Lunar Obverse

It’s “Mistaken Identity” weekend here at Chez Luna.

First, on Friday I met a friend, who asked me in advance if a friend of hers could come along. I said, “sure, no problem.” For some reason, I was expecting the as-yet-unmet person to be a 50-ish aging hippy. And she turned out to be a red-haired green-eyed anthropologist-slash-model. (Yes, my friend does have a friend like the one I was expecting; I just got mixed-up, is all.)

Then, today I was meeting face-to-face with someone I met online, and I had thought she was a 26-year-old dark-haired woman of Portuguese ancestry — but she wasn’t. She was in her 30’s, a red-haired woman of Caucasian descent.

Joke’s on me, I guess. I’m flexible. Had a good time anyway, both times.

Not that I care, or listen, but the universe is obviously trying to tell me something…

Qwest still has not ported my landline number to my cell phone. I have lots of details but no time to divulge them in the rant-y manner in which they so completely deserve.

I’ve been dealing with Devin (Qwest employee #8220, direct phone number 602-665-4765). Well, if you call me leaving voice mails for him for the past half-week and not geting a fucking phone call back “dealing with”.

Oops, did I just post his phone number? Damn, now he’s on the IntarWeb.

NOTE: Please do not call the number I just posted above. Devin is a busy man and I’m sure that he’s hard at work resolving my issue, and I’m sure he doesn’t need any distractions from the fine job he’s doing for Qwest. I only posted it so that I would have reference to it when I need to call him.

One final question: How in the hucking fell does a company get away with such obvious disrespect for their customers?

Whew!

Been busy lately, and I have had lots of experiences and events to blog about, but just haven’t had the time.

Moved into a new apartment two weeks ago.

Saw the movie “Coffee and Cigarettes” — very funny. Any movie that has appearances by both Bill Murray and a Tesla coil (built by Jack White of the White Stripes!) gets a thumb’s up by me. “So, Jack, aren’t you going to tell me about your Tesla coil?”

Threw a housewarming party for myself last weekend, had a great time. Used my Nalgene bottle as a margarita shaker and now it smells like tequila! Not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Although I was under the impression that Nalgene bottles never pick up a smell that couldn’t be washed out. When the party rolled out into the street and I woke the neighbors cracking the 8′ bullwhip I’d picked up in Mexico last Christmas I knew that this was one of the best parties I’d ever thrown. There will be more, oh, yes.

Hmm… could do a review of “The Sparrow” by Mary Doria Russell. A friend lent it to me when she found out I was an atheist. OK, I don’t know that the two thoughts were connected in her mind, but she did mention my “beliefs” when loaning it to me. It was a surprisingly well-written novel about a Jesuit expedition to another planet for a first contact with an alien species… or two… Thought-provoking. But I don’t want to spoil my coming conversation with my friend about this (are you reading, Anna?) so I’ll say no more for now.

My PC won’t frickin’ boot up. Just clicks through the speakers. I’ve tried troubleshooting it and have had no success. Sucks. Looks like either the power supply, the motherboard, or the processor is blown. Happened after the lightning storm earlier this week, although I’m sure that’s a coincidence. I powered it down and unplugged it during the storm just because I didn’t want anything to happen to it. Grumble, grumble. Now I have to build me a new PC. Oh, well, my trusty iBook is still up and running… (What? Me, tempting fate? I don’t believe in fate, remember?)

I’ve gained 5 lb since the party. Weird. Probably just a random fluctuation. It’s dropping back to what it was before, though. If it went up and stayed up for a while I’d be more worried.

Vitamins do help my running. Guess I have to start watching my actual nutrition, not just calories.

Went to a book reading at Powell’s by Davy Rothbart, of Found Magazine and it was so very very funny. Davy is a guy who finds things; photos, tossed-away notes and letters, personal items… and he scans them or takes pictures and puts them in his magazine. It’s funny and sad, seeing into random people’s lives and the stuff they write, never knowing the whole story, or even whether the intended recipient received the note or not. Davy’s brother also sang two songs based on items that appeared in Found — one song had me (and, apparently, only me) laughing uproariously, which only made it funnier. I could write so much more about that reading… that deserves a full post.

Shit. So much stuff, so much rich material… and I have to turn them into bullet points. Each one of those things deserves a full post all by itself. It’s funny; when I had almost nothing going on in my life, I had lots of time to write but not a lot to say. Now that I’ve got a much fuller life, I have no time to document or create stories. Paradox.

Ray Charles passed away today, at the age of 73.

I’m listening to “Shake A Tail Feather” from the Blues Brothers movie soundtrack in tribute, on repeat. It’s the only thing of his I’ve got on my iPod.

C’mon, sing it with me…

{ lead voice, keys, solo }
“Well, I heard about the fella you’ve been dancing with
All over the neighborhood
Well, why didn’t you ask me, baby?
Or didn’t you think I could?

{ band joins in }

Well I know that the Boogiloo is out of sight
but the shingaling she’s paying tonight
but if that were you and me haughty baby
I would have shown you how to do right!
Do it right, ( ah ha ), do it right
Do it right, ( do it right ), (( do it right ))

(( Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! ))

(( Twisting, shake-it shake-it shake-it shake-it baby ))

(( Heaven go loop-dee-loop )), shake it up baby

(( Heaven go loop-dee-li ))

{ low } Bend over and let me see you shake your tail feather

{ mid joins } Bend over and let me see you shake your tail feather

{ All } Come on and let me see you shake your tail feather
Come on and let me see you shake your tail feather
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

{ repeat chorus }
Come on! Come on baby!
Come on-on, yeah come on baby
Alright, do the twist
Do the fly, oh!
Do the swim, ha ha ha
and do the bird
Wo do the jerk
and do the monkey
Hey hey The Watusi
and uh what about the fool
Do the mash potato!
What about the boogiloo
Or the phoney moroney
Come on and do the twist
(( Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! ))
Twisting, shake-it shake-it shake-it shake-it baby
Twisting, skake-it shake-it shake-it shake-it baby

After the thunderstorm passed last night, I went out for a run. I planned on doing the Three Park Run, 3.5 miles. I know, I know, I ran the day before and I probably shouldn’t run two days in a row. But the Sunday run was out of sequence for me and I wanted to get back to the proper every-other-day sequence. Which is one reason I ran after work, not before — more than 24 hours since my last run.

I didn’t have high hopes for this run, considering my fear that I run for shit in the afternoon. But, I have been taking vitamins (a multi, a Super B-complex, a C, and a calcium and potassium supplement), plus I wasn’t going for speed, just endurance. I wanted to go the distance. I wanted to finish without walking.

And I did it! I now have a mental success to counter my fear. I only had to stop running and walk when traffic forced me to. I did the run in the opposite route of before: first towards Johnson Creek Park, then through Westmoreland, then uphill to Sellwood Park and back home. I have no idea what my time was; it felt like slower than a 10:00 pace. And I was afraid the thunderstorm (or at least the rain) would come back — it didn’t.

I also added push ups and sit ups to my routine. I’m going to track how many I can do, and do them every day. I went rock-climbing (indoors, at the Portland Rock Gym) on Saturday and I found I have very little upper-body strength. Gotta work on that. Come to think of it, I haven’t been to the gym in weeks and weeks… that would help, too.

My weight peaked after my party on Saturday. Got up over 176 lb. and freaked me out. But it’s coming back down, and I’m relieved to discover that it was probably just water gain. Or at least liquid (beer, tequila, vodka, sake…). Today I’m back in the “zone” — 173.5.

Stupid rain.

Stupid stupid rain, first it ruins my run this morning, then it ruins my one freakin’ day to goof off outside.

Stupid, stupid rain.