I connected with several students today – Natasha, Yusef, Gerald and Jeremiah – over lunch at a Pakistani restaurant. That felt good, and those connections made me really feel a part of the city, almost as a resident, and no longer as a stranger. The afternoon found me nodding off during the last hour (sorry).Diana and I have dinner at a totally-out-of-place-in-the-Haight restaurant called RNM, a French and American fusion establishment. I eventually got into a conversation with a couple sitting next to us – it turns out that the guy sitting next to me works for the National Labor Relations Board – and talked about the rise and fall and present status of the labor/union movement. I didn’t expect that.
Going Coastal
Nicole, my partner in the cleanse, and I had “real” (and by real, I mean not) food for breakfast at the Ccoastal Kitchen. I had the goat cheese rhumba, with spinach and eggs and cilantro, and some tea. Not the healthiest breakfast, but a little gift to myself since I stuck religiously to the cleanse for two weeks.Diana and I were going to have dinner this weekend at Platanos in the Mission, but just found out that the chef there was killed a couple of blocks from there last night. I think that’d be kind of creepy to eat somewhere when the body’s not even cold yet.
Day 14
So today is Day 14 of the cleanse. Man, oh, man, if I wasn’t going to San Francisco this weekend, I’d continue to do it. A hydrotherapist I worked with has been on a raw foods diet for the past two years, and looks extraordinarily healthy. She told me that she covered her stove with a board and uses it for extra counter space. I don’t think I could go that far.So now it’s time to think about new ways of doing things. I am, quite internally, starting from scratch, and giving new thought as to what I want to put in my body, and what sort of exercise I want to do in order to achieve my perceived ideal weight (according to the Body Mass Index) of 175. I’m almost there, at 184.
What Would Jesus Drive?
A day to catch up with friends all over the place. I’ve booked two weekends in SF for February as there’s a protest march on February 16th I really want to be a part of. I’m thinking of volunteering for it. I’m also getting revved up about the possibilities that my thesis can offer, especially after watching a recent Bill Moyers special about hydrogen cars. It offered a spotlight on Arianna Huffington’s “When you drive an SUV, you fund terrorists” commercial campaign, and an evangelical association’s “What Would Jesus Drive?” campaign. This ties in with my thesis, and makes excellent background material. They’re shaping a visual language for certain mainstream elements. I think the WWJD campaign is more effective, though, because it doesn’t attack people personally.
Gerald Collier
I got to go out tonight. Gerald Collier — a former bartender at my old watering hole – played at Molly’s tonight. He has an alt-country sort of feel to his music, and probably the most pleasant voice I’ve ever heard. He’s one of the friendliest people I’ve ever met in this city, and has the sort of inner peace that attracts people to him. After trying out what a national scale feels like, he’s found happiness in a local existence, where his conversation and musical talents don’t need to be watered down via a media company.
The shuttle Columbia exploded on re-entry – Yow.
I’m on Day 10 of the cleanse. There was great temptation tonight, however, as Molly’s makes really good Irish food, and the smell of mashed potatoes and shepherd’s pie was permeating the establishment.
Deep breathing
I need to learn deep breathing and get back into meditation and yoga. It’s difficult for me to initially start, but once I get going with it, I wonder why I hadn’t done it earlier.
“Oh, yeah! I knew this guy at this party where someone bought one of those strobe lights from Radio Shack, and turned it on, and the guy was shaking all over the place, and it turns out he had epilepsy, and it was a convulsion, and he’s like ‘TURN THAT THING OFF!'”
Overheard on Capitol Hill
Day 6
Day 6 of cleanse… I’m not really even missing food or alcohol, but then I haven’t been putting myself in situations that require those things to be around. I saw “Confessions of a Dangerous Mind”, the alleged autobiography of Chuck Barris, with Kimmay and Celeste. It was brilliant in the way that we have no way of knowing if his CIA story was true, through the way his tale is told. Anyway, they wanted to go out to eat after the movie, but I had to decline – I don’t want to go off this now.One of the side effects of a cleanse is also emotional release. I’m living past experiences in reverse, newest ones first – sort of like peeling back layers.
I watched the State of the Union address. Yow. Hydrogen funding for cars? Getting off foreign oil? Dubya was sounding like the Green Party a bit, but there’s no way he’ll fund these programs. He’s simply moving to the center (just talking about these ideas) to further co-opt the Democrats, and then will do nothing about it.
Crossfire
CNN’s Crossfire is the show I’ve been looking for, and it stars Paul Begala, James Carville (Buck Up, Suck Up, and Come Back When You Foul Up) representing the left (well, the Democratic left, anyway), and Tucker Carlson and Robert Novak on the right. It’s fast-paced and fun to watch.
BWI without the WI
I bowled with my brother today. Without the influence of alcohol, I averaged in the 150s. I’m on to something here.
Avoiding the cleansing “crisis”
Day one of the cleanse brings back some of the memories of the last time I tried this, June of 2002. I was drinking alcohol in moderately high volumes and two shots of espresso a day. And then I went directly to the restrictions of the cleanse. Bad idea. Day four of that cleanse brought severe caffeine withdrawal headaches, and on day five, I spent the evening at Indian Oven eating a most delicious curry. There’s a schedule involved with vitamins, shakes and two meals in 1 1/2 hour intervals, and to work properly, it needs to be adhered to. I’m not used to this kind of structure, but I figure I can handle it for a couple of weeks.