Frequently Asked Questions

Are you getting your hair cut tonight, at least three weeks overdue, and is KC totally going to, like, whinny at you when you come with your front hair looking all like some sort of Shetland pony?

Yes, yes, YES. KC, if you’re reading this, let me apologize in advance. WHEEE-hee-heee-nee! Also, is your band still going on tour with Pretty Girls Make Graves? Can’t wait to hear all about it this evening.

Is the combination of Spoon by Cibo Matto, (to which you have been listening for fully seven years now), followed by Choli Ke Peeche by Bally Sagoo (the JayZ remix, duh), followed by My Sharona (by the guy who sings My Sharona) possibly the best ever, in terms of summer mixes even though it’s only May?

Yes. Don’t forget that SOS song. Man, I love that song. Also, do I love Choli Ke Peeche because or in spite of the JayZ thing?

Well, which is it?

Because, I think. I think. My favorite parts are the “Yes I need your lovin’ yes I need your lovin’ unh” part that JayZ does and then “Oh Cho-LI!” that the Bollywood film star does.

How much do you hate going to the gym lately?

Oh my GOSH, so MUCH. I’ve been pretty good about going lately…like for the past year, actually, now that I think about it. I go between three and four times a week and I do the same thing every time because I only have an hour: elliptical machine (I get to watch either a nature show or Will And Grace), three bajillion crunches, and weights. It is very very boring. Even with my Not Quite Summer yet mix. Also, the other thing about the gym is that you kind of never get to stop, you know? It’s not like you get rewarded, if you go to the gym, by getting to not go to the gym. You just have to keep going. I am dancing between two and three hours a week now, which I totally love, but it’s not enough to keep the specter of Type II diabetes far from my door, and I’m a little afraid to ride my bike to work, so I have to do something else, so I go to the (cheap, near my work, full of very small girls in very tight shorts) gym. I hate it. Oh, and you know what else? My job, in one of the great ironies of my life, is to encourage other people to exercise, like that’s seriously what I do all day. I sit on the phone and say things like “You’re choosing all the benefits of working out, every week!” and “I can sense a real shift in thinking when you talk about your exercise choices” and I mean everything I say to my patients, but I totally don’t mean it when I have to drag myself there every morning. “Self,” I say to myself, “working out is good for you. You don’t want to get a leg cut off when you’re sixty-five due to diabetes-related peripheral neuropathy. Just get up and gooooooo. To the gyyyyyyyyyyymmm. It will be over in an hour and fifteen minutes and maybe there will be a good documentary about albatross or something on the TV. Just goooooooo.” And then I say back to myself, “Self, you shut up. You don’t even know. I haaaaaaaaaaaaate the gym. I’m not losing weight. I hate my discolored yoga pants. I don’t want to gooooooooo.” But I guess my Self and my other Self somehow duke it out between them…selves, because I do go, three to four times a week. I just wish it could feel like more of an accomplishment and less like a failure. Also, I wish I could get some of those endorphins people are always talking about.

How many times has your iPod got broke since last summer, and is it true that the one you currently have is acting up?

That would be THREE times since last summer. The one I have now…and who knows what this is about or how long it will last…is doing this weird pause thing for no reason. I check the headphones, I check to make sure I haven’t bumped it, the whole thing. It is a mystery. As much of a mystery as why I am currently on my third set of headphones, by the way. The white ones the (original) iPod came with totally broke down and it felt like the earbud things were shooting electrical sparks directly into my brain through my ears, so I got some cheap ones at Radio Shack and then those burnt out too, like only one bus at a time would work unless you held the cord in a very specific way, which would not allow you to do anything else, like do the elliptical machine or walk down the street or sit on the bus. I just got a new set the other day but now I wonder if they are, somehow, responsible for this weird pausing thing. I love my iPod but I sort of hate my iPod…I guess because whenever I start to get to know one it immediately leaves me and I have to start a whole new relationship again.

What’s the best way to drive you crazy with frustration in intermediate bellydance class?

Torso rotations, torso rotations, torso rotations! We did those for a while on Monday and I ended up cross-eyed. I think I stamped my foot, too. It’s just really really hard. I try to focus and just do the best I can but for some reason I can’t coordinate my torso and my arms and my head and the music, all at once. Plus it hurts my back, which I know means I’m doing it wrong. The only way it could be more frustrating would be if we immediately went from that to marked turns, at which I would probably lay down on the floor and cry. Torso rotations and marked turns, man. I am so their bitch.

Are you going to see some naked ladies this weekend?

Yup. Purely in the interest of knocking another item off the list, of course. I’m going to a birthday/ bachelorette party too, the night after, and I’m a little worried about what to wear. Also I am worried about parking in Belltown two nights in a row. In fact I am a little worried about the fact that by Sunday I will have gone out every night this week (I sort of count Monday night bellydance as going out because it does not involve my pajamas). I mean, I love going out, but it’s certainly not doing my Netflix queue any favors, I tell you what.

How about wearing the black and white sparkly skirt on Saturday? With the little pearl necklace and earrings?

Could do, could do.

How are you feeling about lying lately?

Still white-hot-rageful, thanks for asking.

What’s the weather like in Seattle?

The kind of weather that lets me know I really am becoming one of those people I used to mock heartlessly when I first moved here from California and was shivering in my basement room for eight months out of the year. This morning it was fifty degrees outside and I hopped out of bed and blithely put on a skirt and sandals. It’s going to soar, you see, to sixty-five during the day. Fifty-five degrees, by the way, was the temperature at which we were allowed to forego our uniforms in middle school, and wear jeans and sweaters instead. It’s a good thing I’m not going to be in Miami before 2008 because I really fear I have lost my heat tolerance (not to mention my tan) and I probably would be one of those terrible people who complained about the heat when it was only ninety degrees and ninety percent humidity.

How do you write a book?

Ha! If only I knew. I’m thinking about this a lot again lately. As I wrote to Martha last night, I don’t want to fall into the trap of believing that just because I know some people who have written/are writing books, that I totally should (or, even, can) too. There is the very big barrier, of course, that I don’t know how to write one. In fact I’m not sure I can write fiction at all. I have been sort of slothfully starting to think of some non-fiction ideas recently, but that’s all I have. I want to keep thinking about this, though. Although I do realize that if this is something I really wanted to do, I’d just do it, right, instead of talking about it. You’d think.

How excited are you for all the various people who are talking about coming to visit you to actually come and visit you?

Very! Dawnie is already setting up barbecues for us to go to. Anna, on the other hand, has told me that she will only tolerate sitting around the house, standing around the house, and laying around the house. (With a daily break to walk down to Market Street to refresh the cupcake supply). Tracy just emailed me to tell me that she wants to watch soccer if she visits, which I do not really support but since it’s Tracy I will tolerate it, especially if she shows up looking cute and then proceeds to make a delicious dinner right in my kitchen where I can totally get at it, which you know she will. I can’t wait.

The reason people are coming to visit you is because you’re leaving for a long time, right?

Well, I’d like to think it’s because of my scintillating conversation, but, uh, yes. That’s very weird to think about. Although possibly they are coming just for the cupcakes, which is a slightly happier thought.

Is it totally weird to be interviewing people for the job you currently hold?

Totally. I mean, what I am supposed to say: “In what ways are you…me?” Between that and the rumor I just heard about some friends moving into my room in July, it looks like I am just going to have to move to New Zealand, you know? Since soon I will have no job and no place to live.

What’s the best way to watch Star Wars?

In pajamas in our TV room, squished up between John and Treasa on the reclining couch, drinking tea and eating dried apples from Trader Joe’s, while John makes me wish that it was him doing the commentary on the DVDs. (Best line thus far, regarding Princess Leia in Episode IV: “She’s playing Hard To Stand.”)

Are you just about done with your silly thrown-together I-ate-soup-for-lunch today entry now?

Not until I tell you that I did, in fact, eat soup for lunch today.