Chris

* Yay spontaneous New Yorkian trips by moominmolly and fennel!  I haven't seen them since I moved to Portland, so yay!  And yay for everything socially working out okay.  (M and R and I went to lunch on our own, then R went to work and the four of the rest of us went for chocolate.)

* I left my ring at home like a doofus, and it was driving me mad, so rosefox pointed out I could buy a new ring for now, so I did.  Simple metal ring on my right index finger, and suddenly this mental itch goes entirely away, hooray.

* I've been writing Yelp reviews.  I like reviews, and so I want to contribute.  I still get a bit anxy about what if I got it wrong - the perpetual tape running in the squirrel hive of my mind - but eh.  Worse=worst, someone decides to upbraid me for not seeing the beauty and wonder that is $place, and I look at them funny for thinking that yelling at me is the way to get me to open my eyes.

* Relatedly, when I compare The Strand to Powell's, Powell's wins by a mile and a half, even leaving out employee comparisons.  (Josh works in the warehouse, not in the store proper (to my knowledge), so this isn't a biased-by-my-boyfriend-omg thing.)

* My body fucking hates me and wants me to fucking suffer.  Of this I am convinced.

* Mmm, coffee.  Boo, insufficient coffee.

Lessee.

* Chattery motherfuckers at SIX IN THE MORNING can-- well, I'd say "go down in flames", but I was on the same plane as them.  Nrrgh.  Dear teenagers: a sense of other people, get you some.

* Thanksgiving was splendid.  The 14-year-old was way more mature than I was expecting, mostly out of assumptions based on age than anything else.  The 5-year-old was infinitely cute, even when she was testing.  Sometimes especially so.  It was a struggle not to laugh (and therefore encourage her) sometimes.

* Josh is in hearts with the city.  He was very pleased that I was willing to go out, and wasn't put off at all by the fact that I was managing expectations.  I typically do not get along well with the city, and I don't like being away from $home for too long regardless of where I am, so I was careful to emphasise fairly frequently that he would likely be off on his own or with sinboy or suchlike.  I didn't want him expecting that I'd be up for a tromp every five minutes, because then he's upset and I'm upset, boo.

* I am, however, on better terms with NYC than before.  I think part of it is I'm more willing nowadays to say "This is outside my limits, and I would like $this_much going-out, then home", and similar-sounding things.  So I don't go on for hours being very grumpy and not telling anybody because how can people walk for that long oh god I just want to go home, which means I'm more free to appreciate what's around me.

I still get spurts of "I wonder what this looked like before the city infested it?  *morose*".  I remain myself.

* One thing I definitely appreciate about NYC is, you know that awareness of other people thing?  Where you see someone coming up on your left, so you edge to your right, or someone's going to cross in front of you so you slow down so they do that and you keep walking and it's all good?  I bloody love exercising that, and it gets a workout here.

(I'm sure there's a term for it in German.)

* Speaking of German, one of my pipe dreams is to somehow acquire a roomful of used books, where I can go through each book one-by-one and assess them individually.  I always feel like I'm missing something when I just scan through piles.  I'm not very thorough.  Talking about this with sinboy turned into something involving a will and a knife-fight with regyt, which I am okay with.

* I am on vacation, and it is glorious.  Right now, I am drinking coffee, writing this post, and catching a bit up on my various to-read places.  (Friends list here, blogs elsewhere, &c &c.)  I may go to a thrift store later.  Or back to The Strand to get this one book.  Later, dancing with Rose.  No phones, no coworkers, no getting up at bloody 5:30 in the goddamn morning.  *relaxes*

* I am making great strides in not taking responsibility for others, but I still sometimes get stuck with poly situations.  Josh can reassure me a million million times that of course I'm here to see Rose and of course he doesn't mind (wtf) my sleeping in her room a lot, but I still get worried that he will feel left out or like a third wheel, blah blah blah.  So, I told him that he can pull me aside at any time for any reason to discuss whatever's on his mind, and then I did not bring it up again.  And so every time I get that twinge, I think, "Self, he is a big boy and can tell me if there's a problem, and I reminded him so my responsibilities have been covered, so shutcher piehole."  So far, it's working.

* Any post on how wonderful it is to see Rose and how fucking gorgeous and amazing she is will descend into me beaming like an idiot and forgetting to do things like type real words with meaning and things.  I am a doofus.  She and Josh conspire against me to turn me into food, and she and I conspire against Josh by talking about feminist stuff shortly before he comes in the room.

J: I'll be in shortly!
R: So what, you think it's impossible for two women to be by themselves?  You think we need a man?
J: ...quoi??
R/X: *cracks up*

Okay so, I was at a Dunkin Donuts downtown (it's all downtown, ahahaha).  I went up to the counter, where there was a guy next to me, fumbling to come up with $.48 to complete his $2.48 order.  I ordered a medium regular and a corn muffin, which is full of win and happy for me, and handed the next-to-me guy fifty cents, no worries.  I then sat down at the counter-thing to eat and drink and read a bit.

1) He came up to me and thanked me, to which I said no worries.  He wandered off.

2) He came up to me and handed me 35 cents.  I, uh, sure, okay.  He wandered off.

3) He came up to me and offered me his plant, claiming that he didn't know why he bought it because he had such a black thumb, do I want a plant?  I uh buh wha?  He set it down and left.

I was so bemused.  I turned to the guy next to me, who was on his way out the door.

G: *chuckling*
X: Do... do you want a plant?
G: Nah, man, you're on your own.
X: *still bemused*

I.  Uh.  Well, okay, I appear to have gotten myself a plant for $.15.

...

Do you want a plant?

As it turns out, I actually don't like New York that much.  I tested yesterday to see if I was letting past experiences or expectations get in my way, and nope.  There is constant noise (in the "signal to noise" sense), the flow of people is like trying to swim in a river, and the greenery feels grudging, honestly.  (Depending - I mean, the lilac tree-bush-thing next door feels more like it's going to leap down and consume a passer-by some day, but that's both different and awesome.)  I could barely keep my head together long enough to think.  There was too much, too much, all the time.

(For those keeping track, yesterday I was in upper Manhattan, Chinatown, and Little Italy.  I think.  So you have a frame of reference here.)

I way prefer Portland.  There's greenery everywhere, of both stripes.  (My god people throw out plastic things.  I died.  I am a revenant, posting to LJ.)  There's real air.  You can move quickly, but the vibe I get is more "Question why you'd want to do so" than "Getouttamyway!!".  (Once I walked like I did in Boston, against the light and as fast as possible, due to kitty need.  I felt really out of place doing so.)  There are bicyclists everywhere, that's so fantastic.  And there are actual shops.  Not wall-to-wall storefronts or apartment-fronts.  :(

I may get recommendations to go to this place because there's greenery, or go to that place because there are locally owned shops where they all recycle.  My point is, I even like Portland's downtown area.  I even like the financial district, insofar as there is one.  (It's kind of cute, honestly.)  In NYC, I'd have to go to places to get tastes of what I like.  That would be missing the point.

I am apparently more a suburbanite than an urbanite, as -ites go.  I'm glad New York exists, I guess, because that way people who like it here have a place to be, but I am way pleased there's a Portland I can go to.

An appeals court has ruled that a gay couple's marriage in Canada should be recognized in New York.

"The state Legislature "may decide to prohibit the recognition of same-sex marriages solemnized abroad," the ruling said. "Until it does so, however, such marriages are entitled to recognition in New York."

And here's the ACLU press release on the topic.  This is fantastic!

Oh, hey, and, lookit this:

A[n Oregon] state law allowing gay couples to register as domestic partners belatedly took effect Friday after a federal judge ruled the state's process of disqualifying petition signatures was consistent enough to be valid.

I love waking up to good news.

Originally posted at Xtinian Thoughts.  Comment here or there.