yesteryear category archives

friday refrain · goin’ out to the brujo

Friday 21 November 2008 | 15 cookies in the jar

[But extra credit to anyone who can decipher Ms. Jackson's notoriously inscrutable gesture at 2:00 and 2:52, ending my twenty-year speculations?] Strange how you literally cannot watch her and not think about him. What we have inscribed on and into his body, deconstructing its blackness as surely as Elvis Presley took apart Big Mama Thornton. [...]

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crumpets

Wednesday 28 November 2007 | 3 cookies in the jar

Crumpets always make me think of Ms. Zlatarog— (my Dutch-Scots (Irish-Indonesian-Italian?) genius friend from Girton, currently a researcher who goes skiing in the Alps, has exquisite taste in fiction, and does something mysterious and smart and complicated with the amygdala and facial expressions and emotion; I don’t get to see her nearly enough because she’s [...]

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trying to catch up an old college friend

Friday 21 September 2007 | 4 cookies in the jar

It’s always revelatory to me to see what I leave out, what I choose to include. Maybe not so engrossing for my readers, but here’s the illustrated précis anyway (with most as thumbnails cos I got carried away uploading pictures). And now I betake me back to bed, where the menstrual faeries are slowly and [...]

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propaedeutics

Wednesday 22 August 2007 | 2 cookies in the jar

At the moment I’m finding the teaching associate training incredibly frustrating, which I’m sure is no secret to its four instructors, since I usually sit in the front row and glare balefully at them—at first, ever-optimistic despite myself that something exciting will happen; and then fighting boredom by ignoring the “discussion,” doing the next assigned [...]

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stump the bookseller

Sunday 13 May 2007 | someone left a cookie

How cool is Loganberry Books’ search feature where you pay $2, recall a treasured childhood book and see if the book clerks can find it?! I’m tempted to shell out, just to try to find a beloved picture book about a giant orange tabby who was the captain’s cat on a ship. The book was [...]

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vignettes of violence

Saturday 12 May 2007 | I like a cookie

You know those days where you just don’t understand anything in the world? So about a week ago, that beloved malapropism-in-newsprint the Santa Fe New Mexican ran a bone-rattlingly horrific story about a guy who knocked over his pregnant girlfriend with his pickup truck. He’d partially succeeded in running her over when a stranger tried [...]

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a day spent outside is a good day, encore

Friday 11 May 2007 | I like a cookie

Hey—I didn’t mean to bring anyone down with Friday Refrains. The possibility never even occurred to me, which maybe tells you something about being bipolar. Sorry if I repelled, offended or just plain grossed out anyone. After another sleepless night, another magnificent gardening day, yielding four count ‘em four biodegradable bags of dandelions (blown far [...]

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the modem’s working! quickly, blog….

Saturday 21 April 2007 | someone left a cookie

I’m doubly thrilled because it’s actually after four a.m., and I went to bed at ten—so for the first time in a week my sleep was nearly normal. Of course I did drug myself freely with Rozerem and Tylenol (which for some reason has a terribly soporific effect for me, and I use it off-label [...]

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the rent was due last week

Monday 22 January 2007 | I like a cookie

And in profound avoidance of this fact, I hid all weekend at the Brujo’s house. It worked out in one way, because his car was in the shop all weekend; but in another, it didn’t, in that now it’s Monday and has been Monday for hours; I need a shower like you wouldn’t believe; no [...]

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you already know

Monday 13 November 2006 | I like a cookie

Lemon verbena tisane. So I order, pour through the pretty silver strainer and sip, hoping it will be cooling, steadying; also, at $4 a pot, it’s all I can afford on the Hotel St. Francis menu. I’ve saved $5 especially for this afternoon date with my godmother—my other, second godmother—nous appellerons sa, Gail— Whom I [...]

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