more nocturnal submissions

downtown at night

crafty care packages

my friend bethany moved a few hours north a couple years ago, and since then we haven’t traded birthday or xmas or any other presents...so we decided to remedy that with some boxes full o’ crafts. it all started with this li’l monkey:

i named her prunella, after a character in a really cool fairy tale. bethany’s been making these amigurumi creatures like crazy lately, and she offered to make me one, and then i was like “i should make you something too!” and then we both set off on this month-long quest to make as many fun presents for each other as we possibly could. we also decided to blog about it as soon as we got them.

she sent me so many thoughtful and awesome (and tasty!) things! the only thing that didn’t make it into the photos was a rock candy stick…that was devoured about two minutes after i opened the package.

toucha toucha toucha touch me!

last night i stayed up much later than i should have and ended up getting way dizzy and delirious. i made an impulse purchase of a new cell phone...a fancy touch-screen one. my beloved two-year-old lg clamshell is finally showing signs of crapping out, and since i love this phone so much i was going to buy a new one of the same exact model, but then i saw the lg vu...my mouth started watering. or maybe i briefly fell asleep and was drooling. either way it’s a damn cool phone and i ordered one on the spot. in a moment of clarity i thought i might regret the purchase upon waking today, but i don’t.

today was another lovely springy day. the high was 52. it’s katherine’s birthday so we went out thrifting—she found some good clothes and this gross pair of freaky rubber underwear that she’s going to try selling on ebay. i found a huge tin of dominoes, a little kid’s spiderman chair that i’m going to paint over and turn into a plant stand, a book of essays and photos called “women in wilderness,” and some clothes.

afterwards we went to lunch at the shangri-la and talked out our poetry frustrations. we ordered fairy flower tea, which is still the best tea in the universe, and also experimented with a new one...i think it was called fruit and root? something like that. not nearly as tasty. she had the mushroom miso soup:

i had teriyaki tofu (which was mysteriously gone before i could take a picture), and the blessed pita plate:

then we went to fred meyers in search of plants. their garden center isn’t quite open yet, but we both got some wee little potted plants that were 2 for $3. i planted mine in a fishbowl terrarium along with two different types of moss that i pilfered from neighbors yards.

downtown in the morning

this was a rare scene. i somehow became mostly conscious at around 6:30 this morning (after going to bed at 3), dressed myself up all fancy and conservative-like (!), and drove (quite dangerously) to the old ada county courthouse to sit in on a hearing to amend the idaho human rights act to include protection for GLBT individuals. it didn’t pass of course, and i heard only one democrat bothered to show up for the vote, but there was a huge showing of support from the community. i got there a few minutes before it started and there was already overflow into the hall, most of us never even got to peek inside the room. overall it was a disappointment, exactly what i expected.

i like the old ada county courthouse because of how hard it is for me to say, and how close i come to saying “ada cunty cowt-house,” or even better, “ada cowty cunt-house,” every time i attempt it. especially when i’m this drunk with tiredness.

after the hearing i wandered around and took pictures downtown. the weather was sooo gorgeous!

when i was riding to school yesterday i saw the first butterfly of the season! i have no idea what it intends to eat since nothing’s bloomed yet, but it looked fluttery and alive. i also ran into a very small, two-spotted ladybug friend who rode my pantsleg indoors. now it’s living on a basil plant in the kitchen.

rummy table!

for my birthday my aunt sent me a book called “the big ass book of crafts,” and one of the projects is to cover the top of a table with dominoes. i love the idea, and i wanted to carry it out exactly, but i couldn’t find enough dominoes at the thrift stores. all i found were little white ones (that are actually quite nice and i will eventually use for something else) and black wooden ones with colored dots. there weren’t nearly enough of either variety for a whole tabletop, or even a design within the tabletop.

however, i did find these amazing vintage rummy tiles. they’re quite old--from the packaging i would guess 1960s at the latest. and they were brand new! the package was slightly opened but you could tell the tiles had never been touched, they were all lined up in order and most of them were still under the original plastic wrapping that hadn’t been peeled back all the way. they came inside a mini-briefcase along with four wooden tile holders that i’ll eventually use for something else.

i wanted to do an entirely red and black color scheme on the table, so i left off all the blue and yellow rummy tiles. which means i have a wealth of tiles to use for jewelry making! it’s perfect because i was just starting to run low on (and get tired of the limiting size of) those little wooden scrabble-tile-ish things.

savers also had two green folding tv tables--i bought them both. this one i painted black, and the other one i’m thinking of doing in rainbow, if my service learning group ends up doing an art auction for the community center for our final service project, which i hope we’ll do. then i’ll cover the top in rainbow print fabric and/or rhinestones and sequins and other fun little bits. otherwise i’ll wait until i get some dominoes and cover the entire tabletop with them instead. i have plans for a tarot card table too…why have i never thought of table decorating before? it’s so much fun. next i'll do chairs!

lots of good finds at the thrift stores yesterday. i scored a nice wooden chess set for my parents, a very old star d camera tripod that seems to work, a few photography books, and these rubber stamps. i’ve never been interested in scrapbooking or card-crafting, but these stamps might change that…they’re so interesting and detailed. i’ve never seen anything like them at joann’s--it almost seems like they’re handmade, because the rubber part is attached to very obviously hand-cut blocks of wood, and there isn’t a brand on them anywhere.

this was an exciting find. it has googley eyes!

engrish! i’ll never wear this shirt, it’s so hideous, but i couldn’t resist.

rusty eyelids and oxidizing lips. teeth like green pennies.

it’s hard to believe this is my last semester at BSU. i know i’ll miss it someday, but right now i’m looking forward to being done. this summer i’m planning on staying up in mccall for a while, if i manage to remain unemployed that long.

which reminds me of something my american renaissance professor said. i’d never heard of the poem behind that saying, “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” on the first day of class he told us the story that takes place in the poem and then recited lines. he has so much poetry memorized. i’ve never had a professor who recites poetry like that…it’s wonderful, and it amazes me, and going to that class makes me feel awfully stupid but in an enjoyable way.

this professor basically approaches the class from the unspoken but evident point of view that everyone there is a scholar and hardcore intellectual, and his attitude effectively raises the level of class discussion right up to where he wants it. the questions from my classmates—average english majors, the same lot who go to poetry readings and ask visiting poets, “what’s your favorite color?” and, “is the title of this poem a reference to buffy the vampire slayer?” (seriously, this happened on friday)—they’re incredibly deep and thoughtful. i can hardly pretend to keep up, but it’s a fun ride.

my favorite class this semester is advanced nonfiction writing. we’re doing podcasts! NPR style, three essays: one commentary (just talking), one narrative (with music, like this american life) and one documentary (with music and interviews and all kinds of fun things). i’m so excited about it i even bought a serious microphone for my computer. a serious one.

gender studies is pretty cool, we’re reading a lot of good stuff. one of the main text books is bell hooks’ “feminism is for everybody: passionate politics” which i’ve been wanting to read…i started her book “feminist theory: from margin to center” a couple years ago, and even though it’s just a tiny thing i only made it about halfway through. it was fascinating, just incredibly dense. every time she rattles off some list of things, like her favorite “white-supremacist capitalist patriarchy,” it takes me a good few minutes to wrap my mind around everything she’s talking about. “feminism is for everybody” is still quite interesting but much more dumbed-down…which makes sense, given that it’s for everybody.

we’re also doing book clubs, and i signed up for middlesex…another book i only got halfway through but was enjoying immensely. i’ve never read anything like it. it’s not often that i’m extremely conscious of how much research must go into a novel, but for that one i couldn’t stop thinking about it. it must have been a hell of a lot.

there’s a service learning component to that class—i had a choice between planned parenthood, men today men tomorrow, BSU’s women’s center and the community center. i chose community center because i would love to get involved with their publication, “diversity.” they desperately need some better photography. hopefully after the service learning project is done i can continue volunteering for them.

the only class i’m feeling iffy about is advanced poetry. this class is ridiculous…there is so much drama, it’s out of control and bizarre. and the professor is one of the perpetrators! i count three people out of a total of nine who are not (as of yet) involved in some kind of awkwardness or fight or “high school drama creepy,” as katherine put it. and the class has only met three times! i don’t get it at all. i love poetry but i’m beginning to think the poetry faction within the english department is a bit scary. it’s so much friendlier in nonfiction writing!