"it was a good reading. i don't care what everyone else says."-- jake

tonight I did a feature at zippy's java lounge in everett. felt good about it, though the crowd was appreciatively unresponsive. . . unresponsively appreciative? I think it is not a room that lends itself to raucous sorts of participation i.e. Poetry Night or The Crunch, but has a bit "bigger" feel than a lot of coffee shops, so spacing it out can be difficult.

Setlist:
Neo Takes the Blue Pill
Little Red Corvette
Zombies and Paint Thinner
Cafe Across . . .
Beneath the Cathedral
Get Smart!
Rucksacks
Ambition is Critical
Paintings of Famous Satanists

I realised afters that just because I close with my two favourites in the book doesn't mean they'll be crowd pleasers.
But. It was great to see loads of friends and family there (from camp and abroad, new and old) and getting to hang out with Chris/Ryan/Jake always serves both as fun and grounding. Reading at Chris' house in December, too which I'm excited for.

on the way home I listened to Pack Up the Cats for the first time in about 3 years. My copy still skips.

Doctor, doctor

I don't often write politics here; I would hardly describe myself as a-political, but my levels of information intake and activism pale in comparison to many of my friends.

Still, its been with interest I've tracked the Health Care Reform bill and debate surrounding it. Precisely because I'm one of the people that Obama wants to help. I'm not the most heart-wrenching story, granted, but it's been about 10 years at least since I've been able to go to a U.S. doctor. I had more comprehensive coverage as a student-visitor to the U.K. than I have here. For the most part, I've just made the best of it and in my more health-conscious moments hoped that the old "apple-a-day" adage is true.

For most of our lives, this has been true with regards to my parents. As Dad said "there were a lot of times we just had to give you some aspirin and hope it got better."*

So, on the surface I'm glad that the health care bill passed the House of Reps. I don't love doctors, but I'd like to go. But I'm kind of scared.
I'm not scared that Obama is going to plunge the nation into a socialist welfare state akin to Communist Russia or whatever. I'm not really that scared that right-wing reactionism will prompt actual attempts at secessionism or what-have-you, either.

But. Watching the way the parties have been batting this bill back and forth, the complete lack of actual discussion (nothing new, really) and level of public frustration, I'm not convinced anything good can come. From my heady days in Youth and Government, I know it takes one poorly worded line to change the entire meaning of a bill. And Max Bacchus has written a 1,000 page epic. You don't have to be a let-them-eat-caker to approach that with caution.

What I'm afraid of is that a bill will make it through that's been gutted by republicans and saddled with impossible and impractical retaliatory provisions by democrats. And that when it finally passes, in whatever form it is, Obama will sign it because he has to. He's created a situation in which its political suicide to not sign a bill that comes through. And we'll be left with a system that costs taxpayers a shitload of money, creates loads of new bureacracy, endangers existing practices and after all that I still won't be able to go to the doctor.

That. Is what I'm afraid of.


*I still have some un-fond memories of the doctor's office.

new writing project:

I'm trying my fingers at Nanowrimo.

So far I have half a page. If this is the pace I keep up, I will have a long short story by the end of the month, about a guy with a toothache who lives in the second tallest apartment building in the world that has a window in the bathroom but its okay because the building is so tall, but his head hurts and he is waiting to die.


don't everyone jump up to publish at once.