hello 2004

the virgo in me likes to start 2004 pure and productive. don't ask me why. but it's been that way for the last decade at least. i like to start things out with a clean house, clear head, and shootin' outta the starting blocks.

cough cough. that was then. this is now.

now i'm thinking that a great way to start the new year is in bed. like all-day-if-you-want in bed. it helps when it's rainy and cold. it helps when you were up til 3:00 in the morning playing poker.

it was a fun new year's. my friend jeremy, who is really one of my most favorite people in the world, lives in seattle, is interesting and funny and sweet and all things great, was in town and i joined his family for dinner. soup and wine and long conversations of which i seemed to dominate them all. and then off to kb's for gin and poker.

at midnight a group of us tried to hustle our butts to the bridge that goes over the railroad. why a bridge, i dunno. but it is a good bridge. and it's good to toast in unexpected places i think. but with only 45 seconds to spare and a block and a half still to go, we made a last minute detour to the stab to bang pots and pans and shake our groove thangs and shout in a new year.

thing is, the stab was in a super mellow, straight-ahead jazz, deeply philosophical rumination mood (the whole building) (funny; last year they were whooping it up til the wee morning light). so we exploded like chinese fire crackers on a sleepy bunch and tried to leave as quickly as possible, too (like campers keeping their site free of human trace) (a.k.a. empaque su basura). returning the cd player back to miles davis as quickly as possible.

today. rain. breakie at dan's. following the boys to home depot (aka snoozeville; why do people love that place?). and then s&tc mini-marathon with kb. in between lollygagging nap time.

and that, my friends, can be a new way to meander out of the starting blocks. hurrah '04.