Veggie Tales

Tonight I ate at a vegan restaurant with the vegans (Pretty Kitty, Mr. Pretty Kitty, and Mark) and Kathryn (like me, along for the vegan ride).

Vegans tend to be very picky eaters, even within the scope of their mandated dietary restrictions. For instance, Paul doesn’t like tomatoes, mushrooms, or eggplants, and Mark doesn’t like…vegetables in general. (?!)

After reading a list of specials straight out of American Psycho, the waitress asked if we had any questions. Despite our utter lack of comprehension, none of us did. We had several minutes of juvenile fun pronouncing “seitan” like “Satan.”

Then, just as the vegans were lamenting the lack, in the world, of a decent pizza-grade meltable soy-based cheese substitute, we were interrupted by a fellow diner.

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” she said, “But I really recommend ‘Slice’ — the new vegan pizza place on 2nd Ave. Their cheese…melts…exactly like…cow cheese. (Pause.) The only thing is, you do have to be careful about their crusts. Some of their crusts contain honey.”

With a lead on the best soy cheese substitute in the city, we thanked her profusely and watched her leave. When she was gone, we immediately turned on the vegans. “You can’t eat honey?!” we shrieked, “Because of the bees???”

“I eat honey,” said Paul. “I say…fuck the bees.”

How does this machine work?
This navigation of cogs and meshing
Gears
I look at him and I think
He will leave me
And I will charged to bear
the strength
To let him go.

Happy Birthday to Me

Around midnight I was experiencing excruciating and finely localized pain just below the bottom right side of my ribcage. As the hour crept toward 3, I kept picturing that stupid pain graph they have in the emergency room (on a scale of one to ten, one is a happy face and ten is an anguished sobbing face, but somewhere around three is neutral) and trying to place myself. A six? A seven? If it’s all relative, do I have to take into account that maybe I’ve never felt extreme pain before? I mean, I’ve never experienced being stabbed, or mauled by a shark, or burned all over. Maybe I should save the nine rating for that — just in case.

Around three, I actually looked up “appendicitis” in the dictionary (see: appendix; see: alimentary canal). Wondered if maybe I was dying, or if I could call an ambulance, wait for them outside, and be back home before anyone woke up and noticed.

I am such a wimp.

I couldn’t ride it out and finally decided on codeine pills (Elizabeth Wurtzel was right, no one finishes or throws out their Tylenol 3), and around 3:30am, the throbbing, nauseating pain was down to “sore,” I was able to put pressure on my side without crying, and sleep looked like it might not be impossible.

As a result of all this, I was both sleep deprived and completely high when the 9am call came for breakfast and church. So when my mom woke me up saying “Happy birthday,” I replied “Happy birthday,” only following up with a “to me” a few moments later.

Yeah…

Transit strikes SUCK.

April

And Quin’s second degree test (a long time coming) was suitably excellent: a three-on-one fight with a bunch of red belts, followed by some amazing breaks. Two seconds after my martial arts master warned Quin’s opponents “Don’t get kicked in the head by this guy,” one of them had lost his head gear to an axe kick and another was simply tossed at the feet of the third. Later, the last red belt standing confided to me that he had spent the fight trying to fake out not Quin, but rather his own fellow attackers into charging Quin first, so he wouldn’t bear the brunt of Quin’s counter-technique.

I was only sad that Quin didn’t kick them harder. ‘Cause he could’ve.

Later, Quin made a bunch of suspended boards (three for the reverse turning kick and some crazy number for the punch) explode in dramatic fashion.

P.S. Quin and I both tested for our first degrees in April of 2002, though neither of us wanted to. (Testing with us: Li, Heather A., Don, and Victor.) Paul immediately nicknamed us “April” — hence the subject title of this entry.

Twins?

Weirdly, the Indigo Girls sound remarkably like Simon & Garfunkel on their cover of “Mrs. Robinson.” One wonders if the reverse might also be true: that Simon & Garfunkel would sound exactly like the Indigo Girls if they were to cover, say, “Closer to Fine.” For a moment, allow yourself to imagine the two duos actually switching places on tours and recording sessions, thus sparking a renaissance that changed the world of folk music forever.

This is kind of like my wish that someday Tom Cruise and Tom Hanks will switch places. Picture it: “Mission Impossible 4” starring Tom Hanks! Tom Cruise and Meg Ryan are magical in “Big 3 and a Half!”

Ha! I’ve got a million of ’em.

Consumerism/Meditation

Bought a new mac mini, on a whim. I really don’t do a lot of strenuous graphics work at home, so it’s humming along like a dream. By which I mean “not humming,” since it has a lovely silent cooling system. Ah! Maybe now I can find some peace.

I found myself in a Borders bookstore, browsing through their CD selection of ambient thunderstorms and white noise. I now know there is such a product as pink noise. This bodes not well, for me or for the rest of humanity.

The geisha movie, as expected, was visually beautiful and amazingly melodramatic. It was good to see Gong Li in such fine form as a truly excellent villainess. It’s enough to make me go around spouting lines like “I shall destroy you!” — which comes in handy, epecially in the following situation.

Last night when my mom went to get Chinese takeout, she ordered brown rice. What they gave her was white rice dyed brown with soy sauce. Now, I know my mom is a white woman, but come on. Bitch! Do my eyes not slant??? Do you want me to get all TaeKwon-do on your ass??? I SHALL DESTROY YOU!!!

Heady Stuff

Last night’s yellow & green belt oriented class went exceedingly well; I think everyone involved had lots of fun. Those kids sure enjoyed that self defense leg sweeping! Skeptical as I was, I really think the new format sparked a new surge of excitement in all involved (which is a relief), and I have high hopes for Thursday’s blue & red belt class.

In other news, I finally watched “American Psycho” and am three fourths of my way through the book. This weekend: the overtly Christian-themed Narnia movie, and “Memoirs of a Geisha.”