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i tell my pen pal i can't imagine having sex with anyone other than my thai boyfriend, but the truth is i have just turned myself off. it's remarkable actually, how close to a non-existence i can make myself get. if i acknowledged the tiniest twinge of conscious sexual desire i think it would set off some sort of explosion and i would go mad... so i keep everything quietly bottlenecked in... my dreams are sympathetic though, and are filled with xxx..........well, i censored this part to prevent potential embarassment. :) ...yeep! i am 28, too old for this isolated longing. seemingly it wouldn't be that hard for a relatively pretty girl to find someone she wants to sleep with but colorado might as well be full of eunuchs as far as i am concerned...i am not attracted to guys in shorts, baseball hats and tevas... if only there were brothels for girls! filled with 15 year old skater boys, shy muscle-y dark haired men (with blue eyes and accents), metrosexual artists with floppy hair....

'x' introduced me to myspace.com, a "networking" site on which his roommate picks up people. there are lots of interesting people on it, just unfortunately not in colorado.

living to live again. living only for the day i see that six figure amount in my bank account. perhaps i go too far to extremes in trying to make my life what i want it to be. sometimes i forget that my life is now, not some theoretical day in the future when i have saved a big enough pile of cash to start living again. in trying to be practical i forget to allow for reality in my plans. i need to find a balance- enjoy my life where i am while i save to meet my goals... easier said than done, especially in sleepy colorado where it seems futile to even open my eyes in the morning.

bleary eyed and furious with my chirpy alarm, i stamped out of my bedroom in a braless tank top and low slung workout pants this morning, slamming the door. realized instantly that i had just locked myself out of my room with mussed hair and morning breath, no shoes, and no chance of getting help from the main hostel until they opened at 8. three or four people from the house came out and refused to let me borrow a phone, shoes, or a jacket to get to the main hostel house to beg for a key. one man laughed outright and said "too bad" as he sauntered past with cellphone and jacket in hand. tearing my hair out i sat with a butter knife trying to break in, and finally slumped to the floor and pouted to myself. finally my new friend cliff staggered sleepily out of his room. he was in flimsy boxers, with his fat, hairy belly hanging over the wasteband, and he was wearing coke bottle glasses which i had never seen on him and which magnified his eyes to an especially unattractive degree. he obviously hadn't expected to run into anyone that early in the morning, but despite his embarassment at his appearance, he immediately ran downstairs, got a huge knife, and spent ten minutes breaking into my room for me. people at the hostel always make fun of cliff, but it's always the people you least expect who show sudden kindness... i made it to an important meeting just in time and am very grateful to him.

march forth. i tell myself.

boring work day with lots of miscellaneous office politics to contend with. wired up, knowing i would leave tonight on a plane to NY to see 'x' and taka.

ecstatic on the airport bus, like a kid on the way to disneyland. i met a cute williamsburg hipster boy (very out of place in denver) at the airport. we had both fallen asleep on the same bench, and ended up sleeping half on top of each other. we smiled shyly across the aisles through our entire plane trip. two cocky, well dressed city boys turned their iPods up to full blast behind me and hassled the stewardesses constantly for more whiskey, and on top of that jetblue's seats are unbelievably cramped, but nothing could deter me from my good mood. i love new york! just like the t-shirt. funnily enough, i love the subways most of all. on the A train from JFK to meet 'x' in the upper east side i finally relaxed for the first time since i hit american turf and felt like i was home.

ny seduces me with it's casual magic. i met a suprisingly cleaned up 'x' at his intimidating art deco office on the upper east side. i was a little awed by his sleek appearance (including new blond streaks in his hair... this "metrosexual" craze is a good thing indeed!) and we quickly shoveled down our breakfast in awkward silence. he gave me his apartment key and i headed down to the east village, breathing in the lovely industrial air and taking in the grimy sights. he lives in a great, artsy neighborhood, though his place is an exhausting six floor walkup. i nodded politely to the shadow of his roommate and went to pass out on 'x''s lovely bed.

'x' came home a couple of hours later and poked me out of my doze. he dragged me out to meet his roommate, leonardo. he is a huge pot head, and never leaves the house. but he's italian and has interesting stories on italy, picks up different chicks every day online, talks to his cat, and makes great italian food. he smoked me up for the first time in a long while and we made silly conversation.

shopping on broadway is always an adventure, and left me wide-eyed with awe since it has been so long since i have been in an actual city. there are beautiful people every three feet in new york- i fell in love at least eight times an hour. there is a lot of unnecessary cuteness and kitsch, excess and style... i felt curiously insecure- like a country bumpkin in my old shoes and ill fitting clothes. 'x' laughed at me and shopped unabashedly, scolding me as i hung nervously a few steps behind him. i ended up going home with nothing, an incredible feat in this capitalistic capitol.

taka called me later in the evening to meet up and i invited 'x' to come with me, to his later glee. taka was accompanied by a gorgeous, quirky little model girl who happened to be 'x''s exact type (asian). taka himself disappointed me. believe it or not, i think it was his hair i was crazy about, and now that he's cut it off i simply don't feel a thing for him anymore. pretty shallow. then again his english has not improved one bit and i found myself constantly frustrated by the difficulties communicating. 'x' and i dragged taka and rila from bar to bar in the east village, in a frenzy to show them everything at once. somehow rila dropped off along the way and 'x' dragged taka and i to a super exclusive hipster club called 'apt'. thinking we wouldn't get in, we were making alternate plans at the door when the gruff bouncer waved us right in. the venue was great but the crowd did not impress me. 'x' brought us huge $10 beers and i eyed two middle aged women who kept flipping their hair and leaning not so surreptitiously over taka, trying to get his attention. the dj just plain sucked.

the night ended with taka and i alone at the yaffa cafe on st. mark's place, where i fed him delicious pasta under the sparkly lights and kitschy decor and he gushed how much he liked NY. i kissed him on the neck as i caught my cab home in the rain, but i had pretty much determined that whatever interest i might have had in taka has morphed into simple friendship and went home to cuddle with 'x'.

'x' and i lazed in under our three thick blankets and assorted pillows with the window open over the foggy rooftops and the drizzling day. i made him watch one of my favorite dvds and he managed admirably to stay awake through the whole thing. later we wandered around the city a bit, ending up in the new orleans style restaurant we used to frequent, eating fried oysters and drinking abita amber.

later on we went on a wild goose chase to find taka, finally meeting up with him and group of japanese kids including the luscious and very drunk rila, whose mag shot was passed surreptitiously around, for a great night at the international bar on avenue A. it was dimly lit and served only bad beer, but i liked the crowd and the atmosphere, and by the end of the night the pigtailed bartender was giving me free drinks. 'x' did his best to land rila (lesbian-magnet that he is) who mourned all night her recently deceased girl friend. i in turn focused on a gorgeous young crispin glover lookalike who was purportedly a rock star, who seemed equally infatuated with me. i regret to report that i pretty much ignored taka. i felt dizzy with glamour and recognition and fun. the excitement wound down and everyone wandered their separate ways with phone numbers in hand at around 5am. i grabbed some late night pizza at ray's and went to sleep sweetly next to furry 'x'.

'x' and i got up early and went to deal with our stuff in storage in williamsburg- a goal we have had for a while. our young taxi driver chatted nonstop on his phone as he drove us through the old 'hood, which has gotten even cooler. by some eery stroke of luck it happened to be the one day a year that the hasidic kids celebrate something like halloween, where they dress up in costumes. there is also even more grafitti art in inconspicuous places, if that is possible. the nice storage manager let us in munching on a sandwich to see a smaller space, and we spent all afternoon huffing and puffing between exclamations of joy at things we uncovered (damn we were rich at one point!) ...luckily neither of us had any inhibition towards throwing away things we really didn't need, and now all of our remaining stuff is packed nicely and neatly into a 3x5 foot space for $50/mo.

we went home for a nap (after six flights to the top of 'x''s castle and trying to catch our breath in his smoke filled house). met taka later on at a red lit bar that was embarassingly empty besides us. made cringing, awkward conversation- 'x' couldn't take it and left. more awkward conversation and i said a fond but relieved goodbye to taka in the rain, once again, knowing it won't be the last time i see him either way.

dreary, foggy day which makes NY feel even more alive than ever, though i myself felt rather hermit-like. slept til 1p and then cleaned 'x''s room. smoked some pot, took a trip to the 'life cafe' near tomkins square park in the east village for a delicious breakfast over the village voice, with old depeche mode in the background. wandered around seeing what was to be seen. met 'x' in times square for a sad lunch... just another leaving, but not any less hard. multi goodbyes to pals via SMS, subway to airtrain to airport to denver to bus to boulder and the brown brown brown vacuum of anti-life.

absolute hell day at work. the worst possible day i could have had coming back. decided to move somewhere where i have some quality of life asap. miss 'x'. miss attention from good friends. miss inspiration. miss life.

with my lips pulled back from my teeth in a crazed, desperate snarl i gouged away at the job boards today for a nice escape package to NY. found a few, too, to my gluttonous pleasure. the girl from an online music company called to say i have the perfect portfolio for her but that i would have to work full time rather than contract. not giving a flucking fuck as long as the address doesn't end in 'CO.', i implored stickily as to the salary. $90k a year- once i would have jumped to mars at a chance like that, now it is a significant drop in income for me and i can't decide if i would be crazy to give up quick cash for not so quick cash and a decent quality of life. no use counting my chickens though... we'll see where fate leads me this time.

i read 'x''s update from the past weekend in NY and am sad to see that the entire time i was happily sleeping next to him he was obsessed with ms. tokyo pop queen. i feel rather greasy and even more, sad.

told myself today i would try to put a positive spin on things instead of my normal morose disdain. i looked out the bus window on the way to work to see rows of sports bars and country western shindigs behind black glass. acres upon acres of flat burnt fields and pockets of plastic suburbs filled with drones in leisure shorts with pockets meandering with bored looking dogs tripping on their extra bored fat rolls on the sidewalks. they must be happy, somehow though. i tried to imagine what could possibly make the average local hick happy- ricki lake? hostess cupcakes? gossip about the dark shifty girl in room number 13 at the hostel? hmmph. if only i were so easy to please. as 'x' says it is easy to be easy. but easy is easier said than done if you have more than half a brain.

thinking back on my life on ko chang. it sometimes blows my mind that that life still exists for someone, at the same time i am here. it makes me crazy to think i have to remain here and not there. i miss the sweet boredom, the sensual weather, the singing nature.

after a particularly frustrating day of work i gratefully made the trip down to andrew's bar to meet a girl who reads my site and wanted to get a drink. feeling a bit like i was headed to a job interview i plopped down on the bar stool and flirted with the simple, happy go lucky bartender and smoked cigarettes to pass the time. finally jane arrived. she was spooky. she had way to much in common with me. she went to the next high school over from me, used to hang out at ground zero (my favorite club in the olden days), worked at qwest, lived in thailand for two years, and moved back to colorado. she was in the punk crowd and is fond of tattoos. i don't usually like girls at all and it is rare that i have more than a sentence or two to say to them, but we had so much to talk about that we kept tripping over each others' sentences. by the time we left i realized i'd been drinking for about 6 hours straight, with no regard for time and place. it was weirdly nice, and i am glad to have met her. somehow i made it home without vomiting all over the cute boy in front of me on the bus. slurred good night to 'x' on my phone and passed out.

i greatly dislike being hung over.

i had a premonition that i would win the lottery if i bought a ticket today, so i ventured out and bought 3. otherwise the allure of my tv and my comfy room was irresistable, even up against the sunny spring weather outside... i figured there will be plenty more of that to come and plopped down to watch three biographies in a row- of adolf hitler, osama bin laden, and saddam hussein. at least i am educating myself in my laziness.

at this point in time i have nothing much to say, and a revamp of my site is in order. my journal can't possibly continue in it's current form... i am terribly bored of it. i am thinking of lowering myself to an actual "blog", which i update whenever i feel like it on no regular schedule. we'll see how much motivation i even find to do that... something coming soon.

horribly depressed about being in denver and missing my 'x'-friend like a limb (despite our hour-long phone calls every day), i was not in the right mindset to meet up with denver friends... but my old pal adrian came to town from new mexico (where coincidentally, he recently met my sister!) and i couldn't say no to seeing him. we went to governor's park, which has one of the best happy hours in denver. more and more people kept adding themselves to the group, and it became a bit overwhelming to me to be around so many old friends. dimitri's girlfriend showed up to add a bit of discomfort to the scene, and as no one seemed in the mood to drink with me i had to satisfy myself with nervous tipsiness and some awkward conversation. i love my friends, but i suppose i have never done well in groups. later i walked halfway across denver to find the bus home alone while they all went to see denver joe play old funky country songs and heckle the crowd at cricket on the hill.

a few readers emailed me today to say please don't stop my writing and that i just need to change my attitude. first of all, i am not quite as negative as i come off here... i am actually quite happy, but i suppose this site is an outlet for frustration as much as anything else. second of all, i realize i do need to try and have a positive attitude about americans and about being back here in the states, and i am sure i sound like a spoilt brat at times, but i have to say that i think it is fairly normal to come back from a trip like i had the last year and a half and feel a bit bitter about having to! some other points: i really love to write but i am frustrated more than anything else with the lack of inspiration for writing here. i think that is because i know colorado well- i spent years here. it has nothing much new to show me. and i have a (sometimes unfortunate) addiction to novelty. i don't have a car which limits things in this land of canyons and scenery, my friends are all weird and conservative now, when i venture out otherwise i am surrounded by the frat/sorority kids which makes me feel like it is futile to even leave my bed, or worse- workmates!, it's been winter......also, i haven't been paid yet so i feel like i am trapped in a stuffy box...!!!!

but i have loved colorado in the past and i can probably find a bit of that again. spring and a paycheck will help.

i am still considering running away to NY too. 'x' and i have landed a huge freelance project and i worked hard on some comps for them today, hoping it will lead to more work in the big apple.

i usually do my own hair because i don't trust anyone else, but out of boredom i made an appointment at a trendy salon today to get some highlights, for a change. the lady who did it for me was obviously not interested in making conversation with yet another customer today, and seemed grumpy that i was keeping her late. she made me nervous. she ended up striping my hair with 4 different colors- red, brown, purple, and blond. it looks rather...weird. not sure how the qwest team is going to take it. still, it's new, and that's all i care at this point. i tipped her well and skipped out into the warm st. paddy's night. the streets were teeming with drunk irish wannabes. some of them quite attractive. i attempted to follow a cute gothic asian boy and his two mod girls into a club but lost them around a corner. i shrugged and trudged back to market street station on the way to have a little party alone in my big green bed.

called otto tonight, in thailand, whom i suddenly missed horribly. he professed his insanity as well, saying he can't eat, drink, or sleep without thinking of me. i take everything he says with a grain of salt, as usual.

after work today polly (the little chinese gal i work with), walked with me to a transvestite-run coffee shop i was to meet dimitri at, looking sideways at me like i was a freak. i left her and dimitri showed up looking nervous right as i arrived in the neighborhood. we both realized the coffeeshop was closed. so he took me on the tour of capitol hill (not too impressive) as we walked around in the sun seeking another place to hang. we finally settled for gabor's, a dark club with a twenties theme and a great jukebox on the hill. dimitri seemed rather paranoid, looking towards the door every five minutes and smoking nervously. finally he told me his girlfriend was on the way. that made me a bit nervous too, and curiously guilty. we downed a few beers rather quickly and talked awkwardly, tripping over ourselves. i revealed a little too much as usual- having little regard for boundaries. kristen showed up and gave me the cold shoulder and i sighed and slouched over my beer as they turned away from me to chat with each other. dimitri flinched whenever she touched him, most likely feeling uncomfortable with me there. finally, they agreed to drive me to boulder, where they were headed to see a friend, and i jumped into the back seat of kristen's car, grateful for the music playing to cover forced conversation. i watched them from the backseat being very affectionate and domesticated with each other, though i noticed that kristen has control in the relationship, and i felt a mixture of jealousy and disgust. we arrived in boulder and they dropped me off at my house with an obvious measure of relief that i felt equally. argh. it is really hard to have male friends in your late 20s.

after an unusually long day made up of a couple of horrible phone interviews with companies in NY (one was rushed since i didn't have much time and one was with a snappy CEO who obviously knew nothing about the design process), i was happy to go out into the 80 degree first day of spring at long last. though when i got home i was supposed to have one more interview and was disgusted to see that AT&T wireless was having problems and no one could call me, so i missed it (#!%&*@). i went to illegal pete's to shove a football sized burrito down my throat to cover the frustration.

later on a guy named michael called me- we had met online. i agreed to meet him at penny lane (hippie coffee shop) and gave 'x' a quick call to tell him to check on me in an hour. that was thankfully unneccesary. michael was a great guy. he has baby smooth skin and a cute smile, and bright blue eyes. after a fiasco in which i remembered i had left my i.d. at home and had to drag him across town to go get it, we ended up in a booth at the southern sun brewery, talking nonstop. we have absolutely nothing in common, and i felt like he is probably one of those guys who (like 'x''s roommate) is a serial picker-upper of girls online, but he was a gentleman and fun to talk to. we drank a couple of beers and i realized i had missed the last bus home. so he walked me to his house and snuck in (trying not to wake up a suspicious "ex" girlfriend roommate) to get the keys to his explorer to drive me home. he surprised me with a joint and we sat in the car outside of my house smoking up, listening to music, and being silly- like i used to do in college. when the car had become too smoky and i had to pee i jumped out, gave him a quick, silly handshake, and ran to my room with a grin.

got home to find about 8 angry messages from 'x', trying to save me.

weekends are sacred to me so i was secretly glad i didn't have any commitments today. i ran all my errands in the morning in the sunny sun and went back to bed to sleep til about 3. told chris there was no way in hell i would make the too-similar-to-the-trip-to-work trip to denver to go to his going away party for adrian, and instead put on my jammies and watched old movies and finished my book. it was a gorgeous night, with a full moon, and i hung out my window staring at the stars over the foothills for a bit before climbing back to bed for the night.

oh yeah, i watched a horrid show on people who do plastic surgery to look like famous people. it's scary on mtv. but the funny thing about it is that they never end up looking like them.

argh. people really take everything i say on here too literally. so i mentioned last update that i was sexually frustrated and could use a fling and was of course inundated this week by eager takers. the thing is though, it doesn't work like that with me (i am a girl, after all). i either have to have a mad physical attraction to a guy or some shred of emotional investment... otherwise, casual meaningless sex with someone random is (by experience) a boring waste of time. & american guys are particularly bad at sex anyway. so, for clarification, in reality i am not interested in a fling unless i meet some gorgeous guy spontaneously- which is not likely. you can not plan a hot fling like some people seem to expect, argh!... me, i really plan to wait until i get back to a country full of gorgeous men and in the meantime, like i mentioned, i can turn myself off.

that said, i am meeting up tonight with a guy who has been writing me for a month now. we'll see what happens.

at 'x''s suggestion i went to see 'the passion of christ' today. i am obviously pretty anti-religious and didn't think it would be my thing but in fact i loved it. it is really an extraordinary movie. it has a lot of flaws- satan was more silly than evil, jesus just seemed like a poor man being tortured, not a powerful figure, and the violence was almost gratuitous. but it was definitely worth seeing... my hands were clenched the whole time and i left with a huge headache. it's more gory than any horror movie i have ever seen. with a portrayal like that though i can almost see how more easily influenced people can "find religion". i recommend seeing it...

thinking later about this movie i feel like it was a great way to sell flicks. a visual representation of christ across the board... which they never had in his time and people ate up anyway....yes laudable marketing. i think it will be amazing how many people fall for it.

feeling reckless. kid's poetry, by my friend michael in my inbox today. gorgeous them kids... see things like we should... but they are far too stupid in most cases and they inevitably lose it....(the view of it, back in our heads, before we worried about everything) (on and on end on into eternity... )(which is of course mad....) the quiet, strange novelty of the universe.............

note to self: you haven't lost it. so stop.

?something in the air. don't ask me. could be my humidifier (8$ at tar-zhay).

felt sick, maybe mental. xxx avoiding me. not sure why. energy in this place getting out of control. good and bad in excess. watched lots of tv. the boyz n the hood all got killed. ate my toes.

ditched weird chris after 10 mins... after work which speaks for itself. read about parasites. had bad dreams.

80 degrees. otto on the phone, in my email, in my freaking r.e.m. phase. fake. sick of fake people. i want someone .real. sometimes i feel like i am the only one who can feel. i feel something coming.

memorable quotes from xxx:

"we both have seperate lives - and I think we deal alot with each other by using each other as a bitch/sounding board, and someone to talk to in this lonely planet. So should we really even continue that?

I mean - it seems like no-one is real and we could just as easily send a text message to each other each day that says 'E-1A' that corrosponds with a chart that shows a mental state:

'O, xxx is E-1A today - that means he's 'slightly uncomfortable in his skin, want's to travel, not getting laid, bored with cable, and slighly peeved about his (hair, roomate, weight, job)..'

I also feel that we somehow insulate each other - our 5 conversations each day help keep up in some sort of weird slumber. If I'm going to exist in a miserable world, I'd rather do it without any padding so I can at least be fully miserable in it. you know?"

 

....can't even spell. hmmph.

mmm. hhhmmmmm. somehow it's still a good day!


(((nah don't worry. change my phone number and block the email. everything will be fine. meanwhile, drink a lot with jane!- at andrew's bar with butch the tender- who says hi to sugar bear.)))

...well, they were playing the cure at my gym today, where i pretended every racquetball was xxx's face....not exactly workout music. ...(surprisingly though then i felt better).

the killer likes to imitate the victim....says my new radio, with jazz wailing in the static eaves. i decided to paint, and spent $xx. instantly forgot i don't know quite, how to paint. but there it is, on my canvas, waiting to be born. a black deer running from his leering yellow traffic death.... boulder. in the headlights.

i drank and played scrabble and ate half a volcano of nachos at the brewery, with michael the kid. i am good at scrabble if i have the right letters.

it's cold outside this wailing room. my bed has a new foam mattress so i can sleep. (before i was the princess and the pea).... and i have said brand spanking new, might-as-well-be-wind-up, crap radio, playing me art. my very necessary humidifier is blowing waves of sexy steam over the picture of tokyo taka hanging low in the window- under the hair....

the snow is gone, the sky is clear, bright electric blue with bats, belfry, blackbirds, and Bobs. to ground things. in khakis. i scream to myself under the yellow paint ceiling...roll my eyes and fall asleep.

felt like vomiting all day. slept last night with the spanish channel on in the background, hoping to refresh in my sleep. as if it were instant karma i ran into a gorgeous spanish guy on the bus. i said "que tal", he waved hello ecstatically to his dumpy girlfriend who climbed aboard five minutes later and gave me evil stares. learned that when i finally get paid after waiting 9 weeks (on april 16) i don't get a big happy check for the past 9 weeks... instead it's that every check from then on will be 60 days off. argh. my frustration meter is blowing steam. still can't do anything i have been waiting breathlessly for- send ot some money, get into a real place, pay off my taxes, go on a short trip... ate raviolis with fake meat sauce, drank half a bottle of wine, and went to bed blubbering to myself.

if i turn on my tv one more time to some stupid reality shows i am going to start having those mass murder urges i hear so much about in america. this country is disgustingly subservient to the will of the media. to make things worse, bart simpson found 'God' today... i couldn't finish the episode which was a first for me. why do i have a tv again? i sort of enjoyed the last few years without one.

i went to see an apartment in denver after work. it was a five minute walk from my office, which was nice. a perfect bachelorette pad which was nice- with an outdoor pool and courtyard right outside my window, big outdoor fireplaces and torches for romantic strolls through the garden and glasses of wine...a gym... the (big, muscley) guy was desperate for me to take it off his hands, but now that it comes down to it i am reluctant to leave lush nature-filled boulder in the spring for yuppieville denver. to be seen...

spring has sprung... i went in to work this morning to find exactly eleven emails in my inbox from guys saying i was "beautiful", "gorgeous" "stunning", and nice things along those lines. i had to check my calendar to make sure it wasn't april fools day yet! the only thing i can figure is they are all soldiers in iraq or something.

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