Yes, as a matter of fact that is Dr. Frank.
On the right, I mean. On the left is me having a conniption fit.

Um... that's all!

[xoxo]

Something is up with this site and won't let me edit properly. Grargh. Please ignore this post right here.

...

Oh my lord, there is so much I want to tell everyone about. Mainly, my Houseboat adventure. But it wouldn't be fair to just completely blow off the entirety of May to make room for Houseboats, so I have to post a preambling journal first. Please enjoy the rest of last month while I edit and format tons and tons of photographs...

It's a jolly holiday with you, dear.
A jolly, jolly holiday with you...

Hey Sasha, you just got through another week of classes and successfully got the day off from work. What're you gonna do next?



Get my face blocked by Mike's fat head at Disneyland!

Disneyland had been in the works for a couple of weeks. The sky had been nothing but sun lately, and it was the perfect idea for a lovely late-spring day. Dan was taking his girlfriend, Mike was taking his girlfriend, and Andrew was taking me. The only possible obstacle was this: the night before we went was a birthday party for one of Andrew's friends, so I told him Don't drink too much! I know I wasn't the only one, because Dan corroborated that he'd talked to Andrew and told him Don't drink too much! But when he called me at two in the morning to tell me that he wasn't taking me to Disneyland after all because I'm too damn fat to fit in his car, and then laughed maniacally.....

Well. You be the judge!

My worries were confirmed when he (and Dan and Janine in the back seat) showed up at my door to pick me up looking quite dire and in need of coffee or electroshock therapy or a whole lot more sleep, a condition which only got worse as we drove under the charms of a flat grey sky that threatened rain.

I guess you could say he's a trooper, though. After some desperate-looking moments in line, we all broke for lunch fairly early into the day, and after some sort of fresh fruit plate he was up to at least around 60% restored health.



After all, you have to have a strong constitution to pull off the 3D glasses from the "Honey I Shrunk the Audience!" ride, and I think we just about managed.

It's kind of ridiculous. I've been to Disneyland more times in the past six months than I've been in the past six years. But you know what? I love it. We went on the INNOVENTIONS! Epcot-type display ride, and oohed and ahhed at hilariously outdated innovative inventions. (Ooooooh, the internet! Ahhhhh, Dance Dance Revolution!)



We debated the respiratory delight of Autopia before determining that fake-driving isn't so fun once you have to start doing it in real life. We rode a series of those rides where they take a picture of you, of which I concurrently either ruined them with a dazed flash look or failed to appear at all through bad angles. There was a brief debate over the merits of (the wildly underappreciated) Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. We got trapped on the wrong side of some idiotic parade. We stuffed ourselves with churros and screamed with outrage that Pirates of the Carribean was down for repairs.

But the most important thing is that we managed to get on the two greatest amusement park rides in the history of the world: It's a Small World, and the Teacups.



Oooh, lights!



We ended up staying fairly late, all things considered. Mike wanted to go to Rosscoe's Chicken and Waffles after we left, but Andrew was still pretty busted up and I had to go to work the next day. Eventually I will get chicken and waffles. The preposterous combination intrigues me.

All in all, fun times. It's still prettier in the wintertime, though. I think all the Christmas tree lights have left me jaded.

There is a house in New Orleans
that they call The Rising Sun.
It's been the ruin of many a poor boy,
and god, I know I'm one…

Sungod Festival: UCSD's one chance every year to act like we actually try to have fun. Everyone lets off some steam in whatever way they know how, be it drinking profusely, or drinking profusely and swimming in the fountain next to the book store.



To be honest, this year's Sungod festival was pretty drab compared to last year's extravaganza. There was something in the air that screamed mediocrity. I think it was the oppressive grey of rain clouds. Who wants to have a party in celebration of summer when even the sun itself refuses to come out?

I usually use Sungod as an excuse to mooch liquor off of The Koala, seeing as that's the only thing they're good for, but this year either the feds were on their ass or Sammy was pissed off at me for some reason, because the well had run dry.



Luckily for me and my co-worker compadres Carrie and Richard, I had a personal bottle of Bacardi Limon all ready to be shaken up with some bottles of Orangina. It wasn't much, but it was enough to make Carrie laugh uncontrollably. It was adorable.

We found some kids at Marshall College cooking up free cheeseburgers, and pissed them off by taking too many free burger buns, and that was pretty much the highlight of the day.

Oh, no wait. The highlight was walking back to the car from school and coming across a box that some woman had put outside her house with a "Free!" sign on the front. We dug through it ravenously and came up with the greatest book in the history of the world.



Here's a synopsis from the inside of the book:

HOT. Isn't it though? It's one of the spiciest books I've ever thumbed through. We read aloud from it on the way home, continuously dissolving into fits of laughter. Maybe later I'll post a sample of the stellar writing. I think the best thing about it is that it was made into a movie starring a very young Don fucking Johnson. It is one of my main missions in life right now to find and watch this movie.

Oh darling, it's so sweet.
You think you know how crazy,
how crazy I am...

Next up in journal entries? The greatest week in my own little life history. A very special tale of adventure, romance, post-adolescent bonding, and the pains and twists of growing up.

Oh yes, and beer. Lots of beer.

Stay tuned.

[xoxo]

So kiss me, and smile for me.
Tell me that you'll wait for me.
Hold me like you'll never let me go,
'cause I'm leavin' on a jet plane.
Don't know when I'll be back again.
Oh babe, I hate to go...

I wanted to write a big new journal, but I just haven't had the time. But I'll be leaving my computer for an unprecedented SIX WHOLE DAYS while I embark on a journey of epic proportions. Almost even a journey of Steve Perry proportions. In a little over two hours, I'll be on a plane to Sacramento, whereupon I'll meet my old chap Daniel, and from there we shall drive back to Davis. And from there, we and several others shall board the SUPER AWESOME HOUSEBOAT that we have rented, and aboard it we shall have a rollicking good time all around through the entirety of Memorial Day weekend. On Tuesday I shall return, tired but satisfied.

(I hope!)

Stay golden. I shall return.

[xoxo]

HOUSEBOATS, DAY ONE: Two girls so far have told me that this is nothing more than a drunken frat-boy fest that Daniel has conned me into, and I'm probably going to get gang-raped and contract chlamydia. And herpes. And possibly syphillis. I am terrified. Somebody hold me. Someone I trust.

*cries*

Don't you tell me I can't tell you what to do --
I can, on the whole, 'cause I work for a magazine
and I wrote a book about rock and roll.

Sometimes you write so much that you feel like you just heaved out an internal organ through the top of your head and it fell with a thickly wet squelch onto your keyboard and made you so sick that you feel like you could never write again. As my last journal entry drew to a close, I was just about to write the last forty pages of a novella and an eleven-page job application all within a week, and when I finished I couldn't bring myself to write anything longer than a couple sentences at a time, so I decided to catch up on my reading instead and fill up my head with new words to replace all the ones I hoarked onto the computer screen. Now the smoke has cleared, I've read about fun books that made me happy, and now I see that I'd promised to make my journals less few-and-far-between. D'oh!

So, as I said: two big writing projects. And holy crap, was I tired.

My novella turned out fairly well, I think. I got an A in the class, so I guess it must have. Fifty-six pages, total. (Double-spaced, 1.5" margins, courier new font. Score!) It could have been funnier, and it should have been even longer because I think it ended pretty abruptly and I didn't really get to develop the relationships I wanted to, but I guess that just means I have to keep writing it. Here's a piece so you can see how lame I am:

My teacher said she's a fan of my work and wants me to come by and visit her to talk more about it. I haven't gotten a chance yet, but I really want to. I have been hanging out with one of my former professors after my Tuesday classes though, which is good. Last week she gave me a mock-up of the book she's having published that'll be out next year. It was very good and made me cry. Today she let me borrow her copy of Best of McSweeny's Volumes 1-10 to read on the bus. I love Ms. Brooks something awful.

The other writing project I undertook was for the MTV/Rolling Stone Reality Show Project, which I found out about (and you can read about) right here. Here's a random fact about me: (a.) I've listed "Rolling Stone music review writer" in my Top Five All-Time Dream Jobs since I was 12. Ask any of my friends from middle school. They'll tell you. So how dumb would I be to not apply, right? The application was a nerve-wracking ten pages long (not counting the cover page) full of questions like "Who are your top five favorite non-fiction writers of all time?" (MTV< IF YOU'RE READING THIS: I FORGOT! LESTER BANGS!!!) and "What are you most proud of?" (Hell, I don't know! I'm the self-deprecating type.) More nerve-wracking still, I had to make a ten-minute video of myself blathering like an idiot about, well, myself. I had my wonderful artist co-worker Sol handle the camera and do the editing. He asked me if I'm a boxers or briefs kind of girl while the camera was rolling. I said "boy-cut shorts; that's the way I roll. Although you'll probably find that out anyway if this show ends up being anything like The Real World." He added that in there. Oh, the humanity! I guess it was cute, though. He said it "showed personality," and I need all the personality I can get. In addition, I had to send in three writing samples. (I used a review from the school music magazine, part of my cover story on Elliott Smith, and part of an essay on 'zines that I wrote for my media writing class.) Last, but not least, two photos. I probably should have printed 8x10s, but all I had in glossy paper was 5x7 and surely my cuteness still shines through in high resolution? Sol took the picture, too. (I couldn't take a full-length shot of myself to save my life.)



I think I could totally fill a character niche on an MTV reality show. Rebellious white girl, ahoy! I really hope I make it. Chuck Klosterman would be proud. Bemused, but proud.

All this was done by the first week of April, and since then I've done nothing but relax and read other peoples' writing, finally getting through all the books I bought over the summer and never wound up finishing. Here's a list of what I've gotten through:

Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs by Chuck Klosterman
The Rum Diary by Hunter S. Thompson
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami
California by Amra Brooks (out next year for all you suckers!)
King Dork by (Dr.) Frank Portman

Greatness, every single one of them. I'll return to that last one shortly.

I stumbled around 'til I found another bar.
(Which was good, because I couldn't find my car.)
I ordered a scotch, and I drank it down,
and I did this several times 'til I lost count...

In my last journal, I mentioned A Night on the Town with TedKoppel, and now the time has come.

Having busted out of the mental hospital for spring break, Koppel was back in California and so it was imperative that we go to a bar to order Shirley Temples like we keep talking about, so he drove down from Los Angeles to another friend of his out in La Jolla, and then the two of them came to pick me up at my house. My mother said "My, who are these tall and ominous young ruffians who have come to take you out?" and I said "Oh, that's just my friend from a... um... music message board on Teh Intarnets, and his friend whom I've never met before. We are going to partake of alcoholic beverages downtown. I'm sure I won't end up dead in a back alley! I'll be back later tonight!" It all seemed to go over real well. Why wouldn't it, after all? Is that not a totally safe and plausible situation? I certainly think so. And it actually is, as I trust Koppel not to be a psychopath what with his being my long-lost twin and all, but it just doesn't sound that great on paper.

So first we went to Hillcrest, but not a one of of us could figure out how to get to the Whistlestop, so I suggested a rad British pub in Little Italy. Koppel's friend James, however, made a wrong turn and we ended up in the Gaslamp District and the car was promptly walled in by a sea of clubbing people. There was nothing we could do except park and investigate the "trendy" nightlife.

The first bar we went to seemed like a very nice little upstanding pub from the outside, but on the inside it was nothing but Lenny Kravitz and frat boys and leopard-print roundabout couches. So we ordered a gin and tonic each, downed them, and got the hell out of there.

We got maybe half a block down the road before some chick lured us into an underground reggae/hip-hop bar with the promise of no cover charge and half-price bottom-shelf drinks. So we decided to stay there for a while, and we talked about Kingdom of Loathing and various other internet phenomena and indie music, and brought on the various-things-and-tonic until the innocuous indie hip-hop turned into Sean Paul and people actually started dancing.

I started feeling a litttle wobbly as we rushed back up the stairs, but what's a little wobble? So we went to the Tiki-Tiki lounge across the street, where we could discuss deep mysteries of the universe like the brainiacs we are. Mostly music, I think.



If any of you ever had reservations that we're pretty much the same person, this comparison should put that doubt to rest. Or at least our hair is pretty similar anyway. James took this picture. I'm glad someone got a hold of the camera, because I certainly wasn't about to get any decent picture down. I look retarded in this one, but not as retarded as Koppel looks in the other one, and I have way more pictures of myself on the internet looking decent so I think this is only fair. May I draw your attention to the two orange drinks side-by-side to my right? Yes, I ordered some kind of plum wine drink, but it wasn't as sweet as I thought it would be, so I decided that the best course of action would be to order a rum-mango drink to chase the plum drink with. Isn't that sensible?

This is where the night ends for me. By which I mean that the next thing I know, it's 9AM in the morning, I'm in bed with my jeans on and my sister is sitting on my stomach, I have one shoe and one contact lens on, my parka is on the bathroom floor, and my mother is swearing and screaming bloody murder at me for being so irresponsibly as to come home at two in the morning without so much as a phone call, and I have a headache I haven't felt since Andrew's birthday soju disaster. All parts of me were intact, however, nothing was missing from my purse, and from what I hear, I walked back to the car and made it in the door to my house wtih surprisingly agile skill.

So, in other words, nerd night out was a success!

Except: we totally forgot to order Shirley Temples. Oh well. Maybe next time.

Teacher, please, don't be such a tease:
give me some kind of sign, not detention this time.
The things that we used to do have been turned into a zoo
by people who say all the things that we used to say,
and if we say them again, we're gonna sound just like them.
(After years of remorse, I think I've taken it in...)

So I've gotten my final teaching assignment of the school year. No longer must I toil at the sterile mercy of Scripps Ranch High School. Now, I find myself at....

San Diego High. My other former high school.

I attended SDHS for my 10th grade education throughout the duration of the 1998-1999 school year. I dare say, all things considered, it was one of the best years of my life. Almost everyone I really care about these days, I met during my year at SDHS, even though most of us weren't really close or anything until after I'd gone away. (Pulled out kicking and screaming by my parents, to save me from falling grades and a destructive relationship with a boy who was bad for my health. They knew that school was better for me in every other way, but sometimes a girl makes a crappy decision and has to live with the consequences. If I hadn't had to transfer schools, I may never have met Ally, so it all worked out for the best anyway.)

Over spring break I wandered around taking pictures of the area while I waited for Daniel to call me back about whether he wanted to hang out or not.



Turned out he couldn't that day, what with chores and needing to get ready to go back up to Davis.



We only got to hang out once over break, during which we got burritos at Colima's. We then went bravely into this really horrible neighborhood dive bar called Tobacco Rhoda's and pissed off the locals by playing The Clash and Aesop Rock and The Agenda on the jukebox. (Hey man, whose fault is it that they had a digital jukebox? Our money was good, and we bought beer too!) It was kind of scary though and this guy in the corner kept trying to get us to try some of the fish he was eating whole off the bone, so we got the hell out of there and went back to Daniel's and watched MST3K until it was time for me to go to work.

It was kind of a bummer of a spring break, all things considered. Andrew had plans to go to Las Vegas with his friends, and since it was one of the friends' birthday it wasn't much my place to go. Meanwhile Daniel went on some sort of archeological toxicology excavation with his dad in Mexico. I stayed at home, worked, babysat my sister, and got acquainted with a little thing called World of Warcraft. Well someone had to hold down the fort here. I'm now a level 16 zombie mage. Somebody stop me.

Still, even if they were all gone over break, I like the people I met during my stay at San Diego High an awful lot. 10th grade was one hell of a year.

You're too dear to put a price on, and (when I talk to you)
you're more than Monty Python, Star Trek, or Dr. Who.
You're much more than MST3K or D&D, yeah.
I'm King Dork, and I want you to be with me.

So, tying this post together, let's get back to the most awesomest book to come out this year. King Dork, by Frank Portman, otherwise known as Dr. Frank, singer in my favorite band since, that's right, 10th grade. It's about a boy named Tom and his wild and crazy adventures in trying to start a band with his best friend, taking lame AP foreign language classes, and surviving, that's right, 10th grade. There's a passage where he's talking about The Catcher in the Rye, specifically Holden Caulfield, and he says:

"For teachers, he is the ultimate guy, a real dreamboat. They love him to pieces. They want to have sex with him, and with the book's author, too, and they'd probably even try to do it with the book itself if they could figure out a way to go about it."

Well, sex? That's a little drastic. Poor Tom's just a little sophomore, and I'm no creepazoid. But I can certainly hug it like the very dearest thing.



And also make a fan art band poster. Because lord knows you're not a real pretend serious high school punk rock band until you have a band poster. I know Tennis With Guitars was only band name incarnation #4, but it struck a chord with me in that I too know the horror of almost failing 10th grade P.E. for hitting the ball over the fence one too many times in order to stall on actual physical activity and too much practicing guitar jumps with the racquet faced the other way. I posted it on Dr. Frank's myspace and he wasn't totally horrified, so I guess it's not too dorky. (And even if it was, I suppose that'd fit just right?)



That's all for tonight, kids.
Stay tuned for a comic or something in the near future. I think I'm getting past being burned out on writing. It's about time. Writing's one thing I never get tired of for long. I guess that's why I'm a writer.

[xoxo]

P.S. ~ Holy crap!