My laptop bit the big one Thursday night. I've lost all my pictures from 2009 and whatever music I've received over the last four months. Which was A LOT. I'm glad I backed up my harddrive in February but it still doesn't alleviate the pain.

In the meanwhile, it's back to the old pen and pad of paper.

Yes/No

Thumbs up:
Believing in the "anywhere but here" motto. Doing activities in one sitting. Marathon reading. Drunk dancing. Soft blankets. Plum eyeliner. Gay boyfriends. Paychecks. The smell of "green" and vanilla. Spontaneous acts of recklessness. Nighttime Skylines. Conor Oberst. Motorbikes. Takeoffs and landings. My dead poet lovers: Ian Curtis. Kurt Cobain. Elliott Smith. Making lists. Academia. Red nail polish. Free wifi. Giant coffee mugs. Tiptoe kisses. Making short term brilliant/long term piss poor decisions. Languages. Jewish musicians. New York City. Street vendors. Farmer markets. Arm in arm walks. Gael Garcia Bernal. Coke. Black motorcycle jackets.

Thumbs down:
Pop music. Sarah Palin. Beer breath. Long distance. Traffic. Laundry. Taxes. Short battery life. Delays. Telemarketers. Idiots. Sarah Palin, who's worth a second mention. Confederate states with people who people it's still 1863. Red eye flights. Soggy shoes. Diaper duty. Dry skin. Epilogues. Breaking concert etiquette. Chick lit.

Greenbacks, payback

Madoff, you silly fuck. You screwed my organization out of millions of dollars. There goes my pay raise. I hope you get shanked in the showers.

I'm developing a workshop/program for the LGBTQ community and last week my boss told me, "No pressure, but we have a lot of grants riding on your program. But no pressure, ok?" Insert deranged laughter here. Grants = a few thousand to hundred of thousands of dollars. So no pressure indeed.

And current travel plans? Egypt and Greece. Sweet! Knowing me, this will change in a week's time. Oh, my fickle, fickle tendencies.

P.S. I really hope someone pees on your bed, Madoff. I really do.

Do it

I am going to make a short film this summer.
But first, I will write the script for it before even trying to get that ship to sail.

I am going to be an somewhat-okay-but-still-needs-to-work-at-it amateur photographer. (I do not think I included enough hyphens in that sentence.)
But first, I will take a thousand pictures on each setting I have so I can figure out what the hell my camera is good for, then upgrade to something more expensive!

I am going to visit my friends wherever they are this year. First stop, Seattle. Next will be Chicago or Monterey. We'll see.

Those are my three goals for 2009. I don't make New Years resolutions because I suck at them. Instead, I'll try to get my ambition to work out for me because I really miss making short films and haven't done so in quite a long while. Biggest problem that's stopping me isn't writer's block, it's having a damn camera to film with. God, materialism does make the world go round.

Across the universe

It's been a shit-tastic couple of weeks but I'm already edging on the "been there, done that" part and moving on. Summer is about to start and I'm getting my plans in action. I'm trying to narrow down my choices of travel spots. If David pulls through, I think I'm going to Africa. But the prospect of stepping on a landmine while I'm in Morocco is not appeasing. I really had my heart set on Belize but it's windy weather in the October and if I'm going to Belize, I am not going to be bundle up in long sleeves and jackets. So, Barcelona and Berlin could be another option in the fall. Or Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Brazil, etc etc etc. Odd how I don't have Italy, London, or Paris on my list of places to go. Western civilization be damned, I suppose.

I've been bitten by the travel bug so bad that it's developing into a constant itch. No matter how much I want to get it out of my system, I'm stuck with the ever wanting desire to be somewhere new, trying something new.

It's awful. I dream of airports. That's how bad it is. Le sigh.