my stomach hurts

because of what i ate at lunch today... some mediocre sushi and a plane ticket.

wah wah wah

i like you, you like me. i hate when good & true things are complicated and arduous when they shouldn't have to be. wah wah. i'm bitching, and i hate that too. also, if a certain fake-friendly face gets in my way in the next week, i *will* slap the everlasting shit out of it. believe it. u know who u are because u probably read my blog just to gossip about me some more you seething pile of instigating bullshit.

V E G A S

miz is celebrating his birthday next month in true playa dolla bling style - by renting a hotel suite in vegas.

as i wrote jorge rojo, two words: kobe beef. it's not quite the quasi-religious food experience you would have had some years ago when japan only exported a severely limited amount to only the most posh places, and then they served it to you in a special room curtained off from the lowly minions eating peasant filet mignon, and the waiter would cut a slice of raw meat off so marbled with fat that it was more white and sear it on a hot rock to cook for just a few moments - and not until your mouth exploded with the deliciousness of it would the server cut off another slice. i mean, kobe beef used to be the stuff of legend. from an ancient stock of cattle that are massaged every day?? on a diet of the purest sake and beer mash?? uh, yes please, and i'll have that with a side of unicorn meat while you're at it. so yeah, it's not like THAT anymore. now it's been mcdonaldsized and there's kobe quesadillas and kobe burger and kobe corndogs - lame. and now america grows their own style of kobe beef. and pretty soon (if not already), it will be $19.99 kobe steak night at applebee's.

there was one restaurant in cincinnati that served it. it cost almost $80, a la carte. i found out about the place a few weeks before i was moving to alaska, and at that point, all $600 of my savings were going to leaving. & don't get me started on juneau's restaurant choices.

ok so not only is this culinary fantasy about to be realized, but ... we are going to The Price Is Right. i was born and raised on that show. plinko, the grocery game, the mountain climber dude, bring it on! showcase showdown? always hold out for showcase 2! i bet $1 bob! in your face!! ahhh!! if my name gets called, i am gonna be crazier than derone.

i don't know if it's spring or juneau. once again, life changes in the ordinary instant.

the width

four coworkers went with me to the "unveiling" of the poem placards last friday for the omnibus contest i won. there was no unveiling so much as performance poetry with one of the city buses held at the steps of the capitol. despite the woman reciting in a microphone, obviously fake passengers holding scripts in their hands, & orange cones around the bus, a couple people got in and sat down inside mistaking it for a real stop. one guy waited until halfway through the recital before giving up and leaving. ahh, juneau. so i guess i did miss out by being absent at the awards ceremony because i didn't see my poem placard or the book with our bios in it. i also have no idea which bus my poem's on. so here it is on the internet for you virtual travelers:

the width of two continents

manila mountains make the shape of a woman's back;
i am wandering in the small of it
arms outstretched in birthright search.

lightning bolt to severed bough
flame to paper
adam's hand extended on a cracked ceiling.

to the west is an island where my grandmother swam and dove for pearls
black hair twisting and gliding behind her.
in this placed filled with water, i have inherited the distance and reaching.
it is for my lola (grandmother), appolonia dela roca santa romana, who raised me in manila, gave me possibilities, and trusted me to go where i had to go. she died last year, march 29, and for awhile after that, i had to negotiate a world suddenly empty because she was no longer in it. but luckily, she taught me well so i didn't have to flounder long. thank you lola; mahal kita.

it's a brand new day

as promised...

it just looks like i'm humping the rock when i actually slipped and almost ate my own face...

over the mountain and down in the valley

We drove to Waipio this morning and hiked to Hi'ilawe Falls - a breath-taking 1400+ ft waterfall, the highest in Hawaii. (Pictures of us getting sexy on the rocks pending.) There ARE good reasons for waking up at 7a.m. after all. I'm leaving for Alaska in 3 hours - but first! twenty pounds of babyback ribs, 2 pounds of ahi poke (pokey), queso, Ruffles, tortilla chips, bags of salad, and 2 boxes of ice cream mochi balls. i love how we roll.

my momma says poetry's in my blood

so juneau shanghai'd another seattle city project - putting local poetry on the public buses. i didn't enter last year although a roommate did, so this year when a different roomie suggested it on the last day of deadline, i emailed a poem in. and whaddya know! i won! there were 20 poems in the adult category and 16 adult winners that were selected out of over 200 people by alaska state poet laureates. the awards ceremony where they'll read them and the judge laureate talks about his top 5 is tomorrow, so i won't be able to attend because i'm still in paraidse; woe is me, i know. the "unveiling" ceremony of the poem placards, however, isn't til the 9th so i will hopefully have some pictures of me posing inappropriately for such a distinction. as usual.

from the ends of the world to the beginning

george looks like that because he has 2,000 degree molten magma wind blowing up his ass