um. no. i mean REALLY too hot.

ok. i spoke too soon.

it was 104 degrees in Portland on Monday.

THAT is TOO hot.

um...yeah...too hot.

it is way, way, way, way, way too stupidly hot here today.

the sad news for puffy old water retaining me is that, well, I just checked Portland's forecast, and it's even hotter there. and that is where dave and i are going this weekend. ugh. mount st helens is not looking quite so delectable at this moment in time....

hope. some sweet hope.

Oh how i sometimes love the fresh start feeling of a monday...

In brief -

a) am doing a short 4 day workshop of a new play – which i will go into possibly at a later time, but the most important take away here is that it is engaging and good and smart and funny and out-there and creative and gritty and psychedelic and really fun to play with....which helps heal the pain of;

b) saw Happy End last night for free. um. Yeah. um. Okay. Wow. It was really really really really bad. The couple next to us fell asleep. The girls behind us actually said, “Do you think they call it Happy End because you are so happy when it's finally over?” oh and did I mention that it had two – that's right – two intermissions. Something i am morally opposed to....

c) went climbing tonight and did not shake from fear. Phew. Reminder NOT to take three weeks off from top-roping EVER again. Getting over heights fear is not something you want to do regularly. no.

d) felt Sarita's little Daisy move again. This time is actually felt like toes. It was pretty freaking amazing. We also had ice cream together. Always pleasing. :) Must get a spring sampler to her so that Daisy will already know my voice and Dave's voice and therefore make us seem familiar. And that reminds me – Dave compiled a Spring Sampler of stuff that we've been working on – it's mostly Dave, since, well, in reality he is the main musician of the tart family – but it's a two-disc set of some pretty good stuff. Let us know if you want one.

e) started recording first tracks of 'Underground' – a strange song about my grandmother. feels even stranger not to play it on my seacow. but i'm coping.

f) Saw a really fun and fantastic dance, theatre, circus, fire, live music, burning man morph piece on Fri night by a troupe called Xeno at the Xenodrome with the AMD (this was after we fed our summer movie palate with, please don't laugh OR hate us, 'The Davinci Code'. Sorry. PwC has been rather hard on us these days and we needed a release. And it was.) Xeno's piece, called keepsake, was like a child's acid dream. I really really enjoyed it. There was a tissu act. She was incredibly buff and tremendously cute and, well, also hot. Was really nice to see something innovative and creative and well executed. 8 stars out of 8 stars. Happy End: -0 stars.

g) met my lit pal at Martin Luther King Middle School in Berkeley on Tuesday. I've never been able to actually meet one before (it's a program where you and a child write letters once a month to one another and you are supposed to ask about normal things as well as talk about reading and books. I've been doing it for 5 or 6 years and it's been pretty cool.) My Lit Pal was excellent this time. We had an incredible amount of things in common. When I was there, she toured me around the AMAZING edible garden, showed me the school chicken coop (!!!!!), had me eat an edible flower, played the piano for me (that they just happened to have in the kitchen) and made organic strawberry puffs. It was pretty freaking great. I brought her a pen and a journal in her favorite color. She lit up like it was Christmas. I played piano for her as well. She lit up again. It was really sweet. She was off to drama class after we were done. I was very impressed to hear that he school still had a drama, art and music program. On TOP of gardening class EVERY week in Alice Waters' edible garden (which is really worth seeing! Prince Charles took the time to stop and see it – so should you.)

must go to bed. Was going to catch up on sleep. Looks like i jacked up that idea again. Good night.

Series of Unfortunate Events

what a week.

1) Sadly, even though there was an incredible amount of opposition (including a whole hell of a lot of you all – thank you!), the politicians of Florida let my little majestic seacow friends down and have voted to downlist manatees from 'endangered' to 'threatened'. This is so awful that I get a little misty every time I think about it and therefore will just direct you to www.savethemanatee.org (should you want more information and to send a follow-up e-mail of disgust), instead of trying to write anymore about it. Sigh. It's a sad world these days.

2) i cannot speak to much to this, as i am still tender from the loss. But on Wednesday some mother fucker broke a large back window in our truck (in broad daylight, during rush hour) and stole everything out of the back which included Dave's climbing bag (that's right folks, AGAIN!) and my guitar. That would be Seacow #1 to those of you that know. This was my first guitar. The one that I learned on. The one I wrote all my songs on. She was my baby. I hate how much it makes me think people suck and I hate how angry and sad and violated and shitty and fruitless and vague it makes me feel.

3) a co-worker of mine sits in a great corner cube by windows facing the parrot park. He sometimes calls me over when he sees them flocking, or hawks circling or sea lions in the bay or any other animal occurrence that he knows I will be excited about. ok. So he calls me over on Thursday to say that he thinks that he sees an injured pigeon in the street outside (we watch these things from the 18^th floor) and it's incredible because he seems to have a flock mate that will just NOT leave his side – even when cars go speeding by. So I looked out and kind of saw what he was talking about, but asked him how it was he had initially spied this as it was kind of hard to see. He pulls out a pair of very nice binoculars and says, “This is how.” - and hands them to me. So I take a look at where he was indicating and I locate the two pigeons and what he said seems to be true and before I can open my mouth to tell him so, a car enters my view and runs right over the injured bird killing it instantly. It was, um, unpleasant timing for me. And YES - I know. I know everyone thinks that they are rats with wings. I know that they sort of are rats with wings. I know that they have beady little insane eyes. I know that they are dirty and eat leftover KFC which is really wrong in so many ways. BUT - I still do not wish to watch them get run over. In vivid detail. :(

4) I seem to officially hate my day job and have become very slovenly and feel like I am making errors and being lazy and have fallen into a rut in a position that holds no interest for me and does not use enough of my faculties and yet pays me enough to work part-time and so i cannot seem to leave, yet something must change.

5) I killed a spider on Monday before I even really realized what I was doing, but that's kind of a lie, since as I did it I apologized to him. He started to run for my hand up the dustbuster and I couldn't tell what kind of spider he was and in a very strange fit of thoughtlessness I shook him off the vac, said, “I am so sorry for this Mr. Spider” and I crushed him with the dustbuster and immediately dustbusted him up. I don't know why. So out of character. I save EVERYthing and walk it out of the apartment to safety. I feel terrible and just had to admit my guilt. Maybe that's why my seacow was stolen? Spider karma? However another spider was walking toward me across the bathroom floor tonight and I did indeed pick him up and carry him out of the apartment. And I apologized to him as well.

6) I saw a play on Thursday and felt rather conflicted. It was a play that I was down to the finals for a role in and thought I had a VERY good chance at getting (especially since part of the role was to animate a puppet – a skill I have no training in officially, but, well, I think we all know Herbert.) So I did not end up getting the part...but can now see that I had a totally different take on the character....but that's not really what I'm talking about anyway.... I guess I just really wanted to feel some of that old magic. That old theatre magic. That feeling of being so moved by something that your chemistry is altered for a short while along with everyone around you and it's the most amazing feeling of community without really communicating in a normal way – which is why it's so magical – and touching. And important. It's a lot to ask from a show. And from people. And from actors. I guess that is part of what makes it so challenging. And risky. And beautiful. Wow. This is going to be a weird summer.

birdy bathing

Serafina Pekkala, Terfle and Rowsby Woof all watch as the Faerie Wogdog goes totally nuts in the water bowl. She practically went swimming.

Terfle clearly disapproves. Serafina wants to join her, but cannot find the courage. And Rowsby most certainly has one thing on his mind. like always.

tissu class today...ouch

i am so sore that there seems to be no part in my body that i cannot feel due to the fact that it is in so much pain. there are muscles in my arms and back that i had never really notated before. i showed one to the AMD this morning. and i have tissu class in 2 1/2 hours. i am so screwed.

Speaking of tissu class....I meant to put this up here, like, well, a long time ago. thanks to Arika and her phone for this neat photo. it is the only proof that i have that i really am learning to do this nutty little thing....I am just about to do a double star drop. :) And for reference - the top of the Tissu in our gym is about 30 feet.