too busy eating to blog...blegh...

so, writing to you from my homebase of SF/Concord California...i can't express enough how good it feels to be out of Boulder for holiday...Boulder is great if not a bit claustraphobic...at least to a Pacific scalawag like me...the Rocky Mountains (as grand as they are) don't make up for the severe comfortability of the ocean...anyway...

caveat: blogging will occur infrequently at best while i'm in the Bay Area...the whole eating thing coupled with USA's decision to frequently (like 3 times a week) run Law & Order marathons is double trouble for me...and then if USA isn't airing L&W then TNT is...and then if TNT isn't then Bravo is...you get the point...almond rocca con homemade taco's con egg nog con Dectectives Stabler and Benson makes John a happy boy...

yesterday went to the 4th installment of David Larsen's The New Yipes reading series at 21 Grand in Oakland...last night's readers were Bill Luoma and Rachel Levitsky with films by David Enos (some hilarious shorts...one about the/a wolfman and some girls with bows and arrows...they fall in love? grooming? not really sure but enjoyable)

Brandon Brown and Alli Warren freshly minted from SFO via Kansas City Mo where they found long lost graveyards on Grandma's acreage/ mystey bar clam chowder/ snow and a historical train stop shoot out (Brandon's got the pictures to prove it!)...Stephanie Young and i bonding over digital camera impossibilities...Kelly Holt talking smack about Khan-kerd per usual ad infinitum etc. et al (and me sort of agreeing with her per usual ad infinitum etc. et al)...Steve Dickison up in the place to be with his wife Tina, in disbelief about the rare tropical Bay Area rain storm...David Larsen doing a sort of off the cuff introduction (the usual New Yipes rigamorole?) that was one part improv stand up one part raving street person all parts hilarious...and then the readers...

in leau (sp) of a reading report (not sure if i'm up to that at the moment) i'll just say that Bill's translation of The Illiad ("up to where Achilles calls Agamemnon a dog-face") was stunning...i kept getting caught in his syllables (a good thing)...Rachel gave an ad hoc read through of various works culminating with her ongoing project/book/poem "Neighbor"..."Neighbor"'s a strange piece, hard to pin down, at once discursive/lyrical/journalistic/epistolary...i've heard versions and revisions and visions of "Neighbor" over the last couple of years and am looking forward to the completed polished project hopefully in the not too far off future...

okay! some highlights from a couple of parties in the last few days:

1. me falling down a flight of stairs on saturday night and not spilling a drop (okay maybe a drop) of my Chivas Regal whiskey drink
2. danceparty danceparty danceparty...first just me, then me and this girl, then me and this girl and this boy, then more boys and more girls then danceparty danceparty danceparty...
3. Armand calling some guy in the bathroom a "fucking prick" to which the guy responded by showing us his biceps
4. catching a cab at 7 am holding the door open for Armand to which he replied "i think i'm gonna stay..."
5. Brittany!!!
6. ostensibly Zane telling Brittany that he wanted to pee on her head
7. Brittany getting hella pissed to which i replied "naw, Zane's cool..."
8. dancing around with everyone but Brittany cause she hid in my brother's closet
9. pizza with Parker which got my stomach bubblin' something awful
10. Santa Claus pub crawl (about 300 of us Santa's walking around SF with 40's sort of "home invading" unassuming bars around the Mission and Downtown area...we got 86'd from a couple...one bartender got on her PA system and was all "alright! if all you Santa's are gonna be motherfucker's then get the fucking hell out of my bar!!!" to which we replied in chorus "HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" and marched over to Doloros Park where a nice man with a moving van had the forsight to set up a speaker system in the back of his cab where he began to DJ lot's of Too Short and NWA to 400 of us soaking wet (super rain) Santas to which we replied with lot's and lot's of dancing and tail wagging...then we marched down Market St. shouting "HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" while some naughty Santa's decided to spray paint "HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" on buildings and bus stops...and then over to Lucky 13 for more beer/whiskey and then over to Steiner to pee in the street and then home to my brother's for the aforementioned dance party...)
11. Lea!!!
12. i demonstrated some playing card magic tricks to my brother's roommates to which they replied by giving me the finger (i'm still trying to figure out why...seriously)
13. my brother's homemade spiced wine
14. my brother asking me "dude! have you ever had egg nog?! it's the best!!!"
15. interpretive dancing to Peaches with Lauren and Janet

oops! 4 pm...Law & Order SVU is about to come on...