I returned yesterday from a visit to the enchanted realm of New Mexico. My bosses, who are also my friends and insist I refer to them as such 
, wanted me to see the new office building and to discuss some of our big current projects. They essentially pay me to be Drey and I make cool things for them, resulting in probably the best work situation I could ask for. I do regularly talk with them on the phone, but it is great to reconnect face to face a few times a year.
I had been back last December, but this time around felt a lot different. I felt like I was still in Austin and had just sent a serviceable hologram of myself on the plane. It took a few days to shake the dissonance, but I never stopped feeling like a stranger. Ghosts haunted every street corner and layers of emotional data augmented every interaction.
This has nothing to do with my friends or Albuquerque, but I just didn’t want to be there for very long. I felt like in order to fit into that realm and feel at ease I would need to morph into some old version of myself, a proposition I found horrific. Although there were major changes in the worlds of all of my friends, my version of Albuquerque remained the same.
It really is true: You can’t go home again.
Tags: Albuquerque, Austin, work
Last week my company graciously flew my back to Albuquerque to participate in the company Christmas party. I decided to stay a whole week so I would have time to visit my friends. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: Albuquerque, gaming, House of Whack, Landmark, movies, work
I really hate good-byes. I haven’t said good-bye to this many people since… well, ever. The thought of having this conversation with every one of you just breaks my heart, so I hope you will forgive the e-mail. In about 2 weeks I will be moving to Austin, Texas. So I guess this is me putting in my 2 weeks’ notice to Albuquerque. To a lot of things, actually. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: Albuquerque, Austin, avatar
I wanted so badly
somebody other than me
Staring back at me
but you were gone
I wanted to see you walking backwards
And get the sensation of you coming home
I wanted to see you walking away from me
Without the sensation of you leaving me alone
Time and time again
Time and time again
Time and time again
I can’t please myself
I wanted the ocean to cover over me
I wanna sink slowly without getting wet
Maybe someday I won’t be so lonely
And I’ll walk on water every chance I get
Time and time again
Time and time again
Time and time again
I can’t please myself
So when are you coming home, sweet angel?
You leaving me alone? all alone?
Well if I’m drowning, darling, you’ll come down this way on your own
I wish I was traveling on a freeway
Beneath this graveyard western sky
I’m gonna set fire to this city
And out into the desert we’re gonna ride
Time and time again
Time and time again
Time and time again
I can’t please myself
I can’t please myself
I can’t please nobody else
- Counting Crows
Tags: Albuquerque, Jess, music
The stream of time hit a nexus and, like an arrow striking ice, it splintered into five possibilities. I slipped into the most difficult crack, the choice hardest to make.
Like the Cylons, I have a plan.
And I am so sorry, my friends. I’m so sorry.
I must raze Caprica and follow the Eye of Jupiter.
Tags: Albuquerque, Austin, Jess, Life
For the voyeuristically inclined, I present a thorough investigation of my day, in all of its tedious detail.
Sleep was punctuated by coughing fits every hour or so, as I am in the end stages of defeating a cold. I had survived all of the minibosses and was now facing off against Master Phlem. It is a protracted battle, spread across various arenas, including my sinuses. When I did manage to sleep, I had sexual mini-dreams of someone awesome. I didn’t have much time to sleep in the first place as I had gone out to see my friend’s band perform at Joker’s. She kicked much ass and sang tunes both resonant and prescient. I also witnessed much male posturing by a dude at our table. I’m above such peacockery, but it amuses me to see them dance before her. There was also this other guy that kind of made me want to be gay. Like if she had suggested a threesome, I’d have said “cool.”
So the alarm finally goes off at 6AM. I have it tuned to a radio station I hate, so I will be eager to get up and turn it off. The wacky morning DJs are actually calling a listener and getting her out of bed, which actually seems like a useful service. It reminded me of the alarm in the movie I watched last night, American Astronaut. The astronaut’s alarm blares “What did your father teach you?” over and over until the astronaut answered, “My father taught me to kill the sunflower.” The alarm would then say, “Congratulations, you are now awake.” This was very much like my interactions with Dave when we were roomates in college. He was the astronaut and I was the alarm.
I peed and coughed and herded the cats around. I wrote a provocative email. I fed the cats. Alucard is on a special diet, so I have to sequester him in the bedroom while the other cats eat normal food. He is then free to eat his special bunny and green pea nuggets. They all started out eating it, but it makes Neeka puke. $30 a bag. It’s a real drag.
I may or may not have had some tea. I’ve been drinking Gypsy Cold Care all the time. I think I looked at a few web sites. Gabe’s late on getting the comic up and Tycho’s early for a change.
I get in the shower. I need to think about ordering more conditioner. Is this stuff really working? There’s still a wad of hair in the drain. Getting out of the shower, I decide to postpone putting the waffles in the toaster until right before I have to brush my teeth. Defeats the purpose otherwise. Then I use The Device. I bought The Device a few weeks ago when I was ready to shoot myself rather than suffer another morning of hacking up snot due to the cold weather and how it interacts with my throat. The Device helps. Its pulsating jets of salt water ream out my sinuses. This morning I was able to smell the carpet. It’s that good.
The pimple by my nose is almost gone.
Even though my hair is fairly short, it is still not short enough. I tie up a little 1″ ponytail so I can see what it would look like with the back cut off. I will wear this the rest of the day so I can get a feel for it.
I make sure my iPod is all loaded up and then I head out for work. I’m maybe 20 minutes late. It’s okay because I’ve been going in 15 minutes early all week. I’m almost to the freeway when the coughing fit hits me. I pull into a parking lot and cough and choke and vomit. I head back home and cough and vomit some more. I think about eating breakfast again, but decide instead to take some of Amy’s Organic Ravioli with me for lunch. I head back towards work, listening to GeeksOn. They are having a rather heated discussion about copyright and deep linking on web sites. I haven’t heard them so wound up. Peter and Matt are especially intense.
At work there are now too many things for me to do. In addition to ongoing web site redesigns, I am learning CSS, writing articles for the new newsletter, running a batch of find & replace tasks on the site code, making icons, taking over some sites from the other designer, and thinking of new ways to revamp the company’s business model. I have some tea and answer emails. I finish another site. I never noticed how often I have to use the restroom until I started being someplace other than my apartment for extended periods of time.
I find myself thinking of someone awesome and smiling a lot, thinking I might just go for it.
Eventually, 1PM rolls around and I get out of there. I stop at Style America and have the hairdresser cut it even shorter. Sitting in the chair, I am painfully aware of how I am talking about nothing at all with the hairdresser and I am doing it vigorously. I used phrases I didn’t really need to in order to describe the simplest of things. So now I have a wedge cut, like Starbuck.
I listen to GeeksOn on the way home. There is traffic on I-40 as they have decided to do construction on the left lane. There is so much road construction going on around the city that the detours actually lead you into more construction. The Washington overpass is simply gone. There’s some kind of archeological dig happening on the eastbound side of I-40. Central is a nightmare of orange barrels. During one such meandering detour, I drove past the new Uptown, a dazzling array of new stores that once only existed in California.
At home there is no good email or regular mail. I file my taxes. I’m getting a refund for the first time in like forever. I already spent it on a new movie screen. For lunch I reheat the gnocchi I made last night, but it tastes like ass. Nothing like Saggio’s. I decide to rejoin the GeeksOn forums. I was gone for about a week, nursing a bruised ego. I had made a valentine for Lisa Lassek, building it from bits of Wonderfalls and Firefly footage she had edited. They called me a stalker and that hurt. It was a cool valentine. I get caught up on the forums and then write a few emails.
Then I started writing this blog entry.
I was first alerted to the snow by my trusty weather globe. It is never wrong.
Drat. Where will we have the dinner party now?
My car was buried under an impenetrable layer of snow.
The camper out back fared no better.
The streets were transformed.
Recent excavations in my back yard unearthed some sort of frozen beast!
Note its baleful stare.
Saving these for July…
Tags: Albuquerque, photos
It has now been snowing for almost 24 hours. I haven’t seen this much snow since I lived in New York or maybe when I watched The Empire Strikes Back. They closed down the entire city to incoming and outgoing traffic, stranding many people here. Yesterday the interstates were lined with semi trucks with no place to go. All outbound flights are canceled.
I live in the middle of the desert!
Tags: Albuquerque
It’s 10:30 PM and it is still light outside. The sky is a backlit grey, like an overcast afternoon. I’m supposed to be in bed by now, but I don’t feel like it is night time. And there’s a constant rumbling sound shaking the apartment. I can’t tell where it is coming from. It’s like a massive subwoofer somewhere nearby.
Tags: Albuquerque
