Oed's Xanga

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Tue, 13 Sep 2005 16:10:57 GMT

Hissy Cat Wants You!

Go to www.blog.hissycat.com, the new home of Oed/ Joanna/ Hissycat on the web! Go there now! Everything that's here is over there plus a lot more. What are you doing on this dinky Xanga when you could be reading the same content in addition to gads of new content in a much prettier format over at Hissycat right now? Go! Now!

http://www.blog.hissycat.com

Monday, September 12, 2005

Mon, 12 Sep 2005 16:15:05 GMT

Hissycat is up and kind of running. Go there now!

I'll be adding gads more content later today. Just you wait, boy. Oh, just you wait.

Friday, September 09, 2005

Fri, 09 Sep 2005 20:02:30 GMT

When Designs Attack

Exciting news: smartypants Tamara (Death Before Onions) will be transferring her blog to hissycat.com. How fantastic. I'm flattered.

I don't sleep anymore. I cry and I code (no connection). CSS is the best/ worst thing to happen to me. I'm obsessed. I'm still tentative about messing with any of the non-CSS MT template files. I tried to "plug in" a couple of extremely modest, teeny-weeny little scripts, but when I loaded the page the scripts not only failed to execute anything but also made my formatting go ape-shit. I'm thinking I must have plugged them into the wrong jack, or outlet, or whatever the fuck I'm supposed to call the place where they plug into. I want to get my page icon to display in the url bar, but I can't. And other difficulties, middling to moderate in size. The hissycat blog, at the very least, should launch by the end of this weekend. Additional pages will follow. Now that I have a working schema of the site, I can do fun, design-related tasks. Like playing with pictures of bunnies and ducks. Like making pretty patterns. Like offending and horrifying Alex with my opposite-of-minimalist "design"-- chock full of lacy crap and cobbled together clutter. Everything I touch looks like the frumpy, faded tschatzke of a packrat-spinster-librarian who lives alone, feeding off of books, public radio, and obscure scholarly/ literary journals, and talking to the three-legged cat she named after a character in Ulysses. I'm trying to excercise restraint, though. I don't want to be precious and, like a good bookworm spinster nerd, my first priority is readability.

The elevator in Alex's apartment building was done in a wallpaper that, frankly, is horrifying. Even to me, and I'm, like, the least effeminate gay man† I know. The pattern is so obnoxious and bizarre and aggresive. Alex has perfected a backwards walk into the elevator with his eyes half-closed and cast down so as to avoid the blight on his vision. It gives you motion sickness just to look at it. I started to feel like the heroine of the Charlotte Perkins Gilman story. Before long, I felt compelled to enact the final scene of The Yellow Wallpaper.

It sticks horribly and the pattern just enjoys it! All those strangled heads and bulbous eyes and waddling fungus growths just shriek with derision!
. . .there are so many of those creeping women, and they creep so fast. I wonder if they all come out of that wall-paper as I did?

†"gay man" = adjective.

Oh. And this:

Friday, September 09, 2005

Fri, 09 Sep 2005 15:35:56 GMT

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

Wed, 07 Sep 2005 19:58:41 GMT

I behaved somewhat badly at orientation yesterday. I arrived late and caused a commotion knocking things over on my way to find a seat at the far end of one of the two long, long conference tables. My bag was exploding stuff, and it took me a while to collect myself and get settled. I asked questions about health insurance that caused the HR-bot to backtrack and repeat herself because she misunderstood what I was asking, and then an obnoxiously slick-looking, pastel-button-down wearing youngish man who, if I overheard correctly, is an English Ph.D. with a teaching post (figures) had to translate my question for me and ask it again. I kept getting up to go pee and causing a rumpus and I stole handfuls of post-it pads that were set out in little baskets on the conference table so we could mark up our packets and brochures as we followed along. Because I did not feel the need to pay attention to the slide shows about all the wonderful perqs Stanford has to offer and because the lectures on HRAs, retirement plans, and long-term investing was both painfully boring and utterly beyond my powers of comprehension, I unfocused my ears, pulled out my laptop, and turned my attention to the html and css I was writing. Essentially, I was behaving at any unbearably boring Stanford lecture.

Aside from a few conspiratorial smiles I got from a fat, sassy older woman in a colorful blouse across from me who I assume was some wise-cracking humanities appointee fresh from an east coast institution, recognising me as one of her own kind and sending me her tacit approval, everyone else clearly dissapproved of me. A young Asian woman, irritatingly tidy (she was eating her scone with knife and fork) and preppiliy dressed, was sitting across from me, right next to Prof. Sass and kept shooting me looks that were if not nasty then at least mildly disgusted. On the rare occaision I lifted my eyes from the laptop screen, I would catch her sort of tsk-tsking me with her eyes. Then she'd quickly glance away. They all thought I was a young, dumb, ill-mannered brat. As well they should have. My dress, which I had grabbed that morning without thinking, was inappropriately low-cut. I didn't notice how ho-baggy I looked until mid-morning when I spilled half a thimble of half-&-half on my lap. I looked down to survey the damage and saw my cleavage looking back up at me, smiling. No, not smiling. It was smirking. Smirking menacingly.

Neither surprising nor entertaining, my boredom and impoliteness at an HR function. But you will need to know all this for later on.

Because my insurance is not all set up, I was told by the hospital yesterday that the quickest way to get seen was not by scheduling an appointment but by calling this morning and requesting a same-day visit. I did. This morning, I called and was given a 10:20 appointment with a general practitioner. Brett drove us because we'd both slept in a little late and because I'm picking him up later today anyway; I snoozed in the car. Brett grabbed me some Google feed and I drove back up to P.A.. It was 10:07 by the time I was on Campus Drive, but the street I was looking for was not where I remembered it to be. I was driving at a crawl, reading street signs, looking, feeling abused and shaky. I turned into a dead-end road to pull a U when I noticed the red and blue lights flashing behind me.

"Do you know why I pulled you over?"

"No."

"You ran a stop sign."

He asked for my licence, registration and proof of insurance. License? No problem Registration? There was shuffling involved, the glove compartment unleasing its contents into the rest of the mess and filth on the floor, but eventually I found a square of carstock whose numbers and words were printed in an old sans-serif typwriter font and which looked out-dated and inefficient enough to be properly beaurocratic and offical (think: Weight Watchers, pre-computerized booklets, when we had actual paper, alphebetized files to carry up to the scales with us so the staff could write a number in); I asked if it was my registration and it was. Insurance? Sorry. No go. I lose.   He was not impressed when I offered to show him the electronic copy on my laptop.

I got a moving violation for the stop light and for the insurance, an appointment in Palo Alto traffic court where I have to prove that I do have insurance by producing "just a print-out of that thing."

I was sniffing back tears as he explained to me what I could do to clear my record (traffic school) and how it wasn't such a big deal.
He was extremely nice, actually. I wasn't upset over the tickets, I was just feeling late and ill-treated by the universe and he seemed so competent and kind as he gave me directions to the clinic I was looking for that I lost my hold of myself just a little.

I pull into the parking structure about twenty minutes after I was scheduled to show up at the office and immedeatly proceed to drive my car into a parked tow-truck. Hard. But I finished pulling into the spot and didn't pause to check the damage on my own car as I hurried away. In the wrong direction.

I don't know how late I was when I got there. In the exam room, the nurse took my vitals. I knew I'd been off the wagon a lot latelly. I avoided going last week because I didn't want to weigh-in, and I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't 142lbs. I mean, that can't be accurate. I was 136 a week and a half ago. I want to be 130, which is what I was this time last year. But I keep failing, failing, failing.

The medical assistant looks over my chart and asks questions. She asks, "so the reason you are here [pause] is [pause as she adjusts her face] a blump?"

A blump? I stare blankly at her for at least fifteen seconds as I try to understand what she is saying. A blump? What? Could that be the medical term for--

She interrupts my thought: "A lump. A lump in your breast."

"Oh, yes," I say. "Right."

"Your right breast?"

"No. Left one."

She leaves. The doctor comes in and she's young, which already I don't like. She's young and she's preppy and she's Asian. She looks somewhat familiar, but then there are a lot of doctors and residents at Stanford that are young, preppy and Asian. I don't think much of it. She's looking at my chart, asking me more questions. All of a sudden she interrupts herself; "Wait, you were at the orientation yesterday, weren't you? Yes, I was sitting directly across from you."

Of course. My dissapprover.

My confidence in this doctor is dealt another blow. Strike two.

I rattle off my list of medications: Zoloft, 150mg; Wellbutrin 100mg twice a day; Ritalin, 20mg three times a day (though it is actually ususually four); and birth control. "And who writes these prescriptions?" she asks, and it seems like she is asking, "and what is that person doing with a medical licensce?" too.

"Dr. Harriet R---" say I.

"And who is Dr. R--?" she asks.

"Um, a doctor. A psychaitrist." She looks at me like I've just told her I take pills given to me by my imaginary friend. "I've been seeing her for, like, four and a half years."

"Oh, that's good. That's greaaate." Her voice is purposefully soft and ingratiating and she speaks slowly while nodding her head with what I suppose is meant to be understood as compassion. She is incredibly condescending. Strike three, but it's not over.

I had written A.D.D. as one my medical problems on my history sheet. I see her looking over at it and then she asks, "So, the Ritalin you take, is that to help with conentration" --I am about to answer yes, when she continues-- "or do you actually have A.D.D.?"

What the fuck is that? "Um, both?" I stutter, dumbfounded. It can't be possible that she doesn't know what A.D.D. stands for, it just can't. Is she implying something, the preppy bitch? I so do not understand what she is asking.

"And what kind of birth control do you use?"

"Ortho Tri-Cyclin,"

"How long have you been taking it?"

"About four or five years. Well, for a very brief time I was on Ortho TriCyclinLo, but that was disastrous, it totally did not work. "

"In what way was it disastrous?" she asks.

"Oh, in the way that I, you know, got pregnant."

"Maybe it was too Lo!" she says. Then she giggles. ha ha.

"And do you smoke?" she asks, even though she knows I do, the goddamn sheet I filled out is right in front of her.

"Yes," I say. I know exactly where this is going.

"How much?"

"I don't know exactly. Maybe seven or eight cigarettes a day."

"Who writes your prescriptions for the pill?"

I tell her I don't know her name, but it's the nurse-practitioner at Vaden whose latexed digits have paid call to nearly every student vagina.

"Vay -der," she sounds out very slowly. "What's Vader? What's that?"

I have to explain it's Vaden, and it's the student health clinic.   She asks about my visits with nurse at Vader (meaning, she asks how they could possibly continue to write prescriptions for the pill), until I realize she must think I go there and get a new prescription every month. Which is retarded. I explain to her that birth control prescriptions (in my experience) are prescribed by the dozen, so I only have to see the nurse once a year and then every month I just have to pick up a pack from the pharmacy.

She tells me that smoking in combination with the pill is risky, that smoking while on the pill puts me at risk for blod clots. I know she has to say these things, but I thought she was a little over the top. She kept saying how she would never have prescribed contraceptives for me and how she never allows patients who smoke to take the pill. And how, if I were her regular patient (by now, of course, I'm thanking my stars that I'm not), she would take me off the pill. She asks me if I've tried to quit and said yes, I had, but hey, I'm smoking again.   She frowns disapprovingly. "For now, I won't change this, but next time you're here, we'll have to discuss this. I don't let my patients smoke and take any contraception at all. It puts you at such a high risk for clots."

I realized later, that it wasn't the Vaden nurse who had prescribed this round of B.C., it was the gynocologist I saw last winter, when I got pregnant, who I trust infinately more that this woman. I understand smoking while on the pill increases the risk of blood clots, I really do, and I know that blood clots are nasty and bad. But the idea that she would have me on no hormonal contraceptive is idiotic. Beyond idiotic. I am twenty-two. I have lots of sex. And, AND, I GOT PREGNANT WHILE ON THE PILL (with PERFECT USE). Duh. I just told her that I got pregnant when they dropped me down to a lower dose of hormone. Taking me off completely? Bad idea! Big, fat, shiny, in-flashy-letters BAD IDEA. Bad, bad, don't-even-think it idea. Reducing hormonal birth control = horrible idea, already tested and proved to be horrible.

The thing is that the doctor I saw today, Dr. Dumb, is just so young. I know what she was suggesting is probably, techincally what she is supposed to say. She was probably taught not to encourage women to smoke on the pill and she's just following what she learned in class and in her textbook. But the thing is, that telling me to stop taking the pill because I smoke is inane. Of course my risk factor is higher than it would if I didn't smoke, but my risk factor of getting pregnant if I'm not on the pill is so great, it's not even a risk. It's a flat-out guarantee. The gyno I saw was an older woman, very business-like and matter-of-fact. Her brusqueness was very reassuring, like she'd seen it all before, like she was just too solid and competent to bother to slow her speech or otherwise condescend. The gyno knew I smoked and after she scraped my uterus with what looked like a shoehorn and hoovered the products of conception out of me and into a glass jar, she wrote me a prescription for a B.C. pill with a high dose of hormone. She didn't suggest I cease taking hormonal B.C.; in fact, she was all but frisbeeing the disks of pills into my throat (or something). Because if some one is twenty-two, has intercourse with a man or men, is fertile as all fuck, as has been proven by a recent unwanted pregnancy that happened while on the low dose pill, and not only doesn't want to be pregnant but also would be medically advised against pregnancy (i.e. psychiatric illnesses + medication + fertilized human egg = dolphin fetus), then the increased risk factor is worth it. Duh. I'm not saying it's optimal, but it's reasonable. In fact, it's the only choice that's reasonable.

Jesus gay this is a long post, and I'm not even up to the breast exam. I bet Dr. Dumb loves PowerPoint. Dr. Dumb totally loves PowerPoint presentations. And uses (blech) comic sans for a fun, informal look. Whimsy! I don't know how I know this, but I do. It's the feeling I get.

Anyway, what was I talking about? Oh yeah, my tit. I explain that last week, I noticed what I thought was a bruise, but that the color had gotten darker rather than lighter as the week went on. Then I was poking around a couple nights ago and noticed a bump. It's a sizable bump, near the bruise, just north of my nipple. Dr. Dumb asked me how I thought I had bruised myself. Had I had a bump or a hit? I told her no. So what did you think it was from? "Well, I thought it was a, uh, hickey. But then I was out of town for the holiday weekend, away from my boyfriend, and the skin darkened and reddened, so I had second thoughts about its bruiseness." She asked family history, and I explained: my mother's sister has breast cancer; my father's mother had breast cancer when she was my age. She asked about my immedeate family. Neither of my parents has cancer, and I have no siblings. "Technically," she said, "traditionally, the extended family-- your aunt and grandmother-- don't count, they don't increase your chances of having breast cancer." She poked my boob a little, but the more I think about it, the more I think she did a really poor job of feeling me up. It was the quickest breast exam I ever had. Even the Vader nurse takes more time.

"It looks like it's probably a bruise," she said, "if you were poking, it's possible you irritated or inflamed some tissue. Have you ever had a breast nodule before?"

"No."

"Well, it's a benign lump. Most lumps in women your age are benign. So what I'm going to say is just to go home and keep an eye on it. If it's just a bruise, it might resolve on its own. If it doesn't, then you should call and come back."

"Ok," I said, completely not trusting her. "Well, what's going to happen in a week if it does not go away?"

"Then we'll do a sonogram to find out if the mass is solid or if it's fluid filled. But it is highly unlikely for a woman your age to have breast cancer. Younger women tend to have lumpy bumpy breasts. Some growths do cause changes and discoloration to the skin, but that is probably just a bruise. Given your age and that you have no family history--"

"But I do have family history. My grandmother had breast cancer very young."

"Techincally, that doesn't count. There is no history of cancer in your immedeate family."

"But," I said, "the is only one other person with breasts in my immedeate family."

I did not want to wait a week, I said. "Well, that's what we do," she said. I was still unhappy. "It's a good sign that the lump appeared suddenly, though." I explained that I only noticed it a couple days ago because I was intrigued by the bruising and prodding. I don't do regular breast exams.

"Well, if it is a tumor," she said, "it is probably not going to matter if we wait just a week."

No, really. She said that. She finally relented, "Ok, she said, since you are so concerned, I will see you in three days. Well, on Monday, because for Friday there is really no point. I'm making an exception for you. Normally I would say in a week or two. But because I don't want you to worry, I'll let you come back earlier."

Well, gee, thanks.

She was getting ready to leave and she asked me, "oh, by the way, is this weird for you? I mean, that we met at the thing yesterday?"

"No," I said. It wasn't weird for me because we'd met. It was bad for me because I didn't like her.

Most likely, it is just a bruise. I was a little frayed the past two days worrying, but I'm not freaking out right now. It is probably just a bruise, but I want to hear that from someone other than Dr. Dumb.

Tonight: insurance forms! Tomorrow: quest for a new physician!

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

Wed, 07 Sep 2005 01:37:38 GMT

Accidental Death and Dismemberment

I spent most of today sitting through Stanford 101, the mandatory orientation and benefits briefing for new employees. It started off with a video about "the Farm" (what?), and then a barage of PowerPoint slides about insurance.

At Q & A, some one asked about the difference between life insurance and accidental death & dismembership insurance. The response of the HR rep, an older woman with grayed hair and a frumpy demeanor?

Let's say I start working at Stanford, and after a month I become gravely ill and die of cancer. My beneficiaries will receive my life insurance benefits. Let's say, on the other hand, that I'm in perfect, tip-top health, but I have this hobby. This hobby that I love. My whole family thinks its nuts, but it's my reason to live. My hobby is riding motorcycles. So one day, I'm out riding a motorcycle. I don't put on my protective gear, like a helmet or pads. It's a warm day and, hey, I'm not going very far. Well so, I'm driving down University and as I make a turn I meet a bus. Then, my beneficiaries would recieve both the life and the accidental death & dismemberment insurance. But let's say I did put on all my gear. But there is a gravel truck ahead of me, and as it turns, some gravel-- a few little pebbles-- fall out of the truck's bed. Five minutes later, I'm making that same turn, and my wheel hits those couple of pieces of gravel at just the wrong angle, and my motorcycle tips and throws me. I'm wearing the protective gear, so I don't die, but I loose my legs or my eye. Or something even smaller, an elbow or an ankle. Then I'm eligible because I've been dismembered, even thought I am not dead.

In case you, too, were wondering.

Sunday, September 04, 2005

Sun, 04 Sep 2005 22:40:38 GMT

Seattle Dorkathon 2005

Just a quick note while we're sitting here in the flashy, futuristic Seattle Public Library (an announcement just sounded that all computers will be logged in out in fifteen minutes and the library will close in thirty). I love libraries. I want to a librarian. A Librarian of the Future.

You know what, this is not going to be an interesting post-- I'm just too elated to put in the work to make it worthwhile-- so instead of cluttering the internet and draining my gentle readers' time, I'm going to do the more noble thing and just bow out.

Posts have been too sparse this weekend, especially given the hefty collection of hours I've spent at the computer lately. I've been trying to get my new website (hissycat.com) in gear. Once that is up and running, I'll get my postings on a regular, industrious schedule. And I will write something fabulous and bloggy later today. Maybe tomorrow.

Thursday, September 01, 2005

Thu, 01 Sep 2005 16:19:56 GMT

I had to practically pitch a fit to get my appointment (as a full-time employee with bennies) through yesterday so that I could get my pills refilled this week, but, in truth, I'm conflicted about this appointment. It's great, of course, that I can, like, see a doctor and take a vacation and pull in a bit more much-needed dough, but on the other hand, I *really* don't want to be doing this job. It's a long commute. It's extremely isolative: I really don't work *with* anyone, I get little to no feedback or guidance and half the time have no idea what I'm doing. I have some ethical reservations about the implementation of the product I am making.

And also, I do jack shit. I mean, I spend the vast majority of my work day fucking around on the internet. Now, in one sense, that's just peachy: I cat just sit in my private office and write or read or stick my thumb up my butt and not have anyone bugging me. But at the same time, all this pointless sloughing of time can be wearying and prohibitive. I can't *really* work on what I want to be working on. It's not like I can just pull up the novel and start working on that. I am in constant terror of being caught doing something wrong, because eventually some one has to realize how utterly worthless my presence here is, right? It makes me feel shifty and bad, being here. My time isn't *really* my time, and I'm not free to fully engage in my own projects and I'm certainly not engaging fully with the work projects. It feels like I'm keeping my brain on ice, like I'm always just waiting for something to do with it. It kind of really sucks.

On Sunday, Brett had some friends over for a dinner and I was talking to Emily and Shaun, who are both working artists. Emily is really a model of how to live and work as an artist with integrity. We were talking about jobs, and I was saying that I really wanted to leave but am limited by health insurance (essentially, I have no other way of obtaining healthcare except through an employer; in addition to being young and poor, I'm also insane in at least three different ways with a prescription for each. Oh, and a smoker, too. And in California, The Land Without Regulation, insurers are free to turn down anyone they choose, and you know they choose me). Emily mentioned that the local yuppie grocer-- and I love local yuppie grocers-- offers health insurance to their part-time employees and is currently hiring. That is exactly what I need: health insurance and a job that is 1) local 2) menial 3) would leave me the time and brain I need to put in my writing. It's true, I have spending problems, but by Monday afternoon I was determined that this was something I would have to make work. I'd just have to go without. No vacation, no unessential purchases, and rely on wilted produce intercepted on its way to the trash bin.

But I need the insurance now, you know, so I was pushy on Tuesday, and yesterday, my appointment went through. I'm going to be out of here in a year, though. I give myself one year to get up on my freelancing legs at least enough to reasonably supplement the salary of a part-time casheir at a grocery and to maybe, if I'm lucky, save up a couple of month's rent so I have some padding when I leave.

I'm going to do actual, like, work, now. Oh, but you know what is good? Because today is my last day working as a temp, I get handed my last two weeks' salary today instead of waiting another week for payroll and direct deposit to go through. Which is exciting. For once, I can actually pay my rent on time.

Wednesday, August 31, 2005

Wed, 31 Aug 2005 03:29:54 GMT

I Will Never Make It As A Writer Or A Blogger

I will never make it as a writer because I hate writers. I've been sitting in Café La Onda all evening, taking advantage of the free internet and spacious desks and abundant caffeine. Two seperate writing groups have come, met, and left since I've been here. The most offensive member of the nearest table was a man with black framed glasses exactly like mine, a loud, overly emphatic voice, and a domineering personality. "And I care about the character, I do, but that's not the Jessica I know;" "You are less interested in that than in the subtle inner thoughts-- and that's great, but. . ."; "I hear that a lot at all the writing workshops and conferences I've attended;" "You all are going to be invited to a very civilized cocktail party as soon as I move into my new apartment. You guys have to come and be my friends. I don't have any other friends. Seriously, all my friends moved away, so you guys have to come and say you are my friends and not just my colleagues. There will be booze-- a keg!"

I'll never make it as blogger, though, because I'm too dumb to figure out Movable Type.

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Tue, 30 Aug 2005 23:51:19 GMT

The Internet Is My New Boyfriend

Last summer, when Brett was in Berlin and I was in New York and we had just started "dating" (i.e. we agreed the time had come to check the 'In a Relationship' status box on Friendster, and click we did), I wrote an obscene amount of letters (also, obscene letters) to Brett. I spent unsafe numbers of hours facing the computer screen: at cafes after work, sometimes at the school betwen classes or in the morning before the students arrived, and when I could not sleep in the wee hours I skulked around the house, sometimes army-crawling, sometimes on my tiptoes in search of stolen wireless. Yes, we used e-mail, but I stand by my statement that what I wrote was letters. Ok, there were some e-mails, little notes sent off in fits when I was late for work or about to teach a class and could not stopper my outbursts over something I'd just heard or seen or suppress the raptures of finding I'd received a new letter from him: "Got your letter" and "I'll write more soon." Those were emails. But I strongly believe that if you spend hours tapping out stories to a new lover, if you edit your writing with frightening intensity, and after reading and editing and reading again you have to close your eyes before you hit send, then what you have written is a letter. You just happened to post it using e-mail. (And if every afternoon at work you print out his missive or downlaod it onto your laptop and, instead of tearing into it at once, you take a deep breath and plunge it to the bottom of your bag and through sheer force of will manage not to look at it until after you have driven home, parked the car, bought a cup of vanilla Tasti-D-Lite with rainbow sprinkles, and locked the bedroom door to be alone in your chair with your ice cream and your prize, then what you are reading in an email.)

This summer, as though I'd fallen flash fast in love with myself, I find myself spending too much time blogging. Again, I find myself living without internet, waltzing my laptop across my studio as I do the wireless reception dance, sneaking in writing time at work (ok, "sneaking in writing time" is a bit of an understatement; "work" is a mammoth overstatement). I've only been really into this for a few weeks, I know, but, hey, the heart works in mysterious and inarguable ways. Now, I've taken the plunge.

No, it's not a bakkrupting plane ticket to Berlin I blew a summer's salary on.

It. . .

Is. . .

My Very Own. . .

Website!!

Hissy Cat

http://www.hissycat.com

There's nothing but an Under Construction page there now, but it's coming. It's on its way. And I am hoping to spend some time with Alex up in Seattle this weekend working on our blogs together. Nerdfest 2005, man! Seriously: the man is a genius.

So if my posts thin out this week, dear bloggy-boo, it's not that I don't love you. I'm gearing up to takes us to The Next Stage.