I perversely WANT to catalogue exactly how many books I've read since living in seattle. I read at least two a week. sometimes four. sometimes I'll reread stuff. last summer, for example, I reread the "little house" books, lest I seem all pompous n shit. regarding the "little house" books: yeesh! I hadn't fully appreciated the bible-thumping and obedience and racism when i first read them as a lassie. I know, it defines an era, but it made me uncomfortable, as an adult. but then she'd diverge into some florid description of their pantry and the salt pork and dried apples and steaming, salty clam chowder... shit i don't even really EAT in reality, but somehow in her books they seemed astonishingly delicious- and I would feel better about life again.
Beverly cleary's books, at least the earlier ones? racist as fuck, also.
but I digress.
-I had to go to Bellevue today. what a strange place. I spent 3 horrible months working here (as an incompetent receptionist at a home-insurance company! moi! HAR! I listened to Lou Reed "magic and loss" a lot while I worked there, I remember) when I was 19. all I remember was the really good lentil soup at a place that no longer exists, and it rained every day, and my boss never turned on the heat in the vile shack the office was housed in. fast-forward, oh wow, 14 years: Bellevue is the polished wunderland one would expect. even the litter looks premeditated. I stumbled upon a park. there were groups of polo-shirted men, and pregnant women pushing expensive strollers containing more children, and old people with kyphosis and yappy dogs. it was weird. I was a stranger in a strange land. oh Bellevue.
-back in seattle.
-yesterday, my hood. it was pride weekend. the cuff (the bar on the left with the inflatable miller lite bottle) had a boisterous queue stretching the entire length of the block. it was about 9pm when I took this. on the right: a bunch of EMTs camped out in front of the fire station, lawn chairs and all. everyone looked profoundly amused and cool with everything. it made me happy. "pride" in seattle is such a non-thing; we are spoiled to live in such dn insulatedly liberal part of the country. would firefighters be happily observing the antics the same way in, say, Yakima? or Spokane? or even Tacoma? yeah, this place is special because it has the privelege of being jaded.
-(boring) buildings within a (bauhaus) building, Bellevue.
didja know? sloths are so adapted to climbing that when they die they often continue to hang in trees until they rot.
so there's that.
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