There's more to life than this

My cats had some sort of kitty laryngitis, they were silently meowing while I was there. There's this other cat, who has lived outside for a while, who has decided he wants to be inside all the time now. Peterkin (for that is his name) was originally one of our catch-neuter-release cats in the neighborhood, but he stuck around more, and so we've been feeding him on the back porch for years. He's always been skittish about letting you pet him, but now he's dying, and has wasted away to nothing (seriously, I think he weighs about 5 pounds) and so he lets you pet him whenever, and tries to get inside whenever he can. It's kind of sad, but also nice to have another cat around. He spent a lot of time leaning against Fred for warmth.
Okay- anyway, so the rest of my trip. Thanksgiving was fine. My cookies were really good. Other than that, we had turkey chili verde, and baked polenta. We usually go on a hike, and then stop and picnic, but this year, through weird circumstances, we went to this park, Pt. Pinole, that my dad spent some time working in, and walked for maybe 20 minutes, to this little bluff/cliff overlooking the San Pablo bay. It was really gorgeous, and a nice clear day, with no clouds. We walked down the other side, and walked out along a pier where all kinds of people were fishing, and then back. It was nice, but short. Usually we walk for an hour or so.
When we got home, I hung out and waited for Mimosa to call, which she never did. Or rather, she sent me a text message at about 8 saying that she was still at dinner, and then called me at 11 to cancel. Which I'm glad she did, I was pretty tired by then, so I ended up just hanging out and reading books from my childhood.
Friday was a really good day. I slept in, and then went with my mom to Cost Plus and Barnes and Noble. It's odd, I guess I've spent so much time in used bookstores now that I don't feel comfortable paying full price for a book. I mean, I want to support the author, and it's usually only 15 dollars, but I feel like because it's new, I have to be sure that I want it, I have to know. I went home, and Mimosa picked me up to go rock climbing. I haven't been in a really long time, it was pretty fun. Not something I'd do regularly, but it was good. We went to Ironworks, where incidentally someone from Camp works, though she wasn't there that day. There was a total mixture of people there. Crazy skilled people, belaying people, total newbies, a lot of kids, and Mimosa and me. We did okay, I think. I made it up a few different routes, and we hung out and talked. I miss her, it was nice to catch up. She wants to move out to New York. I am encouraging it. But ET doesn't really want to yet, he has good work and all his friends and family in the Bay. But so does she. In any case, she's going to come visit me this spring.
After rock climbing we went and got sushi. I love sushi. There are a lot of foods that I like, but sushi is one of the few that just makes me happy. I don't understand it.
And then I rushed home and then rushed out to the Bart station to go into San Francisco to see Zina's show. It was okay. The skill level was higher than that of Splash, but the acts didn't really flow any better. But a couple of the acts were really good, particularly the rope/Spanish web act, and one of the clowning acts. And Zina had a lot of fun. Her back tucks are crazy high now, I remember when she was barely landing them. She, too, is going to visit me in New York, she's looking into colleges around there, which would be fantastic. She's one of my anomaly friends. I usually am friends with people older than me (even Jill is a year older, though a year doesn't really matter), but she is 4 or 5 years younger. After the show, we went to Fenton's and talked about Patch's trip (she wants to go, but doesn't know of anyone else that's going, I really want to go, but on a building trip, I don�t want to clown) and about people at Camp, and New York. It was a good satisfying conversation with no weird pauses. I always worry about weird pauses with people that I don't see on a regular basis.
Saturday was even better. Originally I was going to see Casino Royale with my mom, but I backed out on her, which I feel a little bad about, but I think she was okay with it. We went and wandered around the farmers market for a while, and then down Lakeshore Ave., stopping in a few stores here and there. I ended up buying a dress. It's black, and kind of a wrap dress, and about knee length, and kind of heavy material, so it hangs nicely, and has a great spinny skirt. I figure it can be worn to a wide variety of events, and it will fit me well even if I lose weight like I'm planning. It was 75 dollars, which is way on the expensive side for me, but I really liked it, and like I said, it will be all kinds of useful.
So then, instead of seeing James Bond, I went to the matinee of Passing Strange at the Berkeley Rep. It was the only time I could see it, and I really wanted to. It was fantastic and amazing. I'm so glad I went (and added bonus, I got walked in, I didn't have to pay, and I got a fucking awesome seat). It wasn't so much a play as it was, to quote the program, 'a song big enough to run around in.' It was one of those plays that you want to have a conversation with, but you want it to keep talking as long as possible. I don't think I totally understood it, but I felt it, which is sometimes just as good. The lighting was amazing, a totally successful mixture of rock show and play. It's going to the Public in New York in few months, and I'm going to try to work on it there, but at the very least I'll get to see it again, which is fantastic. One weird thing- at intermission I stayed in my seat and perused the program and looked around a bit. I look over on my right and holy hell. There's Percy and his girlfriend sitting in the next section. Of all the performances that they could have been at, being season subscribers, they're at the one that I'm able to go to. I don't know if he even knew I was there. But weird, no?
So the guy who wrote the show, Stew, and his co-music-writer Heidi performed at the Narsai Toast, way back when. And I ran followspot for him then, which was pretty cool. It was this audience of money-out-their-ears rich white people, and this portly black guy singing "Black men ski. Yes, black men ski". It was pretty awesome. In the bows, one of the actors kind of skied forward, which may have been a reference to that song, but I don't know. I was amused in any case. After the bows, I darted out and upstairs to talk to Taryn and Zoltan. I had talked to Fred for a while before the show, but only kind of said hi in passing to the other two. Stew was getting his earpiece taken off when I went up, and when he was done he flopped down on the couch next to Taryn, looked at me, and said "Who're you?" I told him, and said awesome show, and that I would get to see it again in New York. He talked to me for a minute about the Public, and then Zoltan showed up, and I talked to him for a minute, and then realized that I needed to jet because it was 5pm, and my flight was at 6:55. I hopped on Bart, rode past one of the prettiest sunsets ever, and got off at Lake Merritt. I thought it very fitting that the last place I was before basically leaving forever was across the street from Laney College, where I took a theatre tech class. It was one of the best classes I've ever taken, and it started me on this whole path. Because I took a class there, I decided to go to SOTA. Because I went to SOTA, I decided to go to Cornish, and because of that, I did my internship at Berkeley Rep, and because of that I'm going to New York. So it was very fitting that I waited across the street from Laney for my dad to swing by and pick me up and drive straight to the airport. Which was kind of hell. It was crazy crowded and long lines everywhere. But I made it through checking my bag and security, and got to the gate about 5 minutes before my plane boarded. I read on the whole flight, it was pretty uneventful. Jill picked me up, and we went barhopping with Holly's 21st birthday crowd. We were late, and only in time for the last two bars, but we both managed to get sufficiently drunk. I think that's the most I've ever drunk without being sick. I think it was a stoli raz and sprite, followed by a Long Island iced tea (yes, I was trying to get drunk) and then at the second place a shot of something, an absolut cranberri and sprite (or something. All I know is that she was out of chambord and stoli raz, so I took whatever she had that sort of resembled that) and then a slutty redhead. The first place we went was pretty boring. But the second was much better, much more crowded and noisy, and it helped that I was drunk. Anne-Marie sang Roxanne in a fabulously grating voice, and I talked to everyone. At about 2 (I think) we headed home, and I got into bed. And then Jill called to tell me about something or other, and I ended up going up to her apartment to have an English muffin, which ended up being a few bites of English muffin, two serving of easy mac, some Cap'n Crunch, and half a Mike's hard lime. And we watched some of Gilmore Girls. At about 4, I left, went to my own apartment, and crashed. I had crazy vivid dreams. The second set of them, I think I've had before, at least the beginning. The end changed, but I'm having a very hard time recalling them now. But I'm pretty sure I've dreamed that before. Which brings us to now, where I'm sitting in bed, and really hungry. I'm going to do something about that. Though I might take a shower first. This is ridiculously long. I can't believe anyone will read the whole thing.