thursday, october 28th (2004)

HOORAY! IT'S JAY DAY! - AKA JAYMAS

7:16 am
Waffle House is the place to find me on my birthday these past three years. Pecan waffle is the menu item on the plate in front of me. Today I made it a double - only $1.00 more. What a deal!

It must be a rule in the employee handbook to greet the customers as they enter the establishment. I'm never ready for it when I walk in; two or three "Good mornin's!" get throwed at me. It's hard to even respond. Then as I sit here I watch and see everybody else get good mornin's throwed at 'em, and they don't know how to respond either. Well, once in a while a regular walks in at his regular time and he gets a personalized good mornin' throwed at him, and he might even get razzed a little about something if he's the type, and he usually throws back a kind good mornin' or a "Howdy, sweetheart!" if he's the type. But for the most part, we're all in the same boat; we don't know how to respond.

7:29 am
One would've been enough! I guess I was afraid I might go hungry since my Jay Day schedule I made up over the last few days. {sic} Or maybe I was subconsciously thinking I need to start working on my paunch since I'm 40-something now! The first item I on my schedule was GYM, but I decided last night that I didn't need to do that first thing since I went at the end of the work day yesterday.

The rest of the schedule looks like this:
BREAKFAST @ WAFFLE HOUSE
VOTE
PICK UP AV SYSTEM
AV TO FUUN 1 - 4
I {HEART} HUCKABEES 2:25(?)
FRIST EXHIBIT
EAT
SET UP AV
SCREENING 7 - 11:30

I might change things around a bit, naturally. I'm still going to vote next, but I might go to the gym after that to steam. My right shoulder/side hurts. And I can shower and shave too. And I think I might see an earlier movie. I better get to the poll since I hear they've been pretty crowded, and today is the last day for early voting.

3:31 pm
I haven't had a chance to update. Things have been swimming along. One reason I was thinking of going to the gym was because I thought maybe B the black guy would be there. I figured I could stand to have sex on my birthday. He was and I did. We drove to a Baptist Hospital parking garage, pulled the curtains in the back of Shambhala Blue, and got off. It was okay. There was no spirit connection there and I realized that is what I desire most in my life, whether it be sex with a stranger or someone closer, or whether it be conversation with someone or a group of people.

I'm having a falafel sandwich at Kalamata's now. On my way here I came up with an idea for tonight. (Wear the terrycloth robe and house slippers.)

Under this robe I'm wearing my birthday suit, and this is my birthday party! Which might make me look like a real egomaniac! And I know there are therapists and people in therapy in the room tonight, so please don't read too far into all this! Actually, the reason why I'm wearing my birthday suit tonight is because in the email invitation I sent out, I said that there would be nudity. And come to find out, in the final edit, S all but edited out almost every last trace of nudity, so I thought I should give you what you paid for... Just kidding!

Actually, you didn't pay for this, yet. I said in the email that this was a private screening and it wouldn't cost anything, but that was just to keep Sundance from disqualifying LIAB. So, it doesn't cost to get in, but it costs to get out. Just kidding!

However, if any of you would like to put a little money in the corn silo, it would help me out with the money I spent renting all this equipment so y'all could see it in style! Please don't feel obligated in any way - it's my party and I'll cry if I want to! - but I figured out that if everybody put $5 in the corn silo, the system would just about be paid for. But like I said, don't feel obligated if you can't or don't want to make a donation. And that's all I'll say about that.

(Two things S wanted me to mention about this film)

These two films will probably explain why I've been in therapy for 2 years now. But obviously, the therapy is working. I've made some real progress, which is clearly evident in S.A.L.L.I.

3:56 pm
I just went back in for the largest piece of tira misu the woman could find in the cooler. And then I came back out and wrote the above part before I remembered to write the time code.

After sex I went and picked up the audio-visual system for tonight. On the way to TennVisual, S called and I answered. He said, "Are you driving?"
"Yes."
"Do you want to die on your birthday?"

What I didn't say to him - but I might have to call him back and tell him because I just thought of it - was that I don't avoid talking on the phone while I'm driving because I don't want to kill myself but rather because I don't want to kill someone else. I couldn't live with that. Well, I couldn't live with killing myself either, but that's different.

C called while I was at TennVisual and I called her back when I was done with my transaction and we talked for a while. Then I took the system to the church, unloaded it and went to see I {Heart} HUCKABEES. (How am I not myself?)

Good movie; I especially like how Lily Tomlin seemed very well-manicured and unrushed, even when she's running. S said I would {heart} it, and I did {heart} it; I {heart} I {Heart} Huckabees!

Now I'm at Kalamata's. Not too far off schedule. And I'm gonna add an event: NEW PHONE @ TMOBILE. (and case). My phone has shattered to the floor so many times it looks downright pitiful. And then I'm planning on heading to the Frist, skipping EAT after it and continue on with the schedule from there.

11:52 pm
There were a few hitches leading up to the screening, but nothing that wasn't fairly easy to take care of, thanks to the kindness of friends. Sa had left the only copy remaining in the city of Nashville of S.A.L.L.I (did that make any sense? I'm high.) in a baggie in case it rained on their back patio. I kept forgetting to go get it while I was having Jay Day, and finally got it on my last way home before the screening (at 6pm or something like that). The baggie felt very light. I opened the DVD case without even opening the baggie, just to check. Oops! No DVD. I called Sa. They wouldn't be back home until 9 or so. I called L and he called somebody and located a DVD-R for me to reburn it. He actually got me two copies and asked for a copy of S.A.L.L.I. as a return favor for the people who had the blanks. He even brought them by the house for me. How nice!

And having CK at the screening to set up and run the AV system, that was a stroke of genius on my part - there were a couple of times during the process that I'm sure would've stressed me out totally: opening the projector screen; replacing a missing cable (actually it wasn't missing, it was non-existent, it hadn't been given to me with the rental). CK said a computer cable would do the trick. And I turned around and there was R, the computer geek member of First UU. He went right to a stash of three extra ones.

I think I'm gonna stop writing now, and glow a little bit (the film is fantastic, thanks to S); I had people leave messages for S on the camera and I'm gonna go and watch them before I send the tape to him. Besides, it's no longer Thursday, October 28th. It's 12:05 am tomorrow.