waking with the sun in my eyes, i slowly blink myself to consciousness. another gorgeous day. looking around at my apartment, i resolve to clean the place up and do some laundry. sometimes i can be such a pig.

minutes later i’m on the phone, calling my pals to see if anyone wants to go get breakfast. ah well, i think. well-intentioned but short-lived is the story of my life. i yam what i yam.

fully intending to take advantage of the spring that has finally arrived, i pull on my red summer skirt and sandals with my green zippy jacket. i’m as good to go as i’ll ever be, so i head over to doug’s for appetizers. we walk to willalby’s, causing a ruckus (as usual) and drooling in anticipation of the feast to come.

willalby’s (wby’s) is our favorite breakfast (brekkie) joint. it became something of a tradition to get brekkie there on saturdays when i moved to willy street a couple of years ago and met the pack i hang with now. we’re all pretty heavy-duty carnivores, and nothing satisfies the craving for meat like a jaunt to wby’s. it can sometimes take up to two hours to get your food, the waitstaff are nutters and the place is tiny. nonetheless, there is a particular charm to the place, and we’ve been going there so long that they don’t mind us grabbing a pad to write our own orders (usually in crayon) for the kitchen or going behind the counter to get more coffee. in other words, a nirvana for folk such as we.

after we order and begin the crossword (a group endeavor that has also become tradition, along with reading all our horoscopes out loud), casey launches into another praise-filled review of sin city. he had told me about it at dinner the night before, and i determine i need to see it right now. as in pronto. we check the listings, and decide the 1:30 at eastgate will do us just fine.

doug says he’ll come along, but pete craps out on us. silly man, i think. the day is made for movies, and i want some popcorn. but he won’t be budged. i call peter and anna, thinking they would enjoy such an outing. anna doesn’t answer, but i get peter on the line. he’s catching brekkie at cleveland’s, another stellar joint, with his roomie debbie. i inform him that we’re going to see a movie, to which he says something like “tell me it’s sin city. tell me it’s sin city.”  i affirm, and he’s in. perfect. i love saturday mornings.

we pick up peter and head over, driving the back way on the highway. i’ve got my window down and keep rolling my hand over and over in the wind. a grin is perma-fixed on my face and i’m feelin’ fine. we arrive and peter pays for my ticket. i offer to buy concessions, although when we get to the counter he won’t tell me what he wants and i’m in no condition to be making decisions, especially ones that potentially involve chocolate. after several false starts, i go with my original craving for popcorn. we find doug and casey sitting in the front row of the back section and sit our asses down just in time for the previews.

i love previews. these were exceptionally bad, for the most part, which saddened me. i quickly got over it, however, once the movie started.

i’m not going to talk to you about the movie. all i’m going to say is that you need to see it. i mean, really need to see it. wah. that’s all i can say. wah.

go see it.

on the drive back we speak of many things, all of them some form of how awesome the movie was.

i have doug drop me off at h.q., as my car is there, as well as my guitar, and i wanna pluck something in the worst way. i sit on the back porch steps and play the hell out of the only song i know. pete is preparing the apartment for the cementville cast party later on, and i feel vaguely bad about not helping, but not bad enough to actually help. having already ditched cleaning earlier, i wasn’t about to start the vicious cycle somewhere else. the place is looking good, so i rationalize my way out of aiding and keep playing. aahhhhhhh.

somehow hours pass and i’m sitting at the table feasting on ben & jerry’s and listening to pete shower while casey washes dishes. it becomes a bit harder to convince myself that it’s okay to be completely fucking lazy, but somehow i manage. i don’t move. i’m so proud of myself.

jeremiah from cementville walks in, and though i don’t really know him at all, and since pete’s in the shower, i offer him a drink, playing temp hostess. he tells me he doesn’t drink anymore, as he’s in recovery.oops. casey gets him some juice while i resolve to not play emcee at a gig that’s not mine. i can’t be responsible for the potential fallout. i think that maybe this is an omen that the day has turned. i’m right.

the place is soon packed, and i retreat to the porch. however, i’ve not been home to change, and it’s gotten considerably colder. my tootsies become chilled rather quickly, and i head inside, wandering, feeling a bit out of place. my indefinable mood from the night before comes back in full force, and i escape to the porch again, admonishing my toes to suck it up.

i’m not always good in a crowd of people. i like gatherings where i can sit and talk to one person, and mingling’s never been my forte. usually i’m able to get through it, but tonight, somehow, they’re all closing in on me. i can’t even bring myself to go inside and ask pete for my keys, because then people will know i’m leaving, and i don’t want to go through all the leave-taking shit. i ask casey to do this for me, and wait while he tries to find pete. he comes back out and starts going through my purse, finally finding them. somehow in the course of the afternoon pete dropped them in there and didn’t tell me.

so now i’m pissed that i’ve been standing out in the cold longer than i had to be. i say a few brief goodbyes to the people on the porch and head down the stairs, realizing once i’m down there that pete didn’t tell me where he parked my car. i yell up to the porch at casey. he knows what i need without having to ask, and says “in the lot across the street.”  mumbling my thanks, i practically bolt down the driveway and hustle my butt into my car. i sit there for a minute, just breathing, then start the heap up and get myself home.

i sit on my couch for a good 45 minutes, relishing the silence and chain smoking like bette davis. the lights are off, and the muted conversations of people walking by outside become my only link. i think that maybe tomorrow i’ll hermit myself and figure out what’s going on inside my head so i can be done with it. and although i can’t see the mess around me as midnight comes, i know it’s still there, and think ah, hell. maybe the boys will be up for risk tomorrow.