Concentration Vacation

holidays in vegas

2009-12-07T18:54:00.000-08:00

Don't really have time for an update, because we're in Vegas, but we're thinking of everyone and wanted to wish you all some love with this, our number one song of this holiday road trip:

Proof that Dan's iPod has absolutely EVERYTHING. (And that we might need some social contact with people other than each other).

later gators

2009-12-02T21:19:00.001-08:00

feel good inc?

2009-11-29T21:31:00.000-08:00

It all started when Dan's friend Adam sent us a DVD in the mail of some documentary that Christian wanted Dan to see. In the package, presumably to provide some sort of stiff backing to the disc, Adam included a piece of corrugated cardboard, onto which he had drawn, without much thought I'm sure, a cartoon smileyface and the words FEEL GOOD. This piece of cardboard had its first funny-strange moment when it arrived in the mail exactly as Dan was yakking all the contents of his food-poisoned stomach into the upstairs toilet. We said "heh Adam says 'feel good' Dan!" and watched the DVD, and the piece of cardboard was cast aside in the livingroom.

A couple weeks later, my uncle Pat contracted a mysterious illness that made him super lethargic. He didn't know what it was or how to kick it, so he came over to the Big House to watch some West Wings and eat his mom's bologna sammiches on white bread. He was sitting on the couch feeling crappy when he noticed a piece of cardboard sitting behind the lamp on the side table. He picked it up and shouted, and I mean shouted: "Who drew this picture of my dad telling me to feel good!?"

My late grandfather, Jack Brickley:

It's possible that the similarities might not strike you immediately. Especially if you didn't know my grandpa Jack. But it really does look like him! The downturned eyes, the short nose, the broad smirk! Who are you, Adam?! Are you part of some interdimensional conspiracy of souls to make people feel good?

Anyway, Pat started feeling better and Grandma got all teary-eyed and huggy, and now the cardboard cartoon is propped against the lamp, beaming down upon the livingroom. Pat is making plans to have it matted and framed. Thanks Adam! (And welcome to a spot on the King's wall). Moreover, thanks to Grandpa for having the kind of character that can manifest in anything, even in six lines drawn on cardboard, and make everyone feel good.

can't get my head out of doors

2009-11-23T20:20:00.000-08:00

Dan told me he spent his whole bonus nap yesterday (bonus nap = while I take a shower in the morning) feeling abruptly sad about leaving, looking around our spacious bedroom, remembering life without this sense of space. I was feelin him. Now that we only have ten days until we leave, we've stopped being homesick; instead, we're getting pre-emptively homesick for Indiana. Sheesh. "Travel broadens the mind / Till you can't get your head out of doors." (Hey that was my first Elvis quote yet on this thing).

But if my head must be stuck in doors, I'm glad the doors are as beautiful as these.
Pat just sent me this photo with the subject "Now that's an office." True dat, Pat. I'm in there as I type this, actually, and I'm very very aware of how much I'm going to miss this when I'm back in the office of the Masonic Ave house listening to Igby whine outside the door and looking out at the paint-peeling wall of the airshaft, and the descending column of fog, and the reusable feminine hygiene products laid out to dry on the hippie neighbors' windowsill.

Then again, friends. And family. And dancing. Dear god, dancing. Can we all go to Leisure or Soul Night or something really old and familiar that might not even exist anymore and get ridonculously sweaty and pull some muscles and sing along so loud to Ain't Too Proud to Beg or whatever that we can barely croak out our cross-streets to the cabbie? THX.

the cure for homesickness

2009-11-20T08:53:00.000-08:00

Rachel and Christian came to visit! It was so fun! Guys! I can't even tell you how fun it was! We did practically no work the whole time and just laughed and drank wine and ate food and omg we are sad they are gone now.

Here they are being all like "woah this house is beautiful / Indiana rules":

Their reaction to our surroundings made us remember how much we loved it during our first several weeks here -- not that we don't still love it, but with the combination of homesickness and the natural taking-things-for-granted-ness that always builds up, the thrill had somewhat faded. It was invigorating to watch them exclaim at the huge house, the sense of space, the remarkable amount of architectural beauty, and of course the awesomeness of the uncles/grandma.

The first night we went to Tim's studio for beer and geez ("geez(sp?)" = Tim's name for his particular genre of music, generally but not exclusively made by people over 40, i.e. "geezers"). Then we spent a weirdly warm sunny afternoon running around Fountain Square, a 50's-style 'hood with a wonderfully preserved old theatre and diner, bowling alley, lots of vintage/antique places, and a bar called Radio Radio which obviously rules.

We wandered through the nethers of the art-studio complex by the Big Car Gallery and stumbled upon this monster made of, I dunno, whiteout?, but Rach wasn't skeered:

My uncle Pat had a party, so we finally got to see his house in all its glory. There are no words, really, and the pictures definitely do not do it justice. How do you describe a party at the home of an insanely generous and witty bachelor who calls himself "The King" and built a karaoke stage and a bar in his home and has nine-foot paintings of Madonna that he commissioned himself displayed on the wall? You just can't. Somebody needs to make a sitcom or reality show about my uncle Pat and his roommate Jay. Seriously. It's just way too hilarious and awesome not to be enjoyed by the masses.

Then we went to Chicago for one night, which was a lot of driving for a little stay, but it was really fun to be running around a big city again.

And then Dan got food poisoning from the restaurant in Chicago. Aaaand it was his birthday dinner. We arrived back in Indianapolis just in time for Dan to have one night of complete hell, and then it was over. We spent the day lounging around the fire, watching movies, and playing Catan while rain poured against the windows. (Note the transfer of the Catan Winner's Medallion from Dan to me WOOO.)

Their last night here, Rachel and I sat on the couch and had a long awesome talk while Dan and Christian went to Tim's studio to sip tequila and record what Tim called a "space jam," which apparently doesn't put anyone but me in the mind of some Bugs Bunny / Michael Jordan movie from the nineties. Dan and Chris were both super inspired by the night, mostly by Tim's laid-back and less-cerebral (i.e. un-Lyon-esque) approach to music-making.

And then they left and Dan and I were both hit with a TON of actual work. Like, I immediately began twelve-hour workdays. It sucks because their whole visit was so invigorating (that's just the perfect word) that we wish we could transfer the energy to creative stuff. Sigh/reality.

More soon about our plans for the short remainder of our trip and the drive home. Thank you Rachel for taking pictures!

homesick

2009-11-09T07:16:00.000-08:00

California, we miss you! Public transportation and sidewalks and Malcolm (sorry Igby, not you) and all of our friends and family, we miss you too! That Girls/Cass McCombs show at the Great American, we really missed you! Vietnamese sandwiches and Herbivore's fake chicken! The ability to wear contact lenses without our eyes becoming insanely red!

What do contact lenses have to do with California, you ask? WELL. Since one week after arriving in Indianapolis, I've been unable to wear contact lenses (and I've worn contacts all day every day with no problems since I was 12). My eyes get really red and bloodshot and emit a strange goo. I saw an optometrist twice, and he said everything looked okay and gave me some different lenses to try, but nothing worked. Internet research revealed that it could be the result of a "change in environment" (allergies to pollen, water, etc) or it could be a "normal resistance to contact lenses experienced by women over 30" (I do qualify for this category albeit by the slimmest of margins). But then Dan started noticing the exact same symptoms. WTF? We're both stuck wearing our glasses all the time, which is kind of a pain. My personal theory is to blame the midwestern water, which tastes and feels and smells really quite strange -- much worse than tap water from other places I've lived, including LA and NYC. Either that or our eyes are allergic to the feeling of being relaxed and inspired? Anybody have any experiences or information about this problem?

Anyway. For contacts and many other things, we're getting really homesick. Luckily some heroic visitors have come to alleviate the pain. My dad spontaneously bought a ticket on Priceline last week and arrived less than two days later. We let it be a surprise for Grandma (she dropped two handfuls of silverware when he walked into the kitchen). Then we took some time off to try new restaurants with him, drink some delicious Dad-approved beer, and watch the World Series (and by "watch" I mean play Rock Band and pinball at Pat's while the game played on another TV upstairs). And this week, starting Thursday, Rachel and Christian are coming! Um YAY.

In other news, we've decided to delete the Tuscon portion from our trip. I have to be back in CA a bit earlier than anticipated because of a work presentation, plus our Christmas party date is creeping up earlier -- there just wasn't going to be much time in AZ to make the change of location worthwhile. Plus, we've settled in here so nicely; water aside, we're really enjoying it here. It seems to make more sense to stay put, keep our momentum going, and then drive straight across the country home in December.

I haven't been taking many pictures but here's Pat's cat lounging on his pinball machine and an autographed copy of Ted Nugent's World Bowhunters Magazine, Issue #1, spotted at a flea market.

two years ago

2009-10-31T08:58:00.001-07:00

A couple nights before Halloween 2007, my friends Jesse and Lloyd threw a party with the theme "Come as You Were in High School." I wore an Elvis Costello shirt, cutoff jeans, black tights, and Doc Martens. It was a blast. Near the beginning of the party, I met a very handsome gay man named Dan.

As it turns out, Dan was coming from a more generic Halloween party and was not, in fact, gay in high school. He couldn't get my number because his spandex shorts did not allow for a cell phone, but he gave me his. I texted something cute and never heard back and assumed that was that.

Luckily we ran into each other again on the actual night of Halloween, when I was Captain Fun and Dan was Brian.

Dan explained that he'd accidentally given me his brother's phone number, and then he told me all about his sensitive singer-songwriter music and his awesome job making ringtones and his brother's band that was about to be signed by an indie label. *SWOON*

Tonight we have no costumes but we're gonna go to Pat's and hand out candy and play Beatles Rock Band. Happy anniversary us. (And congrats to my cousin Sarah who's getting married today! Wish I could be there.)

this makes me feel smug and proud

2009-10-27T19:26:00.000-07:00

"Easier graphed than done," captioned my friend Dave when he recently posted this image. But we did it! We really did! The "no" then "yes" path of this chart totally visualizes the basic structure of our thinking when we plotted this trip and we are now quite a great deal happier.

I can't believe it's almost over though. Must work harder. We can't let down the optimistic early-'09 versions of ourselves who actually managed to have such thoughts. I'm at 100 pages but my first chapter is all wobbly; Dan's latest song is so incredible it makes me want to do aerobics, but he's still uncertain about his singing. In other words: our momentum is strong, and that is good, because here comes the hard part.

less talk more photo

2009-10-26T09:57:00.000-07:00

The front yard, falling. / My sneaky attempt to photograph Dan in his jeans.

We bought some sweet painted gourds and ornaments for the Masonic Christmas tree at Grandma's bazaar, which was a couple weekends ago. Several of her painting friends set up their goods throughout the house and Grandma made lunch for all the shoppers. I manned my aunt's jewelry station and judging from this photo I must've gained an instant twenty pounds that morning from candy-corn grazing.

Tim and Susan took us to see a play called The Heavens are Hung in Black, a really interesting psychological portrait of Abraham Lincoln. Abe spent a chunk of his childhood in Indiana so he's a bit of a hometown hero here (along with John Mellencamp, whose name we've heard more in the past two months than in our entire lives). Anyway, the play was excellent and the old downtown theatre was beautiful:

The "Soldiers and Sailors" monument downtown is supported by some hilariously relaxed bears.

status update / it's late

2009-10-22T01:57:00.000-07:00

I hit 85 pages sometime last week, followed immediately by a brick wall of work. I have several paying gigs over the next while, then a break, then a serious descent back into marketresearchland for part of November and early December. I'm not stressed, though; that urgent need for vast amounts of writing time has faded. I know the characters, I know how they talk and how they behave, I can even see their town perfectly in my head (it no longer looks quite like Hope). I'm fairly confident that I can pick up my laptop at any point and jump back into that world, which honestly makes this trip already sooo worth it, just to have arrived at that place. A friend tweeted this Woody Allen quote yesterday: "It's a wonderful thing to be able to create your own world whenever you want." I'm pretty sure I've only ever felt like that, as a writer, exactly three times in my life: once during the summer between grade 9 and 10 when I started and completed a collection of (unintentionally hilarious) linked stories; once during grad school when I wrote my (unintentionally obnoxious) novel; and now, during a sabbatical. All times when the world wasn't asking much of me.

It makes me want to find a more appropriate outlet for all those times when the world *is* asking. Because obviously this can't last forever. I described my current creative state to my dad on the phone a couple nights ago and he was intrigued -- he knows well that home-free feeling when you're onto something good and the distractions don't bother you as much, but his art forms (haiku poetry and songwriting) are, well, shorter. They don't require world-creation, at least not in the same way. It's a bummer I've never been able to write poems, because I do think they would fit much better into the realities of daily life. Anyway, for now, I'm loving this feeling of having this world waiting patiently at the edge of my mind, ready for me to jump back into whenever I get the chance. So fun. Hopefully this one ends up seeming intentionally, um, something. (Hah).

OKAY OKAY WHAT ABOUT DAN, you're probably asking. He's ruling, suddenly! We've realized we have very different creative challenges, now that the challenges are becoming more nuanced than finding time and motivation. Dan's is finishing things. So starting last week, he set up a strict schedule for himself: every Wednesday, he has to show me 2 songs. (Lyrics can be "scrambled eggs" if absolutely necessary). He just showed me his first Wednesday 2 and they are, expectedly, ahhhhmaaaazing, and now he feels like finishing things isn't so hard after all, and he won't come to bed even though it's two a.m. because he's in his music room making more.

He also got a pair of jeans. I got so excited in the store I texted Giovanni.

What else. Fall is still raging and awesome. I have some pictures from Grandma's bazaar but I'll post them next time because my camera is downstairs and I'm upstairs and it's a big house.

fall and other surprises

2009-10-14T12:08:00.000-07:00

There are many benefits to this trip that don't have anything to do with its stated purpose. Some of them have surprised us; others we expected, but had no idea how much daily joy they would bring us. So, creativity-related benefits aside, here's what we're loving...

First: FALL. Dudes. Fall is amazing. Indiana has still not apparently reached the peak of fall season, and it is already so gorgeous, we can hardly drive down the street without running straight into a tree. As Dan put it the other day, as we drove past a particularly amazing tri-colored tree leaning out from the edge of a yard to greet the street: "I've just never seen anything like that." This tree was green in parts, yellow in others, and then the leaves around the edges seemed to have been dipped in a can of red paint--and the red is not reddish, not that amber-brown dead-looking red, which is also beautiful but more familiar; this is a practically fluorescent shade of red that just doesn't exist in California. So yeah, we're loving the proper seasons. We've been pretty gay about it actually. Mulled cider, pumpkin pancakes, sitting around a fire made with wood that my uncle has been drying in the backyard for years. I'm telling you. These midwesterners are on to something.

Second, of course, is family. My grandma is the sweetest lady ever and it's pretty much impossible to eavesdrop on one of her five-minute conversations with the cat and not feel really good about the world. (That cat talks back, for real). My uncle Tim and his girlfriend Susan are like our personal tour guides, arranging road trips, showing us some tasty Thai and Indian restaurants, and on weekend nights, indulging in a game of Catan or two (yes, you heard me, two). Susan even made this insane necklace with a picture of Klaus Teuber on the pendant, to be worn by the victor. My uncle Pat has every good television series ever on DVD, not to mention two full bars in his house (yes, again, two!) plus a karaoke stage. We haven't used the karaoke stage yet but we have a dream of somehow incorporating it with Beatles Rock Band.

Third: feeling relaxed, like, all the time. It's not bad.

And now for some pictures! We drove down south a couple hours last weekend to a forgotten-by-time town called Story that had an amazing dive bar in the basement of its only hotel, the Story Inn. Several men and women were very rowdy and drunk in there, and then they left on horseback. Grandma was glad they weren't driving.

who's boring now

2009-10-06T19:09:00.000-07:00

So it's come to our attention that our blog is kind of like insanely boring. OHH OKAY I guess we'll tell you about all the crazy parties and events we've been promoting and stuff. It's been pretty bonkerstown. I guess you could call us scenesters among a certain crowd here in Indiana. They're called the Indy Decorative Artists and they paint flowers and animals on wooden objects and clothing.

All right we just made the flyers. Dan's is clearly awesomer but it's a bit too edgy for the occasion so it looks like they're gonna go with mine YAY I WIN SEE WE HAVE TONS OF FUN!

Keywords: indianapolis toll painting craft bazaar holiday sale wreaths china pumpkins gourds santas

drove to chicago

2009-10-05T14:55:00.000-07:00

We spent the weekend in Chicago. Dan's brother Matt is there all week on a business trip, and he flew out early so we could all hang out for the weekend. It was fun; we did touristy stuff all day and on Saturday night we had legitimate Mexican food (the Mexican food in Indianapolis is ~~beyond~~ terrible) and went to a blues bar. It felt strange to be, um, well, doing things. My brain was sort of stunned to have been removed from the world of the novel, while my body was exhausted from not sitting in a chair all day.

The Art Institute was free to Bank of America cardholders, randomly, so we went twice.

We took a boat tour of Chicago architecture.

Why doesn't San Francisco have better public art?

Before driving home on Sunday we stopped at the Chicago Diner, "Meat-free since Eighty-Three," and Dan was so happy I thought he might faint. Here he is with a vanilla-chai tofu milkshake, a vegan chocolate chip cheesecake, and a coconut lemon cake. Yes, we got three desserts. Dan's lost 25 pounds in five weeks; he took the weekend off.

when i'm sixty-five

2009-09-30T14:21:00.000-07:00

I have sixty-five pages written, and I'm super happy with all of them. (I would have a lot more if I included those I'm not happy with.) I'm especially happy because Dan read the whole document and gave me some sincerely positive feedback, along with a few suggestions that made it way better. YAY. I'm getting excited. It might actually get finished and it might actually not suck.

Today we ate lunch at Jenxie's, a vegan restaurant in the basement of a methodist church downtown.

Dan likes this picture.

This weekend: Chicago!!!!

cease-whine / rocky ripple

2009-09-27T10:04:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm done whining about all our work. I've written twenty pages of the novel in the last three days. And they're good! (I think).

Dan, though, has had an irritated throat and a slightly hoarse voice ever since he took a sip of one of those 5 Hour Energy drinks somewhere just east of Seattle. (There is absolutely no convincing him that this month-long ailment is not solely to blame on the 5 Hour Energy drink.) It's very slight and apparently not painful, but it's making it hard for him to sing, and therefore hard to complete songs, and he's understandably pretty cranky about it. Anybody have any miracle cures for persistent throat irritation? Brian?

Yesterday we went to a "festival" in Rocky Ripple. Rocky Ripple is a small neighborhood of houses clustered along a canal in the dead center of Indianapolis, just a five minute drive from my grandmother's house. But Rocky Ripple is pretty secluded, despite being inside the city; it's incorporated as a township and they even have their own mayor. It has a legacy of settlers from Appalachia and Kentucky, and is also described as "bohemian," and I've always been curious to visit. Turns out, Rocky Ripple is weird and kind of creepy and fairly awesome.

There were missing teeth and teenagers with babies, like we were a hundred miles outside of the city. Octogenarians hobbled about everywhere, a good 25% of the population in attendance, some of them wearing obviously homemade clothes. Others wore shirts made for the occasion that said, "I'm not lost, I live here. ROCKY RIPPLE." A group of old men cooked corn in the husks in a cast-iron oven. The ex-mayor sold magnets and had Weird Al hair to match his Weird Al face. A woodworker sold rolling pins. A blacksmith sold chainmails. Twentysomething dudes played southern rock on a gazebo and sounded like they were in their sixties. This is an exaggerated comparison but I swear it reminded me of that scene in I'm Not There when Billy the Kid is hiding in that weird town and Jim James sings "Goin to Acapulco" and everyone is dressed for Halloween.

Anyway. It was one of the many moments on this trip when I've turned to Dan and said, "Don't you feel like we're in America?" and Dan has answered with a slow, awestruck nod.

blergh + breaks

2009-09-24T16:29:00.000-07:00

My workload has subsided somewhat, having finished the monster report, but Dan's has increased. We're both struggling to find creative time in each day.

However: I changed the storyline/structure of my novel and now it's suddenly way more fun to write. I'm actually dying every day for that delicious hour or two when I can put away the paying gig and crank out a page. Yay. I wish I'd felt this way when we first arrived in Hope, when I had entire days free to write, but it feels good anyway.

Of course, we take some breaks. Catan (Tim shown here workin' on a Longest Road):

Pool (the most contact my skin has sustained with the sun since I was a teenager):

Sunset in Broad Ripple:

In other news, my friend Janet from grad school just published her book, The Creepy Girl (the title was my suggestion, she tells me, though I have no recollection of this), and it's getting amazing reviews. Buy it, if you wanna be creeped! And Rachel says John's finished his book too! More inspiration to crank.

blergh.

2009-09-17T08:46:00.000-07:00

Okay actually this kind of sucks. I'm working 15-hour days writing this research report, seriously from waking to sleeping minus tiny breaks for eating and and one Deadwood at midnight. Plus I'm getting more writing offers. A chunk of October is already blocked off for a project, and even a bit of November. I've turned down a couple small jobs but I don't have the guts to turn them all down; it's just not in my constitution. (What if they stop coming?)

Anyway, um, you might want to stop expecting a completed novel from me when I come home. It's looking unlikely. *giant sigh* What a privileged problem to have, I know I know, boohoo. I was looking for a job and then I found a job and heaven knows I'm miserable now.

You can keep expecting tons from Dan, though! Tee hee.

in defense of indy

2009-09-13T08:09:00.000-07:00

When we told people the main destination of our trip would be Indianapolis, we got some intensely blank stares. It was even deemed, during one reaction, "the randomest place possible." This is fair enough, especially given that neither of us are from here in any sense; my grandparents moved out here with their youngest sons in the early 70s, after my dad had married my mom and moved from SF to Canada. In response, I would explain that my Grandma is amazing and lives in a big house by herself, and my uncles are loads of fun, and it's actually a really pretty city -- but the stares persisted. Here are some pictures so you can at least know we're not living with pro-lifers in the shade of a Wal-Mart.

The house:

Our bedroom overlooks a sundrenched backyard and is the most peaceful place to wake up.

As a kid I'd wear soft-bottom slippers and my uncle Pat would pull me around this marble entryway. Nothing since has ever been quite as fun.

Here's my workstation (Dan's is in a previous post). The best part about this room is that the wi-fi doesn't reach! Very good for concentration, even when all I'm writing are market research reports.

This painting announces the entry to my work-room. (My grandma is an artist). Portrait of the Market Researcher As a Young Girl.

When I do need internet, or just feel like slouchin', I hunker down on the livingroom couch with this nifty Levenger lap-desk that Dan got me for my birthday (excellent present for nerds, btw). (And yeah I pretty much wear this outfit every day).

As for the city itself, I don't have any pictures, but it's really pretty and laid-back. The sprawl is hard to get used to (stripmallstripmallstripmall) but the thing about sprawl is it allows people to have really huge lawns. Lawns are nice. Rachel sent us this article in the NY Times about how you can buy a 4-bedroom house in Indianapolis for $250K, and I bet it'd have a huge-ass lawn.

Despite the sprawl it's still, really, a city. There's a downtown with galleries and old brick buildings and lots of bars with graffiti'd bathrooms. Broad Ripple is the hip neighborhood (although naturally it gets kinda North Beachy by night), filled with vegan restaurants and vintage clothing stores and businesses run out of homes. Dan explored it while I was away on business and now he's the Broad Ripple expert. Sometimes we take our laptops to the Monon Coffee Shop, where all the juices are freshly made in a Vita-Mix and the baristas are all these very likeable people who've probably outgrown an extreme allegiance to some subculture (straightedge, I'm guessing, and the dapper variety of scenester goths) and now throw parties for their kittens. (Honest eavesdrop). There are hipsters everywhere, and my lord they're young, but we still can't figure out where the good danceparties are. All we've found is some flyers advertising "hipsterhouse" which is the most depressing compound I've ever heard in my life. The good dancing must be happening in a secret network of BOTH-style houses (RIP BOTH!).

In leiu of dancing we've been having fun seeing Tim play his wide variety of working-musician gigs. Last night he played a solo acoustic set downtown with a numbered setlist, so the audience could shout out the number of the song they wanted (a trick he stole from the Bobcats of Vancouver), and they were seriously hollering those requests. I had to yell "Fifty-eight" nearly fifty-eight times at the top of my lungs before he played me Man Out of Time. Here he is on Friday night, singing If I Only Had a Brain with a jazz trio at a restaurant.

So, you see, it really is a nice place to be for awhile. We really miss everybody, though; the homesickness is starting to hit. Lots of love and hugs and such.

reality i accept you

2009-09-10T20:46:00.000-07:00

My week has been all work. I'm preparing the analysis of the research I did in NY/SF, plus I have another freelance copywriting assignment. Dan too has had some requests from the home office, although he's still finding time for music, whereas it's been over a week since I've opened the looming "MY BOOK" folder on my desktop (named to distinguish it from the $$ folders, as in BARB'S BOOK and BARTENDER'S BOOK). It sucks, sure; this isn't what I came here to do. But at the same time, the role of reality in our vacation is part of what makes the whole plan so great. It's not just a fantasy. Money is necessary, obvs, and the fact that we're still making it even with all this flexibility gives us hope that this lifestyle can possibly be, to some degree anyway, sustainable.

Dan's not in the same omg zone I described last week -- he seems to have good days and so-so days -- but on the whole he seems upbeat about what he's creating. And he's eating so well! We're cooking vegan meals and doing yoga and just generally being retardedly Californian. But Dan, as is his style, is taking it all the way. He's entering his third week of hardcore Fuhrman eating, and DAYUMN he looks good. As for me, well, Pat just ordered two cases of It's-Its from San Francisco, which arrived in a rather dramatic presentation of smoking dry ice, so my diet has been vegan + It's-Its. I recommend it!

labor day

2009-09-07T09:26:00.000-07:00

Back in 'Nap. Spent yesterday playing Catan with the fam, followed by a lovers vs. brothers game of bocce ball. I'm staring down a heavy barrel of Actual Work but it was nice to relax after all the work-travel. (Although my trip did include a brief spell in SF, which was mostly hectic but also allowed for some QT with parents, wine at the Masonic Manse, and breakfast with Kelli and Matthew. It felt great to see them all, like getting a fierce shot of home in the arm).

Today is Labor Day, and the tractor is learnin' the cityboy.

"That kid was born to cut," said my Uncle Tim, nodding appreciatively.

senda salami to your boy in the army

2009-09-03T10:38:00.001-07:00

After two full days in my New York hotel, it came to my attention that Bridget and Giovanni were also in New York. Uh what? I had an unexpected morning off, and the three of us wandered around the EV and LES, strategizing ways to achieve bi-coastal living while eating candy and getting tomato-faced from the sun. Our wanderings included a typical new-New York coffee shop (an Adam C haunt) but then lots of Mad Men era (ok Peggy-specific) spots like Katz's Deli and Economy Candy:

Then I had just enough time to meet Angela for lunch. Ange and I were roommates at Berkeley and came to New York for the summer of 2001 to be interns, which was everything you'd expect: sharing the world's tiniest room, scrounging pennies from our laundry pile, finding grand importance in every moment simply because we were in New York, etc. She's doing amazingly well, btw! She excaped the NY magazine industry just before it imploded and now works at Macy's as a copywriter, while also writing screenplays and becoming a media mogul (video journalism site coming soon). Forgot to take pics but she looks exactly the same.

I really love New York. Trying to remind myself not to glamorize it too much and remember why I left, but it's hard when everything is so damn timeless and inspiring and urgent and the people are all so abruptly nice and even the weather is perfect. I just want to live everywhere all at once.

pause

2009-08-30T16:15:00.000-07:00

I'm in New York on business; haven't touched the novel in days. I knew this project would happen, and I knew it would mean a lengthy pause in my writing, but it came faster and harder than I expected. So now Dan is totally kicking my ass at Concentration Vacation. He's got a sweet setup in one of the bedrooms, the one that Grandma furnished especially for my brother and I when we were kids. Anytime we get home, whether it's from grocery shopping or a Tim Brickley and the Bleeding Hearts show, Dan immediately disappears in there for hours. He is IN the ZONE. I'm stoked for him, if a bit jealous.

But I will say, it feels nice to be challenged by Actual Work, or maybe just by something outside of my own brain. And to be bringin' home some juicy bacon. And New York! I had a few hours this afternoon to be free in the city, and it made me really jones to live here again in a non-student state of mind. This city is so much better when you're not penniless and stressed and living on 130th.

I know we're falling behind update-wise, but Pat just got me a new camera as a belated barfday present, so stay tuned. Indianapolis has been really really fun and relaxing and we have soooo much space and peace and I'll tell you all about it soon, or maybe Dan will get bored out there without me and decide to contribute to the blog hmmm? Unrelated: my hotel has janky wifi so I have to sit in the lobby to write this, and sitting next to me is a very tired-looking businessman in nice slacks and loafers, half-napping, listening to a blaring iPod, audible even over the lobby's smoove jazz, and I just caught the chorus coming from his earbuds: Oh Mandy / You came and you gave without taking. !!?? Not lying! Manilow! Divorce, maybe? *only-in-new-york headshake*

when we were going away

2009-08-27T09:06:00.000-07:00

the drive

2009-08-25T10:30:00.000-07:00

We're here!

Our car is covered in farm dirt and dead bees, which Dan views as sweet vengeance for the bee that flew through the car window the first day in Hope and stung him in the neck.

Two hours after our departure from Hope, we stopped in Bellingham to visit with Steven and Brenda, more old family friends (Dan observed that my parents have the coolest friends ever, which is really true), and then zoomed through Eastern Washington. We rested in an amazing little town called Ritzville, population 1736. My camera stopped working so these are all iPhone pics:

Next stop was Missoula, MT. It's a college town with a good creative writing MFA program, so I've always been curious about it. Too bad I already got my MFA; I could totally live there. We stayed in a cute B&B courtesy of a gift card from my brother, and the next morning we cruised around and enjoyed the benefits of the liberal oasis (vegeterian food, unsweetened iced tea, record stores). I forgot to take pictures for a couple days starting now, ewps.

The Montana leg of the drive was my favorite. We were well-rested from the B&B, and Dan played perfect music from his bottomless iPod. Through the big-sky farmland and silo towns, it was Lee Hazelwood (Cowboy in Sweden, Best Of, Nancy and Lee). Through the rocky terrain of mining towns and war memorials, Scott Walker (Scott 4, Scott 3, Nite Flights). Through the sudden expanse of yellow nothingness with blue NO SERVICES signs at every exit, a cowboy set of George Jones and Glen Campbell. And then through the "crazy mountains" of gnarled broken trees, we satisfied an inexplicable Neil Finn craving with Crowded House and Split Enz. It was so fun to watch the landscape of our country changing so quickly and organically, giving way to different climates and cultures and products in the time it takes to finish a single greatest hits.

Then there were patches of green trees, one out of every ten a burnt red color, and Joni Mitchell and Jim Guthrie, and then we dipped down into Wyoming for a bit. And then there was South Dakota. South Dakota went on and on. And on.

I don't even remember where we spent that night. At every hotel, we had to unpack all of Dan's instruments and everything in the backseat, which we did with a bleary-eyed sympathy for touring musicians everywhere.

We were giggly tourists at the Wall Drug store:

The Badlands were immense and scary and made you feel like some 19th Century Souix was about to casually pop out from behind a rock any minute.

South Dakotan vegetarian cuisine:

Iowa was adorable, a sharp change from the prairies. It looks a lot like Indiana: lush and green with big yards and happy farmers. We had lunch in Iowa City, another famous writing/MFA town that I've always wanted to see. By then we were so close, we just wanted to beeline for Indianapolis.

Grandma greeted us with freshly baked cookies and invitations from both uncles: watch Mad Men at Pat's bachelor pad? meet Tim for a drink? We did both, touring Tim's studio and drinking a beer across the street, and then driving to Pat's to watch Mad Men on his 133-inch TV. More updates and photos from Indianapolis coming soon; we're just settling in, unpacking, stocking the pantry with food, and generally getting our land legs back.

the end of hope

2009-08-18T18:00:00.000-07:00

If our first week in Hope felt like a month, our last week has felt like about ten seconds. I've gotten overwhelmingly busy with Actual Work, and Dan has been juggling a bit of FunMo along with car-repair errands. (Nothing major, don't worry). But it does look like we're both going to meet the Hope Deadline (one chapter, one song), if only by the skin of our teeth.

Yauni and Dave came to visit on Sunday so we finally hit the tourist sites. We planned on meeting at Lake of the Woods, but we ran into them at Fields, natch, when we stopped to buy beach towels. We spent some time at the lake and then went to Sucker's Creek and the Othello Tunnels. Yauni showed Dave her childhood homes (although her mom's old hippie cabin in Othello is now an eco-retreat, haha) and the boys got wowed by the Tunnels. (Dan's planning a Rambo post, stay tuned.) It was such a beautiful day. Finished with pie at the Home Restaurant and a short tour of Eva's house before we had to kick them out so we could watch the Mad Men premiere.

View of the bridge from Sucker's Creek.

Even the Tunnels parking lot is epic.

It's always nostalgic coming back to Hope, but this time it's been especially intense. Partly because my parents aren't here anymore, and partly because I haven't had a proper visit in so many years. And mostly, perhaps, because I'm really shoving my face in the nostalgia, seeking it out and indulging it, as research for the novel's coming-home themes. It's been fun, but I'm looking forward to leaving and returning to 30. No matter how great my Hope memories are (and they really are great), nostalgia is still an intrinsically melancholy thing.

Yesterday on one of my many sloooow drives past my house, which my parents are renting to another family, I saw a young girl in a bathing suit darting out the front door, skipping the steps on the front porch to jump onto the lawn. I could feel the concrete porch under her summer-hardened feet, the cool arrival of the mossy grass. And I actually heard myself saying, in a defensive whine, "Hey!" That's my life, random little girl. Jeez.

look what we found at the tunnels!

2009-08-18T15:37:00.000-07:00

Hahaha! (Sorry Kenny. We love you.)

brigade days

2009-08-12T19:22:00.000-07:00

Every September, Hope celebrates its birthday with a weekend-long celebration called Brigade Days, including a parade, a carnival, fireworks, logger sports, a demolition derby, and the crown jewel of the weekend, the Briggie Ball. Entrance to all festivities is granted with purchase of a "Briggie Button," flat wooden pins that are currently on sale all over town. I haven't been around for Brigade Days since I was seventeen, and the Briggie Ball is 18+ so I've never attended that at all. And I am super bummed we're leaving Hope before September because LOOK AT THIS YEAR'S LINEUP!!!?!!:

vancouver, thank god

2009-08-11T14:42:00.001-07:00

Just enjoyed a brief but much-needed respite in Vancouver. The day before we left, Dan and I were so excited about going to a real city that we could hardly sleep. It'd been five full days in Hope at that point, and it felt like nothing less than a month. Five days is a long time to listen to the drone of your own mind.

First stop in Vancouver was the Bobcats. The Bobcats have been playing at the same pub on Denman St. every Sunday for years, and it's been the epicenter of Brickley Family Funtimes for much of my adult life -- I even made Kelli and Sam come when we visited Vancouver a couple years ago. This video is pretty terrible but I felt self-conscious standing on the dancefloor with my FlipCam, especially since everything about the Bobcats is supposed to transport you to a decidedly pre-FlipCam era.

The crowd was all 60+, but they looked 80+ (hard livin'), and they danced like they were 50. In other words, we had the BEST TIME. Seriously. The waitress was speedy with the Granville Island Lager and of course we knew all the songs, earning us some approving and slightly salacious nods from the crowd.

Yauni and Dave picked us up and took us to the best Indian meal I've ever had in my life, at Vij's in South Granville. Yauni is an old family friend, the kind of friend where your mom has pictures of her in your bathtub when she was two. Dave, Yauni's boyfriend, promotes shows in Vancouver, which is actually his family business -- his father was the Bill Graham of Vancouver, and he has actual stories about Grandmaster Flash crashing in his childhood bedroom. Later we went back to their apartment and Bonnie (Yauni's mom / family BFF dating back to my parents' hippie days) came over with a frostbitten bottle of vodka in her purse. Pretty sure Yauni is contributing to the heated conversation about my mom's amazing wheat-germ-covered-frozen bananas in this picture...

The next morning Dan and I took the Aquabus to Granville Island, where we spent most of our time at the Kids Market wishing we were seven. SNOOPY SNO-CONE MAKER!

Then Yaunie and Dave took us on a driving tour of Vancouver (awesome except for the pouring rain), shopping on Robson, and then to Commercial Drive for dinner at an ancient Italian restaurant called Nick's that is recently enjoying a hipster renaissance, probably largely to do with the bibs.

Then we went to Casa Gelata (218 choices of ice cream flavors but they were out of my favorite, Tiger Tail, so I tried to manufacture my own with one scoop of black licorice and one of orange sherbert, which I don't actually recommend, nosiree) and drove the long dark highway back to the boondocks. Awoke this morning to our first substantial requests from Actual Work (FunMo/Outlaw), blech...

is this work?

2009-08-07T18:29:00.000-07:00

A vast amount of unstructured time is a scary thing. Worried we might let it all slip by, we initially decided to keep a strict schedule for our work. But then we realized that one of the most exciting things about this trip, for both of us, is the ability to work whenever we're feeling inspired: to actually get up when you get an idea in the middle of the night and spend time pursuing it, rather than lying in bed trying to fall back asleep because you have to wake up at seven. That's a frustrating feeling, as anyone with a job and a creative persuasion and a dash of insomnia knows well. So we settled on a compromise: we can work whenever we want, as long as we log at least 5 hours, but preferably 8+, per day.

So far I think it's going well, although we're closer to the 5 mark most days than the 8. And really, it's kind of funny that we're thinking of this as work. It's not ringtones; it's not market research. What will happen soon, I'm sure, is that it will start being fun, and then we won't have to count our hours at all.

Meanwhile, the other hours in the day are pretty ruling. Our John Hughes marathon last night sent me on an ill-advised path of writing a Ducky/Anthony Michael Hall type character into my novel (abandoned that quickly, don't worry -- I'm so suggestive these days!). Dan's learned his way around Hope well enough to develop his own preferences in stores (he prefers COOPERS, ahem) and a fair obsession with Rambo sights. Still have lots of stuff to show him, but we're saving the touristy stuff for our rumored visitors... Heather? Anyone? Bueller?

the hope house

2009-08-05T00:16:00.001-07:00

For the next three weeks in Hope, we are housesitting an epic treehouse, perched on the side of a mountain, with several small rooms all on different levels (going anywhere, even to the bathroom, requires a staircase). It's one of my favorite houses ever and I'm so grateful we get to stay here. The owner, Eva, is a Swedish documentarian and an old family friend.

Living room:

My workstation:

Dan's workstation:

Can't go anywhere without seeing something that makes you smile, like this random blue door in the wall:

Love this little guy in the kitchen!

The bathtub is heaven:

Can't really see but it says "Major M. McManus" above the door. (Not, however, "MacManus.")

Upstairs deck, pizza and Peeb, awkward let's-eat smile:

Peppers purchased direct from the farm. (You just drive up, take a bag from a hanging hook, and drop a toonie in a box. It took us forever to find the farm, which I only remembered vaguely from childhood, but asking the old ladies who work at the museum for directions was half the fun.)

K. Time to get to work for real now.

portland

2009-08-04T21:51:00.000-07:00

Portland surprised us with its awesomeness. Heather devoted her entire Sunday to showing us around, which included: brunch at the Cricket Cafe, QT with the cutest (fattest) cats ever, a thorough Powell's tour, beer and pizza at one of the city's many $3 theaters, dinner at a Japanese restaurant, and a free show of exactly the kind of local indie-rock we wanted to hear. We caught the tail end of a heat wave, meaning that it felt insanely hot to us, but everyone else seemed to be greeting the slightest breeze with ecstatic relief.

We treated ourselves to a couple nights at a hipster hotel called The Ace. The paint-dripping text on the walls was kinda, um, No Doubt, but everything else about the place was great.

Especially the Leonard Cohen lyrics on the lobby wall.

Portland is filled with people on permanent concentration-vacations: they work a few days at a coffee shop, which earns them enough to pay their minuscule living expenses, and they spend the rest of their time making art. Heather pointed out that this aspect of the city has a few drawbacks, mainly the overwhelming amount of not-great art. But still, it made us a bit SF-resentful. Heather's gorgeous and spacious one-bedroom apartment is eight hundred flippin' dollars a month. Plus they get actual summers!

this will be our year

2009-08-04T20:51:00.000-07:00

We started our drive with a breakfast at the Millbrae Pancake House. Lots of family from both sides (even in the big group shot, you can tell how freakin' cute my nieces are, right?).

Wish we had some pics from our official going-away party the weekend before, which lasted until 5am, but it was too much fun for picture-taking. We should've given cameras to the people who are sick of hearing MJ at danceparties (sorry guys).

The drive was quick and dirty, with lots of "This Will be Our Year" and Genius playlists. Somewhere around the time the scenery shifted from yellow grass to green trees, Dan learned how to skip.