Spenard.

it's another beautiful day. obviously. 

the puce bruise of optimism

people lose solitary gloves here. there's the latex one that's still mashed into the trail near the post office on Minnesota; I now look for it like a Nordic beacon when I'm walking. this one is like a furious face-fist on today's Spenard sidewalks. 

this is how fucking icy it is here. note the meekly scattered gravel. this is from last week at the bus stop at 36th & Lake Otis. now there are fully blackened swaths of pebbly traction- no more fucking around. 

1. my new cleats are FUCKING AWESOME.

2. last night there was a snow-removal convoy grinding up and down Wisconsin St (and visible from my lair). I'd forgotten about these operations! they're kind of soothing; they signify freedom and greater mobility... and it allows me to pretend i still live in a big city. a few trucks pulled onto my dark little street and I thumbs-upped them from my window; I thought they were finally sanding the ice. they were not. they were dumping snow at the dead-end.  

3. seriously, cleats ROCK. 

at the show over the weekend. I took this in the dark from my weird little corner. I liked the embracing happening. 

and one of the patrons was carrying a wee dog wearing a sweater. 

sexy, mysterious Minnesota Blvd. 

there's somebody in the corner! on the floor! I didn't even walk over to see if they were alive. the store was otherwise empty. who were they with? why were they there? how long had it been? I kept my distance to prolong the mystery... now I kind of hope they're okay. 

tonight, from the bus. someone ran into the wall outside the courthouse. 

...and oh yeah! on another bus earlier today I saw two moose jogging down Northern Lights by the Fred Meyer. just trotting. they didn't seem too hackled or frantic. everyone looked out the window with nonchalant yet appreciative expressions. 

the most terrible of cats. 

last week, when it was cold as fuck. it was bracing! -10F and sunny is so much more tolerable than 40F and rainy... this is a bus stop post. 

Fish Creek. all I did to this picture was "vignette" the border. 

Holga filter vanity. she's thrilled, obviously.

and a nine-year-old's lost tooth. 

"and I am not one of those bold women who enjoy tranquility in crime and who show a countenance that never blushes. I know all my madness and can call it back to mind." -Jean Racine, Phèdre 

another toilet dream

just woke up. 

in the dream, open-air public toilets- regular, tank-on-the-back, non-industrial toilets- are as ubiquitous as water fountains. no one really uses them, because they are completely exposed, but they're everywhere and not necessarily seen as unhygienic or disgusting. 

I'm walking downtown. it's the middle of the night. I must have been staying down there; it's like I'm taking a cheerful sweatpanted insomniac stroll. it's freezing cold but there's no snow; the pavement is bare and glittery. there is also no power- the streetlights are dark and the sky is absolutely saturated with stars. I'm listening to stand-up comedy on my headphones, and the (sigh) Dane Cookish guy is talking about these public toilets. "you want to tell everyone who sees you using one 'hey man, it's cool! I was just peeing!' because NO ONE wants to shit in public!" the audience is laughing hysterically. I'm laughing also as I'm listening on this quiet street. and then I see this toilet at 5th & E. how weirdly timed and perfect that I should have to micturate right then! it's too perfect! so I do. and right when I finish I see someone walking up the dark street from about a block away. I start laughing again, thinking of the comedian, wanting to shout a disclaimer. I cross the street and start walking back to wherever I was staying (toward C Street). the block with the 5th Ave parking garage is so dark I accidentally bump into the corner of the building. I know there are multiple alcoves and I can't see ANYTHING. that one pedestrian is still on the other side of the street. suddenly I realize how fucking vulnerable I am. this is NOT SAFE. I make myself wake up. 

I would actually consider this a nightmare due to the completely sinister turn it took. 

this is what I can remember. the entire setting was hyper-realistic. most of my dreams are; perhaps that's why they fuck with my head. 

*it had a little paper.  

**it's the middle of the night. 

unexpended energy

I took this picture for the frigid backlit furnace-steam, but the filter turned it into something Pythonesque. 

in between all those girlish pillow fights and slow-motion car washes at ma château d'amour. 

a tree-lighting ceremony as seen from the warmth of the PAC. the right filter can turn the most benign of settings into the 9th circle of hell. 

the aforementioned Fish Creek Alm was unappreciated by someone. it's the thing I check for now. today it was covered in a thin veneer of ice. 

the "does liquor freeze?" experiment, part 1. the bottle is back in my freezer where it belongs. 

36th Ave. 

steamy windows. 

a British holiday programme I watched earlier today introduced me to the liqueur known as Advocaat. sounds vile! mix it with 7-Up and lime juice and you have a Snowball to inebriate the fustiest of aunties! 

but yet your kindness is a constant surprise

there is a magical block-length span of unplowed bucolia on my street. this is the portal I have referenced in posts prior, the conduit that transports me from Turnagain (tepid water) to Spenard (painfully hot). on one end is my house, sandwiched between two typical Anchorage homes of sprawling yard-detritus and ailing vehicles (tattered prayer flags optional); after the Conduit of Bucolia is a row of about five immaculate homes of newer subdivided construction. it's a nice reprieve from life's self-involved bullshit, this expanse. 

this is what it looks like from about 67 inches off the ground. 

i staggered through the unplowed wilds of Spenard today...

this contains no telephone. it's outside the Carousel Lounge. a woman in the parking lot was bitching at someone on her cell phone while I was taking this picture. how some moments so poignantly French-braid themselves! 

thank you for this, whomever you are. 

the park on Minnesota. 

I think I was listening to Television "Friction" on my headphones when I took this, so this will hereafter be referred to as the Friction Compound. 

alms for Fish Creek. 

the snow last night along the Park Strip. 

I went to Darwin's tonight to, among sundry nefarious things, do the silly crossword puzzle in the Press. the older guy next to me kept trying to slurrily engage in conversation; I was a surly bitch in return. he finally turned away and started talking to others. eventually he tapped me on the shoulder and said "I'm having more fun with these people than you're having with your crossword puzzle." it was profound and damning enough of an observation that I wrote down his quote verbatim and continued with what I was doing. I like to have visual tangible proof, ideally in my own handwriting, of how vastly I can miss the fucking point. 

seriously: if you're fully aware of how much of a hostile jerk you're behaving, and you feel ashamed of that but not ashamed enough to alter your behavior, how much of a fucking asshole does that make you? 

re-falling in re-love

the lurid sunsetty cloudglow last Friday. 

go-fuck-yourself stare/

cricket limbs dangling from mouth/

the pet store gecko

sexy, mysterious Lake Otis Parkway. 

today's view from the lazy place, facing northwest.  

I'm propped on my elbow and her disgusting paw is covering my mouth. 

this is almost better than the "FRCNDY" van. 

Someone on Lois Drive lost their hat. I didn't tweak the colors at all. 

the other night around 6pm I was cutting through the park on my way home. a man was walking his dog and cat through the snow along the creek. I recognized the dog because he always barks at me from his yard a few houses away. "my cat's nice" he said. the cat rubbed against my boots with his tail in the air, purring. and then it trotted back onto the thin ice-edge to drink some more. 

rippling in still waters

there is some texturally fun stuff happening in the snow around this silly place. 

the midday sun. 

the lair is kept at 78F. heat's included. it's fucking marvelous.  

frozen at Minnesota & Benson. 

4pm sunset from Lake Otis & 36th.

capturing the waiting-for-buses-that-don't-show-up magic. public transit here: a bilateral ass-smacking in both humility and meek optimism. it fucking sucks. at least they crank the heat.

the shit-cat making out with the dracena. 

if I didn't feel so fucking lazy I'd be wanting to do something amazing right now.