As I'm putting in the same dozen or so songs I always put in, a girl from a nearby table approaches me. excuse me, she asks, but was the display clear when you put your money in? She points at the electronic display with number of songs left to choose, which one is playing, etc.

no, i replied truthfully. it was blank.

yeah, well, the last couple of songs i put in didn't play. She fixes me with a look which suggests that I'm somehow responsible.

it actually hasn't been playing anything at all for the last few minutes.

i know that, she replies, getting increasingly agitated, but my songs didn't all play. can you tell me when yours start to—

"There is a Light that Never Goes Out" begins playing. this is one of mine.

not all of my songs played. this really sucks. She turns and stomps away.

God, is it any wonder?

9:11pm

Dropped Vash off at a calligraphy class Saturday morning after the requisite coffee beverage and bagel at The Sea Biscuit, went to the Best Buy near Rainbow and bought a stereo for her car (but didn't have it installed), picked her up, street-scored a terrific desk chair at 16th and Missouri, made an appointment to have the stereo installed noon Sunday at the Best Buy in Colma, had a really good meal at Nippon Sushi after a brief tour of the organic groceries and indie video stores of Pacifica, hit Writers With Drinks late but left early, totally didn't see the Space Shuttle going overhead, drove to Wonderland, crashed at half past ten as though our strings had been cut, not even having the energy to get off the bed and turn off the houselights until four Sunday morning. Drove back into the City and had a coffee beverage and bagel at Brain Wash (nowhere near as good as the Sea Biscuit but infinitely more hip), finally got the stereo installed, found a corner in which to huddle and read while Vash attended a calligraphy workshop at the Main Library, took the really difficult but fiscally necessary step of canceling my Crunch membership, had dinner at Angkor Borei, returned to my place to relax for a few minutes and watch Glen or Glenda?, and then off to The Dark Room for Fatal Attraction at Bad Movie Night, then back home again to sleep for almost an entire six hours.

I think that's everything.

Kaiser went much smoother than I expected it to. I got the refill, even though the prescription has changed, and I think I like my new sunglasses; Vash says they're very "New York chic," which I'm sure is good. The important thing is that they do the job. We were out of there by a quarter to six and had time to kill before the art opening, so we hit the Magazine, then had White Russians at Divas while working on a third-seeking ad. The art show was neat, even if it did make me feel tall and lumpy. But what doesn't these days? After a so-so diner at AI BBQ, we returned to the Black Light District to watch some really bad pr0n on VHS I'd bought for fifty cents at The Magazine (the scratchy handwritten label promised a "shemale scene," so our curiosity was piqued), followed by some higher-rent stuff on DVD. As is so often the case, it would have been a lot better without men.

Tonight is Soundwave.

Didn't the word kaiser once have negative connotations? Wilhelm and World War I and all? I wonder if in, in a few generations, the dominant HMO will be Fuehrer Permanente.

Vash and I went to a picnic with some friends in Dolores Park yesterday afternoon. We arrived right as the San Francisco Mime Troupe was finishing up their annual show, and left as the amateur fireworks were getting underway. It was still daylight, but I guess they figured that the sooner they started, the more they'd be able to do before the cops shut them down. I spent most of the time talking with Shawna Virago about recent events. It was nice to commiserate with someone who really knows where I'm coming from.

From Dolores Park, Vash and I went into the Castro in search of a schedule for the Silent Film Festival. While in the neighborhood, I got a mocha from the increasingly legendary Philz Coffee. I'd kinda lost track of time by then, but I think it was around seven in the evening. Still plenty of daylight out, so it felt like daytime.

Returning to the Black Light District, we considered going out onto Ocean Beach to watch my neighborhood's amateur fireworks, but instead simply listened to them through the window as we engaged in our own waxwork pyrotechnics in the living room. Around midnight, we shifted gears and moved into the bedroom, with the No Other Radio Network on the shortwave.

In the throes of le petit mort, my head started to pound. Really, really hard, a major slamming of the temples. It was nearly overwhelming, reminding me a lot of when I had pneumonia last year. No fever this time, though, at least not that Vash could detect. My head just seriously hurt. I took a few Tylenol and applied pressure and tried to cry (it always helps) and most of all tried to sleep, since it was past midnight and the alarm was set to go off at a quarter to five so Vash could make it to the gym (remember when I used to feel barely safe enough to do that?). I was still awake by half past one, but I think I slept eventually. Vash's theory is that it was cadmium in the mocha. Cadmium or no, I probably did have it too late, since in addition to a blinding headache I was seriously wired. I can't say why it waited until that particular moment to make itself known, beyond the fact that like most everything else in Nature, the human body has a cruel sense of humor.

9:59am

I really need to figure out what the hell I'm doing with my gym membership. The timing doesn't really work for me anymore, plus I'm getting increasingly uncomfortable at the thought of going into the women's locker room. It was scary in the first place, and that was before I entered this dirty epoch in which I'm regularly called out as male on the street. What really kills me, one among many things, is that the location of my old gym is still empty. They had to close because they couldn't afford the lease anymore, and nothing else has moved into the space. The "Golden Gate Fitness" sign is even still up. Insult met injury. They were fruitful and multiplied.

I dug up all the paperwork. I guess now I just need to go in and actually cancel the membership. It'll be a fifty dollar charge, but that's still cheaper than what I'm paying for the monthly membership I now no longer have the courage (or discipline to get there by six under my own power) to use. Then what? I don't know.

Meanwhile, I'm listening to streaming audio from the site for Wicked Wisdom, a metal band fronted by Jada Pinkett-Smith. They're more than a little controversial, since her celebrity surely contributed to her getting a spot on last year's Ozzfest tour. (I'll always regret not having gone in 2001 to see Manson play Ozzfest, since that was the final one before The Osbournes hit, and I can't help but think the festival got much uglier after that.) The controversy, combined with the fact that her lyrics have been derisively compared to that of a "moody gothic teenager" and the simple fact that she's a black actress playing to crowds of primarily white metalheads (not known to be the most recially sensitive and/or gender-equitable group) makes me extremely curious and more than a little sympathetic. I hope the band does well, just to piss people off.

9:41pm

My head never really stopped hurting, though napping this afternoon when I got home from work helped. I can only conclude that, in spite of not having had a drop of alcohol last night, I was hung over today.

In our brave new world of 2006, halfway through the second (but not final) Bush administration, a new CGI-driven Charlotte's Web movie is being released. The trailer claims it's from "the most beloved book of our time." Haven't read the book in question for a decade or two, but I'm not remembering this scene: as a rat runs across the edge of a gate, a cow farts and send the rat flying. Allow me to restate: there's a fart joke in Charlotte's frackin' Web, for the love of jesus. I personally think the movie is a perfect candidate for being remade with modern technology—the original film is as old as I am, as carbon-dated as a polyester suit and sickeningly saccharine in that way which made me hate children's movies when I was growing up—but...I mean...a fart joke?

Happy birthday, America. You get the culture you deserve.

There was karaoke at the wedding reception on Saturday. I wasn't sure I was going to participate—I'd been feeling shy and not especially wanting to go onstage, which is never a good sign with me—until I saw Manson's cover of "Tainted Love" on the list. That pretty well made the decision for me. Hole's "Celebrity Skin" was also tempting, but for better or worse, Manson's key was at least in my range. I did sign up for Alanis's "Joining You," but the reception ended before then, which is surely for the best.

11:02am

Last night at Spices! III in Oakland, I had the accurately named STiNKY! Tofu Sauteed w/ Seafood in Spicy Casserole, and Vash ordered the Spicy Fish Fillet Bowl w/ Flaming RED Oil. Both were delicious, though Vash was not so crazy about the tofu, which did, in fact, stink. It reminded me a bit of the Durian smoothie Maddy and I once attempted to drink, though I had better luck this time. Like Durian, Stinky Tofu is an acquired taste, to put it mildly. Next time, I may get the STiNKY! Tofu Sauteed w/ Intestine in Spicy Casserole. It's a buck cheaper, and, hey! Intestine! The only way it could be more transgressive by Western standards would be if it was made with brains, and that's only a matter of time. There's a brain (sesos) burrito at Cancun which I've been curious about, though as I discovered when I got a head (cabeza) burrito to go, specialty items like that should be eaten hot. A brain burrito which has cooled down during the half-hour car trip home just wouldn't be right.

I'd like to think Poppy would be proud, since her recent books are why I'm eating things with "stinky" or "intestine" in the name. (Her earlier books, however, are not why I've drank blood. That's just a coincidence.)

4:22pm

When nobody was really listening to or respecting you in the first place, why not wear black lipstick? What difference can it make?

I'd like to go out and get some action, but there's really no place where where genetic girls and tranny girls hook up. The Lexington is all about GGs hooking up with other GGs, and Divas is mostly about men picking up tranny girls, and I'm not into men.

You're not into men because you're heterosexual?

No, if I was into men, that would make me heterosexual. I'm female-identified. I consider myself a girl.

Oh. I've never really been sure what you consider yourself to be.

I shudder to think what it's like for those who get SRS and still encounter this sort of thing. It must feel like an even bigger gyp.

I'm off to the side, out of the way, taking up nobody's space but my own. You must not try to compete. You will not win, nor place or show.

sometime after midnight

On the second car of the last outbound N train. There's a really loud guy, hitting the windows and screaming obscenities (including the timeworn classic "fucking faggot!" I caught a glimpse of him and realized that I must not let him see me. I mean, maybe he's harmless. Could just be Tourette's. But. Not worth taking the chance. When we hit 9th and Judah, I got off the second car and dashed forward to the first, which at least has the driver. The second car is unmanned, which has a certain level of risk to it. The presence of the driver implies a kind of (false) protection. It's next to nothing, but you take what you can get.

A group of teenagers just got on, sitting across from me. Hooded sweatshirts and backwards baseballs caps and aggressive heterobraggadacio. I feel only marginally safer because there have been no outward manifestations of violence, and thus far, they are paying me no mind.