My Apartment Is Conveniently Close To LDS Hospital

Remember when I quoted poems and talked about books? Here's a poem that flashed through my mind last night. Actually, it was just the first line of the poem that flashed, since I've always had trouble really understanding this one. But I come closer every time I read it--I think yesterday I finally got a grasp on
"A man goes far to find out what he is--
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light."

Anyway, here it is: "In A Dark Time," by Theodore Roethke, who might be elevated to imaginary boyfriend status because I love his poems so much.

In a Dark Time

In a dark time, the eye begins to see,
I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;
I hear my echo in the echoing wood--
A lord of nature weeping to a tree,
I live between the heron and the wren,
Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.

What's madness but nobility of soul
At odds with circumstance? The day's on fire!
I know the purity of pure despair,
My shadow pinned against a sweating wall,
That place among the rocks--is it a cave,
Or winding path? The edge is what I have.

A steady storm of correspondences!
A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,
And in broad day the midnight come again!
A man goes far to find out what he is--
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.

Dark,dark my light, and darker my desire.
My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,
Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?
A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
And one is One, free in the tearing wind.

This Is Not In My Apartment

Because I'm not THAT weird. Yet.


(Weirdness courtesy of Cute Overload).

The Apartment, Part 2: The Kitchen

I thought I'd share more pictures--because it makes perfect sense to post photos of my home and closet to a web site that uses my first and last name as a URL!

This is what you would see if you were walking in the front door or sitting at the counter on the second barstool that I keep planning on buying.
Yes, we have some bananas...in our big orange colander. We also have a stray houseplant. It ususally doesn't live there but sneaked into the picture. I gave it a talking to.


This is looking into the corner where the sink is. That's why you can see a sink. And the houseplant again.
Notice the dishwasher? I hope those of you who have a dishwasher appreciate it. It is a magical box wherein dirty dishes emerge clean, in only 30 minutes on the "Light/China" cycle.

And here's the rest of that wall, including the door to the bathroom. As my brother said when he saw it, "You can almost shower in your kitchen!"

Bonus Post!

"Possible New Terms for the Old and Tired Term 'Brainstorming'". Enjoy.

The Apartment, Part 1: I Found My Camera

Look! In spite of the Riverdance rehearsals from 7:30-8:00 every morning, my apartment rocks!

I have a chair!
(This is actually the same Eames-like chair I read all my books in as a child, and that I got rocked in as a baby even earlier.)

I have SHELVES, which on the apartment furniture black market would be equivalent to having about twenty kilos of cocaine. Because these are CUSTOM BUILT. By my dad, who is a MASTER CRAFTSMAN. (Also retired! And available to hire for YOUR shelf-building needs! Email me!)

Notice the light blue fabric backing and artful arrangement of books by color. (That was me.)

This is where the internet is. So fast! And what's that? Another chair! (That's the knitting basket to the left.)

And...best of all....I have A FULL-SIZE OVEN.


AND I HAVE THIS CLOSET. This closet has its own light. I think I have to lie down now.

"Apparent Passions of My Upstairs Neighbors"

(From McSweeney's lists.)


Moving furniture

Rolling bowling balls off of tables

Keeping time to music by beating a staff

Picking up anvils, and then dropping them

Riverdance

My camera has disappeared into the depths of my new closet, so the plan of posting pictures of the weekend's progress on the apartment (bookshelves!)is not going to happen today. I know the camera's in the apartment because I took a picture of the shower curtain two weeks ago; I just don't know where I put it. I thought this list was evocative of apartment life, though--I'm just glad they get up when I do and not earlier.

Thursday Night At Chez Solo

It went a little something like this:

I came home and checked my email because now I have the internet in my own house. (There was nothing new since I checked it at work, oh, 30 minutes previously. But you never know!)
I ate Thai food for dinner.
I knitted a pattern repeat on the Fabulous New Spring But It May Actually Be Summer Before I Finish It Handbag while watching an episode from the first season of Northern Exposure.
I became irritated with Rob Morrow and decided to read in the hope of becoming sleepy.
I did not become sleepy.
I finished the book I had picked to read (Fugitive Pieces, one of the top ten books ever in my opinion, and yes Dad, I have your copy, but you don't re-read things anyway)
I decided to read my old journals instead.

Then my head exploded.

And tomorrow? If I still can't sleep, I might read poems to the houseplants.

The Vernal Equinox Means Spring, And Spring Means...

PEEPS!
(The internet was successfully installed at the new place this morning, Now we're cooking with gas!) (Well, actually the range is electric. But you get the idea.)

Back, Kind Of

I was si-ick (say it in a whiney voice) since Sunday morning and stayed home form work for two days and didn't even post anything.
BUT I had my parents to take care of me (yes, I lived alone for a WHOLE WEEK, thank you very much) so now I'm better. (Thanks, parents!) And tomorrow I will have the internet in my own home. So get ready for apartment pictures.

And in other news, it's the Vernal Equinox. You can learn all about the science part of it here or you can dismiss science and learn about the Druid/Christian part here.

Hours - Nay, Days - Of Fun

Six years of random lists, found here: http://www.mcsweeneys.net/links/lists/

My favorites:
Words Never Used in the Titles of Remotely Good Films
Band Names Rejected by the Smashing Pumpkins
Prescription Drug or Metal Band?
HAL's Comments While Trapped on a Desert Island, and Your Name Is Dave
Other Places Jimmy Buffett Wasted Away

and, finally
Original Title Suggestions by J.D. Salinger's Publisher That Could Have Been Deleterious to the Success of His Magnum Opus

Mm-hm, Yes, I Concur

Also: Today I am wearing sandals. My feets are free! FREE, after a winter of shoes!

It's This, or a Vacation

I will have internet access at home in a week and a day and won't have to skulk around work and blog, but until then, I'm afraid there won't be much going on. (Although I promise LOTS of pictures of the new place when I'm back online.) But until then, prepare yourselves for unillustrated and random posts. Like today's: "Words" That People Must Stop Using.

Today's "Word" That People Must Stop Using is "thrift." Not when used as a decent and proper noun, but when used as a verb. It appears on all the pretentious craft blogs I've found, where stay-at-home moms make stuffed animals that they sell on Etsy, and have one or two young-ish children that they dress in vintage smocks, and on days when the kids are at art camp or something they get lattes and go "thrifting."

This is not an acceptable usage of an established word. Nor is it acceptable to describe something you purchased while shopping at a thrift store as "thrifted." It just isn't. It's juvenile and affected. Please, craft bloggers, stop this immediately.

(Don't get me started on people who use "impactful." At least the craft bloggers don't do that.)

Hey, An Anniversary

I'm afraid this will be the week of short posts, since I can't compose them at home ahead of time. (Well, not until the 22nd, when I get internet at the new apartment.) But I noticed it's been just over a year since I started posting. [Insert obligatory remark about how much has changed here.]

Also, is it warm enough to wear a muumuu yet?

Moved!

Oh yes, I am now moved in and very stiff. (Heavy things? I don't want to lift heavy things!) I love my new place and would love to share pictures, but someone was unrealistically hoping to pirate wireless internet in the new place, which is not the case. So I have no way of getting them uploaded at the moment, unless I want to go to the library and do it. (Which I might, by the end of the week--we'll see how this "living alone" will go.) But so far, so good.

Part IV: Muumuus

So I bought a muumuu on vacation but was so filled with delight while wearing it (it's flowy! it's bright! it has a pocket! and a flounce!) I didn't get a modeled shot. So here's a staged one:

When you wear a muumuu in Hawaii, you feel like putting a plumeria behind your ear. That's what I did with this one:

In fact, I loved my muumuu experience so much we found a Hawaiian fabric store and I bought both a pattern for another muumuu:

and the fabric:

Apparently, other people (well, coworkers) think it's strange to go to a fabric store on vacation. But what better souvenir to get? Because this summer I can put on one of my muumuus, sit on my porch, and remember this:

Part III: The Nene

What, you may ask, is a nene ("nay-nay")? A nene, my friends, is the Hawaiian goose, a distant relative of the Canadian goose, and the state bird of Hawaii.

Because it has the best name ever, the nene captured my heart on this vacation. Sadly, I didn't see one, but the signs about them were awesome. My favorite: A nene silhouette with the words "GO SLOW" beneath it. My second favorite: A sign proclaiming "A fed nene is a dead nene!" (I'm still mad I didn't get pictures.) I guess I'll just have to go back.

This is not a nene:

It's a rooster living in the parking lot of:

And what does Akaka Falls look like? Big and damp:

And remember--A FED NENE IS A DEAD NENE. Don't feed the nene.

Part II: Lava

Subtitled: And You Thought The Ocean Could Kill You.

So picture an approach to the shore in Volcano National Park, around sunset. Um, is that shoreline smoking?
Oh, I think it is. Don't breathe in the smoke!
In spite of MANY warnings from the Federal Government...

...we want to get closer to the lava. Where is the lava?


We do not view the 4-minute lava safety video.
On our way to get closer to the lava, we pass some old lava that had happened to just, you know, FLOW ACROSS THE ROAD. In 2005. I am amazed and point at it:

The adventure continued as we hiked across some old lava (avoiding the steam plume) and hunkered down with the lava rats (no, really) and let it get completely dark. Of course, my camera couldn't focus in the dark, so you'll have to imagine the best part: seeing the lava flowing down the hillside and entering the ocean. We were a mile away, more or less safely, and it was just incredible to think that new land was being formed right before our eyes. Because who else gets to see new land being formed? Pretty much only God.

Lava. I like it as much as I like the ocean.

Part I: The Ocean

I had never really spent any time by the ocean until this trip. And let me tell you, I like the ocean. It smells nice. It makes the horizon really big. It does cool things with waves. It's a pretty color:
However, while I like being by the ocean, I learned I am afraid of being in the ocean. It's big. There are waves. And if you're not a strong swimmer, the ocean can kill you:


And things live in the ocean! Sometimes really big things, because the ocean is big! Things like whales:

And sea turtles:

And twenty-year-olds from the Coast Guard! (Hello, boys!)

Yes, I like the ocean.

I'm Back

Oh, Hawai'i...land of vowels, feral cats, tropical drinks, signs about the nene...oh, how I miss you already.

There could be a book from this trip, but for the rest of the week I'll focus on the highlights: the ocean; lava; the nene; and muumuus.