I wasn't afraid of a june bug!!!

It's a done deal. My phobia is gone. I was co-habiting with a flying insect just now.

The cat was trying to eat it. I was waving at it to make it go back to the cat and we just had a jolly ol' time.

It was a weird version of insect hackysack.

I ended up not letting the cat kill it and it's somewhere in the house.

And I'm not sleeping in the bathtub for fear. I'm gonna just sleep and let it fly.

Mark your calendars, folks. This girl is phobia free.

Er, except heights. Still scared. And ocean waves.

But other than that. Totally fine.

"And this paddleball..."

My hair is blow dried and my favorite t-shirt is on and I'm still not karaoke-ing

I was invited to go karaoke and I'm all dolled up from my audition and I just can't get the energy to karaoke. I was just so comfortable on my couch. And then I was uncomfortable enough to move to my bedroom. And now I'm so comfortable on my bed with this laptop.

The cat is next to me struggling to get some grub out of the catfood bag and I could help him, but I'm just a slug. And a slug doesn't feed cats.

I said I was getting sick and I may very well be. I got this summer cough and my throat is a mess. (ah! my singing voice! -my karaoke singing voice, at that!). But it's more.

It's age.

I auditioned today for a 30-something woman and, you know what? I feel 30-something.

When I audition for 20-something, I stay out all night.

It's true.

You are what you pretend to be.

"Take me now you hot stud!"

I've lived my whole life without saying that.

Whole life.

Can you believe that?

Don't ask me how I came up with that thought. I think it's because I've been doing temp work for an adult film distribution company.

Not THAT temp work.

They say adding pictures increases hits. So here's a photo of me being all "Boston Legal." Tell me you don't see the spitting image of Spader right there. Tell me you don't.

I miss that show.

I'm re-reading this blog

I'm a dork.

Lordy. Why do people think atheists are bitter?

Do we think without God there's no reason to be happy?

Can't I say that I believe

1. we all came from slime,
2. no one is watching me right now,
3. nothing holds a key to eternal happiness or eternal distress

and still be happy and good???

Isn't a relationship to God all about rejoicing and celebrating? Isn't God really an umbrella we love each other under? What is up with the God dependency for our emotional and moral health?

Criminy

That wasn't a "sun tea" feeling.

I got a sunburn.

Sun

I'm currently on my bed and the sun is so warm, my eyes are heavy and my body feels like it's a lead weight.

My cat is under the bed, hiding from a seven year old house guest.

I'm journaling a little, posting on other blogs. Lounging.

This must be what sun tea feels like.

My phobia is cured.

Back story:
When I was in my early 20's, I saw a hornet on my window sill. I ran out the door and five blocks to the restaurant I worked at. Once I got there, I grabbed the only other waitress who worked at Mega-Bytes and told her I needed her help urgently. She nodded in that way people do when they're deciding if they would kill for you. "There's a bug in my kitchen." She continued to look at me. I took a deep panic stricken breath. "It flies." Janet told the boss to take over for a few minutes. It was an emergency. That woman walked to my apartment and waved the hornet out the window. I had left the stove on and the macaroni dish I had planned was now a pound of mush in boiling water. So Janet walked me back to the restaurant and made me some comfort food.

The new story:
So I'm doing the whole fence adventure and this very light, very delicate something lands on my shoulder. Assuming it's a leaf, I lift and toss and look at the ground in curiosity.

What lands and scampers away is a good sized spider.

I watch it scurry, the poor thing having a bit of a limp in it's right four legs.

I should be screaming right now. I'm pensive. This is a weird feeling.

So I keep working on the fence and I get pretty dirty, but when it comes to bedtime, I don't care to shower, I just pass out in my clothes on top of my fluffy green blanket.

I wake up to a pincer bug on my arm. Someone else calls it an earwig. I really have no clue which one of us is right, but it's brown, about half an inch long and it has these pincers that are utterly disgusting.

I flick it to the ground.

No killing. That would be barbaric.

And I hop downstairs for some coffee.

Another surreal moment for a woman who once left her apartment for two hours with the shower running because a cockroach was in her bathroom sink.

We get back to work on the fence and my roommate does a girl scream when she accidentally places her finger on a spider while picking up a piece of wood. (This is very funny because she has no phobia and really isn't at all "girly." She's built sets for plays which is feminine machismo in it's coolest sense, I think).

I bend over, and touch the spider. It's dead.

I laugh and tell her that I would be empathy screaming two days ago in the same situation.

What happened? Was that spider on my shoulder some sort of trigger? Did it spawn some sort of courage? Am I now one with the spider?

Now to see how I get when around a bee. That's the ultimate test.

New smell....

..saw dust....mmm....saw dust. I'm gonna post photos of the new fence soon. I'm so excited.

Rosa Parks Freeway

There's a stretch of the I-10 that is named "Rosa Parks Freeway." If it's really for Rosa Parks, wouldn't we have a fast lane on it that white people couldn't use?

The beauty of working on the house

So I saw my parents over the weekend and I explained the chore rotation and special projects we have in the commune (still can't call it a collective...makes me feel like a Borg).

Mom said with just a hint of utter disdain, "You can do all that for some strangers, but you won't even put a dish in the sink over here."

It's true. I'm a slob in the parental home. But it's only cuz Mom always tells me how I clean "wrong."

Anyway, that's for the therapist session.

The point being is that I work on the house and I love it. Yesterday I dug a small trench for the next rain season. I think I'm helping the world of digging and ditching when I say that wet dirt is so much easier to scoop up with a shovel than dry dirt. And also, rocks in the dirt is a bad thing. You want to know what I wish they'd bottle and turn into a perfume? Wet dirt. That is the sexiest fucking scent on the planet. It really is. Stick some wet dirt in front of me and take me...take me!

Today, we all worked on a fence. There's this crazy ass fence we had before that made the place look like a hippy's crack den. I don't think hippies smoke crack per se, but I'm using the visual anyway. The fence was made of doors. And it was painted wild colors with stuff like "This is a hippy crack den." Just kidding. I already forgot what was written on it. But it was poetic and artistic and the only reason it was an eyesore was that the doors were indoor doors, so after a couple years of being in rain and wind, the door-fence was buckling, rotting, bowing, warping and screaming to be put to sleep. So here, we were, three girls soon to be aided by a few other people in the house, tearing down the doors and putting up a new fence that will hold up jasmine ivy. Woohoo! We were fantasizing what to say when the neighbors were bringing us cookies in gratitude. I mean, at the last neighborhood meeting, they called it a "blight". We were taking down an eyesore that's plagued them for years! They would so make cookies.

All we got were the kids coming home from school who would walk past and sneer at change. They asked what we did with the fence and we would point at a pile of pink, purple, and blue wood. Then they would heckle us. We had done them wrong. I had no idea. I almost put it back. Maybe they just liked the old fence because their parents hated it. In any case, we all felt a tinge of guilt.

The kids' reactions stick in my head. They really loved that fence. Did it speak to them? I remember reading one door and relating. Let's see if I remember....I may be able to paraphrase..."They said I was too dark. They said I was too light. I was too ethnic. Not ethnic enough. Too tall. Too short..." You get the picture. But it had an ending. I really don't remember the ending. So maybe these kids (most are multiethnic or ethnic) were truly missing the message from the doors. They had a little reminder that they weren't alone on their way home. Some adult somewhere understood. And we took that away.

I don't really care. I hated that fence.

Opening a God question up to the audience

Is there an audience here?

Okay, here we go...

I was talking to a friend who is an atheist and we were talking about how annoyed we were by people "proving god." He was annoyed because often the proof was flimsy at best. I was annoyed because I believe wanting proof or wanting to prove is pure ego and not at all connected to spirituality. It's the age old "do you want to be right or do you want to be happy?"

If someone "proved" God, how would you react? If someone "proved" God didn't exist, how would you react?

You know what sucks? Happy people.

All weekend, I've been trying to get work done and here's what I'm up against:
1. hot lesbians running around the house talking and eating and drinking beer
2. The kids making smores at the fire pit
3. Intelligent and witty conversation in a nearby room
4. A roommate making balloon animals
5. My cat lounging in the sun and purring at me
6. A parade

All this and more is making me want to hang out. Not write. If I could just find some unhappy people who isolate and whine, I can go to my room and turn on my laptop and bond with my make believe.

This is so unfair.

whyyyyyy meeeee....

mmmmm...leftover marshmallows.

So I almost passed out in a Denny's

And the service is so bad, they didn't notice.

So I've been working weird hours and it takes some getting used to. And I've been running on pure caffeine. So I go to my temporary money making night job which is evenings until 1am. And at the end of the shift, I feel faint. The floor looks much closer than usual and I stare at people in that way boxers look at their coaches after a solid upper cut. My boss says, "You okay?" And I say, in my endearingly martyr saccharine voice, "Just tired." He nods and chuckles. I guess he related.

So then I get on the 405 and can barely see the road. Have you ever been in an extremely dangerous situation and, without irony or any actual fear, you say "Maybe I should be doing something else." That was how I felt on the 405. The steering wheel appeared much closer than usual, my dashboard bobble heads got very loud, and Gwen Stefani never sounded more like a dozen trombones.

I pull over and like an oasis, there's the Denny's neon sign.

Denny's.

My friend.

I get in and focus on two servers struggling with a large vat of ice cream. "Can I get some water?"

"One second."

"I'm very ill."

"Fine." Ohhhhh, was he annoyed. But he does take meticulous care in getting the right amount of ice and water in a glass so that I'm practically reeling from the sheer wait of it all.

I realize that it is very likely they always get a dizzy, faint, woman in around 2am on a Friday. Did I mention this is the Denny's by LAX? I was starting to get the shakes and I bet it just made me melt into the scenery more.

I finally get a water and a booth and call my best friend who is the angel she is because she reacts to situations the way she reacted tonight. She first said "Why are you dizzy and shaking???" I think she was stalling for time since I woke her up and she was completely unarmed for this friendship challenge. Then it was "Why the airport Denny's?" And then, I could literally hear cobwebs shake away when she says "I'm leaving now." Yay! The shaking gets a little less, but now my stomach is tighter than a drum. Denny's is very likely ten degrees below zero. My body is tensing and wondering which Denny's customer I will eat when we all start to freeze to death. Maybe the hooker in the booth across the way. She's thin, but I bet high in body fat.

The waitress, God bless her, is thinking it's a panic attack. "That is so my personality," I respond with a sigh of relief, "A panic attack is just up my alley of neurosis." She looks at me kinda weird and says "I had one three years ago and now I'm on medication for it and I tried to get off the meds, but I can't and the panic attacks just get worse and more frequent after the first one." I'm not sure if I was having a panic attack, but that little summary of the syndrome did not put me in a good frame of mind. I call my doctor's pager for a second opinion.

"Fever? Cold? Trouble urinating? Cough?" I reply with a "I don't have a thermometer, no, wait, maybe, kinda did yesterday, yeah but I thought it was cuz I smoked," and then a laundry list of body malfunctions. My doctors are so used to me, so he says "You may have general bronchitis. Buy a thermometer."

"Margaret says it's a panic attack."

"Who's Margaret?"

"My server."

"Are you currently feeling any anxiety?"

"The service here is atrocious, and I left my laptop in the car."

"I mean, are you having any heart palpitations or shortness of breath?"

"Not right now."

"So it's not likely a panic attack."

"I'll tell Margaret."

"You do that."

"Wait! So if it's a fever, what should I do? And if it's not, what should I do?"

"Come in on Monday if it's a fever or it continues. I'm thinking it's the beginning of a fever. You'll get more chills, but it's nothing urgent."

"Huh."

Yet again, a hypochondriac's horror fantasy of being carted to the ER is dashed against the Denny's soda fountain and crushed in the ice maker. I thank my doctor and call my best friend who I tell to go back to bed because it's not urgent. It's bronchitis. General at that. My best friend is wondering if it's a panic attack. I'm starting to feel demoted.

I tell Margaret everything. She nods solemnly and then proceeds to ignore me.

I spend twenty minutes trying to get my water refilled until I finally give up and go home.

So here I am at home. I cancelled the extra work I got booked on for today and wondering if I can feel better by noon so I can see my favorite 2 year old on his birthday. Either way, I got him an inflatable globe. He's gonna know his states and countries. I'm not gonna let him live a life like mine.

If not today, then tomorrow. He's two. He won't know the difference.

I almost got him a rubik's cube.

This is a tangent. I'm going to bed.

Trek geeks, this one's for you

I just totally geeked out with some friends about Star Trek and I am now in bed, thinking of Patrick Stewart. He is hot. He is so hot, I don't think he was mentioned in the conversation, but talking the Trek talk and then seeing my bed, I just did some free association and thought "Captain Picard." And then imagined him calling me Number One. My roommate thought Spock was hot. I guess so. That sounds right. Smart and aloof. That's hot. But Picard. Wasn't he raised on a vineyard in France? I vaguely remember a brother and father fighting in a vineyard (why the English accent?) And he was always so strong. Fuck the Borg, he says. Sure, they know no pain and only have loyalty for the hive and they stick metal in your orifices, but Jean Luc can kick any borg ass any time. Even with pvc pipe in his nose connecting to his urethra, he's unshaken.

yummy.

I saw a map of the US

My Dad is from Kansas. That is not at all the south. And it really is closer to Cali than I thought. So now I'm not so weirded out by his stories of travelling as a teen to Cali from Kansas.

Then I realized I've been telling people the marathon i ran was through DC, Maryland and Vermont.

Virginia. It's Virginia.

I never ran through Vermont.

I sat in front of this map for a long ass time. My friend was fortunately too wrapped up in putting my new headshots on disc to notice my complete awe. I could once name over 100 geographical locations in the Mediterranean and I can't even remember where Utah is.

I gotta take more gingko biloba.

That's it.

I'm never giving my phone number out again.

I am either avoiding a call or waiting for a call.

I'm throwing the cell phone away.

It's a curse.

A damn travesty!

If anyone wants me, they're just gonna have to stalk me. I'm sick of waiting for emails (refresh. refresh. refresh.) and waiting for phone calls. I'm sick of communication.

THIS IS WHY I'M A WRITER! I'm going right back to my imaginary friends.

So I saw "What the Bleep"

And it's kinda annoying.

Here's one reason why. The woman has an annoying ring tone. And she's deaf. Could she put the fucker on vibrate???

Second reason, Good god, people, soundbytes and science don't mix. Neither does soundbytes and the questions of existence, purpose, and god. Please talk to me longer than 2 minutes when getting a point across. Why? Because the one liners are better for comedy.

I am fascinated by the science of the mind, the science of religion. I don't really need science to prove God to me. In fact, that seems really useless. If God didn't exist, I'd pursue God in the same way. Much like I pursue the magic of Christmas or the "color of love" (cuz I can be a hippie that way). A little pondering of the neurons and brain patterns of enlightenment is kinda fun. But I like to really roll up my sleeves and dig deep when it comes to that stuff. Dr Newberg is fascinating and he takes a fairly long Newsweek article or a full book for him to really get into one little pinpoint of his research. I got four minutes max of him in that movie. And I got a too heavy dose of a woman "channelling" an ancient Indian man. Ramtha. Ramtha talks a good game, but for this girl, he's a dead guy channeling himself through a woman who looks a little too much like the lip injected chick from "Best In Show." (side note: I just watched Cinderella Story because that woman is in it. SHE IS A RIOT! end side note).

Have you ever been so lost in a thought while on the 405...

So lost in a thought that traffic is passing you. You are in the slow lane, following a blue haired woman who's stretching to see over the wheel, blue placard wagging back and forth....

So lost in a thought that this woman who would usually annoy you as you sped past her and gave her the finger is now a nice respite from the rat maze that we call "the 405 to the 10."

She's a respite because she's the excuse you use when you realize you have been driving 40 on the freeway and not noticing.

I was lost in that thought today.

I met a half asian guy from Alabama

I have no clue where Alabama is.