Number 1:
Today I woke up and reminded myself that I had a voice lesson at 2:15pm. I have them scheduled for every other Wednesday, always at the same time slot.

Around 11:30am, my Palm Pilot (that’s not really what it is, but it’s what I like to call it, there you have the truth now, are you HAPPY?) started beeping its little alarm, the one I set so I would remember my appointment, the one that goes off every other Wednesday. I tell myself I should set the alarm a little closer to the actual appointment time so I don’t forget in between 11:30 and 2:15.

Yes, it is possible, and even probable. Be quiet.

I hit “ok” on Palm Pilot, go about my day, la la la, all the while reminding myself: “Gotta be at her studio at 2:15!” Plan other activities and errands around the appt.

Go work on some of said activities, get back home around 1:15pm.
Check email.
Huh, teacher has sent me an email entitled “Voice lesson today”.

Inside, she says that she had me scheduled for an appointment at 12:15, and perhaps I could make it up another day.

I am wondering why on earth we would have moved my appointment to 12:15 - and anyway, wouldn’t I have noticed that in my Palm PILOT?

As I’m calling teacher, I suddenly remember.

My regular appointment time is TWELVE FIFTEEN. It always has been. Like, for 6 months, it’s always been TWELVE FIFTEEN ON WEDNESDAY. It’s never been different.

The Palm’s alarm had gone off at exactly the right time. I just didn’t even look at it, except to note that it said “VOICE LESSON!”

WHY? Why did my brain tell me that every single time I go there, it is at 2:15pm? I was so sure of it I had to go look at past appts in my Palm calendar to be convinced that 12:15 was in fact my regular time.
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Number 2:
I keep getting mail addressed to a different person in a different apartment. My roommate usually checks the mail and puts it on the living room table. I keep seeing “Josie Gibbons, Apt. 265″. Nobody in my apartment is named Josie Gibbons. My apartment number is 267.

I put the letters aside and tell myself to drop them off to the appropriate apartment. Never get around to it.

Yesterday, I went outside to check the mail. Took out my key and went to the location of my mailbox. But the number wasn’t right. Confusion sets in! I know that’s the SPOT of my mailbox, but the number says 265! And I’m 267!

Except, uh, I’m not. I AM in apartment 265. And I have been for the past 18 months.

What is wrong with my brain? Oh, poor brain!
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Number 3:
I sat down just now to write in good ol’ spotsnknots, and before I did so, I put some yummylicious leftover mexican food (homemade!) in the microwave. Cover it up, come sit down, type type type, write write write.

Eventually remember about food and go to retrieve it. Yum!

Except I never turned the microwave on. There it was, all covered up and ready to be blasted! And cold as a dead crow!

Oh well. I can forgive myself for that one, I think. Not the other two, though.
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p.s. this was not my planned entry! but now i don’t have time to finish that one. i will later!

Hello! I just now noticed that it is the TWENTY-SIXTH DAY OF SEPTEMBER. What the hell?? I had stuff I was supposed to get done this month! I was talking with someone last night and everything I said was based on the fact that it was the middle of the month. I kept picturing a calendar in my head and thinking “oh, it’s near the 15th, I’ve got plenty of time!”

Except I don’t! The month is gone! Crap!

I better go do some work.

P.S. That wasn’t Hurricane Rita that was causing the rain the other day, duh. It was the combo of THREE OTHER HURRICANES chillin out over Baja that day. I don’t have time to navigate all the hurricane crap on the web but TRUST ME ON THIS ONE.

Dudes! It’s raining here! It hasn’t rained for, oh, I don’t know, the last 5 months or so.

I love the rain.

Actually, the remarkable thing, which is why I am writing this at all, is that it is raining HERE because of HURRICANE RITA.

Wassup, yo!? Keep your hurricane weather away from California! We live here for a reason!

For no good reason, I just got the urge to look my mother up online. I was thinking about showing pictures of her to RS (lemme know if you need the pw), and don’t have any recent pictures of her in my possession. I mean, I haven’t even seen her in person since 2002, when I moved back to Cali.

I didn’t actually expect to find anything, because my mother is infinitely more paranoid and private than I, and I’m sure she does everything in her power to make sure she can’t be found by any possible search method - individual or electronic.

And, as expected, I didn’t really find anything. But when I typed in her name, the first hit that came up was the obituary for her father, my grandfather. As I (re-)read the short paragraph that described his death and survivors, I suddenly remembered my feelings when I found out he had died.

(blah, blah, more blah…)

Some dude tipped me $420 tonight. Just dropped 4 bennys right into my tip jar. Actually, he tipped $100, and then a little later came up and practically emptied his wallet into my tip jar. Weirdo. Didn’t ask for anything either, except to hear one Eurythmics song.

Met a couple guys tonight. Aaron and Frankie. More on them later; remind me if I slack. Also remind me about Jax.

4:15am and time for me to head over to Rockstar’s house. Latah skatahs!

I’ll tell you what bugs me. It bugs me when I hear people say, about Katrina, “how could God let this happen?”

Do they mean how could god let this happen in America? How could god let this happen to so many people? What, exactly, do they mean? Bad things happen EVERY DAY. They happen to EVERY PERSON. They happen ALL OVER THE WORLD. ALL OVER THE WORLD! I never hear them questioning god about any crisis in the Mideast. In any African country. In times of war. In their cities, where bad things happen to good people all the time. I don’t even remember God being invoked so frequently - at least not among Americans - when the tsunami hit. No, God isn’t questioned until God does something that directly affects them. Or, apparently, their country.

Nature is nature. Life is life. Sometimes things are good, sometimes they’re bad. I suppose my irritation comes from the fact that I’m not religious. I want to wonder why people are spending their time trying to figure god out. Like, what is the point of that!?

It’s like when athletes win a game and when they’re interviewed they say, “First I’d like to thank God for helping us win this game today.” Seriously, people.

Granted, it may make sense that forces of nature seem to be more attributable to god than athletic competitions are, but um… I don’t know where the line is drawn if you have to wonder why god does things. Is it at the country level? Why would God let something happen to our country? City level? Why would God let something happen to our city? Personal level? Why would God let something happen to me, my friends, my family? Is it only based on individual experience? Like, God is only an issue regarding people close to you - he has no relevance to the people continents away, to the people you can’t see? Is it because he’s YOUR god? Maybe he doesn’t care about those other situations, those other people, because they don’t believe in him?

I’m just curious, because I DON’T GET IT.

The biggest problem is not the storm and the devastation that resulted from Katrina. Yes, it sucks that people lost their homes. And I do know that hundreds of thousands of people have lost any semblance of a normal life. It breaks my heart, it does, as it does all of ours. But god has nothing to do with why it’s so painful to see all the suffering, with why I want to help. It’s my connection, tenuous as it is, with humanity. And you know what? I feel the same way about any tragedy I hear about anywhere in the world. I honestly do. They all hit me so hard that sometimes I wonder what is wrong with me, that I am so sensitive to human suffering. That sometimes I can’t function because I get so upset over the state of the world.

And I’m guilty too, since I never talk about any of it, since I never give my time or self to any other causes, yet I mentioned this one. But still.

Of course, I’m assuming the God question mainly comes into play regarding all the suffering and death (if I’m wrong and it has to do with people losing their material possessions, then, um, well, I’m not even going to comment on that). And given that, the biggest problem has been what happened in all the days afterwards - or rather, the lack of what happened, and the lack of preparation & planning.

And, uh, people? That wasn’t God’s fault. That was your government’s fault. Just thought I’d let you know.

I generally try to keep myself as one-dimensional as possible around these here spotsnknots parts. But I thought I’d let you know that I am on every possible local Red Cross waiting list for helping out with the hurricane disaster relief efforts. Phone help, administrative help, disaster relief training help, deployment waiting lists and so on. You name it, I’m on it. (Yes, there are waiting lists to even help with the PHONES. And processing donations. And all that stuff.)

While I’m frustrated and impatient that I have to be put on a waiting list to help in any capacity (besides donations, of course, but we all know that i HAVE NO MONEY - and in fact would be losing money if I were to go down to the disaster area for any amount of time), I suppose that it’s encouraging to know that there are enough volunteer-minded people to necessitate waiting lists. It almost gives me the tiniest hint of respect for humanity again. Almost.

It’s kind of weird, I’m not entirely sure what compelled me to try to volunteer this time around. It’s not as though there haven’t been a zillion other disasters — in this country and elsewhere — that I could have wanted to donate my time towards.

But whatever, there it is. I wonder if anything will come of my oh-so-slight efforts. In the meantime, I guess I could scrounge up 20 bucks and go without some of my red bull for a couple days. And I’ll probably have to look into volunteering with other organizations if I’m going to be serious about this. I’ve found at least 10 religous groups that need volunteers, but I just have such an aversion to associating myself with such organizations. Is that wrong? They’re just trying to help like everyone else, right? Oh well.

You’ve probably seen and heard enough of this, but here I go jumping on the bandwagon anyway:

update 9/3/05: This is a much more comprehensive and much less religion-oriented list of sites dedicated to relief efforts.
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As for the politics surrounding this situation: If *I* were the leader of the free world, you know what I would do?

I’d take this opporunity to say, “Hey, Iraq! Yo! Sorry, but we’ve got some stuff at home we need to deal with.” And pull the troops out of there. Get them to work helping out, um, their OWN COUNTRY.

It’s a quick and easy extrication, and nobody could fault us for it. Kill two birds with one stone.

On the other hand, if I were leader of the free world, Iraq wouldn’t be an issue now ANYWAY.

You know what? I don’t want to get all angry and riled up right now; I have to have my hair did in less than an hour. Screw politics! Screw helping out my fellow humans! My hair is going to look AWESOME for my gogo dancing gig tonight!