6/27/11

Knives for Safety

And who wouldn't like to just move forward? That's why we're all here, right? I have some very exciting projects and performances coming up, but in order to get to them with a clear conscience, I think, in order to do that, we have some catching up to do.

For example, please check out this really cute video interview I did with ALEXANDER while I was in Berlin. It's viewable now on OUT THERE MAGAZINE's site. A few points of clarification:

- This was my last night in town.
- My movie audition didn't happen on that Tuesday (but I still don't want to talk about it).
- I don't know how I pulled the word "Asphalt" out of the ether, in terms of the Chanel nail polish I was describing. The color I was thinking of was "Graphite" from the F/W 2012 collection.

So I flew back to NYC last week (I already said this but am catching up) and went straight to Bobo's going away party. Here's a picture of me hiding in the garden she planted in her mom's backyard in Queens.


Can you spot Billy?

Getting from JFK to Bobo's mom's house in Flushing was easy. Getting home from Queens was fucking insane. PLD and Jiddy and I eventually ended up taking a cab, from Long Island City. I don't want to get into it. I was exhausted.

Monday I woke up early, went to the gym, cleaned my room, did laundry, went grocery shopping, cooked myself dinner AND had time to do a little personal pleasure-seeking, as a way of ending vacation. I dragged PLD with me to go to the Chanel boutique in SoHo to scope the new limited edition F/W 2012 Cha'Nail colors. I ended up not being that into the Graphite. I was really into, however, PERIDOT. Peridot is my birth stone, because I was born in August. It's a great idea. It's gold AND green. I am obsessed. Perfect Lil Daniel, however, opted for the Graphite. She's an academic so I guess it makes more sense for her (y'know, mechanical pencils, school supplies).




But who will wear the Quartz?

Incidentally, a cursory websearch on Peridot (remember when we used to go to libraries?) reveals that it was also Cleopatra's favorite jewel. THINGS CLEOPATRA AND I HAVE IN COMMON. Just kidding. My favorite jewel is probably not Peridot.

The week since then has been pretty fantastic. Last week I went to a couple shows, which I hadn't done in a long time. I saw NU SENSAE play last week and loved their set. This really cool band WHITE LUNG was on tour with them. Such great bands! I love the kids! Good energy! That, combined with seeing the Bush Tetras on Friday (along with the really fantastic openers, the Coathangers, FRIENDS and Religious to Damn ) makes me really want to go to a lot more rock shows. Like: Oh, RIGHT. This is where the cool punk girls hang out. Duly noted. I want in. If you're in a cool band, invite me to your show. I will come. Let's mosh.

I will wear earplugs though. I'm not that crazy.

Hey speaking of crazy, this weekend! You guys! even just Saturday night. I hung out with some of the best people in the world: Bobo, Colita Escolita, P.L.D., Ptrck the Witch, and soul-sister demigoddess Erin Markey (also a Leo, also born in August, she can borrow my Peridot nail polish anytime she wants).

Oh also at the amazing EVERYBOOTY dance party, DJ Lady Miss Kier played one of my songs, "Come on Billy".




So basically I can die. Basically: amazing. Oh my gosh. Wow.

Last night Bobo took me to Ikea so I could get a dresser. I got halfway through putting it together before I got too tired and gave up. Tonight, though! It's gonna happen.

My room will be clean and organized. Soon.
Okay, keep your eyes peeled for the future.
It's almost here.

6/25/11

One of the things I really liked doing in Berlin was going to Rossman's, the oldest drugstore in Germany. Especially for their weird vitamin supplements, like this one:



Great idea, right? Totally jives with this over idea I'd been having, about a beauty regimen:



You guys I saw the Bush Tetras last night! They were so great. I sort of thought, on the way over, that what if they like have all these younger members and are doing a totally different thing? Like, what if they only wanna play new songs? I guess I would understand (I mean, it's their band) but I would be a little disappointed. Anyway it was all of the original members and they played a really great mix of old and new songs. They began with "Things that go Boom in the Night" and it was just a really fantastic show. I'd like to to take this opportunity to ask anyone reading this to revisit the Bush Tetras and their fantastic song "Too Many Creeps" which is kind of an anthem I've taken to hear about living in NYC:



So Gay Marriage is finally legal in NY State. I guess I can stop being a curmudgeon about it. No really, I am personally really happy and glad if this decision makes queer people here feel less isolated, dehumanized or punished. I hope that the good feelings this brings up will inspire us to work for other oppressed people here in our state, to make a situation in which we all feel safe, valued and accounted for. It's a beautiful day.

I'm going to the gym.

6/24/11

FOUR, PACKED

I was talking to someone last weekend, while I was on vacation in Berlin, about my life in New York. And without thinking about it, I found myself talking about the new Beyoncé record. Like, "Well, then this other crazy thing happened to me." I think of a new Beyoncé album as a milestone not only in her life, but mine as well. I was never really into Destiny's Child, but I remember waiting for Dangerously In Love to come out, and buying it at Virgin Megastore in Union Square when I was in college. I loved that record. I still do. I was also really into Speak My Mind, something about the idea of a secret album always appealed to me. B'Day is perhaps one of my favorite records of all time. I remember buying it when it first came out, too. My friend Joanna and I were newly graduated from college, and were driving around NYC one afternoon in September and listened to the whole album. It is one of my happiest memories in the world. B'Day is such an amazing record. I wasn't so into I Am... Sasha Fierce. I dunno. I liked it alright. It seemed a little too pretty for my taste. Or something.

Anyway I really love 4 and have been listening to it for a couple of weeks. I'm totally obsessed. I've been taking notes on it and I wanted to post some of my thoughts. I don't have the energy to write another essay-ish thing, and I don't care to. In college, my favorite Art History professor really liked my final senior paper, but said that I ought to "unpack" my thoughts. I guess the idea is that you're supposed to do that, but I haven't been so into unpacking since then. Not all the time, anyway. So.



SOME OF MY THOUGHTS ON THE NEW BEYONCÉ ALBUM 4, PACKED:

- THIS JUST IN: B can sing. I mean, we all knew she was a good singer already. It's why she's famous. But she sounds really fantastic on the new record. Very raw, high in the mix, and in complete control of what sounds like a newly-trained, articulate, precise instrument. Her voice sounds different (and better) than it ever has on any of her other records.

- Beyoncé's interest in Rock music is totally fascinating. She is a pop star at heart, and her use of rock and roll is always sort of... off, somehow. It's something to the left of center. It is never dead-on rock or pop or anything. There is something slightly unsettling to her poses. In this regard, the tenuous relationship to rock and roll, I would liken her to Pat Benatar. Beyoncé is sort of the heir to the Benatar legacy. Think about it. (ASIDE: check out this wonderful interview between Patricia Benatar and Lydia Lunch from a 1985 issue of Spin).

- So many references in the music. I feel like the harmonies in first line of "Party" ("I may be young but I'm READY,") sound eerily like early Alanis Morissette. Beyoncé loves Alanis. This is what I mean. Why rip off the style of Jagged Little Pill? It's funny. It's strange. It implies a certain decisive choice on Beyoncé's part. Why not rip off, oh, anything else in the last 20 years? Why that? It's great. It's stupefying. It's unique. It does what pop music should do (make you think, and not think at the same time). "Party" is incidentally not my favorite song on the album, I must admit (Kanye; I love you, but you're phoning it in), but the vocals are worth paying close attention to.

- I've always held the opinion that Beyoncé's songs seemed to center on a kind of climax. Something along the lines of a breakdown/breakthrough. This is the logic of her art: the logic is that of an explosion. Her new record, though, painstakingly expands the climactic moment, distorting it from a time-space event into an entire style. The breakthrough is the whole thing. Suddenly, her own Universe opens up. The new record is a missive from planet B, where everything makes sense, if only with its own idiosyncratic logic. This is not unlike a Kate Bush record.

- Beyoncé is showing off. She doesn't need to. Beyoncé is finding ways to employ melisma beyond bragging rights. The songs themselves, the vocal melodies are complex, surprising, engaging and beautiful. There is no reason to shred them with unnecessary notes. B is finding ways to avoid doing this. New uses.

- Much has been (and will be) made of the retro-inspired, delicious "Love On Top". I've seen comparisons to early 80s Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson, and I get that. I'd further submit, though, that it's actually closer to (I would like to think intentionally) to the late great Teena Marie. "Love On Top" is formally about a bygone era. A coded way of singing. This type of music doesn't exist anymore, and this type of love does not exist anymore. It's sad and sweet.

- There's a huge mix of references throughout 4. The lead single "Run The World (Girls)" samples "Pon de Floor" and "Till the End of Time" samples Fela Kuti. The next single "Best Thing I Never Had" sounds remarkably like Vanessa Carlton, perhaps Celine Dion's "All Coming Back To Me". The references ("Killing me softly") are not new. Beyoncés art practice as such (shut up, she totally has one) has been, from the outset of her career with Destiny's Child, about context. In order to Run the World, you need to Know the World. Beyoncé has mentioned in recent interviews that she took some time off before making this record, to see other live music performed. B doesn't live in some ivory tower. She doesn't seem to see herself as an icon, a maverick, a single voice in the wilderness of culture. She is not out to blow everyone's minds with the force of her ability to "create" something out of nothing.

Rather, Beyoncé is interested in situating herself within discourses we already know, and making us look twice. Her new record is a comment on the meaning of context. It seems to ask how and why we listen to her work, and asks us to examine our habitual modes of engaging. Can you hear a new Beyoncé song and also hear last summer's party jam at the same time? The new record is basically a blog. It's a Tumblr. It's a way of summarizing one's influences, almost letting the exquisite corpse of your favorite records become a stand-in for the person. But then B also sings over all the references. She comments. She uses what we know to make something we did not know yet. She gives us clues on how to use it, too.

- It's like a blog, but it also sort of reminds me of a 4AD compilation. Maybe one of Ivo Watts-Russel's This Mortal Coil albums. The one constant on the record is B. But even B is changeable. Is she Sasha Fierce? Is she King B? Who is she? There is some other common thread here, maybe even the tautological fact that since it is on a Beyoncé record, this is what she sounds like now.

- My one complaint about it is with the syrupy ballad "I Was Here". Not because it's a ballad or anything; it's a perfectly beautiful song. I'm upset by this because it implies a certain longing for Beyoncé to control, articulate her legacy. In short: I am afraid that the song means that she wants to quit making music. It feels like a possible goodbye.

Around the time of B'Day, Beyoncé said that she had hoped to retire by the time she was 30. She will turn 30 this September. Y'know what? I also would like to retire by the time I am 30. Here is the uneasy, dark heart of Beyoncé's work, most perfectly articulated by her new album 4: Beyoncé and my generation is a Generation of Quitters. We abdicate. We defer. We would rather listen to the next song on the radio. We are impatient. Her music is music for a generation who is scared to commit. A world of 30 year-olds unwilling to take up the mantle of responsibility for our own lives. And she knows that the only way out, to save ourselves from the apocalypse of our own inborn apathy, is to address it. B's album looks like a party, a metropolis. But it's actually a bonfire she's made and invited us to, and is daring us to jump onto it as if a funeral pyre.

6/23/11



Do you ever feel like a song was written just for you? Like, as if it were a message through time to get to you? I feel like this all the time. Like not necessarily that the world is out to get me (not 100% of the time) and also not like the universe is conspiring for my personal success, necessarily (again, not 100% of the time, not always). I definitely feel like the universe is conspiring (planning something) though. How can you not?

6/21/11

Coming Up Table

So as you know, I was in Berlin last week. I don’t even know how to talk about the last week and a half, so I guess I will just go chronologically to play catch-up.

FRIDAY
I took the day off work and got up at 6:00am to go to the gym. I packed my gigantic Comme des Garçons full of clothes and zines and everything, since I insisted on bringing only one carry-on bag to Germany with me.


It was hella cute. And hella heavy.

And then I waited for my car to come. I got to the Airport ridiculously early for my 5 o clock flight, and noticed I was on the same flight as the inimitable SHERRY as well as RYAN from Fischerspooner, Ssion, etc. I tried and tried, but did not sleep a bit on the flight over.

SATURDAY
I arrived in Berlin at 7am like a zombie and slowly made my way via U-Bahn to my friend Stevie Hanley’s house. He was an excellent host and let me nap for bit while he did some errands. We went to a couple art shows for the excellent Based in Berlin exhibits, and he took me to look at some of his new paintings at his studio in Neukoln. We went out for amazing Turkish food on Oranienstrasse, and I promptly decided to not be a big baby about eating fresh vegetables. The food was great, more so for the fact that in order to enjoy it I had to face my fears of death. We stopped by the Silver Future for a drink on our way back to his place in Kreuzberg. Although there was a performance by Berlin It-Girl Mary Ocher that night, I begged off due to exhaustion and passed out early.

SUNDAY
I could hardly contain my excitement! My wonderful soulmate La JohnJoseph had been performing in Koln the night before, and was on his way back to Berlin. Stevie and I woke up extra early and went out for (at my insistence) coffee and pastries up the street. Kxberg is such a party town, and it was nice to see it all calm and quiet and beautiful in the morning. Stevie and I went to some more museums for the Based in Berlin exhibition, which was nice, and went out for very nice coffee, while we waited for JJ to get back.

And then he did! And we were reunited! He is so gorgeous and wonderful. We hugged for so long. It was great. His apartment is gorgeous and I got my OWN ROOM since his roommate was out. It was just so great. We went out for pizza and to scope the tech situation at the Silver Future, where JJ’s disco alter ego Alexander is doing a series of shows in July.

Next I got ready for my performance and Dj set at Berlin’s most infamous and controversial gay art sex party dance night, PORK at the club Ficken3000. Tennessee Brian, the host, was so gracious and wonderful to me. Monday was a national holiday in Germany, so a ton of people were out partying all night. Boys, girls, in-between-and-beyonders. German, American, Irish, everyone. All cramped into this tiny little sexclub/party space/bar/evening. I did my little performance and thought I did an okay job. I began with a cover of Laura Nyro’s “And When I Die” which I think always sets a nice tone for things. It’s such an awesome song, I can’t do it justice, and guess what? I don’t even try. I just want to convey the way that song makes me feel, and I think I do a pretty good job of this. After my little set, I DJ’ed the party for a bit, which was more nerve-wracking than it sounds. I haven’t DJ-ed in so long, and I definitely remembered why. It’s stress full! La JohnJoseph and I used to Dj at EasternBloc every Tuesday night Happy Hour, from 7-10, at our party, which we called YUMMY!. No one ever came to this party, but it was still quite nerve-wracking. I managed to get fired from this DJ gig, which is interesting considered I wasn’t paid or anything. SO: bad DJ luck in the past for Billy. I was so scared, and kept wondering “What do German kids want to dance to?” The answer is, pretty much anything. Especially the new Beyoncé single, and also, inexplicably, “Fergalicious”. Such a guilty pleasure song. These girls (I later found out they were Irish) went NUTS for it. So nice! Brian had, in his DJ set, played Janet Jackson’s “Escapade”. When I started Dj-ing (in Germany, if you are a lady DJ, you are known as a DJane—cute, huh?) a nice soft butch German girl approached the booth and asked if I would play Janet Jackson. I said I could do that, but we JUST heard a song.
“Yes,” the girl said “’Escapade’.”
“Yeah,” I said, over the music, “Brian just played that, so… was there another Janet song you wanted to hear?”
“Yes!” the girl’s eyes lit up “Can you please play ‘Escapade’?”
“Yeah, I mean… he JUST played that…”
I played “Together Again” and everyone seemed to like it. Go figure. Eventually JJ and I went home to sleep.

MONDAY
JohnJoseph and I went to this new vegan restaurant just opened down the street from his flat, called KUCHEN MAFIA for vegan brunch. The food was excellent, the service was frosty and continental. Great! I took another of many naps, and we walked along the canal near his house. It was gorgeous. We listened to the new Planningtorock album W, sitting on the floor of JJ’s apartment. I’ve been spending a lot of time sitting on floors and listening to this record with friends, and I think this practice is making me a happier person. I dunno. A great way to spend an afternoon. Soon, the legendary Sophie Iremonger came by, and it was such a thrill to meet her. We were then joined by Stevie and had a grand time. JJ and I couldn’t convince them, however, to join us for the queer party at Monster Ronson’s, where JJ’s friend Joey Handsome was Dj-ing. JJ and I went and were too “tired” to sing, but we watched a lot. Another early night, at least by Berlin standards.

TUESDAY
I went shopping, what can I say? The amazing B.CALLA (whose couture I wore onstage all week) gave me a list of places to check out. I went by myself to the CdG shop in Berlin, to Apartment and WoodWood and Star Styling. I got some great Comme des Garçons SYNTHETIC cologne at WoodWood: SKAI, which is meant, from what I understand, to smell like fake leather. It smells really great.


I love it.

Met back up with JJ and Stevie, and we went to this really great German restaurant near Gorlizter park for authentic German food (spaetzle, which apparently I fucking love) and this delicious Berliner Weiße, sweetened and dyed green with Waldmeister.


So delicious!

We retired for a mini-party at Stevie’s studio, where we hung out with Evelyn, a lovely Americanische girl who is long been friends with Stevie and La JJ, and was incidentally my first and last girlfriend. We’re both gay now. It was great to hang out with her at Stevie’s studio. We all had a great time talking about all sorts of nonsense, and then felt sleepy once more so went home to retire.

WEDNESDAY
The other main reason I made JJ go home early with me is that aside from being a total baby about staying up late, I had made a date for us very early on Wednesday morning. What date? Well, getting breakfast with the legendary Miss Vaginal Crème Davis, of course. When I saw Vag give her brilliant lecture at NYU last year, she mentioned that she is an early bird, and is always looking for other early birds to have breakfast with in Berlin. So being as I am a huge fan and admirer of Ms. Davis, as well as an early bird myself, I made an appointment for Wednesday morning. And try as I may, we were totally late getting there. We got lost. Vag was very gracious about it, and we met up with her and Manuel Schubert at a nearby restaurant and had a gorgeous breakfast and chitchat. After our meal, we retired to Vag’s abode, all decked out in decoupage (she ought to be an interior designer, in addition to everything else) and sat in on an interview she was doing for Manuel’s podcast series Film Highlights. We gossiped about Hollywood, Berlin, boys, music, life and art. Vag is such a hero of mine, and a truly sweet person. I was so thrilled I got to hang out with her! So fucking rad.

JJ and I went back to KreutzKoln to get ready for our reading that night, an event called BORDERLINES at a far-out part of town called Treptower park. A black cat stalked around the beautiful room we were reading in, with our lovely hosts Thomas Gotz Von Aust and Andreas Schwartz. The crowd was full of friends and we had a great time. And a lot of white wine (my favorite!). After our reading we tried in vain to see the eclipse, but Stevie and JJ and I went out for Thai food. It was pretty good! We walked home and passed the heck out, again!

THURSDAY
Another beautiful morning in Berlina. I got up early and went on a mini-adventure to The Corner, this super luxe clothes store. It was kind of total Zzzs fest. The nice thing was that on my way there I got totally lost, and found the Ritter Sport store! Where I learned a lot about Ritter Sports, watched a short documentary about them, saw the diorama exhibit, and got to sample some of the limited edition flavors. Rock the fuck on. Having had my dessert, I went back to JJ’s hood and went to the Best Falafel Place In the World, where this lovely ancient old old old old lady makes falafel sandwiches by hand and it takes forever and she speaks only German and so it was hard. And it’s also hard to find. But I found it! I got my sandwich! It was totally worth the hassle. So excellent.

JohnJoseph and I met up and hung out for a bit, getting ready to go to the legendary German photographer Iwalja Klinke’s house for one of her equally legendary dinner parties. There we saw Sophie, Evelyn, Mary Ocher, Tennessee Brian as well as a pair of lovely Swedish boys who had these really gorgeous painted nails. I had to leave the dinner party before the food was served, because I had to run across town to do my sound check for that night’s show at Chantal’s House of Shame. Chantal was, sadly, out of town, in Israel, where the documentary about her long-running and amazing party (HOUSE OF SHAME) was debuting at the film festival in Tel Aviv. So she was out. I found my way to the venue and did my little sound check. Thomas, the promoter, wasn’t there. It was an empty club except for me, the sound guy Frank, and another tough-looking guy who was playing pinball. As I passed Pinball Guy on my way to the stage, he got upset at the pinball machine and started screaming in German, kicking and punching the machine. He saw me and started screaming at me and gesticulating wildly.

I thought I was going to die.

So, I did what any good half-Jewish performance artist would do, I hopped right onstage and insisted that I do my sound check right then. At least if Pinball was gonna kill me, I’d be in my spotlight. So as I checked the microphone, Pinball paced the empty club back and forth, still screaming at me, and mocking me every time I said “Check, check, one, two”. At some point, he got right up to the stage and began pointing at me, staring at me and screaming something over and over and over. I thought “okay, this is going to end really badly.” Finally, Frank, the sound guy, yelled at me over the sounds of Pinball’s shouts to inform me that in fact, Pinball was asking if I wanted something to drink. I asked for a beer. He got me a beer and left me along. Sound check being done, I ran the fuck out of the club and went back to Iwalja’s for my dinner, which she had lovingly saved for me. I collected La JohnJoseph and we went back to the club for the performance, only to notice that the nice Swedish boys had come along! They had to catch a flight back to native Stockholm in the morning and decided to spend their last night backstage with us at Chantal’s House of Shame. How sweet! I wish I could remember their names. So we all hung out backstage drinking and carrying on. Various contingencies of German clubgoers poked their heads backstage to hang out with us. A pair of girls came in to snort lines off of the club’s fliers, and show each other pictures of their ex boyfriends. Old creepy dudes came in to ogle us. Some folks just came in to, I guess, test their English-language skills? Or maybe because there was a huge fucking sign above the curtained door that said BACKSTAGE and they wanted to meet the performer. I really do have the NICEST fans. My little monsters.

My show was great, I must say. I had perhaps a bit much to drink beforehand but I was still afraid that the bouncer, Pinball, was going to murder me, so I drank to calm my nerves. And because drinks were free. A lovely new fan, also incidentally from Israel, invited me and JJ to record a video letter to Björk on his iPad in his car. We obliged. I wish I had that fucking video. Anyway after the show I convinced some other of my fans to help me get paid, which I did, and then our Israeli driver took me and JJ all over town and then to the U-Bahn stop to catch our ride home. What a long and adventurous day it was. Really. Yikes.

FRIDAY
JohnJoseph worked on some business stuff in the morning, so I took myself for a little stroll past the Turkish street markets to sit by the canal and enjoy my coffee. I basked in the sun and watched swans swim down the canal. It was actually incredibly perfect.

La JohnJoseph and Stevie and Sohpie and Evelyn and I checked out this rad art gallery crawl called 48 hours in Neukoln. A really fun night. I felt so much like my life is now caught up. Like I’m not waiting anymore to participate in my life. At least not as much. Maybe this feeling will not last. Maybe I will recover my anxiety. Something, though, about a spontaneous food fight in a foreign city in the middle of the night with old friends and new, was really liberating.

SATURDAY
La JohnJoseph and Stevie and I went to the best store ever, KaDeWe to get fancy cakes. It was so fantastic. Really exciting and definitely a highlight of my trip. I had to run, though, afterward, to meet up with Iwajla for a photoshoot at her apartment. She’s a fantastic artist and I can’t wait to see the shots we took. I mean, I got a preview. They’re cute. You’ll see. JohnJoseph and I went to a very cool party called TOP SECRET and I can’t tell you where it was, but it was rad. Our fantastic Israeli driver/BFF was there, took us to his studio nearby to take some more photos of us (it never ends) and gave me some cool clothes for my trip back home. After the party JJ and I got pizza and I went home to try to sleep before my flight. I couldn’t sleep. Boo.

SUNDAY
Got up at the fucking crack of dawn to go to Tegel to fly home. The flight was full of German schoolchildren, teenagers, and I did not like them one bit. The food on Air Berlin was kind of cool though. I had the foresight (rare, for me) to request vegan meals. So there was a modicum of ceremony about serving me first, etc. On the flight back, delirious as I was with no sleep, I also got what felt like an excessive amount of free alcohol. Maybe they gave us booze because the kids were so obnoxious. I watched the following films on my flight back:

- Meet the Fockers (which I loved)
- The King’s Speech (which I thought was just OK)
- How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days (which was kind of lame, but I love Matthew McConaughey)

Arrived at JFk just in time to go to Bobo’s going-away party at her house in Queens. I saw a bunch of my NYC friends, and, sad as I was to leave JohnJoseph and Berlin behind, it was nice to be welcomed with Champagne and love.

And I am exhausted. But happy.

6/2/11

Superior Mother


I got a fern when I was upstate last weekend. I forgot to mention that. A Green Fantasy fern.

I've been sleeping really badly. It's like my mind just can't get used to the idea of sleep. I said this a few times over the weekend, so I thought I'd repeat it here. I often feel like a crazy person, but nothing makes me feel more insane than when I can't sleep. I had kind of an insane attempt at sleep last week, on Wednesday night. I only slept for about three hours, and ended up leaving work early on Thursday. I felt pretty bad about it, but I think I need to count "insomnia" as an actual affliction. Or something. Give myself a break.

So I've been complaining a lot. What's new. My friends all have these interesting theories as to why I have such bad insomnia: maybe I need to, ironically, stop taking the supplements I take to help me sleep, maybe I need more exercise, maybe I need a better diet, maybe I need a new mattress. Something.

MAYBE I NEED A VACATION.

So excited to be flying to BERLIN this Friday!

And I am doing some DATES there:

- Sunday 6/12: I will be DJ-ing at PORK @ Ficken3000 (Urbanstr. 70) 10pm. 3 Euros! I *MIGHT* be persuaded to sing a few numbers as well. You NEVER KNOW.

- Wednesday 6/15: I will be reading with La JohnJoseph at the BORDERLINES reading series, at
Alt-Stralau 70, 8pm 5 Euros.

- Thursday 6/16: I will be performing at Chantal's House of Shame at BASSY Club (Schönhauser Allee 176) 1am. 7 Euros.

So fucking excited! I'm mostly excited to hang out with La JohnJoseph. And to be on VACATION. I will likely not be blogging as much over there. I say that now but knowing me, I'll get bored and end up spending untold minutes writing instead of hanging out. I just want some fucking pastries. And those pink French cigarettes they sell over there.

Ugh. I guess it's really summer.



The beginning of summer is always like waking up and being asleep at the same time. It's such a trip. I can't really believe it. It feels like drugs (I'm sober). That's why I called the zine Scorcher becuz summers are sacred. Anyway I'm going on vacation and I can hardly believe it.

I've been a little bit in denial about it and not preparing, or something. I guess I don't need to prepare much. I need to pack. My plan is to bring everything in one large-ish carry-on bag. I am going for nine days. Is that crazy? I don't really think so. There will be a washing machine there. And, you know. Limiting myself, or whatever. Traveling light. I don't know what shoes to bring. ("So today I am having a crisis. And why? Because I can’t match a dress with a pair of shoes. I am embarrassed to say that." -- Miuccia Prada, New Yorker 3/12/04) I guess there are just so many things to think about. Infinite opportunities for better vibes and more good choices and outlooks. Mindful-ness.



So obsessed with this song, all the time.