bus highlights of late:

TODAY:
a car wanted to turn into my bus's lane from a parking lot, and it did so without waiting for a polite wave of the hand from the bus driver or anything. bus driver: "did i say you could go, knucklehead?"

on the same bus there was a little girl with her mom. cute kid; missing her two front teeth, which made her all the more endearing. she was carrying a purse with the following items in it: a starfish finger puppet, which she waved at me, and a ten pound note. she was kind of awesome.

A FEW DAYS AGO:
there was a more or less crazy dude on my bus. and he was chattering constant, bizarrely inspirational things, like, "the important thing is just to keep living. even if you're a thousand years old, just keep living." then i sneezed and he said, "bless you, baby! bless you!" i thanked him. his next project was talking to this asian kid who had just gotten on the bus and who was clearly not in a talkative mood. the kid did not respond to the crazy guy's conversational overtures, so crazy guy took it up a notch. "you can't ignore me, because i ACKNOWLEDGE you. ching chong ching!" it got more awkward from there because no one wanted to talk to him.

today was a day of finally getting stuff done. i finished sending out books to freelancers for the winter season, i did as many cataloging-in-publication applications as i can right now, and i finally did a reader's report for a manuscript that roxy gave me like a months ago. tomorrow, though, i think i'm working with marketing, and i think i'm going to have to make phone calls to radio stations in la jolla to see if they'll interview one of our authors. THIS IS TERRIFYING.

i think i have a pinched nerve in my back, just below my right shoulder blade. a spot right around there is occasionally inexplicably tingly and cold.

i went to the pay-what-you-can yoga place the other night, and it was superb. it was not spiritual or gentle, which works great for me! my shoulders still hurt -- it's awesome! i only paid seven dollars for an hour of yoga, and the instructor was super nice. yes, yoga to the people, i think i will frequent your establishment.

work went so fast today! and it seemed like i accomplished so little! but i think i still had a better day than adam, who had to spend at least five hours wading through TWO poorly designed and even more poorly edited manuscripts.

the best taste combination ever: dark chocolate and chili peppers.

i cooked a very unsatisfying dinner tonight, after a trip to berkeley bowl.

i'm trying to buy fewer lattes, because they really are just a money pit. but what makes it tough is that i really like steamed milk. i make strong, good coffee; this is a fact. but there just ain't nothing like a latte, when properly done.

omg. the opera yesterday was INCREDIBLE, even though i had to take a train all the way out to daly city (the only theater i could find that still definitely had seats available) and i got a migraine midway through the third (last) act. despite all of those things, it was still one of the most worthwhile adventures i have undertaken thus far. _tristan und isolde_ was amazing, so amazing, so very amazing that i don't even know how to put it into words. and wagnerian singers are hardcore; they sing incredibly elaborate music for four hours straight.

one reason that i think wagner has gotten this reputation for being difficult is that he didn't really care about musical structure. in most operas, there are reasonably separate songs, which you can hum to yourself on your way home. wagner is not like that. everything is sung, and there's very little sense of where one song ends and another begins -- because there are no pauses, and very few distinct or repeating melody lines. it's not that wagner is really difficult, but he is very different.

anyway, i loved it, and i recommend the experience very highly.

afterwards, my head hurt a lot, but i thought i could tough it out, because i'm a tough guy. so i got on BART... and got off near union square in SF because i needed to find somewhere to buy excedrin . also, yes, ok, i did kind of want to look for pants at H&M. i bought excedrin and drank some water, and, while i was sitting on the lawn at union square, on the phone with my mom, a panhandler came up to me, stuck his hand right in my line of vision (i was kind of looking down) and asked me for a dollar. a dollar! not just anything i can spare, like in berkeley. apparently this man had such standards that he would accept nothing less than a dollar. i gave him nothing. later, i gave a dollar to a man who asked me if i could spare anything. i am not sure that this was the right thing to do, but i did it, so there.

then i bought pants. my head felt better at the time. but then i thought it was going to explode on the train home. when i got home, i took a nap. when i woke up, all i wanted to eat was two pieces of toast and four clementines. i love clementines; jessie bought them last year, and i ate them like i was recovering from scurvy or something. update: i ate two more while i was writing this entry.

i got home before 6:30 today -- it was fantastic! and that includes stopping at whole foods to buy a salad because i really wanted a salad!

this weekend i'm going to see wagner's opera _tristan und isolde_ in a movie theater: www.fathomevents.com. you should all go, too. then we can pretend we're seeing an opera together.

well, dudes, i'm off to read some quality literature that i swiped from counterpoint's storage unit.

well, guys. i've decided to make a few quarter-of-the-way-through-the-year resolutions.

1. get up earlier. getting out of bed is the most difficult thing i do every day. i am tired, and my bed is warm, and, really, who likes to put on real clothes? but i need to stop sleeping in so late.

2. eat more fruits and veggies. lately my diet has been heavy on croissants. that can't be good.

3. drink less coffee. this one especially has gotten out of hand.

4. start blogging more again. and writing letters. and maybe sewing.

i found a yoga studio that offers cheap (pay what you can) classes at super convenient times for me. and it's on my way home from work! MAJOR SCORE!

today the 51 was 45 minutes late. seriously. hence, tomorrow we try a new bus route. how do you like them apples, 51?

well, much has happened, dear readers!

my mom and joe and i drove around san francisco, and it was terrifying! those hills -- you don't realize how steep they are still you're at the top, fearing for your life, watching other people navigate like it ain't no thang, feeling like some sort of monkey who's still scared of fire.

then we went to tommaso's and ate for free, since my parents know the owners. oh hai! delicious italian food -- we ate it!

last night, joe and i ate indian food after seeing _persepolis_. we are almost-globetrotters! we took bart home. i am riding bart a lot more since joe is here -- it is cheaper and quicker to take bart for short trips. actually, it is always quicker, just not always cheaper.

today it was back to the salt mines for this girl. i'm working on filing for library of congress data for counterpoint's next season of books. now that adam is here, i am doing fewer fun editorial things. i guess that is better for the team, since adam knows what he is doing more than i do. but it is not fair to give me a taste of greater things (proofreading!) and then grab them away and replace them with finicky production schedules and this silly library of congress data. and the thing is, i was better at the higher-level editorial stuff than i am at the lower-level administrative stuff, because i am intellectually competent but very disorganized. maybe it's partly because i am only working three days this week and roxy doesn't want to assign me anything too major that i might not finish? i will choose to tell myself this.

taylor the terrier, because she is small and a terrier, came into my room to say hi and pissed all over my sheets out of sheer excitement. now i am washing them. it is 11:40. I WANT TO GO TO BED. doh

late again this morning because it took me so long to finish up my internship time log and reflection. no shower time, even. so then, walking to the bus, all of a sudden i realized i was going to throw up. i ran over to some landscaping and started retching into it, right across the street from a father and his three-year-old. they said nothing.

but because i ain't no quitter, i took the 1 over to where i catch the 51. when i found myself again retching into landscaping (and crying, because i cry when i throw up, for some reason), i decided that going to work would not be a great idea. i called roxy and told her i was staying home. she was nice, especially when i started crying like a moron.

i guess i am just stressed out and tired. there has been a lot to do lately.

i have next thursday and friday off because joe is going to be here (OMG!), so i feel bad missing today -- not as bad as i would have two weeks ago, since adam the new assistant editor is on the job and doing his thang. but still kind of bad. i might be taking this internship too seriously. it's hard to know.

jeez, i am so tired -- but i still have so much more lying to do for my internship spreadsheet! this crap sure ain't gonna make itself up; heck, i can hardly do it!

my midterm evaluation with my ASU internship supervisor is on wednesday -- hence the lying. it is weird to think that i am almost halfway through my internship. weirder still, roxy will be leaving at the end of march (because her kid should be popping out any time around then). i will miss her when she goes. she has been a great leader to my one-person girl scout troop.

ma and i had indian food for dinner. it was pretty good -- her lamb dish was better than my eggplant/potato thing. i should have known that the eggplant wouldn't be great.