Christchurch

Tomorrow I am flying to Christchurch

I'll be there until 5th December

Going to do all these things plus I have a stall at the zinefest. I will be selling this zine that I just finished plus all my others.

Get @ me Cantabrians.

:))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

83

i feel translucent

carved out like the inside of a pumpkin

propped up by pillows

i cannot feel anything else

in my headphones

i am listening to the sound of rain

wanting to slide so far down into my bed

that i can no longer see any light

later, in a city street

resting wearisome limbs over wearisome limbs

we speak of things

with breaths shallow and urgent

words like water that wanted to return

to oceans, rivers, lakes

our bodies together

defined by the negative spaces

i say that

touching you is like putting your hand through smoke

creating waves upon waves of echos

then

something about

skin deflated

the tree above us sheds its leaves

we feel them on our jackets like tiny pins

there are palms pressing upwards into spines

whispering into your neck

"there are some things that i will keep forever"

later, the sensation of needles

DC

Washington, DC is the capital city of the USA. It is a very clean and impressive city with lots of greek inspired buildings. On Friday morning I went to Capitol Hill which is that round building with a statue on top. A rude man greeted us at the door and I had to throw out my water bottle even though I emptied it. We went on a free tour of the building with this strange, jaded man from Florida. There were lots of statutes of people who were important to the development of the country, like former presidents or generals or benefactors. The round dome, which you can actually see pretty much everywhere in the city, has a mural in the top of it. It's a really big painting. The whole thing was very spectacular. After our tour we went into the senate and also the house of representatives. There was more happening in the house so we stayed there for a little while and listened to some reps talking. They did a variety of speeches. One man introduced his speech with a passage from the bible which bemused me and Caroline. In both the senate and the house of reps, above the presiding senator (or whatever) it is written 'In God we trust', which made me feel a little ill. That night we went to a reading of people from Caro's MFA program. The reading was good and afterwards Shaun Gannon, DJ Berndt and Will Bechtold arrived. Jess Dutschmann, Michael Michael Motorpsychle and Jae Dyche were also at the reading, among others. There was a dance party upstairs and we had a bit of a dance and chatted and got to know everyone.

On Saturday Caroline (Caz) and I woke up early to go on a walking tour of the National Mall. This is where a lot of the various war memorials are. The guy who took the tour was called Tim and he said he used to be a guidance counsellor. We walked behind the White House and then towards the Washington Monument, learning lots of things about various presidents as we went. One thing that I started to pick up on was the pride that people have about this country. When we were at the WWII memorial there were some veterans from that war there and our guide was really reverent and kept talking about how amazing people who served in wars were. This intrigued me. All of the war memorials were giant and impressive. We spent a lot of time learning about how the Vietnam war memorial was made. There was a national competition to design a memorial for it. The design was chosen anonymously and turns out it was designed by a Chinese-American architecture student which is amusing because of the whole 'Americans hate Communists' thing. We got to go to the Lincoln memorial which is the big statue of Lincoln sitting down in like this tomb situation. The weirdest memorial was the Korean war memorial which was 19 statues of different ranked military peoples next to a reflective granite wall with laser etched faces of people affected by the war. This wall seemed odd, like it would date badly. There were wreaths at this memorial. Apparently the Korean ambassador puts a new one down every week to thank the American people for their sacrifice. We headed back to Caro's place to get ready for the ustream that night. By get ready I mean we watched a lot of shows on A&E, which apparently used to stand for Arts & Entertainment but now they just show Hoarders, 'I work in the sex industry' and other things of that ilk. We were having a good time being incredulous about the people involved in the show, but on the whole most of us felt rather lethargic and not ready to be interesting for our internet public.

For me, it was the most proper ustream I have done. It was my third one so far and it was the largest. There were about 10 people reading and I didn't know everybody's work so it was interesting to hear things. Beach Sloth wrote a really good rundown of proceedings. Highlights for me were when Megan Boyle rapped 'gettin jiggy with it' and the second piece Shaun Gannon read. I felt nervous when I read the first time but the second time when I read Stacey's dinosaur poems I felt happy and connected to her and people in the room because it was received well. We finished the reading by playing 'My Love' by Justin Timberlake who is a gorgeous man and a wonderful dancer. Then we got changed and went out to a bar. DJ tried to do an Australian accent and it sounded more like an English accent. I did an American accent and impressed everyone with how authentic it sounded. In hindsight it seems really silly. We did some dancing and it was pretty fun. My favourite part was when they played a Smiths song. DJ and Shaun are really good dancers too. We went home and ordered a pizza and ate it ravenously then went to sleep. The next day we were going to try to go to a museum.. there are lots to choose from in Washington, probably close to 10 Smithsonians on offer. We chose the Air and Space museum. We were all really hungover/tired and felt horrible walking around trying to be interested in the development of air and space programs in this country. That evening we watched two movies that I had never seen before: Twilight and Wedding Crashers. Twilight was really horrible and bad but now I want to watch the other films.

Carolyn DeCarlo is an angel of a human being and was so sweet having me and Caz stay with her. I had a really good time with her and other internet lit people. I wish that I could see them more because they were all super nice and entertaining. I also enjoyed being out of a big city and walking down quiet streets in DC, felt chill. I actually learnt a lot more that I cannot recall off the top of my head. I am also building up this picture of America and like their 'national identity' in my mind via different experiences of the country. Now I am in Florida with Jacob Steinberg for a week which will encompass Thanksgiving, which I have never had before because it is an American holiday. HOW EXCITING. I think I will learn more while I am here.

the upper east side & then some

our host was this lady named michelle. michelle has a small, grey, fluffy dog called 'pee-wee'. this is an apt name because he often peed/did small poos on the floor. a lot of people on the upper east side have dogs but they all live in apartments so you see them on the street a lot. people take their dogs for walks in their pyjama pants which i thought was nice given that it was the posh upper east side. it is weird that so many people treat their dogs in this way, taking them outside only a few times a day, and not everybody has small dogs like michelle. and even still, it is weird keeping dogs cooped indoors all day. apartments in new york are usually pretty warm because of pipes that go throughout the whole building, so air isn't fresh and all the smells stay in unless you open windows. 

monday was spent mostly in the american museum of natural history. it was a really cool place that most people might recognise from 'night at the museum'. it was really cool and huuuge and you gotta allow a whole day to experience it. there are some disturbing things about it like the fact that a lot of the animals in cases are taxidermy. weird. it was a good experience though. our feet hurt a lot by the end of the day. 

we started buying breakfast from a nice bagel shop on 86th. i had jelly and cream cheese on mine which was pretty delish one day and my first experience of calling jam 'jelly'. tuesday was an unexpectedly legit day. we went on a tour of the UN and learnt about its role in international relations. i think we all felt a bit empowered by possibilities afterwards. our tour guide was peruvian. i want to roll my Rs like he does. lunch we used my zine guide of nyc to take us to this japanese place called menchanko tei and it was just what we needed, filling but not grossly and felt good for us as opposed to all the mexican and pizza we'd been eating. that evening i went to long island city to catch up with my cousin and go to a free comedy show. i felt like i mastered the subway. the show itself was pretty good. we had some beers then went to flux factory where they were having a birthday party for somebody. sam only wanted to stay for one beer but we ended up having some shots of rum and dancing around the kitchen. there was this one guy dancing really awesome and he had a beard and i asked sam if he was married because that's how i enquire about people's marital status. he was very tall and dancing in short fluoro green shorts and a salmon pink polo tee. that is not why he was attractive though. idk. he was ridiculous and uninhibited, i think that was attractive. i had not eaten dinner so i ate 2 donuts that were on the table. they were really delicious, cinnamonny things mm. we kept trying to leave but having conversations with people instead. i talked to a nice girl from canada and told some of the flux artists who i saw speaking last week that i liked their artwork. 'this charming man' by the smiths played and we got excited about english music being played then i said it was definitely our last dance and then we walked to the subway. i met the girls in the city and got pizza on the way back to our apartment. i was a bit drunk and kept exclaiming about how crunchy the pizza was. 

we had a big sleep in yesterday and woke up around 12pm and went to katz's deli for brunch. we ordered a pastrami sandwich, philly cheesesteak and cheese blintzes to share. it was all pretty good, but the pastrami was the best. katz's is overpriced. it wasn't too busy. it was raining a lot and i didn't have a raincoat or an umbrella so my jacket got quite damp. we split up after brunch (which was in reality a v late lunch) and i walked to a nearby salvation army thrift store. they had no fitting rooms so i could not try anything on. i walked back into soho to check out a wool shop, stopping in other pretty stores on the way. i walked past some nice looking galleries on west broadway. i like a lot of things about soho but i felt as if i looked too much like a drowned rat to go into many stores. the wool shop was a dream and is actually the store of a blog i read sometimes, the purl bee. emma came into the store while i was there, purely by coincidence. i thought she had already been there that day. we bought some wool and then went to meet caroline at mcnally jackson bookstore. we had a sit there for a while as our feet were very sore plus we were cold and wet. then went to hampton chutney co for dinner. we all had dosas which looks like a giant pancake with fillings of indian varieties. very tasty and filling. 

we went home to get gussied up to go to a zine launch that brodie told us about. there was a long line at the zine launch and we smoked cigarettes to have something to do in the line. we saw tao lin walk to the front of the line and get right into the store. we played a game that i know called 'end of the world' which is where you look around you and work out who you would sex if the world was going to end in five mins. we made it inside and drank syrupy red wine. brodie and anton were leaving as we arrived. it was nice to see them, however briefly. inside we bought a copy of the zine and stared at tao lin a bit and spotted ryan o'connell who writes for thought catalog. occasionally i overheard people saying '....tao lin' it was funny/weird. we went for a drink at a bar called botannica. the girls were drinking spirits so they got a bit drunk. my drink in nyc was 'brooklyn lager'. i felt weird in botannica. i suggested we leave to get second dinner or go to another bar. we went to a bar i had noticed after the sunday night comedy. it was called 'the scratcher'. lots of the people from the zine launch were there. there were more good looking people there than at the other bar and we played 'end of the world' again. we decided to go outside smoke the last cigarette that caroline had and also talk to emma's end of the world boy. instead, we struck up a conversation with his friend, jackson. jackson said he worked for the third best art auction house in new york. i was interested in this. he was from tennessee. we got a taxi uptown. caroline and emma called their friend laura who is doing student exchange in arizona. we ate the same pizza that i had eaten the previous evening. again, it was really good. we each had two slices. 

i woke up around 6am this morning and felt awake enough to do some emailing and other internet items. we had to leave the apartment to pick up tickets to our bus at 9am. caroline woke up, we said goodbye to sleepy emma and we were organised enough to get to port authority by 8.30. it was too early and we were bored and tired. it was cold today so everything was misty and looked grim out the bus window. we talked about how things seemed rundown as we were driving out of nyc. the bus journey took 4 hours. it was cool seeing more parts of america. as we drove through baltimore i kept thinking of that song from hairspray. we got to DC and carolyn decarlo picked us up and took us to her place. she lives in a really cool flat. she is an easygoing and nice girl, i think we will have fun staying here. she surprised me by saying that a lot of nice int lit people are coming over to her place on saturday night for a ustream. i got really excited and caroline said 'what's a ustream?'. we walked to get some food and coffee at a cafe near caro's house. caroline and i were both very excited to be out of nyc, which is a cool place, but its bustle became tiring after 10+ days of being there. it's nice to see sky and for there to be trees and less people. 

so we are staying in dc for a little while now, going to do some touristy stuff but also have some chill time and hang with nice lit people. i think it will be good. i am hungry now.

spencer madsen style blog post about my day

went to:

• westgate aa
• parent's house
• sister's house
• home
• titirangi yoga centre

people i saw:

• dad
• kristy
• nova
• hannah
• xinia
• various other strangers

people i talked to on the internet:

• james
• sam

people i talked to on the phone:

• mum

read:

• some of norwegian wood by haruki murakami
• animals by janey smith - a chapbook i ordered from plain wrap press, an excerpt:

"from above, on your small bed, the spread out limbs of the full-grown blue-white polar bear seem to make the polar bear look like a snowy white star - the star bounces ever-so-gently around the walls of your tiny universe."

• groove guide - only read this because sam wrote a feature article about the beach boys, laughed about a reference he made to their cameo on 'home improvement'

• bbq by victoria durnak - a zine sent to me from sweden, contains lil poems such as this one:

pain performance

my bleeding heels turned away from you
as I rip off my blister band-aids in Central Park
but you already know my morning breath
that I sometimes throw up while walking and
that I smell like curry paste
on sunny days

• 'even the oceans' by sheridan mills - a zine feat. excerpts from chat logs, emails, streams of consciousness and things overheard etc, i found it kind of endearing, excerpt:

"i think tomatoes look sweet
i wanna kiss em"

• 'tender lines/tender loins' by leonie v. brialey - prob my favourite zine that i read, comics about various romantic exploits, laughed 3x times, laughed the hardest at a drawing of herself motioning to her crotch with a speech bubble saying 'hey boy, just get on this! it's hell good!"

watched:

• the simpsons (the 'sweet sweet can' ep)
• s1 e5 & 6 community

ate:

• a banana
• chicken croissant
• cheese corn chips
• cheese roll w/ butter
• whittakers creamy milk chocolate x4 pieces
• falefal burger

drank:

• water, maybe 2x bottles idk
• 1x tea
• 1x beer

wrote:

• finished a poem called '82'

listened to:

• wtf podcast w/ bryan cranston
• itunes spring playlist
• yuck

notable:

• sat my full driving licence test and passed
• booked my flights to christchurch
• got a message from susie saying she saw tao lin in nyc
• whilst reading outside i saw a mumma duck and her ducklings in the front yard eating some grass and it made me feel happy
• pulled a 'hammy' during yoga (jk i just like saying 'pulled a hammy' when i've been exerting myself physically)
• during the relaxation part of yoga i felt like my body was melting into the floor
• hannah called me 'wifey' after i made her dinner

probably going to read until i pass out

spencer's blog

new lynn bus station

seeing people carrying around 1.5 L soft drink bottles in public

woman just got up and started 'shimmying' right in front of me, occasionally swearing loudly, it's 11.42am on a wednesday

she just yelled 'don't be jealous', and 'boy i can shake aye'

internal monologue: HOW IS THIS HAPPENING

interested in how each of the 7 individuals in this bus stop are ignoring this woman in their own unique way

my way is to pretend to be deeply engrossed in whatever i am typing into my computer by squinting my eyes slightly and occasionally mouthing words

she might have started singing 'golden years' by david bowie but probably not

she is currently in v. close proximity to me

internal monologue: please get away from me crazy dancing lady

homeless man making really succinct yelping noises at passers-by and making people feel extremely uncomfortable including me, even with headphones on

'smack that' by akon just came on my ipod

life is bloody hilarious

nyc notes

times square

feel like there are so many strange (+ terrifying sometimes) people in the world. the feeling of being in somebody else's holiday pictures makes me feel weird. mostly fine but still not fine. not sure. do people even look at their holiday stuff again? ny seems pretty much as i expected.. or something, as i imagined it to be maybe. or seems to be as it should

g train

semi terrified of getting lost on the subway as per what happened when i was younger (note, i got lost on the tube in london). wondering occasionally whether me + [romantic interest] will do marriage. think i could. but i am v young. the announcements on trains here are still humans... i feel comforted by this + at least on this train i can hear them. feel a scary thing about this country is that anybody could be carrying a gun. hm. going to listen to the whitest music i can: coldplay

staten island ferry

feels like it would be an ok thing to do to be a parent, interesting to show them how to be a normal human + manners etc. i will need to have a partner with really good maners i think b/c mine are poor. love seeing how men get fatherly. for some reason this is immensely endearing and pretty attractive.

hunter college subway

'the network effect'. people seem to be combinations of more things here. like obviously there are just more people, ergo more cultures. in australia those things are very new so it's unlikely one would be a mix of more than one nationality.

museum of natural history

just really miss the boys, specific boys. sometimes feel pain because i am missing out on so much love. but museums + the planetarium will have their special effect on me, make me remember how small i am, how nothing. i guess i am someone to some people.. but the world is too huge.. overwhelmed by how much there is to know.

A thing

My friend Sam is making a publication that you should submit to.

"The first issue is about Collections. If you have something you currently collect, used to collect, or really want to collect, we would like to hear about it. More specifically, I want to know about your personal relationship to that past, present or future collection. There's no word limit and no collection is too large, small, weird or downright pornographic to be considered.

The first issue will be going live early next year and submissions are due at the end of January.

If you'd like more information about the project, email samwieck@gmail.com and put your favourite David Bowie song in the subject line. Feel free to pass this along to anyone who might be interested."

horribly almost daily recount of nyc so far

seems really hard to write enough about my trip so far & only like it will get more difficult

first night i arrived my friends were staying in soho. my face lit up when i saw the city skyline for the first time & getting the cab down prince street i just felt so happy... i was jetlagged and slept while my friends went to broadway. they got back at 2.30am and i was hungry so we went to get pizza. felt overjoyed that this was a possibility. was awesome because the pizza place we went to was playing really cool music like black keys and radiohead, then all of a sudden they played 'in my place' by coldplay which is one of my faves of theirs.

the next day we got a cab to our place in bed-stuy, which apart from being in a pretty rough area (for three white chicks), is amaaayzing and much bigger than the soho flat. we went for a wander around on our first day, caroline got a haircut in williamsburg, then we bought some groceries and made dinner in our place, watched some tv. wednesday we tried to actively go to places in brooklyn but we ended up doing a  more thorough walk down bedford ave in w'burg which was quite enjoyable as it was a fine day. just fiiine. we had lunch at this really cute cafe called egg. i had a chorizo and egg sandwich, while the other girls had pulled pork sandwiches. we have been eating quite well and cheap, i must say. food is pretty cheap, even with tipping, which i am gradually getting used to. that evening we met up with my cousin sam in the city and went to this art opening in noho. there was free champagne. the artwork was really cool, a mix of sort of nostalgia & design. by this i mean there were really well crafted bows & arrows & necklaces & games. we had pizza for dinner at lombardi's.

on thursday we went into the city and did shopping. i bought an american apparel hoodie because i have always wanted one, but in australia they are nearly double the price they are here. we went to urban outfitters. i spent half an hour in a changing room line. that evening i went to have dinner with my cousin at flux factory. once a month on thursdays the 15+ artists associated flux invite their friends/family to come have a potluck dinner and some drinks, then hang around afterwards to hear some of the artists talk about what they're up to. i found this part very interesting. there was a danish guy who had sculpted this log and other wood into a working sculpture with which to make fried egg. a polish guy was making a zine about homosexuality in eastern europe and also researching a documentary about the polish artist natalia ll. it was a very nice thing to do. i got the train back to brooklyn with my cousin's friend meg and then a taxi back to bed-stuy.

friday we did more shopping. you can do a lot of shopping in this city. in the evening we hung out with some friends from melbourne, brodie and anton. they are really sweet and it was nice to see them, catching up about uni things and talking trash about the differences between americans and australians. most people are really nice, but sometimes it's just manners and not very sincere. other times it's sincere. like in brooklyn when we asked people where to go they were always friendly. and when i was trying to get to flux i clearly had no idea what i was doing and these policemen were like "where are you trying to go, miss?". anyway the bar we met brodie & anton at had like a foot of sand on the ground. they instructed us to go up to the manhattan inn. we went into a few lame bars on the way but finally arrived at the manhattan inn which was super cool and what we had hoped williamsburg would be all about. we walked back down bedford ave after a bit of a dance in search of food. emma was pretending that her scarf was an invisibility cloak. we had a lie down on a basketball court halfway back. then we went to this really awesome place called the meatball shop which was so fucking tasty, i think my fave thing i've eaten so far. i really like that you can walk around at 2.30 in the morning and proper restaurants are still open and serving food. when we got back to our apartment the other girls skyped their friend laura in arizona but i had to sleep so i hit the ole hay.

we woke up feeling totally sleep deprived on saturday and struggled to pack up all our stuff for our move to the upper east side. we managed to pull ourselves together and clean up the place. we left our luggage with the nice lady who owned our apartment and went to the brooklyn flea market. this was an enjoyable and easy thing to do when you feel very tired, plus we couldn't check into our new place until later that day. at the market i had some nice food, looked at nice vintage clothes and pretty design things. i bought my mum a tea towel that has brooklyn written on it. our cab driver to manhattan was really nice. he seemed like a friendly family man and pointed out interesting things in brooklyn as we drove through it. everything looks so pretty at the moment because it is fall and the leaves are changing colour.. it's lovely. and it hasn't been too cold which has made for some nice walks around brooklyn & manhattan. after we arrived at our new place we left our bags and went to central park. this was my first time seeing the park and omg it was so kewl. there were a lot of fancy dogs on the walk there, which is inconvenient because my general reaction when i see dogs is like "aww puppy" or "aww doggie" (via stacey) but i can't do this now because it happens too frequently. but it's cute because you see people walking dogs in pyjamas - they obviously live in the apartments really close by and need to take their dog out a couple of times a day. after our little stroll we came back, rugged up and went downtown to take the staten island ferry, which is freeeeeeee. it was really nice seeing the city skyline and being closer to the statue of liberty (miss libs). we had dinner then went back home to watch some sex and the city and chill.

yesterday i met up with marshall mallicoat who is a fine young gentleman. we met at grand central station (which is really freaking awesome btw) then i raced across town to go on a tour of nbc studios with caroline. i got to go inside the SNL studio which made me so excited. the page kept telling us that we were breathing the same air as chris martin because coldplay had performed there the previous night. so cool. all the studios had lots and lots of lights. the halls are obviously decorated for tourists because they have a lot of framed photos of tv shows and actors lining them. we saw the board of controls (or something) which is where they show everything that is broadcast on the network at any given time. they said that if something bad happens to this one on the east coast they have a backup system that keeps it broadcasting for a whole week without power. then we went to the new york public library and sat there for a while but it was closed. marshall came to hang out with us. we wandered around, hung at grand central some more, then went to madison square park to get shake shack, which was pretty tasty, but not mindblowing i must say, after all the hype i'd heard about it. after dinner we went to a $5 comedy show and it was really funny. this was an incredibly satisfying day.

so i have been taking other notes and will try to do more updates but it's really hard because we stay out all day doing things and then get home. sorry friends. i love ya'll

get happy fast plan

my friend alice is making people 'get happy fast' plans

i said that what would make me happy is her cat simba and my (neighbour's) cat pickles nuzzling

she made this
















:)))))))))))))

oh also the reason susie hasn't been posting is because she is in NYC
she is cooking up a big ass travel post though

spring

when i think about writing a poem i turn off all sounds, sort of stare into space for a while and just see how it feels to exist inside of a human body. it is something like a distant humming, a vibration akin to pins and needles. my body is making the noise that my mac book makes when everything else is silent. this humming sound is produced by the movement of blood pumping through my veins and organs. sometimes this is how i feel after i have been drinking peppermint tea, or when i am in love.

i can feel my heart in my chest as though it is significant, as though it is not just pumping blood around my body but also feeling the weight of all of my actions and interactions. i think about people who have wrapped my body in theirs, like a sheet wound tightly around me. i have never felt so good.

all of this makes my body feel light, and i wrap my arms around myself to make sure i do not float away if the wind decides to take me. all the time i feel as though i could jump up into the air and be carried away.

it is getting warmer

soon the humming of my body

will be eclipsed by the sound of cicadas

soon pohutukawa trees will bloom

and i will shed my inhibitions like layers of clothing

soon i will drink a lot of beer

and kiss your mouth

day in review 1/11/11

woke up at [some time, idk] spooning susie's teddy bear. went on the internet until susie woke up and then susie's friend jordan jumped into bed with us and we talked for a while then went out to get things to make for breakfast. we (mostly susie) made scrambled eggs and mushrooms with pesto. jordan was real stoked re: coffee and life. he left, and then susie left with her flat mate steve to get a new vacuum cleaner. i watched an episode of parks and rec and walked to go meet david on smith st. we got coffee and sat in carlton gardens. it is really beautiful there. then we walked into the city and got vegan cupcakes, walked around laneways looking at street art and tried to break into an abandoned building but were foiled by the po-po. then we met susie and went to a gallery opening and drank free wine. there was this performance art piece with a painted lady standing up in this bed, idk 'art'. afterwards we said our goodbyes to david and fraser picked us up and we went to his house and made this good ass stir fry. susie and i caught the train home and then curled up and watched crazy stupid love feat. our man ryan gosling. was a really terrible movie actually. but i've come to realise that almost any situation i'm in with susie there will be some element of laughter and/or merriment. we went to sleep at 12 or 1am or something.

cat reactions

our reactions to the above videos:

wish we recorded a video of our reaction to our reaction video, bloody meta