THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY and THE MOTHER AND THE WHORE

Yesterday I saw THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY and was really moved by it. The initial scenes were hard for me to watch because they are so blurry even though it was clear that the camera was the "eye" of the man who had had a major stroke and was waking up out of a coma. The film was based on a book written by the person who had experienced all this challenge in becoming paralyzed and completely dependent.

The acting, like in all French films, was superb. I love the casting that is done in France. Good acting is much more important than great make-up jobs. Max von Sydow did look extremely handsome and overall, I would say I went to see this film primarily for the visuals. I knew there would have to be many dream sequences and some surreal staging and moments.

I never disliked Julian Schnabel's paintings. I suppose one reaches a limit with painting "greatly" like he had done in the past. Using a new medium and twisting many camera angles, Schnabel demonstrated that painting and drawing are the mothers of the arts.

Speaking of mothers, I saw THE MOTHER AND THE WHORE this past week, having rented it from the video store. (It was on VHS--I don't have a dvd player.) This is a French film as well. It doesn't hurt that I adore Jean-Pierre Leaud (I don't think I've commented on the film he did with Catherine Breillat). This film was 4 hours long. I watched it over three evenings. Actually, I watched Part 11 first and then Part !. So I already knew how the film was to "end." I couldn't say anything that would really convey how brilliant this film is.

Both the DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY and THE MOTHER AND THE WHORE beg the viewer for answers. The answers have to do with questions of love, superficiality, spirituality and the abstraction of the ego.

Trying to consider nested cycles and yoga.

My flash animation class requires alot more time than I had thought it would. There are some concepts I don't grasp yet, like the nested cycle. We are doing buttons right now, and I'm thinking that the button is like a nested cycle. This shows how much I know about Flash.

But, actually, I'm looking forward in this next interactivity project to do something that relates to my own work. I have some video shot over two years ago that I want to use with the character in my project. They are both black cats. I know it is "cute' to do cats, but actually, I think some cats are very funny.

Meanwhile, I should be doing some yoga.

Holland and St. Patrick's Day

St. Patrick's Day parade in Dublin, Ireland part of a five-day festival; over 500,000 people attended the 2006 parade. The largest St. Patrick's Day parade is held in New York City and it is watched by over 2 million spectators. The St. Patrick's Day parade was first held in Boston in 1761, organized by the Charitable Irish Society. New York's celebration began on 18 March 1762 when Irish soldiers in the British army marched through the city.[citation needed] The predominantly French-speaking Canadian city of Montréal, in the province of Québec has the longest continually running Saint Patrick's day parade in North America, since 1824.[4] The city's flag has the Irish emblem, the shamrock, in one of its corners. Ireland's cities all hold their own parades and festivals. These cities include Dublin, Cork, Belfast, Derry, Galway, Kilkenny, Limerick, and Waterford. Parades also take place in other Irish towns and villages.
--Wikipedia

I was eating at a restaurant in which one of my friends works, and a couple under 65 sat at the table next to me. The language they were speaking sounded familiar to me, but as I have noticed about many European visitors to San Francisco, in public, they speak very softly. About ten minutes past, and my friend came over just as I asked the couple, "Spreek je Nederlans (sp)? It turns out that they did, and we started talking about how much I love Holland and how I lived in Groningen for a while and etc.

Eventually I told them that I have an E.U. passport given to me by the country of Eire, or Ireland. So, they had just been to the St. Patrick's Day Parade in San Francisco today. Now, they asked me, since you're Irish, can you tell just who is Saint Patrick?

I am such a complete space. When I was at the university, I almost studied Gaelic. But today I couldn't remember who St. Patrick "was." I told them some b.s. and got St. Patrick mixed up with--I think it is--Saint George...and I've been studying Hinduism and Buddhism and have forgotten alot about Christianity.

There must be common knowledge to every culture, I suppose. I'll remember who Bobby Sands was before I'll be able to tell anyone about why San Francisco and other other cities have parades for Saint Patrick of Ireland.

I told them I thought the holiday was just another commercial one for the U.S. They agreed, and then they said that Irish dancing is commercial. I'm not sure I agree with that. Dance is a form of art that transcends commercialism. The Dutch are well-known for their incredible painters: Van Gogh, Rembrandt, de Kooning. The Irish are well-known for their contributions to music and performance. I just told them, " Ireland doesn't have much of an economy." and they said it was--to them--a place that was still backward. No wonder I couldn't remember who St. Patrick is supposed to be.

Planet Glee rocked again.

I have so much fun when there's a musical guest on the show. So far, the musicians who have been on are new and raw. Last night's guest was a total trip. He calls himself "The Father J. O'Brien." I asked him where the "father" came from. He said it had to do with a group of friends in San Diego, and then he blurted what he was called before and it had some usually-unheard-on-tv words in it. We were on Planet Glee again.

The Father J. O'Brien is in his mid-twenties sings with the wisdom of someone with more life experience. An old soul with an incredible voice (deep like Tom Waits but also with something else--something a J. Mascis voice of inner knowledge and common sense.

We had fun jamming, too. And, we got two callers!! The second caller invited Father J. O'Brien to play at her party on Page Street tonight. She also said that "Miss Planet Glee" could join him on tabla. I thought it was funny and really great.

I missed Shivaratri tonight.

Somehow I thought that 2008 might be a good year. What I mean by "good year" is that I'm not so depressed, work is not so depressing, I've found a new place to live, I have a new boyfriend, I possibly have a new job, I have new friends and I'm not so depressed all the time. So far, 2008 has marked a new low in my energy level. I require much more sleep than I did three months ago to function and to feel energetic somewhat.

I thought that 2007 was a decent year. Work was quite difficult (as usual) but this year work seems worse (if that is possible!!!). I have two new assistants and all the students run all over the place. They spill things, put their hands in their bowel-movement-filled diapers, come in the door at 8:30 a.m. screaming at the top of their lungs (I have had a student like this kind before), require that everything be done for them, run off from the group while walking to the breakfast, lunch or elevator areas... The other teachers at the school used to dislike me because I had a decent amount of assistance (at least three assistants or more) and predominantly children in wheelchairs who didn't run around constantly.

What remains unsaid is that I am exhausted. The job is draining beyond belief. Last night I had a psychedelic dream and woke up wondering if I had ACTUALLY had a happy dream. I couldn't sleep well after that. (Yes, the price of "happiness.")

So, tonight, a Wednesday night and my only night in which I don't have a commitment, a Shivaratri celebration and chanting fest is going on at Amma's ashram in San Ramon. My friends asked me to go. All I had to do was drive myself up to upper Haight and back at around midnight. The headlight on my car first went out 4 years ago. Somehow my landlord glued the part of the casing that kept the lamp dry. About 5 weeks ago, the bulb blew out for the first time in 4 years. Last weekend, the bulb blew out again.

I HATE being stopped by U.S. police or other government "enforcers." Actually, the last time I got stopped by a cop was in upper Haight in 2006 for having a brake light out. The cop held onto my driver's license and was talking on the phone for about 10 minutes. This really unnerved me. Somehow I know that Amma's grace would help through any situation, but I find it hard to break through my mundance experience and feelings surrounding freedom. Despite the fact that the route is pre-set, there is more freedom to be found in riding the bus than driving a car! I keep thinking I'm going to get stopped by a cop and really lose my patience or get into an accident due to exhaustion. So, here I am sitting at home. It's time to meditate and go to sleep. I wish everyone a blessed evening.

Listening to The Smiths and this week, among other things.

For the past week, I've felt weird, because I've had a sinus infection and a cold. There seem to be things that go wrong when one is not "well," I suppose. The littlest annoyance has univeral and cosmic significance.

Meanwhile, back in August I discovered a Morrissey cd at the thrift store. The cd is called "Bona Drag." In any case, I got into listening to his lyrics and melodies. When The Smiths were happening in the eighties, I wasn't into them AT ALL. I was a complete and total punk girl. No frilly Smiths for me, thank you. I suppose if I could have gotten past their style (not fast or hard enough for me then), I could have listened to lyrics that were, in fact, quite political and addressed alot of issues about love and death, among other things.

I bought "Meat is Murder" a month or so ago. It has a young British soldier on the cover replicated four times into a square. Respect for all life forms is more than evident in this cd. I could go on, but I'm not typing very well right now. M Ore later.

Planet Glee is punk--if you want!

Tonight found me in the Flash studio at accessf for another production of Planet Glee. I brought a Ganesh with me, because I couldn't find my bag with the crystals I usually use. Of course, Ganesh brought many blessings to the show.

Although my guest admitted he was nervous at the beginning of the show, all was told and not told on the show tonight. My guest was a friend of mine, Dave Taub, who has studied comedy at a comedy school here in San Francisco. He is a funny guy, and we had alot of larfs this evening.

I didn't know that his schtick was going to be the US presidential election. He flatly told me on air that he was voting for himself for president and he wasn't taking any donations to his campaign. It went on for a while. The political system in this country is abominably inhumane. But do I want to talk about that on Planet Glee?

You were correct if you wrote "NOTA." That's what one of my family said when they referred to the February California elections.

And, meanwhile, we got three callers! It was memorable. The people who called in were not rude or drunk or something. They were sincere and honest and were thinking about justice and peace and desirable states of being. I felt so honored that they were watching my show. It is kind of a punk meets new age alternitiva.

For the musical portion of the show, Dave sang a medley of songs about peace while I tried to play four/four on my tabla. It was really hilarious.

Another Planet Glee evening.

It seems that all I feel like writing about is the show. I still haven't returned the broken DVD player, so I haven't watched any of the films I want to review like Faute a Fidel, for example.

Meanwhile, the show was really fun. I was worried that it was becoming more like a job than something really inspiring. But I met two musicians this past Friday whom I liked a lot.

Back in December I put out an ad in craigslist for musicians for a cable tv show. I got about 10 responses only. Some of the music was not what I would want to feature on my show. SO, I did respond to someone whose music is atmospheric and ambient. He is from the band Five-Eyed Hand. (They have a really cool logo, by the way.) He brought with him a spoken-word/singer who wrote about the Buddha with sincerity and movement.

These two thoughtful performers were on this past Friday night. And, as I couldn't have guessed, a caller on PCP (seemingly) called to "sing" with the guitar through the phone. I decided to let it happen. Actually, I thought the caller was a friend of one of the musicians. The caller started going on about defecation and sexual acts, and I thought, this is Planet Glee... But the guy was not a friend of the musicians. Even so, he kept calling.

We had fun anyway...

What a weird and wonderful night.

Another edition of Planet Glee took place this evening. I dropped off my car at the garage on Valencia to leave it until tomorrow. I hope major things are not wrong with it. Taking the bus can be difficult!!! Tonight I walked six blocks on Valencia from 16th to 23rd--no bus in sight.

Meanwhile the show went ok. I need to get a refresher on the Flash studio course. I don't know how to turn on the cameras nor the monitor. Tonight the person who helps me get set up was sick. I had to type in the character generator. My guest was sitting there while I was typing her name in. She could see in the monitor what her name looked like. After I got home (along the way a local Bernal guy asked me for Bro Jud's phone number--I didn't give it to him because he was drunk), my guest called to say that her last name was this and not that.

It's all good, is what I have to say about it. At first, after I had listened to the message, I thought, "But you were sitting right there--couldn't you have corrected me then?" But it's nobody's fault. As Bro Jud would say: it was cosmic humor.

All the while I've been missing some good films, and I still don't have a dvd player. That is why I have not reviewed any films in a while. Because most people are celebrating Chinese New Year, and because I can make masks, a teacher at the school where I work asked me to make a mask of Father Heaven and one of Father Earth.

She could have at least have given me materials. I should have asked for them. I really have my own art projects to do. But I feel that I can use the masks in my portfolio of art I didn't get paid to do. I am hoping that my payment will be in receiving a new assistant in addition to the ones I have working with me on the job!

Planet Glee was a huge larf.

Friday night saw another version of the SF Live call-in show Planet Glee. Friday night must bring it out in those of us who consider Saturday and Sunday the "weekend." Anyway, Bro Jud Presmont was my guest along with his friend and filmmaker Larry Sweetman. I have known Bro Jud for years. I have been on The Bro Jud on Love Energy show for years. It was the first time that I was interviewing Jud on my own show--as it were!

Bro Jud's adage, "if it ain't fun, it won't get done" was in full force that evening. Every guest I've had has worried about what we're going to talk about. I worry that no one will call in to ask a question or liven up the show. After all, everything is political, and that's Planet Glee's message.

Larry Sweetman had returned recently from Ecuador with a film production ensemble from Oakland. Together they documented the ravaging of the rainforest and its effects on the people who live there by American oil companies. Now this Planet Glee guest is to document Bro Jud's efforts to get his "Plan" and ideas heard. Mr. Sweetman is from Ireland.

I don't think that Jud knows my last name. Often, a person's last name points to a particular culture or ethnicity. Like Larry, I grew up in a culture dominated by Irish music, conversation, customs, etc. When Jud called said that the Irish represent the most Neanderthal of people, Larry and I couldn't stop laughing.

Why doesn't ESP work on the people we really want to contact?

Today I was looking at an object that someone had given me last year. I was thinking that I'd like to contact this person so that I could finish the art piece--a linocut. This person has a press. We went out once, and I think we could hit it off as friends--but not in the romantic sense.

So, of course, I was just thinking about this person at noon today (I had the day off for "end of the semester"--believe me, I'm not complaining!!!). I got home from yoga class tonight, happily groggy, to see that this person had sent me a mail today. I hadn't heard from him since Thanksgiving.

Now, my question is this: if I can think about someone and they call, especially someone I haven't conversed with in a long time, why can't I think of someone I just saw last week and have them call me?

Tonight I spoke with one of the major thinkers at Psychic Horizons about karma. She said that karma is made up of images and thoughts and actions that have to be gotten to, have to be centered upon and resolved. Fair enough, I thought. Perhaps there is more to this than my rigid brain wants to let in. It's tough that my non-frigid libido always gets in the way!!!!

Parce que je suis folle.

Last night I went to the ashram in San Ramon. It was so beautiful, the indigo-black sky dotted with stars, with Mars about 2 feet away from a nearly-full Moon.

It was fitting that we talked about astrology...Vedic Astrology. Our friend Mark checked out a book from Amma's library called Vedic Astrology without Tears. I spoke with Sadasiva about the Moon and Mars at dinner after the meditation. He asked me, "Are you feeling angry tonight?" I had to say, no, I wasn't feeling angry. I was just feeling confused because I couldn't meditate. All these memories from the past kept coming up--even Moises. I thought I had forgotten about him.

I asked Sadasiva if he had dated many women from the ashram. He said, yes, he had, and one of those women was at the ashram that evening. He said that Amma throws alot of karmic relationships his way. I said that I have had similar experiences. In 2002 I made out with a guy who was probably 19 or so. When Moises and I got together in 2005, he was 23. The woman Sadasiva had had a relationship with was younger than him also. She came by as he and I began standing up, and he was quick to stop her to talk with him.

Have I learned a lesson from this? I think it's his karma to be lost in the land of wanting a relationship based upon experience rather than appropriateness. I hope that all the relationships I've had have had some love energy--despite the painful karma--swirling among them.

Special Education, or, how much attention do you need?

I never complain much about teaching Special Education for the past 10 years. Tonight I was just recalling a time when, during an IEP meeting with about ten people present, I got up and walked out, crying. The emotional pressure was too much; I couldn't handle what the "therapist" was saying about this child with cerebral palsy. The therapist wanted to demit the child from services, and I completely disagreed.

It still happens now that a therapist will demit a child because, supposedly, the child is making no progress. Can I do that, too? Can I tell a parent not to send the child to school because no progress is being made? Whose fault is it?

There is constant attention which must be given to my students with severe impairments. Thankfully, some of them are learning how to use the toilet. But some of them still hit other kids and hurt other kids or refuse to walk or just lie down and scream.

It is my belief in bhakti yoga and Amma that helps me stay afloat in this turbulent ocean. Last year I had four paras, but two of them were out to stab me in the back every day. This year, I have only two paras and more kids. These paras are sweet and have great intentions, but we are understaffed. It is about time that I did something proactive about this situation. I am working too hard, and I have to tell someone who can help me. I already typed up an 8-page table on what all the kids do and what all the adults do to help them. This report was written in November. I still have not heard anything from the Special Education department.

It's ok to feel sorry for me. I do!!!

The Unicorn, or how high are you.

Tonight the Planet Glee show was really fun. We fixed the cameras and lighting, and I have been so happy that is Friday and I don't have to get up and do public service tomorrow. It's much more entertaining to do the show. I wish this could be my form of public service rather than trying to provide developmental instances for children with severe cognitive disabilities.

Nonetheless I was in a rare mood this evening. I brought a 4" squarish, pointed rose quartz crystal to keep on the desk to channel good, loving vibrations. My guests, Tobias from Total Care Massage and Sam from Sleeping Buddha Massage Therapy were all set; we were all relaxed. We were told it was air time, and I put the crystal on my forehead because I had a slight headache. I told the camera (the viewers, I guess--I don't assume anything!) that I was a unicorn with a headache. I also had a hood on which made me look like a milkmaid (the rainy weather has brought out the braids again).

We got a call almost right away. The caller told me I looked like I was high on something and that he could tell me what would be the best stuff to get high on. I got a little shy, but I said that I was high on Friday and whatever. We stayed talking for about 2 minutes. He said he was watching the show. That's the point, isn't it? I was enthralled with the exchange. Someone else suggested that I should have hung up on him. NO way!

Meanwhile, the rest of the show was fun. We had three more callers. Next Friday there will be a reflexologist on the show...all about feet!!!

I do miss jamming. I'm looking for musicians who can jam with me on the show. I put out a craigslist ad, and I got some good responses. The musicians want to hear my stuff. Let's put it this way: I'm good at faking it!!!

Venus is in Scorpio, or Planet Glee

I remember really liking the writings of Theodor Adorno. He was part of the reading list for a one of my courses in Marxist criticism at Berkeley. Somehow now he is reminding me of Kierkegaard, the either/or. Oh, I'm writing about my title for this blog. I wrote a paper on Adorno called 'Theodor, or the Adornos.'

Venus is in Scorpio now and for a while. Jupiter is in Sagittarius, which is a good thing. Some things can seem dark, but the idealim of a strong Jupiter can keep the boat afloat and more.

Meanwhile, tomorrow is another night of Planet Glee. We will try to fix the cameras to give the illusion that we are not in a fishbowl like in the other shows. My guests will be massage therapists demonstrating some techniques and best practices. Planet Glee is a call-in show. It's on channel 76 in San Francisco at 7 p.m. on Fridays.

Happy New Year to me.

I spent most of last week going to sleep early. Back to work, and I didn't want to be sleep-deprived given the weird emotional nature of the beginning of a new year. On my first day back to work, at 6:25 am, I was trying to pick up the striped kitten Pablo and he got skittish, his back paw leaving an almost 2" slice of cat claw in my index finger on my dominant hand.

But I stayed steadfast in my desire to return to work and do what I had to do. I'm glad I had my Elmo bandaids.

Meanwhile, I did the chance to see two films WHEN THE CAT"S AWAY (CHACUN CHERCHEZ LE CHAT) and THE BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA. I hadn't seen either film for almost three years. What do they have in common?

THE FUTURE IS UNWRITTEN

Joe Strummer, how I adored you. Your latest bio-documentary (besides RUDE BOY) is really impressive in its use of the medium of film and what it conveys about an artist who went through several incarnations until his early death at age 50. I remember hearing the news and thinking, "Oh, he's turned fifty--too hard to handle, I wonder." But no, although he met death when identifying his suicidal brother's teenage body, he never stopped talking about how being alive was what we all had in common. He died of a heart defect that had gone undiagnosed.

The film's documents the early life of John Mellor (Joe's given name by his diplomat father and Scottish mother) and how, after his brother's death, he continued on to be what he called a non-stop-talking "git." This git got bad grade except in Art. He could draw. Joe's drawings are interwoven in the film's rich fabric.

Pictures, people who knew him, music, all embellish this tale by the fire, as it were. One of Joe's last drawings was of little islands in a river, each with a fire that one sits by and talks. Many of the people who knew him well sit by these fires in different parts of the world. There are no subtitles identifying the interviewed. The members of his bands, The One-on-One-ers, The Clash, and Joe Strummers and Los Mescaleros needed no titles.

The exploration into his film work both as musician and actor are new. I remember the ...Hell film. One of my housemates was watching it on a summer afternoon in the living room. Usually, I didn't go into the living room, but I was drawn in by Joe's presence in the film. I was drawn into the Red Victorian today to see Joe again onscreen. Although I cried at times and at times didn't understand why he said and did things in this life, I will go back and see this film again.

The Confusion of Non-productivity.

Today was spent on the phone, at the laundromat and in cafes. The state of my papers in my room beckons for clarity. It's muddy in here! I save lots of images for future collages that I have yet to make. That's not all the paper that's lingering around. There are all the bills and receipts and stuff that I have no idea where to put. There is no room in my room. So, I put them in paper bags so that I may go through them sometime.

I almost titled this the "pleasure of non-productivity." At my job I have tons of papers that I have not looked at in years. I went through a box of them from 2005. I think I take great joy in not being organized. There is something uncomfortable about being too neat with the paperwork. Or, maybe I've become too used to spontaneity.

In my social life I would like to see more plans made. I tend to let things be decided at the last moment. It's my sleep schedule that gets in the way; it really dictates my days and nights. I'm so glad to be on vacation and to think that I don't have to get up at 7:00 am tomorrow. Lucky!!1

Happy Birthday to me and thank the gods for Zante's

Happy Birthday, Jennifer. Yes...born on the day before Jesus. Many restaurants were closed today. I'm so lucky. One friend took me to dinner last night (we had Indian/Pakistani food), one friend took me to lunch today at a place in the Haight called Cafe for the People (I think that is its name; the sweet punk rock girl behind the counter gave me a free chai for my birthday), and tonight another friend took me out to dinner. Every restaurant on Valencia and Cortland was closed tonight. I knew Zante's would be open. They got to be pretty packed. It's an Indian restaurant, and I had my fill of naan and chai for another night!

So far my holiday vacation from work has been pretty fun. I still haven't returned the dvd player that doesn't work. I watched a vhs this week, a French film from the early nineties called UN COEUR EN HIVER. I have no idea what winter (hiver) has to do with this film. Daniel Auteuil is the star, and he gives his usual enigmatic performance.

I want to get a dvd player soon. At least I won't miss the Joe Strummer film at the Red Vic this week.

It's my birthday night, and I'm spending it with the two cats, Pablo and Budders. Pablito really likes the fact that I sleep in in the mornings, because he's tired then, too. Maybe I'll paint tomorrow during the day before I go over to my friends' house.

Oh, the Judeao-Christian holidays.

It's so much easier for me to be a Hindu. Praying is a good thing. But the Judaeo-Christian "holidays" are something to be thankful for. In the United States, people who work for the government in the United States get paid on the Judaeo-Christian holidays. It's so cool--I can be a Hindu (and an aspiring Tibetan Buddhist) AND still get time off.

I'm getting tired of being alone, though. Even my once-a-week meetings have ended because I don't want to put myself down any more. He can call me and kiss me good-bye. But he chooses not to. Therefore, I don't choose him.

What is my problem with relationships? Only my pediatrician knows for sure. As a child, I was never encouraged to think in terms of a happy family life because I didn't have one. I spent most of my time in my room (yes, I'm thankful I had my own room).

Now, living in San Francisco on a public school teacher's salary, I have my own room. It is smaller than the one I had when I was a child. I have no formal closet. All my video and music stuff is all over the place as are my papers. I can only paint in watercolors. Why have I put up with this life for so long? When is a man going to enter my life and me his? I really miss living with a man as a romantic partner. I've probably lived with six or more guys for over 2 years or more in my lifetime.

JEANETTE ET MARIUS

The film MARIUS is a famous early film from France (I think it's from the late 1930's). This film is set in Marseilles. JEANETTE ET MARIUS, a film from 1997, ia set in Marseilles. I recommend viewing this film. It has much to say about love and society.

But I digress. I really want to talk about the nature of having sex with someone one has just met and knows is not going to be any more than one night of sex. Last Christmas I almost did the one-night stand thing with someone I met at some longtime friends' party. We kissed but didn't go home together because my housemate was with us.

This year I had to see this person again. He took my phone number at the party a year ago and never called me. I never ran into him with my friends. Tonight he was such a complete asshole. When I was in my twenties and thirties, I was never treated this way...like some fucking saint who overlooks the stupidity, vapidity and shallowness of another person in the name of feeling like justice has been served. The saint is a martyr. The other person is just being a moronic human being. The saint is exalted.

I was a fucking saint tonight. I told this guy he was a straight (meaning conservative, drinker type) asshole. He is so stupid to me. But the one is who is really vacant is me. This guy is 22-years-old with maybe a high school education. I'm the one with all the education of a newt following the fragrance of my cunt toward what is merely meat. It's time to buy some veggie dogs.

Jeannette get together with Marius in the aforementioned film because they are contemporaries, they understand one another. Actually, I don't think it's an ageist thing with me. It's a question of intelligence. If you're cognitively impaired by ignorance or lack of empathy, then you're probably really happy. There's only oneself and one's shallowness to puddle around in.

I forgot to mention the call-in show.

Ever since this past summer I knew at one point I'd try having my own 1/2 hour cable (San Francisco's accessf) show on Friday nights. This past Friday was the second show so far. I have so much anxiety about getting there on time. I was 20 minutes late to the Flash studio training, and I was warned IN A SCAREY way that if I were late 2 times to a shoot, that it would be the end of my show.

I thought about it today, and I'm glad that I'll have some time off work for two weeks. Teaching grade school is just too involving. Special Education is a special kind of drain. The first show went really well, but I had to rush through dumb San Francisco Friday night traffic to get there a half hour before the show. The show is on at 7:00 p.m. It was so much fun for me to play around and have fun on this show.

The first show, Jack from the Bargain Basement Band (the band I always jam with on the The Bro Jud on Love Energy Show), was on, and we played music together. He played his guitar and sang, and I played my tabla (without the bhayan). It was so fun. This past Friday, Sam Geppi, the Vedic Astrologer, was on. I asked him if he wanted to play music, but he really did have alot to say. My fascination with Vedic practice of all kinds rocks on.

Meanwhile, Sam will be on the show again this Friday. He'll talk about the positive effects of Jupiter and Mars on the present. This past week he answered a caller about the moon and spoke about Venus and the Moon. Venus is in Libra now. On the 25th it goes into Scorpio. Since my birthday is on the 24th, I'll be feeling the effects of the Venusian movement more deeply, since it will be the time of my solar return: Sagittarius can handle Venus in Scorpio. I just now wondered: do people get bored hearing about other people's charts than they're own?

HEREMAKONO and JAMON JAMON

I had just bought a DVD player. The two other ones I had broken. It was Thanksgiving weekend, and the video store was completely ravaged of all the new dvds. I just happened to see this film at the side of the new releases. It is called HEREMAKONO, or il attende le bonheur. It is a film by Sissako. He studied filmmalking in Russia. The montage effect is so evident in this film. Instead of dialogue, there are scenes to the tell the story with no dialogue. The main character is a traveller. He has come to another place. There are many scenes of him just staring, and the "unprofessional" actor who plays him stares very well.

JAMON JAMON is a more recent one I've seen. I'm trying to improve my Spanish. It's easier for me to listen to Spanish in (I suppose) a Madrid accent. I initially learned Spanish from Catholic nuns from Spain. I still haven't completed a Spanish class since elementary school! Meanwhile, I got this film in Spanish because I had wanted to see it and had somehow heard about it. It is an older film and stars Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem in it as lovers in their early twenties.

I discussed this film with a friend of mine from Mexico. The notion of "puta" or whore in the film was an important one for him. I thought the film was funny and cynical at the same time. The constantly unleashed passions of the characters was hilarious; he association of penis excitement with bull fighting is an example. The obsession with breasts and size is, too. I wonder if Penelope Cruz had her breast enhancement surgery after the making of this film.

Somehow the association of ham and pigs with these characters best exemplifies its cynical naturalism. The pigs are just as attractive as the characters. Maybe the relationship between ham, pigs, and passionate humans overpowered my vegetarian leanings such that the leg of pig that Javier Bardem swings at his lover's fiancee didn't make me flinch but seemed appropriate.

The last night at the ashram.

It was a bizaare evening. I have to process this and then write something worth saying. For now I can say that Devi Bhava in November is an amazing and beautiful way to say thank you.

The thirteen seed portal.

There's a paper I'm supposed to be writing for a class at City College. The paper is about the Mayans and time and the esoteric nature of the glyphs and then about the nahuales. Maybe I should write a paper about the relationship between a nahual and the Skywalker time glyph. The website put out (I think) by the famous Mayan time professor Jose Arguelles is the source of my knowledge about the glyphs. The portal website names each day's figure glyph and its placement within the tone element.

When I saw Amma a very special estoteric glyph was on that calendar day. The blue eagle representing the eyes of the divine, the viewing of all as divine, in the now, in the present, the ultimate present. The tone was rhythmic, after the 3rd and 4th dimensions comes the rhythmic pulsating of the universe.

I got darshan with Amma this morning.

We left for the ashram in San Ramon at about 7:15. My friend who normally drives a taxi cab for income was driving. Both my other friend and I didn't have to drive! She was shuttling people back and forth three times a day. That's just too much and too generous. Thursday I took some people in my car, and I was feeling like a taxi driver. Maybe I've driven to the ashram with lots of people over the years and I felt like not having to worry about the driving. My car is a five-speed, so I especially have to be aware at all times about what gear the car is in and etc.

In any case, I was so grateful that I could sit and anticipate my experience with Amma. I had not idea when we first got there and the ashram was closed off that I would get darshan tonight with Amma. We missed her initial talk, which is something I always enjoy. But we sat for about an hour and a half in the ashram after getting tokens, and Amma was smiling at everyone and giving darshan with intention and sweetness.

I was so happy to get a kiss on the head! And one of the people in our group, a visitor from Germany wanted to get blessed with me. It was really nice. I'm always alone when I meet Amma, and tonight was special.

We got shuttled out to the car about five miles away from the ashram and headed for San Francisco. Someone at the ashram shop asked me if I were going to the retreat this weekend. I had to say no. Monday night is Devi Bhava. I have to go!!! Even if I don't get darshan with Amma, I want to be there to see her again.

Amma is coming on Thursday.

Mata Amritanandamayi is my mother. She is Amma. Read the biography by Judith Cornell. It gives some insight into a person who is more than a person. There are many gurus in India, and there are many spiritially-inspired and gifted people within the Hindu/Buddhist prayer construct.

When I listen to bhajans, I am content. Driving is not that difficult. (I have an 8-hour cd of bhajans written by Amma--it's called the Bhakti Pod, because Amma is Bhakti, self-less love.)

She will be here on the Amurikan holiday of Thanksgiving. I've been thinking about the "holidays" of Autumn: Indigenous People's Day, Dia de los Muertos, Samhain, Diwali, and now Thanksgiving. These months can be dreary upon people's emotions and psyche (see the events in France, the strikes). People are empowered. Somehow Thanksgiving is the perfect day to see Amma. All of us vegetarians will be gathered together to pray for everyone we know and don't know as well as ourselves. It will be a good thing to do.

The Visionary Activist and Planet Glee

Last Saturday, a week ago, I got to meet a person I'd heard on the radio--KPFA--many times and have always had something to say to. It was very weird. I had listened to her lecture at the Green Festival and then bought her book. I stood in line and bought her book. After talking with her, I see that she is a person thinks deeply on some of the same topics that I do. I'm not into American politics the way she is, for instance. Maybe I don't understand her point of view completely. We differ in that she uses western astrology for her interpretations and I believe that Vedic is more accurate.

I'm writing about Caroline Casey (I almost wrote Carolyn Myss--who is that?). Her book is entitled MAKING THE GODS WORK FOR YOU. Yeah. I read about my least favorite one of the gods, Shiva, Saturn. He is not one to be ruled! She writes, "Saturn is our...basic center. In fact, this god lives in our real center, the psychic uterus, right below our navel.

The word hysteria, derived from the Latin word for uterus, addresses this Saturnine issue of loss of center...A therapeutic colleague once described hysteria as occurring when one evters a world that is not of one's own definition. THe process beigns with detachment, which becomes loneliness, which becomes hungry yearning. Hurngy yearning tilts us off balance so that we easily fall into someone else's game, where we then thrash crasily like a hooked fish. Thrashing crazily could be called the predomeineant symptom of the last twentieth century. But flailing is actually a healthy raction to an unhealthy situation, as when a fish attempts to become unhooked. (p.86)"

Caroline is a genius. Saturn is impossible to comprehend. But she demystifies this force while making it even more mysterious--akin to our "center," not in the Derridean sense or Freudian, but in the psychic sense, the realm of Ouspensky and Gurdieff, of the esoteric school.

She and I agreed that Vedic has its similar interpretations of the planets. The first Vedic text I read was Robert Svoboda's Light on Life.

The American idea of DARJEELING LIMITED

It's been a while since I've blogged. I like the word blog. It sounds like blob. In the film BILLY ELLIOTT, our main character says something like "Don't be a blob..."
--or something like that. I didn't get the meaning and context.

Perhaps I don't get the meaning and context of the newly-released Wes Anderson film DARJEELING LIMITED. Starting Friday, November 9th, this weekend started the Diwali celebration. Everything Indian, all Friday night and all weekend. On Friday I saw one of Shahrukh Khan's latest film in which he plays the coach of a women's hockey team that goes to the World Cup. Kind of a sleeper, and Shahrukh barely smiles (his most entertaining facial expression), it was worth some Diwali fun.

There is no excuse for DARJEELING LIMITED. It is purely annoying. I forgot that I mentioned that I might not understand the context. Actually, I think I do. It's another Hollywoood slap in the face to the American worker, to the people who go see films in the theater and buy popcorn and veggie dogs and whatever. This is a wannabe French farce yet instead insults and bores us all the way along.

There are three supposed brothers whom we meet together on a train in India. Although I think Adrien Brody is a great actor, and he is the only one worth watching in the film, I can't believe he would--as an Engishman--make fun of India. Yes, he can't rescue the Indian boy from the downcurrent, etc., and he is invited to the child's cremation, there is no respect paid to India and its rich culture and people.

Owen Wilson puts me to sleep, and just how is Jason Schwartzman? Certainly not the hearthrob this film makes him out to be. These characters never wonder about money. They have an unlimited cash flow. THey have matching, expensive luggage. They dress like French guys often do in suit jacket and unbuttoned buttoned, tailored shirt. They soulless monied Amurikans in a country that experiences some of the deepest poverty on earth. I failed to see the humor and I hope that most Amurikans will not even wonder what India is like. THey will be overwhelmed if they were to visit this beloved, sacred land.

NO END IN SIGHT

This is the title of a documentary written and directed by Charles Ferguson, 2007. It reveals the steps toward the Iraq invasion through the eyes of the people who were actually in Iraq working for the US government. The film begins with the some very sad footage of an Iraqi young man in a casket and other men crying incessantly around him. I was brought to tears and couldn't imagine myself getting through this film.

So, I walked out to the bathroom. The guy who was working at one of the best theatres in San Francisco, the Red Victorian, was reading Notes from the Underground by Dostoevsky. This was a guy I could trust with my feelings about the film. He said that it was well-composed and that he came out from it feeling very frustrated.

For me, the film is another documentary of talking heads interspliced with actual footage of the explosions, fires and demonstrations that Iraq has seen since the US invaded in 2003. Some of the talking heads are actually people who cared about what was happening--and were here and survived.

Others, like UN Ambassador de Vello from Argentina, did not survive. The US government in the form of a Mr. Bremer (who only made it to Iraq once) placed the UN ambassador there for its own purposes: to gain the trust of the Iraqi political elite. Why he had to die in the process is unknown.

What is also left unknown is why the US quadruplets, Bush, Cheney, Rice and (the other one skips my mind--fill in the blank, if you know) kept putting people in Iraq who spoke no Arabic. One is left with the feeling that to bully a group of people and kill and torture them doesn't require that any communication be achieved.

The news is full of the fact that the Iraqi army had been re-hired by a new government, the US. Because Baghdad is held by many factions of Iraqi groups and the US had its hold on Saddam's palace in the center of the city, it is difficult to see, once again, any communication happening. Meanwhile, the cost of the war is something in the thousand trillionth of dollars. Although the draft is not mentioned, the fact that the US doesn't have enough enlistees to carry on conflicts in Iran and North Korea, there might be an end in sight.

The film concludes with a statement by one of the US enlistees. I was able to make it through this insanity without shedding too many more tears. Somehow I couldn't imagine how a woman profesor interviewed from Harvard's government school could actually believe that the son of the president who got the whole ball rolling in the Middle East could possible be a person of intelligence and compassion. I asked my friend about this during the movie. "She's from Harvard, isn't she supposed to be smart?" My friend said, "Maybe she was just idealistic." Yes, belief in the American voting process as a just one is idealistic. But those of us with a material viewpoint can see through the opaque electoral college, two-party (in name only) system. I would like to see a documentary on those scholars and researchers who are looking into the revamping of the whole US legal system.

Laughing Lotus

There's a new yoga studio in San Francisco. It originated in New York City. The purveyors are from San Francisco and brought some New York-style performance to the city. I missed the kirtan, because I had to see Dr. Fu (my acupuncturist from Shanghai) to cure some of my usual stuff. There's another acupuncturist I see from my health plan who is also good. Her name is Ji Ling. But I digress...

The event--the opening of the Laughing Lotus--began at 7:00. That's when I woke up at Dr. Fu's. So, I missed about an hour or more of the festivities. But I was greeted sweetly at the door and welcomed by the sound of chanting. The place is painted so inobtrusively, in a kind of magenta/peach, and the gods are also painted on the wall. Ganesh is a pink elephant!

What was really cool for me was that I got to see my friends (part of my extended family) from the Love of Ganesha AND a friend I hadn't seen in almost 20 years. I had been thinking about this woman and the man she had a deep connection with who was my housemate, the brilliant left-handed guitarist from London, Snakefinger. There was something I had always wanted to tell her, and I got the chance to tell her tonight. It was kind of an apology for being such an immature baby girl back then. Now I'm a mature baby girl!

But more about the studio: there is a shrine to Amma! Yay! This pleased me much, because not many people really appreciate who Amma is and what she means to humanity. It's not that I'm pushing my guru on anyone...no. Amma represents bhakti, love. She gave tons of money to the Katrina victims. I hope she can help the monks in Myanmar!

In any case, if one wants to study yoga, this would be the place to go. There was a performance by six women who did a yogic dance, fundamentally. They were so graceful in their movements and looked like they were so selfless about it. That is perhaps what I like most about this place: its humility and beauty.

BAMBI

This will be my second time trying to get through this film. I has made me wonder why some women want to be called Bambi. I was acquainted with one once. The music is really getting on my nerves. What is it about this time period (the fifties in Hollywood) that's so annoying?

I borrowed this film from a spiritual friend. I suppose I'm waiting to see what uplifting message I'm going to get from this.

Once, again, I missed San Francisco's version of Berlin's Love Parade. What was my problem? I don't like that it's in CIvic Center. Everything I've gone to there (besides political rallies) has been weird for me. About five years ago I played guitar outside at the Medical Marijuana celebration in the flea market section of Civic Center. What's the difference?

I'm just making up excuses. It was four hours of dance that did it to me. But last night I saw some extremely practiced dancers at Fort Mason. The ensemble is a collaboration between Chitresh Das (Kathak pandit) and Jason Samuels Smith, a really talented tap dancer at the beginning of his career. To dance tap with Kathak speed and rhythm is really marvelous. I gained a great respect for tap dancers.

It was cool, though. I got to speak with Chitresh Das after the question and answer period after the show. I asked him how it is for him to dance Kali, to tell stories of Kali with dance. She is an enigmatic goddess for sure. He answered that he is from the city of Kali, Kolkatta. Someone just mentioned to me that his friends are in Kolkatta now.

Anyway, the question is: do men also has a Kali nature? I believe they do.

Housing and html

It's been a while since I've looked at the craigslist housing stuff for San Francisco. Somehow I knew I would be shocked, and I was. Places in certain neighborhoods of the city have gone up at least $500 for the same thing back in the summer. It's too scary. Somehow I don't know if I want to go through the being-the-new-roommate thing. But I would have to be anyway, since this house is so different and the way it's set up I can't hear anyone upstairs. My housemates I've been looking for places with I hardly hear at all and they me. What if we all lived on one floor? That would be a new living situation to consider. But I do know these guys. It's soo hard!!

Today I spent all day reading the html book. It's not really hard, but it will take practice. I don't intend--nor can I--learn the intricacies of this with the amount of time we have. We spent alot of time on Photoshop--our self portraits. This program does not require that much time to get some basic stuff out. Some people do know html already. They didn't even come to class! That's how the Photoshop should have been. But I'm having fun with the project, even though visually I'm keep things very simple!

Thank God for FAMILY GUY

Adam West plays the principal of Quahog High. His is the funniest character of the show. He was on recently as the mediator in the dispute over Petoria, the country Peter had established within Quahog. This reminded me of the Peter Sellers' film THE MOUSE THAT ROARED about a country which wants to be taken over--and taken care of--by the U.S. It's not a direct connection, but both FAMILY GUY and Peter Sellers' films are high on my list of comedic products of genius.

Today was considered--according to the calendar--as the first day of Fall. I wish my friend had called earlier about celebrating the equinox with candles and meditation tonight. It's cool. I have homework for a class tonight to do and I had a good time while out to dinner and walking around in the lower Haight tonight. I hadn't hung out there for a long time. It was actually not windy! I used to live in this neighborhood, and not a lot has changed, really. There's a cheaper Indian/Pakistani food place there now besides Indian Oven.

Cafe International was happening today with live jazz and blues fusion. Life store had all the lovely scents they've been making for a long time... I bought "Violet." Maybe it reminds me of the time I spent early September up north near Klamath about 9 years ago. I've got to get out of the city more!!! On Friday night, some people on Valencia had plants and some others a carpet of grass with plants strewn out into the street. I thought Friday was Fall equinox. Nevertheless both days are viable emblems of transition. Time speeding by. Days are shorter. When we have a heat wave in the middle of the week, it will actually feel like Fall equinox in San Francisco for me.

YOU, ME AND DUPREE

There is a tendency to admit--after the fact--that a film had something moderately interesting to think about. This week I watched MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 3 and YOU, ME AND DUPREE. The choice to watch these movies lay with friends; I didn't select them. It's weird, because I had told one of my friends that I wasn't into action, suspense and dumb dialogue films. But as soon as I got over there, MI 3 was on cable, and my friends were watching it. They had organized a "movie night" that was really just a viewing of what was on tv on their high definition, surround sound video system.

I actually saw the first MI with Tom Cruise back in the nineties. While I was watching MI 3, I kept thinking about how I had dragged my friend who had a Ph.D. from Harvard in anthropology to this droll film. She watched it, but she made no comment afterward. I just tried to pick out the actors I liked in the film (Lawrence Fishburne, Ving Rhames and the Belfast actor whose name I can't recall. In fact, he and an English actor were the only Europeans in this very American-Hollywood-patriotic marvel of a film.

The actors in YOU, ME AND DUPREE saved it for me, too. Actually, I only like Matt Dillon. Kate Hudson has shown that small breasts, thinnish lips and very small breasts can be a part of a beautiful Hollywoodish young actress. Her acting itself, though, is flat to me. Matt's was very flat. He's best as New Yorker. Playing an LA-style character is just not him. It's like he's from another country, and everyone is less self-conscious.

The peroxide-headed actor, Owen Wilson, is just not funny. He's not even cute. How did he get into films, I wonder? He's one for whom the Stanislavsky method really has paid off.

There are marriages between man and woman in both of these films. Another common occurrence in each film was the union of a man at least 12-15 years older than the woman. The difference was subtle, because Cruise, Matt Dillon and Owen Wilson are all boyish, though two are over 40. Of course, all of these actors have had their share of plastic surgery. I was looking forward to watching a thought-provoking film. But all I got were two films that stated that real love is dependent upon how good one looks.

The University of Utopia.

Bro Jud is such a trip. I hung out with him this weekend. He truly has affected many people with his ideas and collectives. Look in Wikipedia for polyamory. Jud and his commune mates came up with this term.

Jud showed me some literature that he wrote in 1979, years after the commune was founded in the Haight. The article I found most interesting concerned the 'University of Utopia." It's taken from the black/white pamphlett entitled "Utopian Eyes."

It begins:

The work of George Gurdjieff and Peter D. Ouspensky is worth following up with the creation of a vanguard school for the study of human behavior...In my opinion, one has to arrive at the tenth dimension of love before one can attain the fifth level of consciousness. This brings us back to Gurdjieff and Ouspendky. One should read their writings to get a clear picture of the first four levels of consciousness. Then one can begin to grasp the conception of the fifth level, which involves thought transference via the attainment of altruistic love..."

To be continued...

Cheval De Frise and Derron Brown

Derron Brown is a psychological illlusionist. When he was a child he fantasized about turning the head of the kid in front of him. To me, Derron Brown has a psychological profile that is quite interesting. He is by no means unintelligent. There is a hyper-conscious ferocity about this person. He does not claim to a psychic. I watched some videos of his shows this evening. I want to watch the episodes in which he takes on a psychologist and, in another, an advertising designer. Derron Brown's world is so Orwellian--yet psy-fi.

Tonight I also had to listen to some heavy guitar music. Cheval de Frise is from Paris. There is a steel-string, amplified guitarist with an eccentric drummer; there is no singer. I bought this cd when I lived in my other house in Bernal. I use to shop alot at Aquarius Records on Valencia. The cd was recommended to me by one of the people working there. I had said I wanted European metal of some kind. I wonder what they would sound like with a singer--there songs have many and complicated changes in them. They are hardcorecollagerock.

Nichts zu sagen.

It really helps to a language that no one around you knows. My Spanish is pretty bad, but I can understand when someone is talking about me. I think I know French better, but I remember two women talking in French together so fast that I didn't get much. For some reason I studied German in high school. I finished German I in one semester and German II the next one. I even took it at the university, reading Goethe's Faust and Jung.

My favorite writer in German is Rainier Maria Rilke. I remember talking to someone from an online meet and greet session about Rilke. Why did he have to be so effete?

Meanwhile, when I'm really angry, I'll not swear--but I will talk to myself in German. Sometimes I call people names--they usually revolve around what kind of animal they look like to me.

Ich bin sehr canzada esta noche.

The Adobe Ilustrator and all the fun one can have with it/him.

My course in Multimedia has led us from Photoshop CS3 to Ilustrator 2.0(or whatever--we'll see how I do on the tests!?!). Both are part of the Adobe Suite. Now, I have a problem with this series. The layer images should be visible for easy access. My instructor didn't know how to get the layer image bigger. It is not even the size of my smallest piece of toenail.

Meanwhile, I was working on a very complex design, not really paying attention to my layers and paths and what was on top of what, but finally, my image I really wanted the machine would not save, noting that the file was corrupted. What could that mean, I thought??? Perhaps I should not have even attempted all the stuff I was trying to do. I took bitmap images and put them in this vector-based program. I spent 20 minutes working on the colors in a photograph of a painting of Ganesh.

My teacher did not know the name of Ganesh. He's really into sci-fi and whatever. But then, maybe he has a point: Ganesh could be called Vishnu or to have Vishnu-like qualities, couldn't he?

Tomorrow I have to get up early for work. The music teacher erased my scheduled supervision system for tomorrow off my white board when I was out of the class. That means I'll have to get up earlier...or not!

Celebrity SKin + APOCALYPTO

There was a band in San Francisco, kind of a metal/glam band, called Celebrity Skin. I met some of them in the late eighties when they were around. In any case, I bought a three cds for $1.50 at the Senior Center thrift store. I got Blur, House of Pain, and Hole. The Hole cd is entitled Celebrity Skin. It is all full of words about Los Angeles, the place of celebrity skin, plastic surgery and generalized superficiality.

I'll bring them to work tomorrow. Lately my day has gone by better when I listen to new cds, especially ones to be played loud. The past two weeks I was listening to Morrissey. Now it'll be House of Pain!

Meanwhile, I watched most of the (painful) scenes from APOCALYPTO. This film was a complete disaster. A very complex civilization is made out to be the Egyptians or present-day America...full of slavery, lack of justice, and overdone violence. Please do not watch this film. It is an abomination. It's worse than LASSIE. People who understood the mechanism of time couldn't be sentimentalized, thoughtless dogs--as they are portrayed in this film.

LA VIE EN ROSE & BECOMING JANE (or something like that)

Why does Gerard Depardieu have to be in every French film? He's like De Niro in that way, I suppose. His character got killed early in the film LA VIE EN ROSE. It's a story of the life of Edith Piaf. The person who deserves the most applause in this film is the actress who plays the quintessential Parisian singer. Of course, I'm forgetting her name right now. She goes from 20 to 40 very easily and sings in the French style like Edith P.

The film has holes in it--Edith P.'s bisexuality is only hinted at, her coming to be married is unexplained, the fact that when she was very young she bore a child named Marcelle and later fell in love with a French boxer (no, not a dog) named Marcel. How she kicks heroin is also not shown. Her life was so rich in drama, I suppose...hard to cover it all.

LA VIE EN ROSE played with BECOMING JANE, and English/Irish collaboration about Jane Austen's only "love," a young Irish lawyer named Tom. The scenes of Ireland are gorgeous. The two male actors who play her brother and Tom are quite attractive for fair-skinned men. Is it me, or does ripping off Antonioni English-style just not seem feasible? This film wasn't too boring, but only the Tom character really kept me watching. The actor had a lot of range and wasn't the least bit dull in that 18th century English stodgy way.

Bro Jud found out.

It had to happen some time. Last Saturday night Jud had me scheduled on a panel of speakers at the Patient's Cooerative. I was supposed to talk about his "Presmont Plan." Why he wanted me to talk about it, I don't know. I've never given him any indication that I understand much of the plan. When I asked him what he wanted me to say, he urged, "Say what your heart tells you to say."

So, I talked about love energy, of course. As far as anything else goes with his learning modules, and etc., I had no idea what to say about the plan.

Today I called Jud to tell him about something regarding the recording of the last show we did which was last week. He finally got around to telling me, "I don't think you understand anything about the plan." Bro Jud found out.

Now that I'm studying multimedia, I might get closer to finding out myself. But, for now, I don't know anything about the plan!

Love Energy, revisited.

Tonight I did the Bro Jud on Love Energy Show. How time has flown since I first saw this show on the San Francisco cable channel in 1996. Jud was always a wise man, a funny, weird, pervy wise man. The first time I saw the show, I didn't know Jud. I just saw the name of the show on the cable menu and thought, "'love energy...?' is this show about Venus and astrology? I need more love in my life..." There was this really insanely cool backdrop of psychedelic color bursts. Jud talked about dedicating the show to the 'world's greatest lover"--Italian porn star, Rocco Siffredi. I was laughing so hard at this.

The show this evening was dedicated to Yuri Kokoshkin, head of the Trident Group, a capitalist-paranoia surveillance thing from Russia about Russia. Jud did not explain why the show was dedicated to this guy at all. Then, he had me read from a book by D. Ikeda about the founder of the namyohorengekyo ideas. This was getting weirder. Thanks to a friend at Dreams of Kathmandu that I had the book by the Tibetan monk, Sakyong Mipham, Ruling Your World. It's a book about compassion for oneself and others. What a night. I got to rock out. These are my last days of freedom!!!!

The Spacey Rocker

Here's a picture of me on a night when I got to perform with my electric guitar. I played my songs I had with a band back in the mid-nineties called Martyr Mia. It was a really fun evening, but I remember that I was depressed. Just joking!!! Do I looked depressed in picture?

The reading training.

I don't know about the state of education these days. Teaching reading is one of the hardest things to do besides operating on a brain. I really admire Kindergarten through 4th grade teachers--they have the hardest job.

My students have severe disabilities. There is one who seems to be more speech delayed. He was on the verge of making the leap from sounding out letters (phonemes) to blending sounds to make meaning.

We got there at 8:30, took a break at 10 for 10 minutes, had really good lunches they provided from 12 to 12:45, worked until 2:45, and then we had homework. There was only one night which had a lot of homework to it. It took me an hour and a half to do!!! The article was on metacognition and a priori knowledge...kind of esoteric.

Thursday night I was panicking, because they told us that if we didn't finish the five days, we wouldn't get paid for any of it!! I finally fell asleep close to one o'clock and arrived 35 minutes late the next morning. Fortunately, if we were late less than an hour, all we had to do was do make-up work during lunch.

I don't know how I'm going to get up for work every day two week from now!

One day and two nights of freedom.

There is tonight and tomorrow night and the day tomorrow left until I have to "work" toward some teaching goal. I'm going to a weeklong seminar on teaching reading. Now, remember, my students do not often recognize letters. The reason why I'm going to this thing is two-fold: the district wants a transitional class for students with more skills or they just want to say they have a functionally academic classroom for students with moderate to severe cognitive delay and autism.

I have a space on MySpace.

I'm such a space. I belong on MySpace, however I lack the technical skills to make my space reflective in some way of myself. I've seen others who know how to create web pages do theirs very creatively. Hopefully after I take my Multimedia class at City I'll be more technically-minded and adept...not inept.

My name on the myspace is charuta, so I think the address is charuta@myspace.com, but I have been wrong before.

Spending money on clothes has become an obsession.

"Obsession for women"--shopping. Last night I wanted to see the British punk band THE SLITS. They were playing at the Independent which is on Divisadero. I used to go to that place when it was a small blues venue. I don't know what my problem was last night. No one wanted to go with me nor had heard of THE SLITS. So, I sat at home and looked them up on the website of the club which referred me to the band's own website.

I hadn't seen a picture of the singer, Ari-Up, in over twenty years. I remember someone having told me that she had gotten involved with Organization for Krishna Consciousness--or whatever they're called. In the pictures on the website, she was wearing a turquoise-ish green/blue hoodie with matching pants. The song she was talking about was "Shoplifting at Selfridges." This is one of her new songs. Since she's the only original member of THE SLITS playing out these days, she can make up a new song with band.

But I thought it was both weird and still cool that she shops and shoplifts (which I remember many punks back in the day doing). I'm worried that shopping at thrift stores--and anywhere, for clothes, in general--has replaced the good clean relaxing fun of reading a book, lying on the grass in the sun (umm, what sun?), or volunteering at Amma's kitchen (something I still must do this summer).

The state of the San Francisco rental market.

Back to this topic again: why are all these landlords so greedy? Everybody uses craigslist here to find places to rent. Consequently, if a place is truly great for the money, 50+ people will show up for the open house. I don't know why, but more and more people are moving here again. I saw a place in the upper Haight last week, and two guys just out of college were telling the landlord that one of them had a job and the other one had enough savings to give the landlord 5 times the rent in advance. Everyone has a right to live here, and there is no question about that.

But someone put on craigslist tonight a large paragraph on the topic of landlords who advertise one bedrooms + another room which turns out not to be a legal bedroom and charges over $1000 each for these two supposed bedrooms. AND, what used to be a low-rent area like the excelsior or the bayview has now become equal with trendy areas like the Mission and Noe Valley. It is hard for me to believe that people are paying so much money for places that are in dangerous areas.

I saw a house in the Balboa Park area which is quite humble and rumbles with cops all the time. I used to have to drive through there to get to my job as a teacher of 8th grade English. It was an area of the city, since I'd only lived in the Mission, Haight and South of Market areas, I'd never seen before. When I went out to look at this house, I thought the rent was still over-priced because of the area. The rent was $1700. for a small three-bedroom house. I know there are people paying $1000. or less for a good neighborhood and equal amount of space. It's because rent control still works for some people--yay!

Unfortunately for me, my landlord sold my house I had rented in 1994 for $850./month. This was a whole house with a huge bedroom upstairs and a massive one downstairs. We paid $425/month in rent. By the time I was forced to move out, the rent was increased to $560. or something like that. The other night I spoke to someone who's been living under rent control for 20 years in Bernal Heights. I told him that he couldn't imagine how lucky he is. The author of the craigslist blurb about the inflated rents and demands of landlords in San Francisco said he was moving to India. Now, there's a thought.

LA ARDILLA ROJA.

This is a very sexy movie--LA ARDILLA ROJA. It begins with a scene of a tall, thin man with dark, longish hair kicking a railing high above the sea rocks. He can't get himself to jump to into the abyss. Instead, a person on a motorcycle crashes into the railing and the two of them fall, fortunately, to the sandy part that separates the road from the abyss. The motorcyclist is a woman, we find out from him, as he gazes into her eyes which are the only distinguishable body parts under her motorcycle gear. He says her eyes are a "tangled blue," but they are actually brown.

She says she can't remember anything. Where is she? What is her name? He is happy to her that her name is Elisa, the same name as his ex-girlfriend who broke his heart. She is ok with this, and the two of them have a hot love affair that is quite unusual because the camera does alot of the work to make this happen. There are many shots of just their eyes and faces looking for each other. He is a famous Spanish rock star from the band called Las Moscas, The Flies. He wears a t-shirt with just his face on the front.

That's enough for this movie. You'll have to rent it to find out more. It won many awards at Cannes in 1993.

Other people's parents and I KNOW WHO KILLED ME.

No one knows what horrible experiences you had with your own parents. NO problems? NO problem. But for those of us who know otherwise, the parents who were not even the slightest bit hippy or were first generation Irish-American or Republicans presented their children with MANY problems. This isn't the place for me to talk about my parents. But this evening I met one of my housemates' parents--his father, specifically.

My housemate's father, is, in many ways, a freak. Just what that means, I'd rather let Derrida figure it out. Meanwhile, this man had the look of someone seen on the streets many times who is not receiving proper psychiatric care. This man has absolutely no social intention. He has never worked. I know that sounds like the privileged class, but, hopefully people will all want to give back to the community who can.

This man really surprised me when he cupped his left hand and patted the outer edge of my upper arm near the shoulder and said, "Thanks for taking care of my son." Sensing the obvious, I said "We're friends." My friend said he could take care of himself. Then, the freak father said, "She's a nice lady...I just wanted to thank her."

It's too bad that this freak father, Mr. Irish-American father, couldn't really control himself. He is the ultimate co-dependent, saying shitty things to me to try and control his son's feelings. Trying to bring "Reality"--in his own negative way--to the fore.

Enough about him. Let's talk about Lindsay Lohan's father in I KNOW WHO KILLED ME. Poor Lindsay's father had separated her from her twin sister at birth. This father kept the secret from the mother. In many scenes, Lindsay gets her right fingers chopped off. She also does pole dancing. But, back to the father--he isn't the one who chops off her fingers, in case you want to pay to raise your thinking-ability quotient enormously.

THE BEST FRIEND comes from France.

No wonder every cinema has its "stars." Sometimes the script or the plot--or even the other acting--may stink, but the "star" holds the cinematic galaxy together. In THE BEST FRIEND, the obvious star is Daniel Auteuil (sp?). He has been in many good French films. I can't think of the names of these films at the moment, but I've seen at least 5 good Daniel A. films. In THE BEST FRIEND he plays an art/antiques dealer of fame and renown around Paris who, according to his circle of acquaintances, has no friends. Leave it to France to ask us to deconstruct "friend."

I don't know about you, but it seems like he has friends to me. But the film portrays him as someone who has great difficulty being close with anyone or empathizing with them. He consequently goes to a support group for people without friends. Because this is a comedy, and because Daniel's character is really not a nice guy (but is trying to be, somewhat). The scene after the meeting when the man with the bottle glasses and Burberry scarf shares his umbrella with the Daniel figure is funny (the play on the British) but also a bit dumb. Being mean is dumb.

Meanwhile, there were many laughs in this film. Parisiens are not very friendly. The self-referential nature of the laughs makes it a good one. You have to like Paris and France to really like this film. It is high brow French realism and BRIDGET JONES' DIARY all in one.

Displacement and TIbet, dreamspell and the Maya.

I was in the doctor's office last week, and I saw that National Geographic has yet another article on the Maya. Got to go buy it! When I was eighteen years old, during the summer after I graduated from high school, I went with my boyfriend to Oaxaca, Mexico. He had been to this region a few months before, but he was overjoyed to go again and spoke of all the spirituality and the Federales. Some may know that there has been a lot of social protest going on in Oaxaca and Chiapas very recently. This is Maya country. When I was there, I saw very small people who lived off the land and were quite shy. In the New York Times magazine from July 7th this year there is an article on the Mayan predictions for December 21, 2012. I am wondering how many people will, by 2012, be cognizant of the Aztec/Mayan calendar and its call for CHANGE.

Meanwhile, back to the discussion of displacement. This year I have had the good fortune to become friends with some Tibetan people who are quite special. One of the women lived in a cave for over 10 years, came out, got married and had seven children. She is a yogini of incredible intent and serenity.

Like Palestine, Tibet has been wiped off the map. I would appreciate anyone teaching me about the plight of other groups of people who have become displaced. My knowledge of the African struggle is limited to that in this country. I watched a C-Span (yes!?) 2 Book Review show the other night. It depicted a Harlem panel discussion with audience participation about the nature of the African-American struggle for human rights in this country. The panel and the audience had mixed reviews of rap and the larger media in this country. Marshall McLuhan was a rare genius.

Naji al-Ali and finding a place.

I saw in the BBC News a small article on what's "In Pictures." The article concerned the work of the Palestinian "cartoonist" Naji al-Ali. If I could put the link in here, I would. Al-Ali was "gundowned on a London street..." in August of 1987. The killer was not found. It is my belief that the Palestinian struggle is much like that of all human beings in their need to have a place, to be in a safe and healthy place that they can afford and that is of their choosing. Naji al-Ali was ten when the state of Israel was created and he became a refugee. His drawings feature a child, about 9 or ten, seen from the back as the figure is looking, and shoeless. The BBC also showed a current graffiti piece from the wall which divides the Israeli side of the West Bank from the Palestinian on the other side of the divide. The figure is peeing a huge arc-full toward the other side.

Just last week I saw a bumper sticker that read: "Don't be a dick." To bitch means to yell or complain excessively. What does being a "dick" really mean? Does it mean being greedy? Does it mean being mean? Does it mean being insensitive and awkward? Does it mean taking someone else's right to a home?

Now those who remember that I'm looking for a new home due to the landlord's greed and harassment-issues, might think, how can this bitch equate the major problem facing the people on earth with her own stupid, trivial life? How? Because I can. And you can be a dick any time you want to. Someone can put a bumper sticker or some other message out to the public to read, but that doesn't mean that you have to do it. That's because no one kills you if you're a dick.

Bro Jud on Love Energy and AZUCAR AMARGA

We taped The Bro Jud on Love Energy Show this past Wednesday night. Jud used to wear a 4" leather peace sign on a long black string. For the past two or three years, he's been sporting a wool-tweed oversized sportcoat and some sort of collared shirt. I don't think he picks out these clothes. But then he's been so full of corporate language for quite some time. "Multi-tasking" is keeping him feeling young, he says. That's good for him. But it's a drag when one person has to the work of more than one person in the name of "multi-tasking." Whatever happened to doing one thing really well? What happened to the land of the expert?

Meanwhile, I haven't mentioned a film in a while. Since having seen MEMORIES OF UNDERDEVELOPMENT in my film history class, I've had a real interest in Cuban film. AZUCAR AMARGA (Bitter Sugar) is a "true" story of two lovers in their twenties who become conflicted by their situations and desires in a country where learning and accomplishment are somewhat rewarded but in which (inescapably???? ...the nature of the relationship between male and female?) "money changes everything." He is a scholar and is told that he will be sent to study in Prague. She spends her time meeting men of money in the hotels where most Cubans are banned. This is an actual recount of people who lived, let's remember.

I was not surprised that the women in this film were not educated. The date, though, of AZUCAR AMARGA is 1995 or so. This doesn't seem long ago to me, but my notion of time is built upon the separation from my punk life in the Mission to my entering the world of Monday through Friday work--full-time. Dull, I know. Several relationships are in there, of course.

But now back to the film. There is no country on the planet that discusses life decisions in terms of Socialism like Cuba. AZUCAR AMARGA is full of doubt about the success of socialism in Cuba, yet everyone agrees that Socialism is conceptually sound. The problem I had with the film is the seeming fact that few people have a "spiritual" life there. Decisions are made along ideological--or rather social concerns--rather than along metaphysical ones.

SICKO

Sooner or later a Michael Moore documentary will really cause the change we are all begging for. In a very humble way in his new film SICKO, he shows how his work caused one hospital to decide to give a child soon-to-become deaf the cochlear implant for the OTHER ear, TOO. He draws on the past (mainly through old Hollywood footage and nineteen- forty-ish cartoons) because it has created the present.

BUT not only in the United States of America--this time. He follows the healthcare industry and its history from the post-WWII era in the U.S., Canada, France and England (we're hoping its true for all of Great Britain--even Northern Ireland) and Cuba to this year! The National Health System in England is portrayed as a really well-run, fair, just institution. The same is true of health care systems in France and Canada. Behind Canada and England's national healthcare philosophies are individuals who somehow elicited the natural human emotion of empathy in creating a just healthcare program. France is a place where the state fears the power of the individual. Demonstrations are shown in France to present this point.

Americans live in fear; there is no doubt about this. People, in general, don't like "demonstrators." Those of us who walked all throughout the spring and fall 2003 against the invasion of Iraq did it because we meant it. We still mean it. What happened?

The search continues.

Once in a while, stereotypes get revisited, even amidst the glimmer of hope that change is possible. Yesterday I looked at a place on 24 Street. This is like the Upper West Side--without all the great places to see performances, etc. I suppose it really has nothing to do with the Upper West Side. In fact, San Francisco and New York have very little in common except for the fact that they both have huge parks in the center of the city. After all, there is only one Haight Street.

Meanwhile, what I'm trying to convey, is that this street and surrounding area appeal to a person of a certain monetary income and of a certain taste category. In other words, they fall into a stereotype. In my own way, I fall into a stereotype, but I'm not sure what it is. Am I a Haight (lower or upper) Street type? Am I a Mission type? The telling question is, Am I a Noe Valley type? I've never lived in this neighborhood before, but I have lived in the others more than a few times.

To get to the point: in viewing the apartment on 24 Street, I was attending an "open house," in which all contenders for the same place could be seen. Everybody looked more American than me. Everyone looked like they have more money than I do. All of them looked like opium was only a fragrance.

Today I called the owner of the property. He was nice to me. I am a karma-dharma kind of person in that I teach for the school district...and my students are the specially "impaired" kind. In the end, however, he revealed that he had offered the place to someone else and was awaiting their decision. I thought, "I knew it was going to be Mr. and Mrs. America who would get the place!"

If anyone wants to vote on whether my attitude is defeatist or realistic, let me know.

Greed and harassment, in all its forms.

I have been living in San Francisco, California, USA, for many, many, many years. The reason why I first moved here was because it was very affordable and artistically stimulating. In 1985, I was able to live on $400/month, rent included. My main occupation was painter and musician, i.e., artist. I worked at a European-style cafe next to the warehouse I was sharing with five other housemates. We had an immense garage, music room with a piano and various instruments, painting spaces, a large sun room, a tv room, two bathrooms, etc. My total rent was $110./month.

By 1990, five years later, my then boyfriend and I found a place in the Mission (this is where the warehouse was, too) for $675./month, one bedroom Edwardian apartment. Four years later, in 1994, he and I moved to Bernal Heights and paid $850./month for a two bedroom house with a backyard, garage, etc. I had two huge closets in my room!

In summer of 2003, over nine years later, the landlord informed me that he was selling the house. By that time my boyfriend and I had long since moved out. The landlord didn't even give me the option of trying to buy the house. I moved to Berkeley, thinking that rents would be cheaper. I lived in a crack neighborhood off of Sixth Street and was constantly being harassed by tenants in my building and having my car windows bashed in and stereo ripped off. I had signed a six-month lease, fortunately, and tried to move with my two cats in December of 2003. No rooms in San Francisco accepted cats--or, at least two of them. I was forced to take an 8'x9' room in a boarding house situation back in Bernal Heights.

No formal papers were signed. The landlord said he was considered a roommate (even though there were no rooms available to him in the house and he in fact did not live there). Because I had to keep my babies, I decided that I would accept this place. It is now 2007, so I've lived in this place for 3 and 1/2 years. During this time, one of my cats died of old age (she was 17, named after rocker Lita Ford!). The other cat died prematurely this past January ( he was only 9 years-old).

I find myself in a situation in which I could possibly find a better place, but there are so far so many places that are extremely expensive that I don't know what to do. Today one of my housemates and I looked at places. The biggest one, and one which is in the Mission, was $2750./month for three bedrooms. The bathroom was the 4'X3'. The landlord wanted first month's rent plus two months' deposit. Although the place had high ceilings and nice floors, it was completely overpriced. The most depressing, saddening place we saw was back in Bernal Heights. The landlord wanted close to $3000./month for a "three" bedroom house that the elderly woman who greeted us at the door had been living in most of her life. The rooms were tiny. There were bars on the front windows ( I suppose since this woman had been living there a long, long time, she lived there when Bernal was a "bad" neighborhood and therefore still kept that idea in her head).

So many people have moved to San Francisco with tons of dollars that landlords are taking advantage of the fact. Areas of the Mission that were severely dangerous are full of people in designer clothes and cars eating and drinking in the chic neighborhood restaurants. One of the teachers where I work told me that she lived in what is definitely considered a dangerous neighborhood: outer Ocean View. I'd wondered how she could live there. What choices does one have to make? Live in a "safe" neighborhood like Bernal but with a landlord who harasses his tenants (particularly me because I moved my musical equipment up from the garage and put in the "common space") or move to crack neighborhood again and be harassed by neighbors!!!!

What is this all about: greed, harassment, i.e., non-community living but instead a city where "money changes everything."

STIFF UPPER LIPS and more on Amma...

Usually I like British comedy. The film STIFF UPPER LIPS was featured in the British secion of the video store. Although an inventive film, it needed something for women to have even more fun with. The plot revolves around 22-year-old Emily whose aunt wants to have married as soon as possible. Emily is limited to the men in her world: the bushy-eyebrowed vicar, her idiot brother, her brother's Homer-quoting Cambridge friend, and the hunky stableman--turned butler--George. None of these men is within her age range. George is at least 15 years older than she is. Somehow the comedy of classes would have been enhanced by some eye candy for the female viewer. There were some good laughs in the film, though, and I love Peter Ustinov...it must have been made in the 1990's sometime.

Last night was the ashram. I took up all these women who has never seen Amma before. In fact, I feel my seva during this time that Amma has been here has been to transport and help individuals to see Amma. I could tell that Amma was happy with me for bringing my Tibetan friend and some other new women. I promise myself to meditate now and from now on. When I see Amma again, I want to be in closer communication. Last night was very magical, but I hardly saw anyone I know. Actually, every day that I went to the ashram had been very uneventful and yet very calm and peaceful.

What a way to end the teaching period--seeing Amma!

Quelle liberation!!! Out of the nine years that I have been teaching children with "severe impairments," ages 5 to 8-years-old, the past 2006-2007 school year has been the most maddening of them all.

The first two years were easy: the teacher in the room next to mine taught SI kids, ages 9-12-years-old. She and I would go to lunch at the local Chinese restaurant every day and talk about how difficult our assistants, otherwise known as "paras" were. To be honest, mine were more agreeable than hers, so I could really lend a sympathetic ear. She left to go teach at a private school.

The next five years after that there was a teacher in the next room who from the first day of her employment at the school treated me like I had number two all over my face. Every day for close to five years she would treat me with such disrespect that it was only Psychic Horizons which helped me ground and keep my space because she kept trying to whack me out of it.

Then, for the past three years there has been a teacher next door who sees the teaching of the kids in a very similar way to me and treats me with respect and kindness. This has been a blessing. However, both of us have had to deal with paras who hate us and challenging student configurations. Although both of us have the desire to heal and help, we have found stumbling blocks and boundary violations along the way. Today, the last day of class for the children, we both gave each other a hug for making it through.

What was most interesting today was that I dressed to go see Amma and went down the street to the bank. A young black woman came out of the chic Italian wine bar and told me she liked my attire. I recognized her from a special branch of SFUSD that we both were participants in this semester. She couldn't believe I remembered her. How could I forget? She is very intelligent, witty and caring--and probably in her mid to late twenties. I wish I had been that together at her age!!!! We talked on about teaching and all that--best not to get really into it. Then I went to the store, and I met another woman who also works as an SFUSD teacher! I forgot my groceries. She came out of the store and mentioned that I might be celebrating a bit too early!!!

Meanwhile, the highlight of the day was going to the ashram in San Ramon to see Amma. For the past couple of years I've kind of taken Amma for granted. Tonight I was in complete gratitude mode. How fortunate we are to have a human being like Amma around twice a year!!! The evening was spent in meditation, singing, talking with friends, old and new. I enjoyed speaking with an Indian woman who had a darling 9-year-old daughter and a son soon to go into pre-med. I hope I see her on Friday at Devi Bhava. The energy at the ashram was extremely relaxed and soothing. I ate dinner alone by the lake, listening to the crickets.

I saw Amma on Tuesday.

Please excuse the last post. I'm too tired to try to figure out how to edit a post with blogger.com. There quite a few errors in it and it had little to say.

At least now I'm going to describe my visit to see Amma on Tuesday morning this week. We arrived at 10:10 am and Amma hadn't come yet. Next minute Amma is there. The ashram is covered with devotees. I got darshan around 2:30 pm, but in the meanwhile I had a really intense meditation sitting on the floor near Amma. I like to sit there. Fortunately, the ashram was not so crowded that I could sit and meditate there.

Went to have lunch. The Indian food line was really long...not a big deal. Talked with a woman in line about her business doing energy/healing work with people with cerebral palsy. I was trying not to think of work!!!

Amma has been on my mind as well what happens at the ashram when she' there.

Last year I went to Amma's ashram in San Ramon every Saturday night for satsang. This year, I've only gone to one satsang. It was in April. Actually I could write at least a short story about all that has happened to me by me for me at me with me and etc. at Amma's ashram--especially when Amma is there.

Back in 2002 in a floatingly hot summer, I spent Devi Bhava with a very young man from Montreal with dreadlocks and a drum. We both got mantras and names that night. He uses his--abbreviatedly--now. (I said "Hi" to him at Amma's birthday satsang last September--a million years ago!!!) I don't use mine. It's too weird. I thought Amma was going to give me a name that meant "Patience" but she gave me the name Charuta. The moon is in the name somewhere, but it doesn't mean "moon." But I digress again. It's all in a name, isn't it? For me, Amma really blew me away in a way, but actually the first thought that came to me was "inner" with regard to "beauty." It has been a problem for me to look at myself on the outside.

When I think I've done some work on my inner world, I do something karmic to make everything more challenging.

This young man I met at the ashram that year and I related to one another in a more karmic way for me. I have Venus, Rahu and a very important other planet in Scorpio in the 10th house.

"Wear your love like heaven...
Alizarin crimson...
Can I believe what I see
All I have wished for could be
All our races proud and free...

THE DEVIL IN DANIEL JOHNSTON and Greetings

This was the second night I watched the film THE DEVIL IN DANIEL JOHNSTON. When I saw the MTV footage of him from about 1985 I realized that I had seen him before--on TV! Many people become famous through that medium. But I think Daniel will be more well-known for all the documentation he did on himself throughout his teens and twenties. He recorded many of his musings and made films when he was in high school. The film about him is therefore full of rich documentation of a true artist. This particular artist is one who was suffering for a long time with mental illness.

Many of us wanted to be on MTV in the eighties. Videos were on constantly, and there were many theme musical shows, one of which Daniel Johnston performed on. He was a product of a kind of Amurikana that is steeped in Christianity and the Bible. No wonder he came from the southern US of A. To me he's kind of an anthropological study of a culture that is its very own and which I, though from the suburbs of San Francisco, can appreciate.

But what's most important about Daniel's contribution to the world is his music and his visual art, paintings and drawings. His metaphors are so simple and sweet. It is no wonder that he went off his meds weeks before he would perform. And though people--his peers one of whom I am--could find some of his lyrics somewhat over the top, the sentiment is real and therefore to be accepted as such.

There is much more to be said about this artist but I would just recommend the documentary. Some may find it exploitative of the mentally ill. I see it as an appreciate of genius.

Just to digress like I usually like to, I want to say that if anyone writes me a "Hi there" I will not respond. For some reason this harmless phrase puts me off. It's an acknowledgment of personal space without the warmth of sincere greeting.

SHREK THE THIRD

Yes, good ol' Shrek. I really liked the first one. I went with some severely cognitively impaired young adults I was teaching in summer school. It was so fun. It was so new. We saw it at 11:00am at the Metreon. SHREK 2 I saw with a friend in the early evening at the Metreon. It, too was sweet. So far I've said nothing about the film that would inform the non-Shrek person.

My favorite thing about Shrek is that one of the guys who works at the local cafe wrote "Tortuga" under Shrek's picture. That made me laugh. I think tortuga is a funny word; it means turtle. A turtle, a donkey, and a cat. I love cats. It's so fitting that the cat has a Spanish accent. He's portrayed as a player in SHREK THE THIRD. In fact, the kittie is the only one who doesn't reproduce in the film. And that's the plot of SHREK THE THIRD.

I got bitten again.

As much as I like to say "Hi, doggie, doggie," to the nearest sweet French bulldog, I have always been afraid of getting bitten by a dog. The only "wild" animal, i.e., one which bites and etc., to gain entrance to the human abode, is the dog. It's odd that humans also can bite into apples and into each other.

Today was the second time this month that I have been bitten by a student. Actually, it's been the same student each time. This student is not the only one in the class who bites. I've been the lucky one to be a "human bite" recipient. I went to occupational health. They know me there. I've received alot of bites and scratches from students over the years.

My getting the bite was no one's fault. I could consider myself slow in realizing that someone intends to bite me, but I won't go there. The blame game is overdone. I'm not sure what karma has to do with it.

What does karma have to do with being "the world's tallest woman?" Where does this woman reside, you may ask. When I saw the caption on the cable menu, "World's Tallest Woman" I was drawn to it. This woman lives in China. I hope this documentary follows her, because she was just given 6 months' worth of medicine to help reduce her pituitary gland tumor. The pituitary gland controls the endocrine system, and the endocrine system controls height. The "condition" this woman has is called "giantism." She stands 7 feet, 8 inches tall. It was incredible to me that people in her village and the health workers in Shanghai treated her with so much respect. She actually demanded it by being a person without an impairment in her ability to communicate her wants and needs.