wilderworks

I am back in New Jersey, with a broken backspace button. I'm living in a room that allows me no space to roll my chair backward, because I'd hit the bed. But that's okay, since my chair has a broken wheel. Most of my posessions are in storage, and it's hard to not feel like my life is in storage as well. Of course, that's a foolish thing to feel: everyone knows I don't have much of a life to store. You could throw it in a shoebox and shove it under the bed ... as long as you weren't sleeping on an inflatable mattress, like I am. I'm not sure if I should hang things on my wall, and pretend this is a home, or instead continue to live out of boxes, as though this were a hotel room, just a long road-side rest-stop while I try to dig myself out of debt and pile up enough cash to finish the trip. Should I continue spending my days playing on the computer, or should shape myself into that writerly routine that I imagined? I can't decide if I should...

I was sucked into a cheesey sci-fi flick last night. It was called Frequency . As a result, I've been considering what I could tell myself, myself of five years ago, what I could warn, were I able to communicate through my cell phone, or maybe my livejournal... You know, something like, "Don't take Flight 567 to LA," or "Buy Stock in Prince," or "Don't Eat the Striped Cheese." But, honestly, I can't think of much... only, I could keep it simple and just transmit, "Nah, She Won't Love You Neither." That'd basically cover it. Hell. Maybe I'll write it now, and send it - to the future! Nah, She Won't Love you Neither.

I went to Staples, sulked, and spent over $200.00. I now have a 19" monitor. I must be compensating for something. Now, here comes that unique, earthly loneliness, the one that stumbles into Jersey at one in the morning. I think it's the bastard what made Bruce Springsteen so full of blood and fire and hope and self-loathing. Yet, knowing that it hangs here like smog over LA, somehow I always end up, here, late at night, alone, watching a movie - that makes me feel unloved. I'm like the guy in the horror movie that suggests splitting up. I'm the girl who takes her shirt off, because, hey, I'm all by myself, what could the danger be? So, once again, I watched another cry-for-myself movie. You know, old standards like The Matrix or First Contact . Except, shit, the embarrassing truth is, it was Love Actually , and shouldn't have been effective - but was. And shouldn't have been watched - but was. The title - isn't that a dead give away? Lau...

Yesterday was not fun. Today was. After cleaning my house in frenzied anticipation of spending my evening curled before my laptop, finally working on A Darkling Plane , avoiding my webpage obligations, I discovered the laptop covered in cola. One little dog, name of Bacon, had gotten himself up onto the coffee table, and overturned a cup of coke. Now the laptop was dead. I spent the remainder of the evening both fuming and waiting on hold with customer support. I accomplished nothing, particularly relief of stress. So, I'm pissed at Bacon all night. This morning, I woke up at around 9am, which is bizarre. I took Bacon outside, and it was the most beautiful day of the year, which was bizarre. He mopes, behaves, and does his business right away, which is bizarre. When we get back from the walk, and I go into the kitchen to make some coffee. He slinks into the corner of the couch and lays down. Five minutes later, I come back out into the living room, and he's...

Besides arriving half-an-hour late for work, entirely due to hiding beneath the covers for an extra half-an-hour this morning, little has of note has happened today. However, I used the lull in irritations to work through a pretty extensive revision of my short screenplay, Twenty Feet Less Dead . I feel unusually positive about the characters -- and unusually lost at resolving the story. The premise and plot that motivated the creation of the characters is entirely useless to them now that they're speaking on their own. Once again, I've sent it out in search of responses. This weekend I will be putting together another screenplay packet to Fed-ex to a producer in Los Angeles. I will be trying to build some momentum on A Darkling Plain , and tinkering with Misplaced Planet's website. Monday, with my cast, I will be viewing another draft of the short-film I directed and wrote, Anniversary Dinner .

When I began this job, a Quiznos Sub opened on 34th street. I was amongst the first customers, and got a little "Frequent Customer" stamp-card. Ten purchases of $5.00 or more, and I would earn a $5.00 discount. Now, many months later, ten Q's stamped, and the card twice chewed (by dog), I have handed over my card, and received my discount. I had a Misquite BBQ Chicken with Bacon on a Flat Bread Pita, with Salt-n-Vinegar chips and a large coke. My constant companion is gone. There is no new card to replace it. I feel a little choked up about it. My little, solitary source of pride has been traded for a measly five dollars.

The train was filled with little children -- two classes I beleive, all of them eleven or twelve years old. One girl was repeatedly asked by her teacher to take various seats as they became vacant. The peculiar girl would obediently sit, then jump up, and refuse to sit there again - because the seat was "hot." Either she was referring to the residual heat left by the former occupant's butt, or she be coo-coo. In the station, an old man looked like Grampa from The Muensters. He played on a keyboard, played a song like a Merry-Go-Round. In front of him, dozens of little toys - clowns, cowboys, robots, cars - danced and danced under battery power. Beside the toys, a round-bellied, round-faced Arab man, with a tiny mustache, danced as well. He held one hand open on his round belly, and the other hand above his head. He moved only his feet. He wore a beige, too-tight shirt, with a big horizontal stripe, clearly from the early 70s. They had my donut. And work b...