Category: The Lisa Chronicles

Tweet tweet: Lisa 2.0 or something very similar.

I’ve been writing online since the mid ’90s. Sometime in 2001, when LiveJournal was still accessible only by invite codes, I snagged a code from someone (unintentionally stealing it from the person it was meant for — not my fault that the originator posted it PUBLICLY!) and started using LiveJournal. For a long time, up until 2004 or 2005, I would cross reference entries between my own domain over to LiveJournal. The writing on my own domain slowly petered out and I started using LiveJournal for all of my “blogging” needs.
But I’m a voracious blogger, as it were, known for indepth analysis of the human condition (that sounded totally Pretentious Fucktwattedness, henceforth known as PFT, but I’m okay with that) and short non-sequitors that were mostly one or two lines of text. Stream of consciousness thinking, as it were, are my calling cards. I could start out a post about the joys of doing laundry only to end up discussing the rituals 006 and I used to share. There was never any “thought” process to my writing, it is what it is.
I’ve owned my own domain since the mid-’90s when one could buy them ONLY from Network Solutions (then Internic) and pay exorbitant amount of cold hard cash for the said privileged. I knew friends who ran their own servers, never paid for my own web hosting up until recently and for the most part, maintained (in the blogosphere) at least some sense of anonymity.
For the last couple of years, I’ve felt disjointed on how to combine my “internets” life with my public and personal ones. I’ve had exes who attempted to sue me for libel and slander, ex-employers who found my website and kept tabs on me after I left the company (even after I’ve left on my own accord and I was not dooced) and a local (in-state) family farm who claimed that my using their family name in the title of a piece was ruining their business. I’m everywhere and nowhere and the projects that I started, always seem to fall to pieces while modgirl.net languishes in disarray from terrible lack of upkeep. So thus began the great “re-organizational plan.”

  • Finish the archives for modgirl.net and never touch that website again.
  • Start updating She’s Got Plans and cross-reference to LiveJournal.
  • Keep small non-sequitor stuff to Twitter.
  • I’ve been asked about the Podcasting plugin that is showcasing on the bottom of this page, here is the scoop: I have over 700 CDs and close to 70 gigs of music, most of which I’ll probably never listen to. I thought it would be great to create a podcast, called AutoMusicBiographically. Each episode, starting with the beginning of the alphabet, I’ll showcase a particular band and discuss how they are relevant to me and to music in general while showcasing a few of their hits. I’m pretty excited about this new project, just need to get other stuff done before I get going on that one. I do, however, have a friend who does audio production work so this should far easier to get accomplished.

And so, what can you expect on She’s Got Plans?

  • Music, book, television, and general pop culture reviews.
  • Library school (and grad school) bru-haha.
  • General commentary on the absurdity of the human populace.
  • Project updates, including but not limited to: Knitting, cooking (because I’m relatively new to this whole “cooking” thing), writing (I’m working on flash fiction pieces to be compiled for an anthology), exercise and diet shit (gluten intolerance, like everyone else on the planet). The usual project and entertainment crap.
  • Team Sassy updates. Steph and I are walking 50 miles in October to help combat MS. Cross-referencing both websites with updates.
  • AutoMusicBiographically. I’m so excited for this project to begin!
  • Photos. There will be lots of photos.
  • And whatever else I can think of.

I’ll be tweaking the front end for a bit while I discover new plugins and widgets and of course, start driving users to the website, etc. That’s it for me, for now. I need to get to bed. Good night internets, sleep well and don’t hog the bed.

Stuff White People Like: White is the new black

I like to think that I am different.
Well, I DO.
But here’s the thing, no matter how awesome or cool I am, there is someone out there who is just a bit more awesomer or cooler than me. I know, shocking as it may seem, someone out there is living a life similiar to mine but doing it just a bit more edgier, a bit more hipper and well, a bit more stereotypical-er.
Indeed, I never really thought of myself as being totally rebellious or mainstream — I was always just me. And I never thought my actions were completely reactionary or followed a set of protocols that are seemingly unwritten, but, I recently found out that perhaps I was oh, so, terribly wrong.
Continue reading “Stuff White People Like: White is the new black”

My Dentist Says I have Hot’n’Sexy Teeth

Okay, he really did not say that, but that was what he was conveying with his “Excellent work, as always Lisa” on the commentary on my ereet brushing skills. I owe it all to Sonicare. Seriously.
The other day I received a few “nudges” from people about updating my LJ. “Hrm.,” I thought to myself, “It hasn’t been THAT long since I’ve updated.” Apparently, it HAS. Nearly two weeks. Eek. Let’s recap with our heroine shall we?
Sunday, April 1, Sara and I drove to Detroit to see Snow Patrol play at the Detroit State Theater. Little did we know that the exact same evening at the exact same time, there was a WWE event happening at the Civic Theater right next door, something going on across the street at Comerica Park for the Tigers and another event was taking place in the same neighborhood. Parking was scarce and we coughed up the $20 bucks to park in the ramp near the State Theater. After watching OK GO perform (which, ironically, they were pretty damn awesome live), Snow Patrol came on stage to the thundering applause of all the teenyboppers and hipsters that were either drunk or semi-drunk. We had few cute Asian girls in front of us who were beyond adorable and also beyond sober. Sara and I had ground floor “seats,” which in short meant we were less than 25 feet from the stage. That was exciting.
The show was excellent, not as good as Bloc Party mind you, but still excellent. Sara and I decided to leave during the “encore game” to head home and beat the traffic.
Hah. Hah. Hah.
Remember the casual mention of the other events earlier in this entry? Yes, well, it took us over an hour to get from the parking ramp to the highway – which was less than two miles away. The traffic guards, not local policemen but simple hired hands, were screaming at all the moronic drivers (okay, this IS Detroit after all), “KEEP FUCKING MOVING!”
Sara is one helluva navigatrix when it comes to this shit. She got us out of the jam and onto the highway fairly quickly. If left to my own devices, I’m sure that I would have been screaming at the traffic while slamming my hands on the steering wheel.
As we were hungry and also needed some gas, we decided to stop at one of the towns that litter the 96 highway between Grand Rapids and Detroit to fill up both tanks. Again, thinking that we were over 20 miles from downtown Detroit (if not more so) and heading westward, there shouldn’t have been an issue.
We were wrong. Again.
We stopped in the tiny town of Wixom where after slugging back caffeine, filling up the gas tank, we pulled into McDonalds. Where we waited for nearly 20 minutes in the same damn spot in the damn line to grab our “all white meat” chicken and greasy fries! Every restaurant in the vicinity is showing the same issue: Long lines, one person seemingly working and every redneck from Detroit to Lansing getting the same bright idea as we had, which was evident by all the yelling and screaming and waving of the fake title belts that we saw from their minivans and SUTs.
We hopped back on the road and drove another 15 miles to Brighton (Consequently, TheEx and I realised on our own road trip the previous weekend to Detroit to see Bloc Party that a good portion of the ‘burbs around Detroit were named after English towns. Brighton. Manchester. Birmingham, Pinckney, Chelsea and even a nod to the north with Dundee. If we really were feeling Anglophilic, we could have crossed over to Canada and driven to Essex, Middlesex and London.), where the longs were similarly as long but not as slow. Stuffed with McDonalds goodness, we headed home, arriving nearly four hours after we had got into the car. The two hour ride home was more than doubled and we concluded next time we attempt to go to a show in Detroit, we WILL be double checking with other local events first to see if said show is worth seeing with the hassle of the damn traffic and moronic drivers.
I also came to the brilliant conclusion that damn near every female on Earth wants a Snow Patrol song written about or sung to them. Think about it.
This past weekend, Easter weekend, TheEx and I made plans to travel up north to unwind and just chill. Our plans were shortened by a night as I had a four hour job interview with a local insurance company Friday morning, thus, instead of leaving Thursday evening as originally planned, we left Friday afternoon.
The weather around here has deteriorated from high 60s one day to freezing and snow the next, thus, by Friday afternoon, we packed our winter boots, mittens, and coats and drove three hours north, where the weather was much worse and our plans for a weekend of wine tasting, driving along the countryside, and checking out the 45th parallel were shot to shit.
TheEx and I took advantage of his parents not arriving until Saturday to laze around a Jacuzzi bathtub for several hours, with Tori Amos and R.E.M. piped in the overhead speakers. We watched tv, read magazines, and had the obvious gratuitous sex. Of course. After his parents arrived, nothing much had changed other than we went out to Funistrada for another excellent dinner, capped off with snow angels and watching Ameros Perros, which I had already seen but loved. We drove back to GR early Sunday afternoon to meet up with my family for Easter dinner, chocolate, and the highly anticipated season opener of The Sopranos (whoa baby!).
Though we have only been up north several times, the patterns are already setting in. Pizza the first night we arrive from Bear Paw or Johnny Salami’s. Errands into the village to pick up perishables for lunches and breakfast. Dinner at Funistrada for Veal Saltimbocca and Anniversary Chicken. French toast prepared Lisa way in the mornings. F1 racing or West Ham games in the afternoon. Lots of reading, relaxing, and naps.
And our lives in GR aren’t that much different. We’ve been cohabitating a schedule that somehow works. We haven’t killed each other yet, haven’t had a single tiff as of yet in regards to anything. And it’s weird, in a way, of this whole “living together” because we don’t think of it as living together but as an extended temporary stay. Once the whole “living together” thing is mentioned and we both do the deer-in-headlights look and just shrug our shoulders. We’ve got our routines, our patterns and our duties, it seems. I’ve declared that one night a week is “date night” were we go out and have a date. This weekend we are seeing a hockey game on Saturday night, the following weekend who knows? We now have the McPaper (USA Today) delivered in the mornings and the local rag on Sundays. We talk about days, our domesticity and our plans for future events. Trips that planned, things we want to do, places we want to go and lofty goals that seem within our reach at that bright, shining moment even if they are really just lofty goals.
But we don’t talk about the future, except in hypotheticals. “If we hypothetically get an apartment together,” I said last night as we walked to dinner at YesterDog’s before walking to Billy’s for Mikey’s surprise party, “I would like to hypothetically get a place in Eastown.” “I hypothetically agree with you that our hypothetical apartment should be within a four block radius of Eastown,” TheEx replied. “With a hypothetically large deck for grilling” he added later on that night.
But of course this idea of hypotheticals gets blown to shit when his mother this weekend, in all of her lovable charm and graciousness, asked me quite sincerely, “So Lisa, what are you doing for Thanksgiving?”
Our six month anniversary is coming up in a few weeks and that in and of itself is kinda crazy, weird, and awesome all at the same time. Because I can recall from our first dates, how I tried to break up with him several times because I didn’t, couldn’t predict that we would ever be in the same place emotionally at the same time. Why bother stringing me along after going through a nasty divorce (that is STILL being dragged out by petty mind fucks and vindictiveness)? And apparently, I was wrong (for once, it does happen) and we’ve worked out series of communication and nurturing skills (heh, how professional) that seem to work. And of course not everything is perfect and it can’t be, but, despite my initial reservation, I fall more in love with TheEx with each passing day.
Damn, that took several hours. I have more to update but I have to motor for work.

third person

One thing that is very true about me is that I’m slow on the uptake on some of the most basic, common sense things. For example, shortly after I bought my 2004 Ion, my friend Karen and I took off to Detroit to see The Twilight Singers. I had not had time to explore my car as properly as I should have, one supposes, and to Karen’t delight and my embarrassment she discovered how to operate a few things in my car that I had no clue about. Which brings me to today, as I’m sitting at Saturn of Grand Rapids waiting on having my car fixed. Jon had joked that since VW had wireless, surely Saturn must have wireless for their customers as well. Armed with my laptop, to surf pron of course, I discovered that Saturn does NOT have wireless. I had some work I wanted to get done on modgirl.net and could do so locally, and as I was putzing around, I discovered the beauty of the function key. Apparently, the function key has a list of short-cuts that are accessible via the keyboard that I had zero idea about. And I’ve had this laptop for nearly a year.
Or perhaps it’s not so much that I’m slow on the uptake, rather, I’m oblivious to small details. Something I’m desperately working on to “fix.”
So right, Saturn, car getting fixed. Nothing major — simply my windshield wipers are not working. And if it is one thing in a Michigan winter you do not want to have is broken windshield wipers. I’m also getting a quote on getting new tires. But what is really making my panties wet is the a Saturn Sky is parked not three feet from me. Black. Shiny. I have images of myself wearing a headscarf and big sunglasses whipping in and out of traffic in this baby. Reality, of course, sets in. I’m broke. I made about $15K last year, take home ridiculously less. I’m in graduate school. I’m living paycheck to paycheck. A new car is not a need but a want. And I argue with myself, of course, about this. One side states, “But you only live once! What is the harm of incurring more debt?” while the other side argues, “Uh, you are robbing Peter to pay Paul. You have $13 dollars in your checking account. Be reasonable about this!” “But the car would make us feel better! We could whip around town looking fabulous AND it would be the reason to have Jon teach us to drive a stick.” “You know how to drive a stick.” “Yes, but it’s been ages since we’ve actually DRIVEN one. A beat-up Dodge Omni doesn’t count.” “You can’t, even remotely afford the payments.” “So?”
This wouldn’t be so humerous if it were not for the fact that both sides ARGUE. ALL. THE. TIME. About every freaking purchase that I want. I give in the want more so than the need, 9/10, and I know — I shouldn’t. BUT YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE! (Shut up!) And when one starts referring to oneself in third person…

Returneth. Sorta.

just found out that a good portion of people have not received the invite to TLC. I just sent out a massive BCC list and I figured I’d send this out as well… 😉
Can you believe it’s been TEN YEARS since this all started? Well, technically 10 years but the TLC as we all know and love, it’s been eight long years. Many men, countries and cities. And pugs, can’t forget the pugs. And alcohol. Lot’o’alcohol.
If you don’t remember me, I run the online journal over at modgirl.net (nee simunye.org). It’s been awhile hasn’t it? It has. I can’t tell you how long as I’VE LOST ALL MY FREAKING EMAIL (more or less) and I’m remiss to say it’s been ages. You guys started out with me when I was a spunky 24 year old and now I’m a misanthropic 34 year old. Wiser and definitely have more tattoos. And shorter hair. And I still hate the world, to some degree or another, but hey, that’s the way the cookie crumbles.
If you haven’t been keeping up with me (and I know some of you have, it is almost eery how many email address I recognize putting together this BCC list), in short, this is what is going on: I’m back living in GR, finished college in ’05 and started graduate school that summer. I’ll be receiving my M.A. in the spring of ’08 ($deity willing), single, still have the damn pugs and I sling books for a living while I attend school. I travel a lot, bitch about moronic people a lot, plan world domination and the whole nine yards.
And how are you? Seriously, tell me. 🙂
So, what has happened is this: Moe, the guy that ran modgirl.net, emailed all of his cliental that they were going to be charging for services for a very reasonable price. However, I currently have other hosting with Dreamhost, so Moe and I hashed it out and decided that I’d just move modgirl.net over to Dreamhost and viola, no problems. Well, there was, you see. Little did I know that in the long days since I worked at UUNet, that DNS propagation, which used to take days, is now done in 3-4 hours. So I didn’t have time to email the list, etc, about the move. The only bright thing I did was save the list to a txt file for future use.
I’m now doing TLC via dreamhost, and I imported the list and sent out an invite. A number of people signed up, but, I found out that also a lot of people didn’t get the invite. Hence the BCC.
So, in short, if you wish to resubscribe, email me and I’ll resend the invite. If you don’t, no worries, just ignore this email. Make sure to add tlc@modgirl.net to your whitelist/addressbook so it doesn’t get tagged by your client/server as spam/junk. You can reach me at this address (academichussy@gmail.com) anytime.
I love you all. Thanks for being with me.
x0x0x
Lisa
PS: If you’re into LJ, i’m located at http://academichussy.livejournal.com , but, I’m planning on coming back to TLC with a vengeance. I swear.

sassy skirt seeks alliterative ally

Last year, feeling rather despondent about the men I kept meeting, I put up a personals ad. Before doing so, I polled my friends to see what they had to say about me. The following is my favorite response thus far:
“GR woman (No! I’m still a girl, dammit!) who enjoys reading, the arts, travel and the occasional megadose of caffeine seeks a guy with similar interests. I have a fully functional brain, a tall and sexy body and a biting sense of humor; if anything of that intimidates you, sorry, please move along. I am *not* a project, trophy or challenge and I don’t need to be saved; if you can’t take me as I am, please read the end of the last sentence.”
Since 99% of the responses were from moronic twits, I pulled down the ad and went back to the old fashioned method. But since I’m always interested in meeting new people, I decided to put the ad back up. Lucky you.
“So, who am I? In a non-metaphysical sense, I’m a tall (5’11-6’1; depending on time of day and who’s measuring me) bodacious brunette in graduate school. During the day I’m a book pimp, while studying for my masters at night. In my previous life, I was a network engineer for a global corporation (if the phrase “nine billion dollar accounting fraud” means anything to you, you know who I used to work for). I embrace both the arts and technology, and feel just as comfortable discoursing on dead white male authors as I do about bleeding edge technology.
If anything, I’m a dichotomy. You’ve been warned.
I’m a music and movie buff as well as a pop culture queen. Musically, I dig everything from Miles Davis to Madchester to Bossa Nova. Right now I’m in love with Elbow and The Doves. In movies, my taste runs to independents, foreign flicks, and blockbusters. Though lately I’ve been obsessed with zombie movies. Netflix is my hero. I’m also a gaming nut and own four gaming consoles. Tivo has become my replacement boyfriend and my “children” consist of three pugs named after The Addams’ Family.
I’m well traveled, having lived in San Francisco, DC, and Toronto as well as Michigan. I’ve been to Spain, France, Germany, England and Scotland. I have a plethora of piercings (no, you cannot ask where they are located) and twelve tattoos.
I read voraciously and dig just about anything. Unfortunately, my training as an English Lit major has caused me to be a snob about books, thus if you think The Da Vinci Code (or books in a similar vein) is “great” literature, please move along. Big points if you dig Terry Pratchett.
Socially, I hit local pubs and shows with friends, read, catch up on Tivo, playing with my dogs, and writing. I plan road trips in my head, make mix cds for various moods and come up with a 1000 and one ideas that never get seen. I love ethnic food and am game to try just about anything once. I once fell asleep at the opera (I was tired! That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it!), but I do like going to the theater, museums and the like. I also like just staying at home playing video games and watching movies. I’ve been known to watch entire seasons of shows in one sitting as well as What I like to do tends to depend on the mood I am in, which tends to shift. A lot.
I’m big on talking, especially debating where I tend to play the devil’s advocate. I’m highly sarcastic and my humour tends to run to the dry variety. If you can’t keep up with me intellectually, then move along please. I’m pretty opinionated and have no problem telling you what is on my mind. I shoot from the hip and usually say the first thing that come out of my mouth, which tends to get me in trouble. Very well-read, though common sense tends to take a backseat sometimes. I can be quite intellectual on some things and a complete ditz on others.
Any other questions?”

but i digress

It is Friday night and I’ve made a very singleton type dinner of pasta with parmesan cheese sprinkled on top, spray butter spritzed on to adhere the cheese to the pasta. Multi-grain pasta, no less, to further infuse the idea that I’m trying to get ìhealthy.î I have a mere few hours between the time I got home from work and until I have to get to bed in order to wake up at 5am to head back to work. I had already walked the dogs, changed into my jammies, swept the living and dining room wood floors, prepped coffee for the morning and paid a few bills. While trying to decide if I was going to read a bit or watch a DVD before hitting the hay, I realised this was my life: and unless something changed, and soon, this is how it was going to be the incessant pattern, day in and day out, with nothing to look forward to and nothing to commend myself on having done, because, I always planned on conquering the world tomorrow and my past was filled with nothing but those empty tomorrows where I just existed and did not really live.
And I felt that sense of panic, that I would end up dead and alone, eaten by ThePugKids, all three of them fighting to eat my hands and feet. I can almost see them burping with a self-satisfied look on their faces. If pugs could smirk, mine surely would in utter defiance of not being spoilt rotten.
But I digress.
Some time ago, a month maybe?, I got this brilliant idea of starting yet another website (yet another vain attempt on my part on commitment and as always, flaking out), which is what you’re looking at now. I had lofty ambitions (doesn’t one always have lofty ambitions when they start projects?), where I would write everyday and it would be about ANYTHING I damned near felt like writing, no matter how trite, absurd, vapid or incessantly boring. I started creating tag after tag because I have IDEAS! PLANS! GOALS! It would be culture of Lisa, and I could finally start getting down what the fuck I wanted out of life without just thinking about it, daydreaming while I shelve books day in and day out, and then wonder how my temporary job has landed me an anniversary date.
Tonight it just clicked, hard for me, as I sat there straining the pasta before spritzing the I Cant Believe it’s Not Butter spray: I’m 34 years old, it’s a Friday night and I just feel like I’m totally left out of the world around me. I seriously am beginning to feel that I have nothing in common with most of my friends anymore and I spend my free time escaping via books, music, and television. And this is not where I want to be. That was the driving force, still is, of purchasing this domain and getting started on where I’m going and how I’m going to get there. Because I’ve got plans, goddamnit, and some how or another, I’m not going to remain another retail monkey working for people who are seriously dumber than a box of rocks (and I put myself in this position, exactly, why?).
Working in a bookstore wouldn’t be SO bad, because where else can you fondle for books for a living, tell people your unadulterated opinion for free and get paid? But the pay is killing me (and today’s check, sans a day when I called in sick last week due to pink eye) just infuriates me. I have a fucking college degree and I’m barely scratching poverty level wages!
Okay, look, I’m going to stop myself right there before I become way too disjointed about this initial entry. Here is the website, here are some of the goals I plan on working on and this here website is where I’m going to catalogue every stinking inch of the way, $deity help me:

  1. Take the GRE and get into a big girl grad school (I’m currently taking graduate classes via Central Mich)
  2. Quit smoking (already started, tracker can be found here).
  3. Lose weight
  4. Join a gym and actually go! (Already joined and went once. Yay me.)
  5. Write a book or twelve
  6. Actually learn how to casually date and not refer to men as being moronic half-wits who have more baggage as UPS, FedEx and DHS combined.
  7. Get into freelance writing as a job.
  8. Find another job!
  9. Put together the “100 things to do in 1000 Days,” encompassing weight loss, travel, quitting smoking, learning new hobbies, etc.

I’m sure there is more, there is always more. But now is my time, while I’m still young, have all my teeth and the energy to do it. Nothing is stopping me other than me, and if takes warm fuzzy bullshit to get self-motivated to do what I need to do and get it done, than so be it.

About: Lisa

Hello, my name is Lisa.
I’ve been keeping an online journal since 1996.1 You may know me from simunye.org, modgirl.net, or from my LiveJournal.
If you are interested in my lifestream, you can find that at [digital biblyotheke].
The original concept for shesgotplans.net was to discuss, in-depth, my sojourn into library and archival school, which I started in fall of 2008. The premise intent that it would contain entries on the nuts and bolts of school while addressing concerns as someone new to the profession. But Twitter changed all of that — my pithy commentary was released instantly to the masses! Thus, the journal languished because writing 140 characters is a lot faster and easier than writing a nicely constructed and in-depth essay.2
Now that graduation is now looming, all the personal projects that I swore I would have time for during breaks is now finally available. This is the first time in in nearly a decade, I currently3 have no plans on being in classes this next school year, it’s time to get back in the writing mode and less on the “OH HOLY FUCK! I HAVE A HUGE PROJECT DUE IN TWO DAYS!” I so won’t miss those days.
Other places where I’m also writing at:

  • Tech-Ink: A librarian’s collection: Tech-Ink is a collective of tech savvy librarians from around the world. I write from the student / new librarian/archivist perspective.
  • The Brit & The Yank: A music blog with a twist, co-written with my friend Chris.
  • AMPed: Staff writer for Archival Media Preservation, a professional blog sponsored by Archive Media Partners that discusses the ins and outs of digital obsolescence, digital media and social networking in the archival world.

Below is the “To Do” list for shesgotplans.net as of 1/31/2010

  • Update more frequently (2-3x a week).
  • Change blog name (not domain) before graduation.
  • Import journal entries from prior incarnations into database.
  • Create categories and folksonomies for those entries.


1. My first journals were on Geocities (now defunct) and I transferred everything over to simunye.org in 1998, which is why the InternetArchive only has my listing from 1998, not 1996, and forward.
2. Interestingly enough, So, you want to be a librarian? Part I is the most requested page on this site. Clearly, I was on to something.
3. I have been made to promise to the family that there will be no more schooling for me! Three degrees in seven years is enough, right?

culture shock

Chris and I had a conversation the other day on our own perspective of what the Midwest meant to us. Chris grew up in tiny hamlets (population of several thousand), while I criss-crossed from Port Huron to Toronto. It was with that conversation that I realised that my own perception of the Midwest, and the world in general, was not what I thought it should or could be. Because I had lived and visited extensively to several metro areas while still a child, I understood a better sense of my gypsy-like lifestyle more so than I did ever before. That alone was perhaps one of the greatest realisations of myself that I have had in current history.
I’ve always talked about the fact that there are two Lisas — one that harbors the home and hearth fantasy while the other sees herself as jet setting across the globe. It’s difficult to reconcile the two, finding a place where I fit in without feeling claustrophobic. Someone once said that my own pre-determined destinies would only come true if I let them — as I had often remarked that I was going to end up being the old hag at the end of a bar, wearing my faux fur and jewels while slugging back vodkas and chain smoking, while regaling of all my love affairs with men that got progressively younger. On the other hand, there is the aging Lisa bouncing my grandchildren on my knee while regaling of all my adventures around the world.
At the Caffe Accademica, near the Piazza di Spagna, inside the putrid smelling bathrooms, graffiti was written by women from all over the world. I had wished I had a pen with me, to leave my mark on that bathroom wall, to note that “Lisa was here.” Who we are but memories that we create with others and memories that we create within ourselves.
Life is about ambience and adventure. Even when we got detoured from the metro the other day, our walk to Termini through Chinatown was an adventure. Our getting lost was an adventure. Life is nothing more than a series of getting lost from location to location and hoping to hell you can find your way back. It’s not just about the tourist sites and the souvenirs collected on your travels, but the impressions that you impart and take with you as you go. I wish that I had the photography training to capture the images of the people as we walked, because I wanted to remember the look of the lovers who were snogging besides us the restaurant or the old couple who walked happily down Via ottavio towards the Vatican, hand in hand.
When I had move to the Bay Area in 1997, one of my friends there notated as we walked down Telegraph Rd. in Berkeley — that I seemed to fit in. This chameleon like trait has been a curse, I thought, since high school when I meshed from social group to social group. And I think that is why I don’t feel so intimidated being in a different country. Sure, the culture is different and the people are different but in the end, we really are all just the same. I could see myself living here, just as I could see myself living in Barcelona or in the South of France (I’m not terribly crazy about Paris but perhaps if I had spent more time in the city, that too would have changed). I feel confident that I could go anywhere in the world and blend in, without having too much of a terrible difficulty getting around. Perhaps I should just accept my fate that I am a world citizen, not a citizen of a particular country or city.

hot date

Smashing good day everyone. 🙂 BBQ was fun at C+S’s, though we were still perplexed how majority of the people in the group (‘cept for the baby of the group, sara) are in their late 20s/early 30s and we STILL separated into boy/girl groups. How the hell does that work?
HELLOOOOOOOOOOOOO. There was some group herpes action going around too.
So, I’ll talk about the date last night and since it includes some of my feelings, which are pretty consistent with BPD, I’m sticking it under a LJ-CUT
So IG#4 (his name is Sam) and I had been talking about meeting for a bit and finally agreed yesterday was the big date. We were going to meet at the GR Public Museum at 2pm, walk around and hit the planet-airum, do dinner, and then whatever. But plans kept changing because of the weather. So, I caught him online late yesterday morning and asked if he could bring the Whit Stillman movies with him that I didn’t own so that we could (if things went well), watch them later in the evening. Little did I know finding the movies would take several hours and by the time he hit grand rapids, it was already nearing 4:30pm.
We decided to meet at Barnes and Noble, to be “pretentious elitist asshats” (my words) on books. He had told me what he was wearing, and I had seen him walking down the middle of the parking lot as I was turning in. Since I had told him I was somewhat of a crazy driver, I gunned my engine and went tearing down the parking lot with the intent of stopping a few feet from him. He had gotten to the front of the store before I got close to him, but I did end up getting an awesome parking spot. I walked up, we shook hands, and entered the store.
For dress up, I opted to go super casual. I knew if I got “ho-banged up” (sara’s words), “hooched up” (jen”s words) or “tarted up” (my words), I’d be uncomfortable. I opted for my “Reading is Sexy tshirt,” with a pink camisole peeking underneath with my favorite jeans and these adorable cork wedge sandals I just bought that matched the shirt. My hair I left down (because I’m constantly being told people like it down better than up) and makeup was fairly minimal. I carried my clutch bag, which doubles as my bar purse, since I didn’t want to carry my normal everyday bag.
Things went off to a good start, lots of eye contact, body language was pretty groovy, and he got fairly smartassed which caused him to get smacked by my clutch bag at least once and a jokey argument almost lead to a banging of each other with coffee table books.
We were both getting pretty hungry, but he reallllllllllllly wanted to go to Vertigo (the local indie record store), which I resisted since going to Vertigo usually means I drop several hundreds of dollars and I can’t afford that. He promised to make it a quick trip, which I started twitching as I had already picked out a CD from the used bin that I wanted. I put the CD back and he paid for his purchases. We stopped at the video store next door to Vertigo and perused the foreign flicks since we are both fans and then headed off to Mikado for Sushi.
Mikado’s was closed, so I dropped him off at his car, lead him to my house to park his car and we then drove to Bombay for Indian (cos I’m lazy like that). Food was good, conversation was excellent. We split two dinners, lots of naan and samosas. We headed back to my place, I had him meet part of the posse (Jen, Mindy, and Kate). We walked the pugs, got settled in for movies.
We watched Metropolitan and Heathers, and literally spent the majority of the time separated by three pugs who decided to make it their business to lay all over Sam. No major flirting going on, really, our body language was pretty open but no one initiated anything. I was not about to (trying new theory of being less aggressive upon the first approach). But still, I wasn’t sure. During our last two weeks of conversation, I wasn’t sure if he was interested in me in a friend sort of way or in a romantic sort of way, so I asked him outright and he said romantic. But, he didn’t really flirt with me and I was getting highly self-conscious about it.
When the movies ended, we spent another couple of hours talking. We had been talking all night, even through the movies, and it was highly entertaining. He even commented it was a shame that we watched the second movie because he enjoyed talking to me so much and that he lusts after women he can hold conversations with. My library and musical tastes also rated big points with him as I apparently got cooler by the minute.
I wasn’t nervous. Which was weird, it just seemed we clicked on so many levels before with talking being with him just seemed natural.
So about 2:30a or so, it was getting late and we decided to call it a night. He wasn’t sure about seeing me again today (Monday) as he had to be at his parents later in the afternoon and he made plans for earlier in the day. He did say he wanted to spend next weekend with me as he’ll be in Grand Rapids helping a friend move and we are pseudo going to the Festival together. Apparently.
We walked ThePugKids for their nightly constitutional and brought them back in. We tap danced in my dining room for a bit and I could feel the tension getting tighter, the sexual tension. I wasn’t sure if I should just go lay one on him or what, when he did this swoop thing towards me that looked like he was going to kiss me but didn’t. I walked him down the stairs, as I had to lock up the front door, when he leans in like he’s going to kiss me. I step back and look at him, “Are you going to kiss me this time or are you going to do that swoop thing like you did before?” I eyed him suspiciously. He laughed and said no, he was really going to kiss me this time and we conked our heads as we went the same way. Giggled and went in for the kill.
Before I know it, I’m pinned up against the wall, hands above my head with his leg driven up to my crotch. It went from all friendly polite gentlemanly behaviour to BOOM. You could cut the sexual tension with a Ginsu and it would become dull. We’re throwing each other around my foyer like rag dolls and I’m surprised (literally) and didn’t come and see if I was okay we were THAT loud.
Hand, lips, bites, scratches. It was war and we both wanted to win and lose. I snaked my hand up underneath his tshirt and raked my nails down his back. He arched, moaned and said “I didn’t know I’d like that.” At one point, he was trembling, and I kept remembering saying to him was “Sam, sam, it’s okay, it’s okay.” For awhile we stood wrapped in each others arms in the foyer. I had ripped off his button down (good thing it was snap buttons) and his jacket and backpack were scattered on the floor. We were wrapped in each others arms with my head buried on his chest. He mumbled in my ear, “It feels to good to have you in my arms.” I smiled to myself and told him the only thing I wanted was to lay next to him, cuddled, in bed. No sex. He agreed he wanted that too. We tear back up the stairs and once we hit my dining room, bam, I was thrown up against the wall and we were all over each other again.
I stopped at some point and said, I can’t do this. He kept promising to be a gentlemen and I kept telling him, It’s not you, it’s ME! I can’t have a guy in my bed, whom I like and find myself sexually attracted to and NOT WANT TO RIP HIS CLOTHES OFF AND BAT HIM AROUND MY BEDROOM LIKE A RAGDOLL. Ahem. So there was that. He told me he wanted to see me again, and soon as possible.
Then I made the typical fatal mistake:
“Sam, what’s next.”
He kept going over and over about how much he liked me, and he thought i was incredibly groovy and how much he wanted to see me again. Because he works second shift, weekends were the only option. And he promised he’d see me next weekend for Festival.
But he got the deer caught in the headlights look. Things were getting really intense between us really quickly. Not just sexually (who knew?) but intellectually and mentally as well. While I was “into the moment” when we were all over each other, I kept conscious of how far I was “willing” to go. Like some level of me wanted nothing more then to unzip his pants, with the outside door wide open, and blow him until the sun came up. I wanted to just shed skin and crawl inside him. But we remained clothed.