved me, and thanked me for cooking for him tonight. He hugged me and told me, "Thank you SO MUCH, I was really going to waste away to nothing." (He hasn't been eating since the Eric thing.) He asked, "Lisette, do you like cooking for me?"

I said Yes, because I do. I honestly don't mind being domestic and cooking for someone who loves me. I rarely cook for myself, because everything I know how to cook is a family recipe and is made for at least 4 people. I'm alone, by myself, and I can't see myself cooking all that and eating it for days. So, tonight, I cooked because I knew J would eat most of the food, and he did. He scarfed EIGHT tacos, took 2 home, and I had two. I wondered truly where he was putting it all.

He hugged me, and we watched Lady And The Tramp, the VHS, while I drank Vella Delicious Red table wine (from a box, ugh...) and he looked through boxes of my albums. He just left. I'm so happy that he spent a little time with me. Just being my friend. No drama, no bullshit.

It was nice. *smile*

Delayed Reality

I have been having these long early-AM conversations with J of late. Tonight, I promised him I would make him tacos, and I actually think he's excited to eat them. He hasn't had anything made with that packet of Lawry's seasoning since his mother died, I suspect.

He's been going through the very first serious time someone has broken his heart. The guy's name was Eric, and the fact that his Eric did almost the same thing to him that I did to my Erica last year, has not been lost on me. I try to pore over it in my mind time and time again, and now, when I see my friend hurting internally so badly because one who courted him and made him have those falling feelings could not be for him what he alluded to being able to be?

Its like a repeat. Its like deja vu. Except mine with my E went on longer and was deeper than his with his E. And I was a much closer friend to my E. Damn that. Damn it all.

He asks me, my J, if what I did to Erica was like what his Eric did to him. He says, "Lisette, I know you, I KNOW you and you wouldn't DO something like that to her. Were you saying, 'Hi, baby, when are you coming back to see me?' Were you stroking her hand and telling her how striking she was? Were you constantly asking her out for coffee?"

*sigh*. Not exactly, no. She lived across the US. But I did flirt, I did tell her I loved her (truth) and I did for a long moment think I could truly rescue her from the woman and man who've been holding her in a southern prison for twenty-odd years. I did put myself into confusing and emotion-stirring positions with someone I should have intuited had not been loved that way or shown that kind of codependent-seeming attention before. I did let the sarcastic, sensual side of my personality dominate at times where I should have reminded myself that a Leo is not the astrological sign with which to play with ruminations on love. I should have been more clear that although I can come off a very sexual person, my idea of intimacy is more emotional than it could ever be physical, with a female. And quite frankly, I don't even really think I'll ever be able to fully expose myself emotionally to a man, going forward in my life. I honestly don't. That goes back to my recent conversations with J. I tell him, the only thing in this life that I think could keep me alive and bring me happiness is a child of my own. Someone who will not have known me the way I am now and have been. Someone who, if shown an unconditional love by a capable parent, will give that love back to m e in return. I know why Halle Berry wanted Nahla so badly. I know why Michael Jackson wanted his three. I know why Jenna Jameson is so ecstatic about being pregnant (with twins!) right now. Those babies will be Somebodies who will be born loving her; she won't feel as if they will judge her for the choices she made or the path she took. Her unhappiness and misery have manifested itself in her outward appearance for several years now, (as Madonna's have hers;) and like myself, that internal unhappiness is palpable. A child will be a fresh start for Jenna.

One day, I pray to God a child will be that fresh start for me.

I'm hoping Erica can forgive me. I want forgiveness for how I hurt her. I apologize, and I will always regret having had to learn that lesson through her. I see how its killing J, and I console and counsel him, from places most women can never come from. But I can, because I've been through it. I tell J he will find happiness one day. I truly believe that he will. So I'm putting it out there into the Cyberspace universe that my E will find that happiness for herself, I truly do think it is meant for her. Man, woman, writer, college graduate, runaway, mental-mother murderer, what have you. I think she will. She's a good girl.

So am I, though. I think I am. I can be, despite all of this, right?

My child will still love me unconditionally as long as I love and care and provide for and teach it. It will. I believe it. It is so, no matter how it will come to be so.

I am certain. I am certain. I have unwavering faith. I will gain health, I will find happiness, I will survive and cast my Demons out. I will be happy at work and play. I will love my home, my belongings, my surroundings. Myself. I will have Lucy, and I will begin to become alright. I won't be broken anymore. I'm going to heal.

I'll be okay. J will be okay. E will be okay.

And Barack Obama will become President. That too. *wink*

"Cat like Dog? Cat Dog?"

So. I got hit on by a really sweet, charming guy today on my way to the spa.

I had been seeing him around, as he works at a coffeehouse in Hollywood two blocks from my gym, and I would stop in there and get lattes on occasion.

So today, i happen to run into him on the Metro. I've been sick as FUCK, so I haven't been able to go to my gym regularly for like 3 months. I didn't recognize him, and then he reminded me where I knew him from, etc. We had a little 5 minute random convo about random shit.
THEN he tells me he's heading home, and asks me in a sly way where I lived and if I lived with my husband.

:? Dude. Seriously?

After I tell him that the wedding ring I wear is purely Nigga repellent- for dudes who aren't bright enough to figure out that its not on the ring finger, therefore is NOT my wedding ring....and how if they're that stupid I ain't talking to they asses anyway... he then proceeeds to tell me that he bets i get hit on a lot, 'looking the way i do'.

:?

I rolled my eyes. I have a migraine and chipped toenail polish and my fingers are jacked the hell up from my Garage Door Closing On Hands OWWW Fucking A! accident last week, AND my skin is all dry and shyt. I am not hot today. "Yeah, dumb mofos and old ass mofos old enough to be my daddy hit on me CONSTANTLY."

He's like...no, really. I bet older dudes..they're the only ones who can get up the nerve to talk to you...

"Aww. Thank you for the compliment, that's sweet."

"That wasn't a compliment; Its a FACT."

Ok, so...what the hell???? This nigga right here.

I eye this dude warily. It dawns on me (finally...I'm slow like that) that he's hitting on me. Oh, word?

"How old are you?"

He goes..."Um...young."

"Young?"

"Younger than you...I know I'm too young."

:huh: I go, no, eff that, HOW OLD is young?

He goes... "Twenty."

OH HELL.

NOT that i'm interested, because A, I don't want or need a man, and B, he's light-skindededed and I don't go for high yella dudes, but because he's SO SWEET and had been hooking me up with extra shots in my lattes and shit and I had no idea he liked me, I was going to be nice to him for a change and give him my number when he asked (he did ask...in that, 'so why don't you call my phone?' kinda way. He ain't slick. )

But he's TWENTY? I'm 25. Oh hell naw! LMAO!

I can't. LMAO

I go...wait, you were born in the 80's, though, right? Okay. That isn't THAT bad. Oh hell.

WHAT is with BABIES hitting on me? After I told him I was 5 years older than him-damn near 6-he still didn't care!

He can't drink yet.

He told me he wants to BE MY MAIN THANG.

Who SAYS that?! What does that mean? I don't even KNOW you, bruh!

He's so sweet, but he can't drink yet, and lord knows I like a glass of wine with my whine.

Damn. Why must the perfect gentleman be underaged (damn close) and the color of Beyonce's L'Oreal Feria ad wig? :(

LMAO!

I'm evil, right? I know. But he didn't even know what BOYZ IN THE HOOD was, and he lives a block from where Ice Cube and Cuba Gooding had guns blazing in the burger joint parking lot! LMAO! How can you not know that movie?!

A damn twenty year old! Naw!

Take Me Out Of Reality

What am I doing wrong?

I'm not doing anything wrong, am I?

Right now, I fully acquiesce to the realization that I am an addict of some kind, and the addiction...the thing I'm knowingly addicted to, helps me to forget about all the things not heading in a positive direction in my life right now.

I thank the addiction for not costing me anything and allowing me to have it.

Thank you thank you thank you SO much. You take me out of reality.

A Little Misfortune

..and a lot of sashimi.

I accidentally ordered 3X my normal amount of ebi nigiri today over at Kabuki. This could have been because I was so peturbed at the events of this morning. Rehashing Chris' frantic email cries of 'where's my money?' and my EDD check not arriving. So, I stopped off at Kabuki, had some sushi (although I packed it up and brought most of it home;) went into Out Of The Closet and bought a few novels (the title of this entry is from the foreword of one by John Irving), and went into Rite Aid for a little pampering Lisette therapy. I got band-aids for this atrocious pinky-toe blister I developed after tromping around Century City in stiletto Franco Sarto leather boots this past Tuesday (being all charming and effusive, hoping for a very cool job), I got psoriasis relief medication (even though I don't exactly have psoriasis, the itchy dryness by my ankles that flares up whenever I have been submerged in a tank of stress is re-flaring, to the point wher last night I could barely sleep if not doused in peppermint oil castile soap..of course, it could've been from the heat;) and Burt's Bees peppermint foot lotion. Just because. Also a pack of olive oil infused deep conditioning treatment with which to maintain my new haircut, and a bag of peppermints (peppermint all around me!) Oh, and some more cold & sinus bubble bath, as I suspect i am about to go soak in a tepid tub full of the last of mine before the VP debate starts in 90 minutes.

I took the DASH home (which today was that bright red Holley-Trolly looking thing) and gave a confused white man trying to break a $20 for bus fare the requisite quarter, for which he thanked me effusely. Dude, its twenty-five cents. I hope you'd spot someone else a quarter if they needed it, i mean, c'mon. I've been that girl without a quarter before; in fact, I was damn near being her just yesterday on my way to the LASFC hospital. (Jennifer, my doctor yesterday, was nice. Dry wit everywhere, but nice, and she got me out of there in under 2 hours. Sweet!)

Another novel I picked up today is entitled "Go West Young F*cked Up Chick" by Rachel Resnick. Ooh, I think i'm going to like that one. But my own novel would be different; something like, "Head East, You Medicated Sarcastic B*tch, You!" and with that, I shall think of ways to come up with vast amounts of dollars with which to pay Christopher, buy fresh new business suits for the JOB im gonna get at the HRCP, and uh...fly to Alabama at the end of the month, God willing, for Ratoisha's baby shower. I think. I hope. But i want that job a tiny bit more, and i know Ms. Jessie'd understand. Besides, I buy fabulous baby clothes, and shopping for her son is no exception!

And I gotta go see Kat in Michigan at Christmas, possibly.

And I think i'ma seriously go to Europe next year...Italy is still on my radar. Oh, yes, another book I grabbed today (along with a BABAR the Elephant VHS)? Learn ITALIANO The Fast And Fun Way.

I fully intend to, shit!

PS: It cooled down today. The weather was downright pleasant. Lucky me and Lucy!
PPS: I lost out on another Zac Posen Iconic Tote today. I swear, I'm going to get me one of those damn things if its the last thing I do! (Well, not really.)

97 Degrees

I just can't understand this shit. Its OCTOBER. We're having a fucking heatwave. The cat is miserable, lying on the floor doing her kitty yoga in her ginger coat of fur. THICK FUR. Poor baby! I'm sitting in my draws and brassiere waiting for the Vice-Presidential debate to begin so I can LMAO at Sarah Palin. But its HOT. The record store owner wants to come see me for a bit, but its SO HOT. I don't want to be bothered...its HOT!!

Yesterday I went to the HRCP and met with 'Cairo'. Drew, he was nice. As were the people in HR. I hope it all turns out well...in fact, i KNOW it will. Know why? I have my faith. Last weekend I went to the Lake Shrine in Pacific Palisades, got off on the wrong stop (who knew there were TWO Marquez Streets?) and walked about a mile and 1/2 until i FINALLY got to the SRF Lake Shrine. I sat and watched the swans and doves, i meditated (kinda), i looked around at all the gorgeousness. I walked in flip-flops through the cedar chips on the ground. I bought a moonstone ring and sandalwood prayer beads. And a picture frame to put Danielle in, and a little carved wooden elephant that reminded me of her, and a bunch of the best incense EVER.

Mostly, I just felt good being in a place that my mother had taken me as a child. It was nice. I might go back soon. The bus ride wasn't too bad. *smile*

Decanates and cusps and moons and ascendants...and toilet bowls and diaphragms...

I am a Scorpio.

Pisces rising, moon in Aquarius, cusp of Sagittarius, born in the 3rd decanate of Scorpio at 10:38pm on November the 21st, 1982.

I need to not drink alcohol. I need to ingest mad amounts of calcium. I need to reign in my volatile qualities, eat lentils, romaine, cherries, dairy and fish. I need to not be as emotionally detached...even if it is in my charts that I tend to be.

Tomorrow, I'm going to Whole Foods and I'm getting me a quick cleanse, and I'm cleaning out my liver. Milk thistle, anyone? All night I have been alternately shitting and retching from the poison in my body. I'm tired of this and I don't like it anymore. So along with my vision board of two hat travel, blue waters, antique style sofas in neutral linen colors and Spanish California houses, I am going to visualize a healthy body, a clean liver, a rested mind, a stronger heart.

Why? Because I think I'm ready now.

Liver, wish your owner luck.

Danielle? Mama? Dani Elle? Listen to me.

Now we were once both silly with the same mind
Quick to roll our eyes and giggle from the same line (Bur Bur Burrr!)
You were many years older, but you still told
Me how Sawyer women could 'catch', and that I was beautiful
I remember when Lindy came around; you didn’t quite learn
Then Malgy moved in and you faltered, lost your job term
Collect calls to Granny’s house, saying that you’d maintain
If she would just come through with a little change
We moved into her home, I didn’t think much
Didn’t know my childhood was over, no childish games and such
It seems I lost my mother then, and to a bad man
You hit the pipe; from then on smoking was your only plan
Rather not work for your money; that was GR’s trouble
David yelled but you ignored and begged for more money
Congratulations on your ‘93 wedding, I hope you now know
You left your child for that life, and Malgy’s bullshitting
I know we grew apart, you probably don't remember
I used to cry for my Granny, you wouldn’t let me see her
And I can see me after school, withdrawn
In my hot-ass room with that pink silk gown on
Now my whole world’s changed, and nothing seems right in it
Got a hole in my heart, and you can’t even fill it
And I knew in my heart you were the same Mother that
Wanted a child so much, after the one you lost a year before that
And I can't even cry, or be remorseful at cha
You died too soon; I feel pain cause you’re dead
But I ain't mad at cha

I ain't mad at cha
I ain't mad at cha

I used to hang out with my cousins, sleeping at your brother’s
Whole time you were buzzing, Malgy and you wasn’t
Trying to parent me at all; it just wasn’t fair
I'm getting blitzed and I reminsce on all the stress I beared
Besides reading and Michael wasn’t nothing on my mind
In time I had to live a life of crime
Rewind me back, to a time was too naïve to know
I caught a misdemeanor off of that Sawyer “Catch” goal
And when I moved, I thought I’d be okay and you’d be straight
But several days after my move, you were lain in state
I couldn’t think of goodbye, and wipe the tears from my lonely eyes
The only one who saw me cry was Joe- a week’d gone by


Please shed a tear, cause Mama I ain't happy here
Sick and tired, all alone with all my fears
They got me goin mad, I'm knocking several drinks back
In my jail, thinking, “Hell, I do not deserve this whack
sentence I’ve received.” Its got me feeling down
I wooed a girl in the south, unknowingly made her frown
And Joe, he wants to kick it, but I’m just not that happy
Trying to forgive you, bitch, so I swear, I ain’t mad at cha

I ain't mad at cha
I ain't mad at cha

Well guess I’m medicated up, sometimes bawling now
Assholes keep calling my cell phone and I keep laying down
I went from prudish to used, quite frigid to screwed
Went from a celibate honey to ‘How much have you got?’
Now Joe’s a rising celebrity, and he still cares for me
He tries to inspire me, to think much more positively
See, I hate my decisions, but I made them, so the choice is made
I can’t rewind time or reflect on my younger days
So full of pain while my candles blaze
Gettin so loose off that Vodka hoping I make it, to see better days
Cause crime pays, for no one, I feel this every day
When I apply for thankful work and I am told ‘No Way!’
My family changed on me, so many tried to plot

I feel like I’m not close to any of our family stock
My pride has stripped me of my essence
Cause even as an adolescent, I refused to have a Welfare presence
So many questions, I feel as if I’m dead now
I’ve sold my body for money, so I ain't real now?

Mom, I regret this day, but I'm just pushing after
Just what, I just don't know, but please know, that I ain't mad at cha

Stevland, is that you?

Um.

I think Stevie Wonder might have moved into the Chicano-filled building next door to me in Hollywood, as for the past 45 minutes straight someone has been languidly playing a lazy harmonica. Every time I think I catch the opening melody of Dionne Warwick's "That's What Friends Are For", the melody changes. Fucking A. I had too much Kenya coffee and not enough solid food in the past 36 hours. I'm losing it. I'm losing my shit. But I can still hear the harmonica. Que???

-Lisette, being all hopeful and optimistic. Really. *smile*

The Aftermath Of The Great Cedars-Sinai 'Let's Drug The Bitch!" Experiment

Or, my last 7 days or so. I have barely been ONLINE in the past, oh, 3 weeks. Just sporadically, when i could check from the Medical Jail i was being held in, or after that when i dragged my raggedy laptop to Coffee Bean and freeloaded off their WiFi. So, all this new shit hath been goin' down and I am all late and shit. Beyonce is running around town looking like a porno-movie bondage cop. Jennifer Hudson is marrying a gay man. Halle Berry is parading her adorable lookalike daughter around. I'm sure some white celebrities have recently given birth or gone to rehab. Oh, that's right, Britney Spears is apparently doing really good again, even though her mama wrote a book about her friend Sam grinding up her anti-psychotics Risperdal and Seroquel into her food, oh Lordy. But back to me. This is all about me, me, me, me, me. To quote Mya Harrison circa 1997. *wink*

Tuesday: Kabuki Sushi with Alicia (her treat, after several of mine.) I get spicy tuna hand rolls and an avocado roll and a blue moon slightly alcoholic-ish drink. She eats lobster and shrimp and lots of butter sauce and later tells me her bowels move. Yippee?

Wednesday: Why I wound up crying my eyes out after drinking champagne and then watching MONSTER is (not) beyond me. I called up J and cried like a little girl. For 2 hours. He listened. I think.

Thursday: Again, crying. I asked him to please teach me how to be thankful for that which i do not yet have in my possession, as my mind is a rational mind and cannot easily psyche itself out into feeling like YAY! EVERYTHING IS COMING UP ROSES!!! when I know that it really, really isn't. He doesn't know how to teach me. But I asked! That's progress, right? Righty-O.

Friday: With Alicia to Walgreens at 11pm to fetch 72 packets of Emergen-C vitamin c powder for sick, sick, motherless J. Then to KFC. Then to Buckingham, where i help Lynne carry my AbLounger Tony Little exercise thingy into her new bedroom. Then J tries to convince me to stay. I say no, do not allow him to come out and meet Alicia who's eating KFC mashed potatoes in one of her have-it-for-48-hours-then-flip-it-Lien-Sale cars, and then, off to Bossa Nova for real food. I get an Andrea's salad. She gets the chicken brochette (bitch is a sucker for bacon wrapped anything.) Then I tell her the majority of my business on a long whim, and am reminded again how to try to make Rhonda Byrne's 'thing' work for me.

Saturday: J takes his Vitamins, still feels sick. I have a third crying jag and call him, begging him, to please come and get me OUT of this apartment. I pop the bottle of Taittinger Rose' that I'd been saving (the one i agonized over whether to ever drink on this blog, because it MATCHED MY DECOR ***sigh). I opened it and drank it ALL. Woooo. Woozy. Then out with J to the Sunset Marquis, briefly, then to 7-Eleven for Red Stripe, Red Vines and frozen burritos, then to Carl's Jr. for Onion Rings and criss-cut fries it took me 24 hours to eat and a shake i rinsed down the drain. (Why negate that sudden 12-pound medically caused Cedars-starvation syndrome weight loss with a NASTY NASTY SHAKE??!) Then home. We talked on the phone.

I FIND OUT *shock*
THAT YEARS AGO *shock shock*
I had *whispers* sex with J. *whispers* In a way I do not remember having ...whatEVER with J.
WHAT?! Why do I not remember that at ALL?!
At ALL!!!!!!
He tells me the details. Aw, shit, i think he's telling the truth. Ok, sure, we did... stuff... but THIS kind of stuff?! The hell I remember that!
I am trying not to vomit, and he's laughing his high, tight, round, Indian-reddish brown black ass off.
I am so done. I shriek, scream and hang up on him several times. He's tripping because A: i REALLY didn't remember it and B: he's cool with it, but all this time later I am the one over here tripping. Talk about a role reversal!

Sunday: More J talk. More teasing me about sex i do not (wish to, or actually) remember. Then, i drink two bottles of champagne (a cheap spumante and Korbel Rose') while listening to Luichini by Camp Lo, and watch more Grey's Anatomy on DVD. Yay! Oh, did I mention i got season 4 on Tuesday and overdrew my bank account to do it? Yup Yup Yup.

Monday: Kabuki Sushi alone at 3:30 for happy hour. I get my usual. Then to H'wood to get my hair braided. Cornrows, very dykey prison-girl style, but i get complimented all day. Um, yay? Then to The Grove to see Tyler Perry's The Family That Preys starring Tyler Perry in a Tyler Perry Studios Production Written By Tyler Perry. Ahem. It was good. Then, home in a taxi, after stopping at CVS to buy fall foliage faux kitchen decor (floor mat, tablecloth, autumn wreath, candles, spoon rest, cutting board, fake ceramic pumpkins and...no, that's it. Now its all THANKSGIVINGY LOOKING in my pale peach kitchen. Coolness.

I am not sick, i am NOT sick, and i am GOING to make what i want to work for me work for me dammit! No more extended hospital stays! No more shutting off my damn cable and wifi! No more not eating anything but string cheese and rolled oats for FOUR WEEKS because a bitch was sick and broke! No more funny shit from my doctors! No more freakish daydreams about my former Leo friend! No more thinking that dang Rhonda Byrne thing (i refuse to call it what it is) can't work for me, because it WILL, got dammit!!!!

It will.

Now i have to write some fiction, watch a bunch of backlogged Law & Order:SVU episodes, and go to the bank. Oh, yes, and get a NEW pedicure. Hospital life is MURDER on the toes.

Thanks to Word Documents...backtracking.

Feels like I sampled True Love… But this sh*t ain’t clear!

Listening to Erykah Badu, sipping Gato Negro Merlot-Cabernet.

Today, pedicure, and a free seafoam green metallic manicure from Kim at Pastel Nails. I guess its not so bad that they accidentally caused me an overdraft charge back in July when I got that extra special super duper $45 pedicure the nigh before J’s asian friend’s B’day party-the one he didn’t go to, at my uh… suggestion.

Sustenance Preparation

“Word to Mama Emma, drama. Dilemma.”

So, I don’t think I’m meant to cook my own food. The rational part of my brain that doesn’t want me to eat BUGS is fucking up my gas stove steelo. Last night I wanted to make this lentil soup I’ve been craving for weeks for some odd reason. I bought all the vegetables, olive oil, some andouille sausage and salt pork (in case I wanted to get really freaking creative) a 5-qt stockpot, a smaller saucepan to make rice in, and a bag (or three) of lentils.

However, I got all that at a regular grocery store, and forgot a few key ingredients: a can of diced tomatoes, garlic cloves and a bag of rice. I figure, hey. Its Labor Day weekend, and I don’t want to be out waiting for the bus late at night on a Sunday just to grab a few things, so I’ll go grab those few staples from the little general-store/bodega-esque 82 Market around the corner on Melrose. They’ve got canned goods, rice, beans, oil, sugar, spices, and all that good shit. Just a short walk away, too, so even though last night I figured I wasn’t going to make a three-hour soup after 9:30, I still ran to the 82 right before they closed and bought what I was missing –and a can of spaghetti sauce to doctor up, along with some inexpensive pasta. I figured it was too late to make the soup, yeah; but spaghetti is quick and a relatively simple way to break in my new yellow Tivoli saucepan.

Well.

Not quite.

I get home and start watching the absurdity that is “Bring It On: All or Nothing”. Yeah, I’ve been on a Solange Knowles kick ever since I heard her Sol-Angel album awhile back; I just thought, why not re-watch her get her little golden-yaki-weaved hood rat on in that dinky movie with the white girl from that show Heroes that everybody raves about? So I put it in, and about halfway through, when the cheerleading Mexican dude takes the white girl to the top of a building in the ghetto and calls it ‘The Beach’ (blank stare), I pressed pause because a bitch was suddenly hungry. Spaghetti time! Right?

Uh, no. I put a pot of water on to boil in my freshly washed, bright sunny yellow saucepan. Salt it, idle for a bit and then toss in two 50-cent packages of ‘coil fideo’ made-in-Mexico pasta noodles that look rather like little bundles of dried ramen noodles, but are actually garden variety durum semolina spaghetti. I let it boil, I stir the water. And then I notice something odd appear at several second intervals in the water: brown bits of something. Whaaa? That ain’t supposed to be in no damn pasta.

I spend about 10 minutes getting an unintended steam facial with my head lowered over the boiling pot of noodles as I try unsuccessfully to fish out the full extent of the boll weevil (?) swirling in the water with my dinner (just to confirm my suspicions as I had absolutely no intentions of rinsing out the pasta and still eating it), but a fork and a spoon later, I gave up trying and flushed the entire pot of colander-drained pasta down my toilet in three, slimy batches and proceeded to scrub the living shit out of my utensils and saucepan with scalding soapy water and a blue Scotch Brite sponge.

Then I made some actual ramen noodles in my microwave and ate that, along with a few (three?) glasses of Sauvignon Blanc that I had intended to have with my lentils (oh well!) as I watched Solange and then Winona Ryder, Keanu Reeves and DRACULA do they thangs. (DVDs are so great when you are mildly drunk in your own warm bed. Trying to make out 18th century Romanian and Transylvanian and eventually resorting to subtitles was not so great.)

Flash forward to this afternoon.

I once again hold off on making my damn soup, because I don’t have a sharp enough knife with which to chop celery, slice the andouille and peel potatoes and other things, but again, after eating nothing all day but a 35 cent single-serving bag of nacho cheese Doritos and a Prozac pill, I’m hungry. I think I want to microwave ‘bake’ myself one of the russet potatoes I bought (in case I decided to make that lentil soup a tad bit more hearty), but its been so long since I’ve cooked a raw potato I can’t remember how the fuck to do it. But wait! I have a great, hulking book the size of your average Catholic bible called HOW TO DO ALMOST EVERYTHING on my bookshelf. Its how I learned to roast a Thanksgiving turkey about 10 years ago and I remember there are some very ‘duh!’ mundane entries in it about food prep. Surely they’ll include an entry on how to nuke a raw potato, right?

Nope. Just about everything but. How to make a hollandaise sauce, how to read body language on a date, how to paint a house, how to water a garden, how to clean a coffeemaker, how to eat lobster, how to stew, braise, steam and/or sauté ANYthing….but no potato. FUCK.

So….rice! That’s it! Any idiot can make a pot of white rice! I haven’t done it in a while (since I threw out my Wolfgang Puck bistro set of cookware at my last apartment in lieu of packing and/or washing it) but I can still remember how to make rice. And I bought a bag of Mahatma last night, just in case I wanted to serve my lentils over rice….so, RICE it is!

No, it isn’t. I’m currently sitting here typing out my sarcasm with unappetizing iced Arizona canned tea in my wineglass after a grand attempt to make a pot of white rice in that same pretty yellow saucepan turned from simple simmering for 20 minutes into the discovery of ONCE AGAIN MORE BROWN SHIT FLOATING IN THE STARCHY WATER. This time I successfully fish out a small brown-dot-at-one-end-is-that-a-maggot?-no-its-a worm with a fork. And once again, the pot of half-cooked rice goes swirling down the gullet of my fucking indoor plumbing. Thank god for the damn toilet not being low flush.

I don’t think I’m meant to eat my own cooking. Is the yellow saucepan cursed? Will I scarily find insect life in any food I attempt to prepare in it? Is it just that starches purchased from the 82 Market are infested, even if not to the naked eye? (And BELIEVE ME, I looked, as I always inspect my groceries like a fucking Nazi Gestapo selecting the sick and unworkable and immediately gas-able Juden from the healthy; ESPECIALLY grains). After that shit, I sealed up my three bags of lentils and split green peas (SEPARATELY) in big, plastic gallon size storage bags, poured this nasty glass of ‘tea’ beverage and gave up. Sure, there’s some instant oatmeal in the kitchen. Sure, I could try to peel a potato with a butter knife, boil it, mash it with a fork and some I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter and salt and eat THAT, sure I’ve got some turkey jerky, dried fruit and another little snack bag of Doritos in there that I COULD munch on if I felt like it, but after all that buggy shit?

I’m appetite-free. The shit has vanished. I just asked a friend to pick me up a baby-sized apple fritter from Winchell’s on her way home, and if she does, I guess I’ll eat that and a cup of cocoa later for dinner (how dietetic.)

But now I’m afraid to make my lentils at all. What if I sauté my garlic, my onion, carrots, and celery; brown my crumbled andouille, add my chicken stock, water and spices… and then dump in my dried lentils and find, I’onno, a fucking FLY or something waving at me in the stockpot? I think I might seriously tear my fucking hair out and cry. And I doubt flushing a giant batch of soup down the commode would be a good idea in this old ass building. I’m grateful to God the damn spaghetti didn’t stop it up.

*sob*

I guess I’m just meant to eat commercially prepared meals right now. Either that, or learn to enjoy and embrace the caloric benefits of the bugs in my food. *sarcasm alert*

You know what?! I blame Granny and my horrific early-childhood full of pantry-pulled ancient infiltrated boxes of Malt-o-Meal, Alber’s quick grits and Jiffy cornbread mix. Lawd only knows how many crawling pounds of ‘minerals’ I ate unknowingly or forcibly as a child.

*sigh*

5:56pm

Secrets

Tuesday: Laundry day. Chris has an old friend visitor. Fresh out of jail, he swings by to say 'herro'. I do not do laundry, instead befriend Ms. 108 and talk for hours. My laundry sits in the basement.

Wednesday: more of the same. Major craigslist usage, a trip to Target for kitty litter and The Secret x2. And fruit snacks. And Mitch Albom's Tuesdays With Morrie.


Thursday: walking through Lemon Grove park, selling a vehicle, then out to dinner at El Coyote for green corn tamales and enchiladas, Alicia's treat.


Friday: Out drinking at the Dynasty, Inglewood, and at The Cork on Adams & Palm Grove. 1 Vodka Madras, 3 (or 4?) Cadillac margaritas and one Adios, Motherfucker later, I am drunk as a skunk and carted home to sleep it off. I wake up in the AM and start downing vitamin C packets like they're going out of style.


Saturday: Spaghetti-making (beef! which I do not eat) near the Hollywood Dell at Tasha's house. This after a long ordeal of a day which began by getting stranded down the block from El Cholo off Western & 11th in a 1993 Toyota Paseo with a dead battery. Buddy to the rescue w/ Jumper Cables, yay.


Sunday: The beginnings of a head cold, allergies or sinusitis, i'm not sure which. Drinking lots of tea.


Monday: late night trek to 99 cent store for pineapple mango, cocoa, bottled water and a scanty doormat. J asks me to build him a resume. I oblige. He offers to pay me. I decline, although i'm touched as hell. Pockets a lil less light due to brief appt. in the evening. But just a little. Freak out momentarily when J goes missing after late night Bus-to-Gym ordeal. I worry about his safety, but he's fine after all.


Tuesday: slept in later than my usual. This time to almost NOON! (these 5am days are crazy). Kick it w/Miss 108 in her apt w/kitties, then off to Kabuki for late sushi lunch/early sushi dinner (my treat). Then quick Starbucks run for iced coffee w/equal. Yes, Equal. What, no splenda?


Today: Up early. Craigslist and Hotmail both down. Chat with Bettie Kim Swilley on Gmail, shoot the shit about Obama & the DNC, young ass men, Muscato wine and how fast children grow. I love that girl, and sometimes wish i could swing by Florida & have a glass of red with her old-soul with a young-face ass. But alas, not yet, as i have to run down my lil affirmations like a good girl before i check out:


Money comes to me easily & frequently (x9)


My sinuses will clear up by thursday (x3)


Very soon I will find a job I love (x7)


I will be a happier person in 2009 (x3)


22. Lucky # 22!

And now, I've got to pee. Byeeee!

I hate when people die.

I miss my grandmother something terrible right now. I woke up too early again, like I have been for the past week or so; And J called around 5 and let loose about how messed up he is over trying to leave Lynne and Kenneth after Daine goes away to school in a few weeks. They don't want him to go, and I knew it would be a problem for him. I tried to tell him, but he wouldn't listen. A part of me wants to tell him that if she needed me too, I'd be happy to work for Lynne for free and be her housekeeper. Do for her what Lucy did for Granny. Or her daughter did for Stacy Williams across the street. But I don't know if I'm even in one piece enough to do all that for myself, let alone somebody else.

I watched Driving Miss Daisy, part of it last night, the rest this morning; it just went off. Watching Jessica Tandy really made me miss my grandmother. And my mother. I want to call Sandra and tell her that i want to go and see Granny at Holy Cross today, but I can't because i have an appointment at 1:30 in Beverly Hills this afternoon. I want to go on my own, but i only have about $4.50 to my name after i gave Chris the rent on Tuesday; I don't feel like working how I do in order to have more. So, i can't really go to Holy Cross right now, i can barely make it to Beverly Hills and back. I'm still talking the medication.

I don't really know what I'd do if i got to the cemetery anyhow. Except tend to her grave and maybe my mother's. I wish one of them was still alive so i could talk to somebody who loved me. Even though a lot of things... still. I think today I wish i could sit with my mother the way Morgan Freeman sat with Jessica in the movie, feeding her pie at the end. I remember all the times i sat with Granny like that, near the end of her life. I didn't realize how precious those memories would wind up being for me later. It hasn't been that many years, but it feels like forever ago since they both died. And i don't really feel like I have much family left.

I was just in the bathroom a few minutes before i started writing this, and i was sitting there thinking, i feel like I'm in jail. I was younger and i had granny and she took care of me and then i took care of her, and maybe one day when I'm older i might get to have a family again, a child, or someone that loves me besides Lucille (the cat), but right now i feel like, for the foreseeable future I'm serving out a sentence to be alone. I'm really all by myself. I'm not angry, just sad and matter of fact about it. I don't see that changing anytime soon. And earlier, when i spoke to J about cause and effect, about how one little change in your life can alter everything that comes after it...i realize just how true that is. If we really make our own paths, why do we choose what we get? We choose harder, don't we. I wish i had led myself to an easier road. I'd only like to rewind time just a few years back to change it. I wish i could sometimes stop time from moving forward at all. I want to go backward. I think i could be happy again. If i changed things some.

Prison songs, Disney songs, and New Jack Swing

Since about 6AM this morning I have alternated between humming the title music from Walt Disney's Beauty & The Beast and the theme from HBO's jail rape show OZ, doing the dutty wine in my shower to I-Wayne's Can't Satisfy Her (reggae jam about a dying prostitute), and now, singing OUT LOUD to Lalah Hathaway and Jane Child after a straight hour of random obscure New Jack Swang music (thankies, Rich!).

In the past week, i have had a grand total of $7.50 total spending money, and that has had to get me through transportation AND food purchases. Needless to say, its Sunday and my fridge and wallet are empty as fuck.

This week I got a job. This week, I was also denied that same job. In a span of 36 hours (24 of which i did not sleep during) I worked a grand total of seven and 1/2, and was then told not to come back to the company because I wasn't a psychic, and would need to be trained to use their software and to understand their shorthand in order to process orders and execute sales. They didn't feel like taking the time to train me (at ALL), so, said, um, our bad, we're too tired to tell you what to do to work here, so, nevermind about that job thing. We thought you could just, like, figure it out on your own. Even though it IS a LOT of technical information, and you've only trained for, like, three hours and you've already pretty much mastered half of it. Um. We don't feel like training you right now. But keep wearing all that makeup like we asked you too. You're so PRETTY like this!

Uh huh. All this after at their insistence, I get all tarted up in an obvious lot of makeup, press out my hair, and generally put on my happy face and try to be as girly and "Hollywood" as i possibly can without gagging. Seriously, ya girl Lee Zett can clean up to be one hot bitch if she puts any real effort into it. I just don't like to be fake like that. Let me rock my miniature afro and a naked face if I wanna. Its my prerogative, I can do what I wanna do, like Bobby Brown used to say. Right?

Uh huh. But you know what? I'm not mad. Even after it happened, i wasn't at all.... affected. I was calm. I was actually happy i was getting to go home. Isn't that crazy?! I had a job for 2 days, and then it was snatched out of my grasp for no good reason, and I didn't even break a sweat or trip. Even though I'm sitting over here with no food, no money, nappy hair, overdue bills and now my face is breaking out from 2 days of heavy makeup, but I'm NOT EVEN TRIPPING. That's so unlike me.

Right?

Well.

On August first I started taking 10mg daily of fluoxetine again. Yes, uh huh, PROZAC. I ain't 'fraid to say it. I think it must be working. I've been in such a not-tripping-over-anything mood all week. Hey. Thank you, Eli Lilly and Co. for inventing this shit. I can't say I'm unhappy with it in the slightest. The same day I lost the job (the day after i GOT the job, LMAO) I went and hung out with J and built him a new resume. Then he made me dinner and we listened to KJLH in his dining room until 5 in the morning, laughing at his grandfather's taste in old ass midget furniture. Before that i took a nap in Dougie's raggedy 1982 Cadillac Brougham while J went to Bally's in West L.A., (the Mercedes is in the shop), and then, i extended that nap back in his new living room while Chicken Man put the chicken in the oven. Before the chicken, we stopped by the ghetto Ralphs (to buy said chicken) and saw two insanely gay black men dressed in cutoff, double knotted t-shirts, greasy Ne-Yo lipgloss, suspenders and a damn fedora. I couldn't even tell whom was who's bitch! They were heading to 'the club', apparently. Its been so long since I've lived over his way that i forgot its now OKAY to be a black man swishing around in the grocery store. Damn. Times change!

But anyway. It was a pleasant night. Possibly the most pleasant, drama free time I've had with J in several years. I'm blaming the Prozac, and hell yes you better believe I'ma keep taking it!!

Lord knows how I'd be feeling right now if i wasn't!

I Feel Young (right now)!?!!!

Weetzie Bat by Francesca Lia Block
Orfe by Cynthia Voigt
Puppy Too Small by Cyndy Szekeres
All Dogs Go To Heaven
Walt Disney's The Little Mermaid
Walt Disney's Beauty & The Beast
Walt Disney's The Hunchback Of Notre Dame
Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty (BEST. EVER.)
Barnum's Circus Animal crackers in the little red box with string handle
yellow socks with the lace ruffle on the top i had to wear to Church
Lil' Miss Makeup
Polly Pocket
The Barbie Fold n' Fun House theme song
long distance phone calls watching 90210
Hello Kitty diaries with the lock you could pick with a Bic pen cap
Duke, Grey, Shotse, Vanilla Bean/Bucket, Dookie, Vhalsa Doom thrown in the pool, Toonsis dropped off Sonny's balcony, Satin, aunt Leslie's evil cat Lucky that had his own bathroom with the castle litterbox, and later on Orangey, Bookie, Michael Pookie Spears Theard, Lisa Marie and Forrest. Even later still, Wanda, Fat Cat, Trigger, Ninno, Leroy, Fozzie Bear and...i'm sure there were others.
Poppy, granny's little dog that somehow wound up at aunt Elizabeth's and uncle Cornell's house.
Babysitter Courtney (friend of Skipper, Barbie's little sister).
Sega Genesis & Sonic The Hedgehog 2
SNES (Castlevania, Mario PAINT, F-Zero, Super Mario World, Street Fighter 2, Mortal Kombat, Mario Kart, The Legend Of Zelda....)



I could go on. But I feel young right now. Could have something to do with finding a really cool picture of my FAVORITE. 'PERSON'. EVER.


Dang, she was pretty. For an evil fairy, that is. :-P

A Reminder Why I Love This Man

Okay.

So, YES, this is old. Hella, hella old. Disneyland's 25th Anniversary old. 25 years?! God, that number seems low, eh?

And yes, this is all types of GAY, what with the trademark over-the-top Disney exuberance, the limp-wristed TERRIFYING looking old-school Pooh bear, and 90-pound Mike in a tight pinky-orange sweater, skinny khakis and a huge joyous GRIN. He's literally punching the air and skipping around Frontierland. Singing. Its like Fosse meets whatever you call that rainbow-shirt and jacket dance he would later do in Captain E.O., also for Disney. THAT thing was a veritable FAME! audition and intergalactic homo-fest in and of itself.

But see, you can't deny that this clip here was MJ in an entirely innocent time. He wasn't much older than a kid himself, thus not far removed from whatever the circumstances were that made him feel stuck forever as a child of sorts. You can see from his literal happiness filming this shit that it isn't an act and he's having the time of his life. I mean, literally, THE BEST TIME. EVER. frolicking with people in mouse and dog and giant chipmunk and duck and Dwarf costumes in an empty theme park.

But his voice, people. The singing. You canNOT deny how GOOD this man is. The falsetto. He's standing on a rock, singing with the sweetest most apt sound. I'm not huge on Disney ethos as a rule, but the way he sings "Fate is kind..." near the end makes me break out into the biggest Michael loving smile.

Fate is kind,
She brings to those who love
The sweet fulfillment of their secret longing

This is my Best. Thing. Ever. I want this for my own life! I want what i'm longing for. But I can't see any stars in the smoggy Los Angeles skies. :(

Mike, pass the message on for me?

*sigh* Lady, Lady, Lady.....

.....We really ARE the same. You didn't know that?

Best for you, best for me. All else fails, an airfare sale. No dates, pick the arrival. But what real good would that do either of us?

I am secretly comforted by all three of our(s) miser(y)ies.

Duz'zat make me a bitch? Yeah? Well... SO. I'm the nicest kind of bitch there is. The kind that ain't directed at YOU.

PS: Not so secretly.

PPS: The pigeons are out there moulting again. Between the giant squirrel and these damned pigeons, I swear I live in the nonexistent Hollywood zoo.

*********

CHRIS is coming Saturday. Damn him. Damn these white people and their 1-day advanced notice. He wanted to come Friday. Don't you know I have to sell off pieces of myself to survive, and i need more than 24 hours in which to do it?

Potlikker Happiness

You know, collard greens, tabasco and tea shouldn't be making me this contented right now. Canned collards. Hot tea, not iced, not sweet.

And Jazmine Sullivan singing jamaicanish reggaeish R&B that reminds me of Lauryn Hill crossed with Alicia Keys.

I'm good, though! Canned greens, man. Now if i had some damn biscuits, it would be ON.


PS: Talked to that Guy today. Turns out, Jackie was a drug dealer. A DRUG DEALER!!!!! How could I have forgotten that shit! Easy, it was back in the Louis & Patricia, Scott Storch and 'Tera', Johnny and Metro, Nick & Jackie, Lisete & Joey DAYS, that's why. 2004 is such a mystery to me, honey, its a wonder I even remember where I lived then.

And not that its funny, but while I was reading through my written shit that caused me to halfway-remember Nick & Jackie in the first place, i read a sentence specifying that i 'walked home from the Wilshire & Western Red line', and i was perplexed, thinking, "How could I have walked all the way back to the Square from the Red line station?" Um...Lisette. You didn't. You lived in a 3-rd floor walk-up on MANHATTAN Place in 2004. Duh.

Why the hell could I not remember that? I'm serious, man. I really can't remember several YEARS of my life. Bad years, yeah. But shit. I can remember all that Scott Storchiavelli shit, so why not that other shit? I'onno, man. Faulty brains will cause that.

Moving Mountains

Nick & Jackie.

Who are, who are NICK and JACKIE??

I can remember Nick, but not Jackie. I called the guy, that GUY, like 7 times, but he never picked up. So, I had a vodka & soda. Literally, SODA. It wasn't very good. I watered it down with ice water.

I really miss Erica and I wish I didn't. But what I wish I didn't more was get caught up in that drama with her that i got caught up in last year. Because because of that, I lost a friend. And friends are at a premium nowadays.

Like gasoline and milk and organic lemons. And limes.


******

Scottsdale, 2 years. That's my timeline. I can't stay here. I never had that high school thing, so I look at people like Sushi's little sister, and i get somewhat envious. Of her female companionship. I need that shit. Not necessarily female, but friends. I just got through reading Western Interiors and Design (the new issue) and I swear, its something about Scottsdale. Or maybe its just that i want to one day live in a beautiful house?

Whatever it is, i give it 2 years, maximum. I can't stay in California. I'm not anything remotely close to happy here, even though this is where I'm from. I wish i lived closer to Kim. We seem to think alike. At times. Hmm.

I don't honestly think I can live (while) feeling this way for all that much longer. This iPod song on repeat thing isn't doing it for me. (That was before the great depression came in and rocked us....)

My heart is obliterated, I'm trying to travel through it. But its like (TITLE).

I found one of my old beat-depression-self-help-workbooks from 2004. I didn't fill much of it in. But the things i did; the rigmarole of working at 3807 Wilshire Blvd Ste 1210, the unhappiness i felt BEFORE my mother had died, even.... I didn't need to re-remember that. All that. So I called the Blackberry 7 times. But its like 6 AM; that thing was off.

I want to move on from this period and wind up happy. I want to exist in a nice space, lay my head in a nice space full of stark, arranged beautiful things. I want space, and no cardboard. I want friends, not many, just a few. I want people in my life i can escape and have a little (fun) with. I don't need sex. I don't think. I can kill that Scorpio part of me, and I'm very willing to do it. I would like to be out of debt, and employed somewhere decent that piques my interest(s), and a little bit more tiny bit more happy.

For good. That's too much, isn't it. Its too much? Its too much to ask for.

I need a psychic to tell me what it is I'm hanging on for. A real one. Pass your suggestions. Ha.

Alewyn. Ahlone.

Life is bad, please get better? Alone right now. Not lonely, just by myself. Can't go to sleep, but can't write. Want to work, not do bad things. Can't find a way to not do bad things. Thank you Jessica, Katacia, Jacqueline, Kim. Still feel bad. Want out right NOW, damn it.

I wish i had some cereal, maybe mini-wheats, or a muffin right now. I feel like i should be eating bread. What the hell? Bread?

G'nighty.

Exhaustion for no particular reason

I don't know what's causing it. I don't know if that flu i accidentally 'wished' for has actually decided to come home to roost in my system, but it is taking every ounce of strength i have in me not to lie my head down on this countertop in this coffeehouse in Little Armenia/Hollywood and go to sleep. I'm here for the second time in as many days, trying to use this lagging downtime of not working because I have no job to do something productive and get some writing done. In all honesty, i could do this at home. But the thing that's killing me here, is that I'm better off trying to do it in this weird ass Sabor Y Cultura coffeehouse than i am sitting at my computer desk in that dark apartment. Right as soon as this exhaustion hit, i laid myself down and cocooned inside this blue crocheted blanket alongside the cat and slept away the majority of the day. For some reason, i woke up still majorly exhausted.

Why?

Let me commit this to E-paper and see if i can get a little something down in one of my word documents before i pass out into my Mexican mocha.

-L.

Tell them you DIED.

I play the Street Life, because there's no place I can go
Street Life, its the only life I know...

Uh, not.

So, I'm sitting over here letting the UV and Crystal Light leech into my system. I'm mildly-to-severely irritated about something J did and/or is going to do and beforehand yet after-hand felt the need to tell me about out of potential guilt, and I'm debating whether or not to 'talk' to him about it. Nothing good is going to come out of me talking to him about it, and I know this going in...so I'm debating just forgetting about it and finishing my drink. But the thing that worries me is, come tomorrow evening when this irritating thing comes to fruition, I know -KNOW- I'm going to be sitting here pissed, and the mild-to-severe irritation will have escalated in my mind to Homeland Security Alert levels of extreme irritation-cum-anger.

I need to just take deep, controlled breaths and let it go, but, shit. It's not in my nature to not want to talk it out so it doesn't fester. Shit. Its only going to ferment into a 'situation' between me and that man if I don't 'talk it out'. But, shit, I KNOW he's not going to listen. He ain't gonna really take it all in. Why should I bother?

Fuck.

Randy Crawford and the UV are over here keeping me contented. And the mofo has just called me 5 times. I keep hitting the mute button so my insides won't churn.

GOD, right now I wish I was more 'Hollywood'. And by 'Hollywood'. I mean 'everything I am not and very infrequently wish to be'.

Finished.

Bullets, Ass, Books and Avocado

5:PM Thursday: DASH Hollywood-Wilshire to Gower Gulch Rite-Aid to return janky Maybelline nail polish, purchased in unfortunate bid to give myself home manicures. Instead, pick up bath salts and other water fragrancing agents. Why does Cold & Sinus bubble bath sound so GOOD right now?

6:20PM: Contemplate DASH-ing it back home with my Symphony bar and airplane vodka-bottles and Rice Krispie Treats in order to not spend any of very short ends in wallet.

Do. Not. Want.

6:30PM: Walk to Sunset/Vine Borders bookstore and purchase 3rd Jen Lancaster book in 3 weeks. What can I say?! She writes and talks like Meeeeee. I had to do it.

7:15PM: Kabuki Sushiiii! Spicy Tuna hand roll. Avocado cut roll. Free edamame. Glass of ice water. $11. Worth it? YES.

8:20PM: Across the street to the ArcLight theatre complex. I know what I'M going to do! I'm gonna see WANTED by myself! I just took myself out to dinner, so fuck, i'ma take my own ass out to a movie too. Dinner and a movie, whoa, this is like a DATE.

But not.

Arrive just as 8:25 showing of Wanted closes for purchase. Damn. Next showing is for 9:40PM. Can I kill an hour or so reading mags and exploring freaky tchotchkes in the ArcLight lobby shop? YES, I CAN.
Sam from Martinique is working. Oh, SHIT he sees me. "Hi, Sam, right?" I say as he approaches. He is flattered that I remember him. Of course I remember you, Sam. You were one of those guys I meet that though perfectly nice, I have no intentions of fuckin' wit. In either sense of the word. He makes small talk. I pay little attention and read about Heath Ledger in Entertainment Weekly. "....Are you married?"

Oh, here we go with THIS SHIT AGAIN.

No, honey. The ring is a decoy. But whatever. I move along and start perusing my favorite section: THE WALL OF CYNICAL REFRIGERATOR MAGNETS. Ooooh. (Before the night is over, i cop 5.)

9:30PM: WANTED to start soon. I keep yawning. Damn, I knew i should've gotten a sugar-free hazelnut latte at the Gower Gulch Starbucks! Darn. Over to the ArcLight lobby Bar (after stashing un-chooseable magnet selection behind a kiosk) for an espresso. Jennifer Hudson lookalike-bartender chick is pretty, brownskinned, with a mess of curls and a J-Hud-as-Louise-Carrie's-Assistant demeanor. I decide i like her. I get coffee. Tip $1.67 on $4.33 coffee. Coo. Then I look at lobby clock. How is it 9:45?! SHIT.

9:45PM: Hightail it downstairs to theatre #6. See long ass concession lines and decide NOT to get a Coke into which to mix my two little airline bottles of Vodka stashed in my bag. Heck, I've had coffee. I don't need another buzz. I'm sober and I'm about to see Angelina Jolie blow some people's heads off. Yay.

9:50PM: Theatre is PACKED. I chose a good seat, X-25. Second to top row, center. Yay. Movie starts. Huh? How did he fly through that window and out the window across the air onto that building? ....ooh. Dead. Nevermind. Neat trick, though!

11:45PM: Film over. Angie shows ass, kicks ass, kills own ass. Rats full of peanut butter explode. People die. Morgan Freeman says 'muthafucka'. GOOD ASS MOVIE!!!! Dang, I think I wanna see that shit AGAIN. I go retrieve my hidden fridge magnets, buy em, talk nice to Sam from Martinique, leave, grab taxi, stop at Pavilions in vain hopes of Lean Cuisine sale, but alas, line is TOO FUCKING LONG so i run out and go straight home.

1:AM: J calls, annoys me with talk of obnoxious friend's impending froufrou birthday party. He wanted to take me, but I A: hate his asshole Asian shyster poseur wannabe-a-rock-star-but-you-are-NOT-a-rock-star friend, and B, do NOT come close to fitting the dress code requirements of 'come in your lingerie or heels and look HOT!' So he asks Nicole. I don't mind.

3:30AM: I finally get into bathtub full of fabulous Village Naturals Cold & Sinus bath elixir, and soak in the menthol tea tree ginseng echinacea and other medicine-y scented waters. Then out. Then into bed. Here comes Kitty. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

All in all? A decent day. From 5PM on, that is. Before 5? Notsomuch good. TODAY, Friday? Notsomuch good. Annoying and bad. But Thursday, avocados, books and violent killings made me happy for a little while. Yay?

Gramercy, hammercy!

MJB says I'm searching for a Real Love..I say I'm just tired.

Lucille, no matter how long you stare, you cannot have that pigeon.

I may not be cute anymore, but i'm chock full of radiation!

*cracking up* OOH!! The TIME is my birthdayDATE again!!

Singing "La La Laaaa" Like Babe the pig in the movie BABE. Drinking Vodka mixed with Crystal Light Sunrise in the early afternoon. Waiting for my check to arrive. VH-1 Soul is playing videos I like. New Edition, Jennifer Hudson, Solange. Bomb diggety. I got all offended and mildly cussed out someone online today. Somehow I don't feel like I've just competed in the Special Olympics.

Bobby Brown was SO GOOD in the late 80's, what happened?!

Okay, besides CRACK. Crack happened. But still!

I'm sweaty, I must shower. And then prepare for the check. I want another Jen Lancaster book. Is that bad? I know its bad. I don't have the fundage to be doing silly things like reading. But, SO?!

Reading is fundamental. And I am fundamentally....skewed. Screwed. Both them words. I need me a book. And a drank. No, just the book.

Huh?

Aaliyah? Yay! I LOVE VH-1 Soul! Rock the boat.....change po-sitions... LMAO!!

***
12:14PM.

I love you always, I love you rain or shine, says Barbra.

There is an intense descension into sadness coming later in the day for me; I feel it. Here's hoping I survive it when it hits me.

Look how they shine for youuuuuu-ooooo....

So, I spent the morning crying intermittently while watching last week's TiVo'ed episode of Extreme Makeover Home Edition. It was the 100th family to get a house episode, so it was 2 hours long.

I finally got up and grabbed a knockoff-Target brand Kleenex just into the second hour.

It always makes me cry, that show. I mean literally, SERIOUSLY cry. It makes my nasal passages swell, my eyes get red, and allofasudden my mucus production kicks into overdrive. By the time Ty Pennington moves the fucking bus, I am always, if not lamenting my own sad, sorry state, plaintively wailing and sobbing into the fur on my cat. (Lucy always seems to come around and allow this display of pitiful affection, but the entire time will keep an annoyed look on her face. As annoyed as a Cat can look).

I always think about how if little jilly has cancer, or little bobby has easy-break-a-bone-fall-down-go-boom disease, then I can't seriously be whining and crying and contemplating suicide constantly because of my OWN sorry little problems. I mean, what is having to be an unhappy call girl to make ends meet compared to having lost both parents in tragic car-and-gunfire accidents while still in middle school, or not being able to breahe in your house because of mold spores or rotting wells in basements or that other putrid shit that The Design Team is always fixing?

God, I've always wanted a cool house full of cool shit like that. Even the children's Elmo rooms are the shit. I like Elmo. Give ME Elmo. I deserve Elmo!

I deserve Prozac.

Maybe in the morning, before the delivery of what is sure to be my second to last week of not-free money, maybe I'll trudge a block and a half to the Hollywood Wilshire MENTAL HEALTH CENTER and, you know, like, GET ME SOME OF THOSE FUCKING LEE-ZETT DON'T KILL YOURSELF DRUGS.

Or maybe i'll ask for a refill of my birth control pills and a dental appointment so as to have my disintegrated front-ish canine-ish tooth dug up from the root and discarded (after my expensive porcelain veneer fell off last year.)

So. Yes. Well, I've GOT to do something, right?

Hmm, you cyberspace personalities, you don't think my brutal honesty on my little website here is keeping all the 'lovely' companies I shill to and interview with from hiring me, do you? It can't be my myspace page. It CAN'T be my Facebook page.

....Can it?

SHIT.

Therapeuticalness

4:28PM

I didn't go to sleep. I just read my book.

I'd like to recommend Jen Lancaster's "BITTER IS THE NEW BLACK".

But only to other hopeless, sad, anxiety-ridden, cynical, sarcastic, angry, OUT OF WORK people like me.

Now, off to sleep.

Swiss Cheese Memory (full of holes)

Today, i will be humming U2's Sunday Bloody Sunday...all day. And it happens to be Sunday. Trite.




Today I will read that a twenty year old russian model named Ruslana something-or-other leapt to her death from the window of her lower Manhattan apartment. Shortly after reading, I will envy her. But just for a moment.

Today I will google the search terms 'job after misdemeanor', and become increasingly sad and frustrated when I read one young man's account of his problems finding gainful employment. I will particularly relate to the passage:

I had trouble getting work until i found the job i mentioned above. Now that my prior job has ended i am finding it virtually impossible to find work with this charge on my record. I have applied to and been interviewed 11 times in 4 months and i always get to the drug test ( which i pass ) and the background check ( which i fail ) before being denied. After 3 months of failing to get a job in my field i went as far as to apply anywhere, as a result i have been denied a job at a grocery store, a game store and a clothing outlet.

I cannot get a job. Im trying and it just won't happen. I have made every effort to be a good citizen. I don't do drugs, i don't break the law and i pay my taxes on time. Eventually when my bank account gets depleted and i still havent found a job what am i going to do? Do they want me to rob a bank? Do they want me to sell drugs? Its almost like they are forcing me to do something illegal since they refuse to let me make an honest living.

Oh, and, after all this? Today, I will resign myself to what has to be withstood in the next few days...and at 2PM, I will lay me down to sleep, for even though i'm not sleepy, my body is tired.

Or maybe I'll read some book instead?

Lee leee leeee leeeee, La laa laaa laaaa....

Da doo doo do, Di da da daaa.

No, I don't know what the fuck is wrong with me; do YOU know what the fuck is wrong with me?

I didn't think you did.

So. It is 5:41 in the morning, and I have just decided that there's an 80% chance that I'm going to get up in the morning (yes, i realize it is morning, but for the purposes of what I'm writing let's just pretend it is NIGHT), get up, hunt around for suitable attire, pile on a thick layer of makeup-like Christina Aguilera thick, wear uncomfortable heels, and for the FIFTH! time, go prostitute myself out to Palihouse Holloway in the hopes they will give me a job.

An 80% chance. I didn't say 100.

Why? Because my EDD checks run out in about 3 weeks. Not that they are doing much to help me. But aside from that, the occupation I have had in the recent past in order to supplement my nonexistent income, has finally reached the point where i think it may be killing me. Or more specifically, its bringing me to the point where I might want to kill others. And I need a job. Yesterday last week 10 months ago, I need a damn JOB. So, I must go get one, and restart my do-not-touch-me clock like I really, REALLY want to. I have not 'worked' since the week of June 14th, when, on the eve of realizing i was just NOT going to make it to Ohio for the BSQ trip, i just said "Fuck It" and decided i would rather be LEFT ALONE than 'work' hard for my money and not be treated, uh, 'right'. So! I scour Craigslist and Hospitality sites and OTHER sites and the Working World on the regular, all the while wondering why allofasudden my lower legs and ankles are swollen, I'm gaining significant weight for no discernible reason, and I have been craving interesting non-Lee Zett food like Skooby's hot dogs, hamburgers, 2% milk, broccoli, bananas, peanut butter, grilled cheese sandwiches, chinese char siu, scrambled eggs, and pancakes for the last 2 months, when ordinarily I, who will not eat most typical shit, do not crave shit like hot dogs (turkey or tofu), hamburgers (turkey or garden) or milk (soy or skim), nor do I become downright ravenous for meat grilled over an open flame. Normally, I crave shit like maker's Mark Kentucky Bourbon, not no damn cow's milk and omelets and MEAT. Last week I actually left the house under the cover of darkness and ventured all the way to fuckin' Thai Town/Little Armenia, partially on foot, for some barbecued ribs. Seriously. Not exactly char siu, but i wasn't willing or able to pay L.A. Bite the $40 minimum order fee to get what I really wanted from Chin Chin Grill on Sunset Plaza. So I walked through the Thai part of Hollywood carrying a Target tote bag with which to tote my (two!) orders of ribs home, and then proceeded to greedily attack them like a starving hyena or a carrion-obsessed vulture for the next three days.

Um, yeeeeeah. If i could afford to buy an E.P.T. test, lets just say I would be hovering over one in my bathroom right this minute, waiting for the ax to drop. I was so...hmm...i guess i could call it 'concerned' about these recent developments that I actually refused to drink any alcohol for the past week, therefore causing a half-consumed bottle of red to go rancid on my kitchen counter. ME let WINE go BAD?! Boo. :(

But that is a crazy thought. If something managed to attach itself to one of my uterine walls through both a regular layer of latex and a strong dose of drospirenone and ethinyl estradiol tablets (yes), then it is obviously the will of Jehovah, God, Buddha AND Allah, and I can't go fucking with it or flushing it down the toilet. Ahem.

But lets not get all dicey thinking about shit like that.

Lets go out and find ourselves a JOB, Lisette, okay? Because we really do need one. Like, right fucking now, we do. So, off to finds an outfit in the lack-of-a-closet that looks somewhat respectable and still fits (I'm telling you, i have REALLY gained some weight. Thighs and stomach are looking at me like, "Bitch, what are you doing?"), off to hit up the MAC counter on Hollywood boulevard to let the white ladies tart me up in rouge and spackle (i'ma tell 'em to lay it on THICK like a tranny, to hopefully distract the Palihouse HR from my fatassness), and then off to West Fucking Hollywood, to beg and shill and grovel for something I am so, so mighty sure i deserve.

Employment!!!!!!!

Note: I finally gave in and drank a tiny half of a half a glass of wine about 30 minutes ago. Screw the miracle child if there is one. If there is one, I'll just give it to "Angelina Jay-Z" anyway. Or donate it to Out Of The Closet thrift store. <---Tax write off, you know.

UPDATE: It is now 5:37PM, I've just gotten home from going to the Russian Jewish/slash/Homosexual part of town (AKA West Hollywood), and I once again, put very uncomfortable blister causing heels on, stuffed my fat fat thighs into business attire, pulled my hair back into a severely shellacked bun, and pandered to the people at Palihouse. I saw that snotty asian chick when I walked in, but deftly avoided her, and wound up talking briefly to the NICEST PERSON I HAVE EVER ENCOUNTERED AT THAT ESTABLISHMENT: "Lisa". Lisa, you were so courteous and polite, you almost restored my faith that that 'hotel' isn't run by Satan's Hollywood minions. So, here's to my begging in a professional manner to be re- re- re- re- RECONSIDERED, and here's to not bitching about it anymore. Besides, a pretty little brownskinned, gospel-turned-pop-singer birdie that I met last week in a gay club 'told' me that "when u complain about what you don't have, then you won't have!!!!!" so, i'll just SHUT THE HELL UP over here and hope for the best.

And now I'll go to sleep, seeing as I still haven't been, and its a full 12 hours since i wrote that^^ up there and 18 minutes shy of 24 hours SINCE I WOKE UP. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz *conk*

Too Hot Lady

Can I offer Al Gore a damn apology? I'm so sorry, Al!

I never thought he was lying with all his global warming "An Inconvenient Truth" rhetoric, but I most surely didn't think he was quite THIS fucking correct. It is so fucking HOT in Southern California this week, I swear there must not even BE any Ozone layer left. It was 116 degrees in the Valley on Thursday! And its been hovering around 103 here in Hollywood for the better part of a week! And why in the HELL is it 90 degrees in my apartment at NIGHT?!

The Earth is trying to kill us, people. I really do think it wants us gone-or at least looking like little individual human pieces of fried chicken.

The cat has been laid out on the kitchen table by the window (which is open, but carries no breeze) for DAYS, looking miserable. I was so worried that she would overheat that i bought her a bottle of milk and gave her some in a little saucer with ice in it just so i could be certain she was drinking cold liquids. I on the other hand, have been too hot to do ANYTHING. Its too hot to talk on the phone, its too hot to listen to J's screeching in my ear, its too hot to drink alcohol, its too hot to cross the street to go to the grocery store, its too hot to do laundry, its too hot to unpack more boxes, its too hot to eat anything that requires heating, its too hot to sleep...etc. Every night i sweat completely through the sheets even though i sleep ON TOP OF THEM. There is a small ineffectual fan perched in one of my windows, but all it does is blow hot ass air around. I've been sleeping in the midday and staying up all night and early morning just to take advantage of a maybe 10 degree drop in temperature. Yesterday i took 4 cold showers. I've also taken to sticking my head in the freezer. SERIOUSLY, IN THE FREEZER. Saturday I went to TARGET at 9 in the morning JUST for the air conditioning. Have i EVER willingly gone ANYWHERE at 9 in the morning?! Hell no, but its fucking HOT!!!! Even the buses are air conditioned, so I really didn't mind Taking Metro (heh.) Just eating Ice constantly. For once not due to my lack of iron. And I'm running out and there isn't any ice left in any of the grocery stores around here. All fans are sold out. All air conditioners are sold out. I mean, seriously, there's only so much Shower 2 Shower body powder I can use to stay cool and dry. I keep sweating through that shit.

Plus, why the hell am i allofasudden gaining mad weight rapidly (I'm not eating any differently) and have swollen ankles and shit? Am i just retaining water, or is it some other weird shit? Is it this heat? Am i eating too much salt? I know i ain't pregnant. That would be some kind of unholy miracle, so, no.

I wish to GOD i had one of those Johnson Bros. Mortuary/Martin Luther King, Jr. hand fans they pass out in church right now. It is too hot to even be typing this, so let me stop.

And a shout-out to the homie J in Western Australia!

Lee Zett: Are you talking to "______"?
Lee Zett: I need assistance before i VOMIT
Objective Man: no i'm not, why's that
Lee Zett: I just had a bad dream.
Lee Zett: I had a dream i had sex with a famous singer.
Lee Zett: Or something like that
Lee Zett: HELP :(
Objective Man: which singer
Objective Man: dare i ask?
Lee Zett: I don't want to say, but lets just say he's married, he's not all that attractive to me, and I ALWAYS THOUGHT HE WAS CLOSETED GAY
Objective Man: "_____"?
Lee Zett: Oh, yes, and he's involved with a wildebeest
Objective Man: kevin federline?
Lee Zett: so, no, not "_____"
Lee Zett: No, not K Fed.
Objective Man: mathew knowles?
Lee Zett: Oh would you HUSH, don't talk about Kelly's "foster" daddy like that.
Lee Zett: One more chance.
Lee Zett: R&B Singer...
Lee Zett: Maried to a wildebeest...
Objective Man: Usher?
Lee Zett: Not all that attractive...
Lee Zett: Probably gay...
Objective Man: he's married to a beast?
Lee Zett: ---Why, YES
Lee Zett: USHER
Lee Zett: How did you know?
Objective Man: ROTFLMAO
Lee Zett: I woke up, literally, screaming in horror.
Lee Zett: Like i was being murdered.
Lee Zett: That was the most horrifying sexual dream in the history of sexual dreams.
Lee Zett: Did i mention Beyonce and Jay were in it too?
Lee Zett: See why i need a hug?
Objective Man: oh dear
Objective Man: *condolences*
Lee Zett: You're a smart guy, O Man.
Lee Zett: I need you to analyze this horrifying ass dream and tell me what it means.
Lee Zett: Usher is about THE MOST unattractive thing i can imagine having sex with
Lee Zett: Not because he's ugly
Lee Zett: but because i am CERTAIN he has boned JD
Lee Zett: And a few other dudes
Lee Zett: And because he looks like a young bootleg Marvin Gaye
Lee Zett: And because he's married to a She-man
Objective Man: LMAAAAO
Lee Zett: So, um...help!?!
Lee Zett: Will you assist me when you get a free moment, booboo?
Objective Man: im just readin...
Objective Man: maybe its trying to say,
Lee Zett: Keep a barf bag nearby?
Objective Man: don't judge a guy by the guy he marries
Lee Zett: ROFL
Lee Zett: I just can't get over it. YUCK
Lee Zett: YUUUUCK
Lee Zett: Usher?!
Lee Zett: Why the hell WHY?
Objective Man: yet you're slightly turned on, aren't you?
Lee Zett: No, and that's the problem!
Lee Zett: I think i might've been IN MY SLEEP, but i woke up majorly disgusted and violated and i felt like i needed to take a bath in boiling water laced with BLEACH
Objective Man: maybe
Objective Man: you're getting a hint
Objective Man: that you'll find love where you don't expect it
Objective Man: or rather, maybe don't want it
Objective Man: introspective and shit
Lee Zett: With fucking USHER?!
Objective Man: ROFLMAO!
Objective Man: God works in mysterious ways
Lee Zett: I'm sorry, but i do NOT want that shit
Lee Zett: God?
Lee Zett: If god had something to do with that dream, I am becoming an atheist!
Lee Zett: That is DISGUSTING!!!
Objective Man: *cries*
Lee Zett: O Man, who is the most revolting female R&B singer you can think of right now?
Objective Man: Rihanna
Lee Zett: Imagine having a dream that you ate her out on a floor with a sad Kelly Rowland sitting across the room.
Objective Man: im so, so sorry
Lee Zett: SEE?!
Lee Zett: See!!!
Lee Zett: I knew you would understand.
Objective Man: :(
Objective Man: there there
Objective Man: think sexy thoughts
Lee Zett: Darling, that is impossible.
Objective Man: well
Objective Man: it could be worse
Objective Man: it COULD be mathew knowles
Lee Zett: Okay, you have a point.
Lee Zett: But even then....Usher is worse.
Objective Man: usher is worse than mathew knowles?
Lee Zett: I really do dislike Usher from ANY TYPE OF SEXUAL STANDPOINT
Lee Zett: I like him as a musician, kinda...depending on the album
Lee Zett: but in ANY KIND OF SEXUAL CONTEXT, i would rather do Miss Tina's husband.
Lee Zett: Raw dog.
Lee Zett: And give birth to a little knockoff Beyonce.
Objective Man: Ew
Lee Zett: EXACTLY.
Lee Zett: That is EW.
Lee Zett: But USHER IS EW-er.
Lee Zett: O Man, i just feel so DIRTY
Lee Zett: I'm telling you, is anything worse to you than being ALLLL up under Rihanna's Umbrella? NAKED?
Lee Zett: No?
Lee Zett: Well, then, you should understand.
Objective Man: oh, i understand
Lee Zett: And WHY THE FUCK was Beyonce in the dream looking all dejected and sad?
Lee Zett: And Jay was playing with some kid?
Lee Zett: And people were drinking punch running marathons?
Lee Zett: As Usher was coming all over the floor?
Lee Zett: WHAT?!
Lee Zett: I swear, I'm not high.
Lee Zett: I sound high, don't i?
Lee Zett: I SWEAR i'm not high.
Objective Man: no, just a little scarred
Lee Zett: a LOT scarred.
Lee Zett: I think i'm going to need a DRINK
Lee Zett: and some dessert.
Objective Man: get me a drink too?
Lee Zett: Yes, i'd gladly get you a drink.
Objective Man: what you got???
Lee Zett: I just have bad dreams of Usher.
Lee Zett: O Man, WHY was B in the dream?
Lee Zett: WTFingF?!
Lee Zett: You know what?
Objective Man: LMAAAO
Lee Zett: I AM NOT GONNA BE ABLE TO WATCH THE B.E.T. AWARDS THIS YEAR, FUCK!
Lee Zett: Aren't they performing?
Lee Zett: Together?
Objective Man: supposedly
Lee Zett: OH HELL NO
Objective Man: yes.
Lee Zett: NO
Lee Zett: Can't watch it.
Lee Zett: BARF!!! EW!
Objective Man: *dies laughing*
Lee Zett: Why is my mind playing tricks on me?
Lee Zett: Are you lauging at me over there?
Lee Zett: You are SO MEAN!!!
Objective Man: im sorry
Objective Man: i can't help it
Lee Zett: Yes you CAN
Lee Zett: These are my confessions!
Objective Man: rotfl @ the reference
Lee Zett: Shut UP!!!!!
Objective Man: ROTFLMFAO
Objective Man: watch me have a Rihanna dream tonight
Lee Zett: I HOPE YOU DO.
Lee Zett: Then you'll wake up crying, praying and shit
Lee Zett: then you'll understand the misery!
Lee Zett: I'm telling you, at least Rihanna is sort of cute when she closes her mouth, does not speak, and just stands there silent.
Objective Man: NO
Objective Man: she's not.
Lee Zett: but still
Lee Zett: USHER?
Objective Man: usher is better looking than rihanna.
Objective Man: I WENT THERE
Lee Zett: You are COLD BLOODED
Lee Zett: LMAO!!
Objective Man: *shrug*
Lee Zett: Let me remind you never to fly to the bahamas.
Lee Zett: or barbados or wherever the fuck she's from.
Objective Man: *barf*
Lee Zett: Do you get nauseated whenever you see a short dark haircut or neon nail polish?
Lee Zett: When it rains, do you refuse to carry an umbrella?
Objective Man: YES.
Objective Man: and i slap people with big foreheads.
Lee Zett: Suddenly, I feel so much better!
Lee Zett: But um...O Man?
Lee Zett: Hon?
Objective Man: hm?
Lee Zett: DO NOT TELL ANYBODY I HAD AN EROTIC DREAM ABOUT USHER OR I WILL KILL YOU.
Objective Man: okay
Lee Zett: Nobody reads my blog, so if "_____" finds out and starts fucking with me, I will know its YOU.
Objective Man: oh uh
Objective Man: *warns her not to mention anything*
Lee Zett: I will HURT you!
Lee Zett: I will sick a Kangaroo, a WILD RABID KANGAROO on you!
Lee Zett: With TEETH!!!
Lee Zett: They have teeth, right?
Objective Man: probably
Lee Zett: OKAY, then, with SHARP TEETH!!!
Lee Zett: Thank you for being my friend.
Lee Zett: I'm going to go shower in Hydrogen Peroxide now
Lee Zett: TELL NOTHING
Lee Zett: Or BEWARE THE KANGAROO
Lee Zett: Understand?
Objective Man: understand!
Objective Man: now, GO SCRUB!
Lee Zett: Good boy.
Lee Zett: Love you! Mean it! Bye now!
Objective Man: *waves*
Objective Man has signed out. (6/12/2008 9:29 PM)

Disturbing Disturbing Ew Ew Ew

I just woke up.

I just woke up from the most lifelike dream i have EVER had-i'm talking, deep R.E.M. sleep-and the ONLY dream of its kind i have ever had.

I'm not horny. I'm not desperate. I'm not even in the slightest way attracted to this person in real life. But I swear to God, I just woke up after an-*checks cellphone for last missed call* 3:33pm to 4:42 pm. AN HOUR LONG graphic sexual dream starring myself and this male, married, possibly-well I always thought he could be GAY R&B Singer.

What? HELL NO I'm not telling you his name. Are you crazy?

Now i'm eating chocolate cake from the grocery store. With a SPOON, i'm so disturbed and ruffled. I had to type this. Frick.

So, for some reason i'm on a tour bus. I'm not sure what city i'm in, but i'm sitting on the top, open air level of one of those double-decker buses, just like the kind you see in London, or see Starline tours going all over Hollywood in. For some reason we (the people on the bus & I) are riding through the street in what looks like an airport terminal, and then we stop to help a breathless white girl rescue a painting-or was it a plant?-from her neighboring hotel room. As the girl thanks the bus conductor/driver, another white chick sets up a microphone on the right side of the bus, stands on a chair and exclaims to a handicapped down-syndrome looking white girl in the front row-"Rebecca (I think), since you've already been to Disney World so many times before, this year we've decided to let her (she points to another white girl) run the marathon in your place, so she can go instead." The downs girl cries and squeals with joy. An entire white family (family of the down's girl?) are exclaiming and crying and hugging and shit. Then, for some reason, the scene changed, and I'm walking in reverse-against most of the flow of traffic-in some kind of marathon race. Confetti and shit is falling. Everyone is just walking-i'm wondering why they aren't RUNNING, hello, its a MARATHON, right? But in some indeterminate amount of minutes I myself reach the end and there are a guy and some other people handing out glasses of pink kool-aid and straws as after-marathon refreshments. Or was it Crystal Light? Whatever; it looked watered down from the melting Ice.

A few feet away from the end of the finish line, was a two tier picnic table with a lot of people sitting at it, one of whom was Beyonce (I have no idea why she was there) and sitting beside her was a little black boy, couldn'tve been older than five. Jay-Z was wandering around the peripheral of the table, too-i think he also had ran the marathon, as had Beyonce. They (the table was filled with people, but I can't remember any other famous faces now) were all engaged in some uninteresting conversation, and Beyonce for some reason looked blank and wasn't very animated. Just kind of had a non-expression on her face, and kept looking down into her handbag, or gesturing quietly to the child. I think everybody at the table had run the marathon, including the little kid. So, for some reason, I say "Hey B! I didn't know you were gonna be here!" She says, "Yeah, I had to run it" or something to that effect, and then her husband comes over and scoops up the kid, who starts laughing. Beyonce smiles briefly before the blank look returns, then walks around and away from the table in some other direction, cutting our convo short.

Then, wondering what was up (sad) with her, I turn away from the picnic table, turn behind me, and there in a corner of the room, back to a wall, is {{R&B Singer}}. I say Hello, walk over, and then, we start talking. For a VERY LONG TIME. Do I already know him? I think i do. This low bed on the floor he's in, its almost like a futon or a mattress at carpet level. I think the floors were hardwood, though. This bed and these covers he's under are just several feet away from the picnic table with everyone at it, in full view. Beyonce was back at the table by this point, making her sad face. So. Me and the Singer. We start talking, and then at one point, i get under the covers with him, in some kind of a very close entertwined-limbs acrobatic-yoga-poses type of snuggle. We are just talking, again, in front of the picnic table. But somehow i'm already half dressed (as opposed to fully clothed) and Singer here is naked from the waist up. I believe he had on grey boxer briefs under the (navy blue top sheet and dark green floral comforter) covers. We are wrapped up in each others appendages, still no nastiness going on, but some odd tension, as if his scary wife may walk in at any time and go ape on him for touching another female, and somehow the topic of his wife comes up a ways into the convo, and i tell him something along the lines of 'don't take this maliciously, because i don't mean to hurt your feelings or offend you. But when you constantly defend her and keep saying how much you love her and how normal you are, it makes you seem desperate to be hiding something...like unhappiness or who knows what.' He looks at me, -I think my arm was wrapped around his thigh-, and sighs and says yeah, he knows its a bullshit game and he's not offended. I started massaging his upper inner thigh, and he says he has a bruise there that's been bothering him. I start kissing his inner thighs, running my hands over his chest and his legs, and we're still rolling around having a nonsexual conversation in between me having my lips on various brown, smooth, chiseled parts of him. Its like, *damp kiss on abdomen* "So what does she say about it?" re-snuggle under blankets, shift, noise of enjoyment on his part. *damp kiss on thigh* "We don't really talk about it. I mean, you can understand why I want to set it straight, though, right?" (<-- him) (me-->) "Yeah, I get that." *sucking gently on the space behind his right knee with his legs wrapped all over me*

End scene.

So. Weird. A conversation? Periodically we both look up and glance over to the picnic table (did i mention its only like 12 feet away from us on this futon on the floor by a dresser?) but the group of folks at the table are paying us no attention, and still milling around, in and out of the room (oh, now the marathon finishline is gone, and we are in a room. Possibly my grandmother's bedroom, as the door and dresser both looked familiar, but the picnic table? Still in there. And it appeared to be outside even though the room was inside. Que?!?)

Time passes. It gets later, but i'm not sure how so, because i have not looked at my cellphone nor he his. I never kiss his face. There is a weird unspoken-out-loud realization between R&B Singer and I that what he is doing, while not intercourse, is cheating on his wife with a female he is not romantically involved with but seemingly very comfortable in a close friendly way with, while wrapped up in blankets on a floor in full view of outsiders, while referencing his lameness over over-defending his choice to marry. ...Shyeah. At some point those grey draws came off, but i never make any moves to make contact with his private parts, nor he mine. We are still having this strange under-covers entwine-entanglement dance of lips on skin and conversation and his intensely enjoying my enjoying how smooth his skin feels while still thinking it was a little wrong and risque to be doing it. At one point, though, Beyonce is back at the table and stands up and paces for a moment, and he sits up and says, "B? You okay?" she replies, blankly. "I'm fine." then pads in her stocking feet back towards her spot at the table. I call out, "Are you sure? You look so tired! They working you hard filming?" She nods, "Film." then sits back down. I look at Singer and agree, "They're working her crazy on this movie she's shooting right now." He asks, "What are the call times?" I say, "5AM to 8PM." He whistles. "Man, that's madness." No wonder she looks beat, I think. We keep talking, singer and I.

At one point, though, I move in and begin kneading and licking the bruise on his inner thigh, while moving my hands in other directions. We are still wrapped up in blankets and our own limbs, but he turns part of me around so my ass is on his chest and he (i assume) licks his fingers for lubrication and begins to rub in slow circles around the point where my back ends and ass begins. He mentions he is enjoying his view. I duck my head down and to the side under the blankets, and i notice that since my lips-on-skin thing began, he has ejaculated massively onto the sheet and slightly onto the floor beside the bed, and, this being my first time setting eyes on his penis, i note that he is still hard and of ...average size. Thinner and long 'enough'. Nothing huge. Will do, I guess. I think to myself, I should get him a kleenex.

Beyonce leaves the room, re-enters, leaves, several times over. Strange. Why is she restless? I sense depression. She pays us no mind. Then she stays gone awhile as everyone else is now gone (assumingly downstairs in the house we were somehow in) and instead of kleenex, i wrap my mouth around that solid appendage of his. I'm thinking of his wife the entire time. I don't recall what he was saying or thinking of, just that he was nervously enjoying this quite a bit. I was somehow indifferent, but still, reacting favorably to his body reacting to what i was doing to it (as in, not getting off on him, because i am not/was not attracted to him, but still, i was liking how what my mouth was doing was making his body react. Pulse, breathing, perspiring, nervousness.) The hunt? The chase? A thrill? Yes, those. I'm weird like that. I don't even like R&B Singer like that.

After a few minutes of a slow blowjob, something alerts us to the prospect that someone may be coming up the stairs back into the room we were in, and as we were now actually doing sexual acts and not just rolling around in a pile of blankets, we both separated (sans fulfillment, btw.) and quickly wiped up his earlier mess off the floor, spread the blankets out, got somewhat nervously dressed and waited to see who would walk through the door.

I don't think anyone did, but then, at that moment, I looked at Singer's face and he was both satiated and afraid-and at that second, I woke up.

FREAKING OUT.

I was under the covers in my bed, as I had made the bed before i laid down at 1:something-PM. I was laying in a damp spot as i had sweated in the sheets as it was deathly HOT in my apartment. I was not turned on, or aroused in any way whatsoever-no, in fact i woke up in the way someone might wake up from a nightmare-- sitting abruptly UP in the bed like "Whaaaa???!!!" I jumped up out of the bed, threw my nightgown off and onto one of these boxes in my apartment, ran to the bathroom, peed, washed my hands and splashed cold water on my face, ran to the kitchen and grabbed the chocolate cake, and then sat down to type this.

WHAT WHAT WHAAAT the hell?!

I have pink Crystal Light in my fridge right now. Maybe that's why?
I saw a video of Jay-Z comforting a crying child this morning on Youtube. Did that influence...?
I saw footage of Beyonce looking blank running throuh an airport on the internet earlier. Is there a...?
I saw a photograph of an old friend named Rebecca crossing the finishline of a marathon on MySpace earlier, does that have anything to do with...?
I saw an advertisement for the newest album of the R&B Singer's in my July issue of Vanity Fair earlier. I was flipping through the mag right before i laid down for my nap. Is that why he was in my head in my sleep?

What what WHAT THE HELL?!

I NEVER have erotic dreams. I ESPECIALLY NEVER have them about CELEBRITIES. ESPECIALLY not CELEBRITIES I AM NOT ATTRACTED TO IN ANY WAY?!

What the hell?!

I had to get this on virtual-e paper before i forgot some details, but lawd Jesus, i woke up rattled, confused, horrified, sweaty and with a vomitous feeling.

If that is what encounters with this particular R&B Singer are like? Count me way the hell out.

And WHY was Beyonce there? And WHY was there a marathon? And WHY was I even physically attracted to the BODY of this Singer, when he doesn't even have that great of a physique anymore?

Why, God, Why. Make It Stop.

It is now 5:59PM, and i need to go put the rest of this slice of cake back in the refrigerator.

Ew, Ew, EW.

~~~~~

PS: Did I mention this R&B Singer was USHER?!????!!!!

*falls the fuck out and dies*

.... down about it.

So, I moved. I now live walking distance from Paramount Studios in Hollywood, and its fine. My rent is much less than it was on Olympic and Mansfield, and surprisingly, less than it was on 6th and Manhattan years before. So this is good.

What isn't good is that because it took me so long and so much (moneywise) to make the move, I haven't had the time since move-in day to regroup and build up my coffers to take this much anticipated trip to Ohio that i'd been planning. The annual BSQ trip. This year it'll be in Lorain, near Cleveland, at one of the girls' houses, because she's about to have her first child and we all decided to come out for the baby shower. Cute idea, huh?

I had intended to be there-hell, i thought i could be there, since i had planned on moving into this place in early MAY, not early June. But seeing as tomorrow it will have been one week since i've lived here, and as of now the apartment is full to the rafters with box after box after box of my things...I don't exactly know WHEN i'll be back right. And i'm sad that I won't be able to go and see my ladies this year.

I shouldn't be that down; i know: Lena can't make it due to her nephew's graduation, Tiana can't either because she'll be in Jamaica, Toisha has a family thing too...so I'm not the only one missing in action. BUt still, i wanted to have a second, a little few minutes to escape before i throw myself back headfirst into looking for a job and settling in this apartment now that i'm in it. I wanted to be around people who like me and who i have fun with and who's presences I rely on to bolster my spirits when I'm seriously down in the dumps (which i have been a lot in the past year). I wanted to se and cackle with and hug the ladies, because they really do mean a lot to me, and they also are like a form of human tranquilizers to me at times...meaning i'm afraid if i didn't have this trip to look forward to, i would've been even more depressed than i usually am, and now that the likelihood of me coming up with a few hundred extra dollars in the next 24 hours has vanished, i'm worrying that this weekend and for a time after it, i'm going to fall back into that dark place again, sad that i could'ntve been there, sad that i won't be in the pictures, sad that i couldn't just snap my fingers and fly in, sad that i didn't have the wherewithal to book my flight back in April like i should have.

Aw, man. And the worst part is, i should be so much happier and more optimistic now that I've moved. Still exploring my new neighborhood. Shit like that. But really i'm just disappointed that out of all these boxes, i can't find my Danskin capris that i wanted to wear with this dress. That this apartment has so little closet space. That i don't know what i'm going to do with all these fucking VHS tapes i made so long ago. And that I should just get to unpacking shit, but its no fun doing it all by myself when i can barely walk around in here. Boo.

I'm hoping i'll be okay with not going, and i'm hoping i'll get to see at least a couple of them later in the year.

I've got to go ship Rose her shower present, shit.

Literally, a nervous breakdown over a cell phone

My. Wireless. Carrier. Just. Changed. My. Phone. Number. Without. My. Permission.