Amanda Failure Princess

i would say of all my nasty habits, chewing the shit out of everything i touch is by far the most disturbing. i re-discovered this while working at my new job, as i have systematically laid waste to each and every disposable bic in my path. this wouldn’t be that bad of a problem, i guess if i was just nibbling, but we are talking full-on distruction here. it starts off with an innocent squeeze of the cap with my front teeth. then i start gnawing slowly on it with my molars until the little circular nipply part in the middle pops off. then i chew and chew until the cap shreds to an unrecognizable pile of plastic and move on to the bottom of the pen. the end result is usually just me staring remorsefully at my now unusable pen, but i will not lie and say i haven’t been caught looking rabid, with inky foam on my lips. oh my god. oh my god, i can’t believe i am admitting that here!

i guess i am just a really nervous person, and work is a nerve-wracking place. the new tape gun we got to seal the packages going out each day may have a comfort grip handle, but it also makes a sound very similar to a veloca raptor everytime i try to use it. not so comforting.

also, i don’t think my boss likes me very much. i find this disconcerting for two reasons, one being that i live in a world (my head) where everyone likes me because i am as soft and harmless as a butterfly breeze and secondly because he controls my financial future and therefore the future of my monthly bikini wax.

p.s. btw next time i go in i am asking lily to take off ALL the hair. i feel the need to start afresh. the current landing strip i have is looking a little beleaguered. and no, i am not alluding yet again to how much sex i have been having lately, but the amount of stress daily things like curling, flat-ironing, and sun-damage can do to your pubes. jk. i am so sleepy!

saturday i went down to long beach with my new friend j. to meet j’s sister and sister’s friend at this sea festival thing and we had an amazing time. i love the beach but i never go there because that means i have to leave the silverlake area. i kid, i kid, i just hate driving. the ocean calls me though, and it makes me feel kind of scared. if i stand there long enough i will start to cry and i don’t really have any idea why. i told j. i was going to walk right in and not come back and j. asked me if i was a selkie. i was impressed.

anyways it was beautiful and the weather was perfect at four o’clock. j. and i laughed a lot like dorks and kissed and i laid in j’s lap in the sand. looking up at the marbled sky, i wondered aloud if, since each and every second of my life i am seized with fear, hurt, and general unrest, then what it meant that at that very moment, i felt perfectly at ease and satisfied. j. said maybe it means i’m falling in love, then followed quickly with "wait, i just made the fear come back, huh?" then i said yes and we laughed a lot again.

i also waded in the water and my skirt got all wet, but i brought about a hundred costume changes. i was feeling pretty okay about that, but then we drove to huntington for a party at amy’s and she and her bro told me the long beach water is filthy filthy dirty. gross. whatever, i just got really drunk then and everyone went swimming and jacuzzing and it was one of the best fucking days in a long time.

i don’t know about all this love biz because as you may know, i do not believe in anything that never leaves but disappears, and honestly we haven’t known each other that long and it is far too early for that, but i am feeling a tinge of happiness… and it’s something i am not used to, so sweet it makes my teeth hurt. and my thigh muscles kinda hurt too, but that’s a different story. a much less or more romantic one, depending on how you look at things.

and right now, i don’t know how to look at things. is my habit of sitting around waiting for the other shoe to drop wise or is it wasteful? when will i ever be able to just experience things and not dissect them so, obliterating my instincts? when will i stop gnawing at the heart?

okay, you guys, i know you hate me and i am sorry. my internet connection availability has been spotty lately and i have been working really hard on some research. below you will see some of my important research notes as well as some other pointless notes.

a) i officially cannot do without at least six hours of sleep anymore. right now i am cracked out on no-doz b/c i have decided all week that late night reaserch trumps the importance of my job security and today i really need to be on target. filing + shaky hands + papercuts = mucho pain this weekend with all the vodka soda limes i’ll be squeezing.

b) fyi the g-spot totally exists. i mean, i guess no one can say for sure, but that’s what i personally have been able to ascertain upon being fucked so thoroughly well that it feels good in my eyeballs.

c) if there is anything i hate more than waking up before noon, i don’t know what it is. it could be a hatchet to the face, but my flawless beauty will tell you i don’t really know what that’s like. hahahaha. sersiously, though, when oh WHEN will leisure befall me?

d) sunset junction this weekend. at first i was excited that blonde redhead is playing, but then i remembered i hate seeing bands at fests. i also remembered i hate rides, children, direct sunlight, and ten-dollar beers. omg, do i hate sunset junction? the answer is maybe.

e) went to the theatre last night around 2 am. the kids were having a memorial (beers) there. there was just the right mix of merriment, reverence, and andrew and kevin bickering. i love those boys and miss them, and old times.  laughing and joking with them felt the same though. everything felt the same, but it has been a long time since i have been there, or any building like that. one that is living, breathing, laying in wait, always.

f) sometimes i wonder if i should look into my super-sensory abilities, but i fear that with that will come too much responsibility. my co-worker told me about a friend who has trouble even meeting new people because she sees so much of the energy that comes with them, right upon first handshake. i dunno, i just think i have a lot more stuff to do while i’m still semi-young, and i can imagine abilities like that really suck the fun out of stuff like doing body shots with strangers in mexico.

g) speaking of, last week i was pretty sure i was pregnant and the baby was gonna be a margarita. i don’t think i have consumed more margies in my life than in july/august of this year. as you can imagine i am chubbier than ever right now, but i’m hoping my grand pattern of slimming-down just in time for sweater season continues. goddamn it goddamn it!

i am terrible at timing. right before my head went blank i was producing more/better work than ever and right now my blog hits are seriously on the rise. of course, now is the time i have nothing to say. i know the entire basis of my pseudo-writing career is "getting it wrong since 1981" but it’s still always a jolt when it happens again. i need to do something about this, but i don’t know where to focus my creative energy. maybe i’ll take a class or something. i know they have a wine-tasting course at LACC…

j/k.

so the picture to your left is kind of what it looks like from the street i grew up on in san gabriel, ca. (except for the giant black cloud, wtf?). i know, i know, the san gabriel mountains are beautiful. in the winter the valley is crisp and sunny, and there are snow caps on the mountain peaks, just like this. what i love most are the palm trees. i have become obsessed with the palms since the last time i was living here in-between housings. today the sky was bright blue and i got home from work in time to oil up and catch an hour of good sun on the new lawn chairs my mom just bought. also, this house has a/c, and my aunt, who lives next door, has a constant supply of various diet and regular sodas. so basically, what i am trying to tell you is that i am GOING ABSOLUTELY INSANE!!!!

god damn. it’s not like i have even been spending that much time here, but the time i am here is confusing for me. on one hand, i feel comforted. i feel like my life can actually stop for a minute and i can sleep at night. on the other hand, i feel trapped, isolated, and terrified that i will never get out. fun: having my new friend come over and pick me up here, park on a dark street and do it in the car, then buy me a rootbeer at the 7-11 i walked to as a kid. not fun: looking through all of my old photos and papers with scribblings of despair or hope or whatever, from a time when today was so far away, and i secretly thought i would have figured it all out by now.

i have a lot of things from when i was in high school, but the bulk of the treasure buried in my chest (aka old, torn christmas giftbags) if from about age 19-22. it was during this time that i worked at the rialto theatre. i have been wanting to write about that for a while, but i was kind of wary because i still know people that work there. well, i just found out from my ex gf (who is now a boy p.s. btw, explain some other time, okay?) that with two weeks notice to the employees, they are shutting the place down next week. this is sad firstly for the employees, who are suddenly out of a job, but also for the community because the theatre is a beautiful, old, historic landmark. the inside is really amazing, but i can’t find any pictures of that. it has a balcony and seats, like, 1000 people or something and the screen is ginormo. the inside is all art deco and there is a gargoyle with red lightbulbs for eyes watching over the auditorium. i dunno, i used to know all these facts like the back of my hand because i worked there for five years and people always came in squawking about how beautiful/run down it was and asking obnoxious questions or compaining about the poor sound. that’s the thing, the theatre isn’t designed to facilitate modern things like digital projection and hd sound. the screen is too big and the acoustics are crap.

what i do remember is all the crazy shit we used to do working at that place. i’d say i grew up there, in many ways, even though i didn’t feel grown up until years after i stopped working there. so many memories… so many firsts… one day i need to really sit and write it all out but there are so many elaborate details and potential lawsuits involved, i feel like i can only talk about myself and my own experiences there.

let’s see, that’s where i got punched in the face by that creepy old guy.

also, that’s where i met my first gf. i remember the first night i realized i had a crush on her. we were having a slumber party in the theatre with another girl who worked there, just getting hammered and hanging out in the mezzanine in our pajamas. she was drinking a forty and telling a story, and i remember watching her hands move. they were large and pale, like two beautiful white birds, and i wanted to feel them against my cheek. anyways, that feeling came and went, but we dated for over three years and she went down on me in the projection booth pretty much every day, so over all it was a positive work experience. except when we were fighting. that was nasty.

before we got together i had another crush there. the assistant manager was six years older than me, large, and bald, but i was obsessed with him, even though he had a girlfriend and i was a lesbian. he was smart, funny, and shockingly charming for such a depressed man. i thought he had a beautiful face. once, when i first started working there, we had a screening and everyone was sooo wasted. toward the end of the night, he put his arms around me and squeezed my ass, saying, “i’m squeezing your ass… i have a girlfriend…” then he kissed me on the mouth. seconds later, he lumbered over to the sink and vomited what i would be willing to give a sworn statement was an entire, in-tact chili dog. ugh. i can’t help it, i have a daddy complex sometimes.

it was seriously just the best job ever for that time in my life though. everyone who worked there was some kind of artist or genius who couldn’t get thier shit together, or hadn’t decided to yet. there were only a handful of us, and there was only one screen so during the movie you just sat there on these brown benches staring out at the box office and the street, talking to whomever was on shift with you, reading, or making fun of the boss. the guys would make up stupid games in the lobby like “courtesy cup bowling” or “throw a nerf football at the payphone and knock the receiver off the hook.” i became close with people i might have never even gotten a chance to meet anywhere else. i learned things about myself and lessons i will never forget. i made up a bunch of hilarious songs about cleaning up after movie theatre patrons, who, if you want to know, are the biggest bastards in the world. i don’t understand why going to the movies just makes people think they can throw stuff on the ground. once, i went in to sweep in-between shows and found myself wading knee deep in a pile of spittle-covered sunflower seed shells. what the hell? i wish i had powers of teleportation so that the trash people left at their seats would magically appear on their car seats. hahaha. oh man. yeah, that job really nurtured my burgeoning rage.

so, even though i will never enjoy buttered popcorn (gaaaaggg) or just sitting back and not thinking about what’s going on behind the scenes, in the projection booth, at the concession stand, etc., when i am at the movies, it was all worth it. i haven’t explored the place in a while, but i am going to try and get in there before it closes this week, at least to say goodbye. you know, to the gargoyle, the lady in white, and a few ghosts of my own.

i don’t understand why some people think that just because they are cute, smart, funny, and good in bed that they can just come around and do whatever they want. super-fucking-annoying things like get inside your thoughts and make you smile to yourself at work when you are supposed to be internally cursing the lord for making you incapable of living up to your potential. it’s like, the sheer audacity of it all is mind-blowing. i like my life the way it is. i like my head the way it is, full of self-deprication, ceaseless sarcasm, and general fear and distrust of everything. i guess there is nothing wrong with experiencing a little pleasure. i mean, maybe, i guess, i don’t know. the worst thing that can happen is that i end up hurt and miserable… or happy and boring, an equally disturbing scenario, if you ask me. no point in overthinking things. better to just experience them. i suppose i will research and archive. i do it all for you, dear reader, and i’m so sorry i haven’t been writing much.

soon, i promise.