the rest of sunday, after publish, i stayed up late talking to the girlies. someone said “it’s so obvious” and i thought about that. i’m still thinking ‘bout that. we hugged goodbye. too much, not enough. bade farewell at the locked chang-chang metal in the doorway. thanks for welcoming me in.

early monday marcel and me and mimi jump into a taxi. hello madrid and we put marcel on a train. hello madrid and we have our breakfast. mimi says “Oh. My. God.” when i take the first bite of the whole mozarella ball at the exit of the lidl. a few minutes later she inquires, with a certain amount of trepidation, where is the cheese? eyes darting at my pockets in desperation. with a still face and a minute shake of the head i express the cheese is gone, it has been eaten, please don’t ask any further questions about the cheese. she says “Wow.” with a tone that does not entirely convey approval.

a coffee shop fix up. information hierarchy. tostada, salad. nice place. good beans. and gently so gently, and back to the station and we put mimi on a train.

and i against the wall, on the floor, write down on the computer about this and about that. and off to the upstairs platform, and i put chee on a train.

marcel missed his connection by a minute.

his new train is tomorrow. same train as me and mimi. he gets a room at the hotel on top of the station. i’m nearby, the two of us meet up and eat tacos.

a man in the street tells me that i am looking beautiful, and tells me to lick my lips. i say no thank you. he calls me a bitch, and tells me i’m a man, and calls me a bitch, and tells me i’m a man.

back at my hotel (the moxy where the pillow casings say “i woke up like this”), i make arrangements with cherene to have breakfast in the morning.

sunset.

daybreak.

i wake up in my boots.

i don’t remember ever falling asleep in my boots before 2025, but since september i’ve woken up in a bed in my boots three times or more.

yes, it’s the morning. birds are chirping, i presume. i find cherene and we wander around talking until the coffee shops open. he’s going to be a father. after an iced latte, he takes me to his favourite pastry shop where i acquire a pair of xuxos (also spelt chuchos), a sort of cannoncini or corone made of croissant. they look delicious, greasy, i’d like one but it would kill me. one for each of my trainmates is almost just as satisfying. xuxo means mutt. a sparkly eyed dog of mixed ancestry. we have a wonderful chat about arts and theatre and libraries and research, weirdos, alchemy, identity, and promise. and, of course, the computer.

goodbye cherene, and through security. send platform and gate info to my colleagues to lower the background radiation of stress. + marcel arrives, + is issued a pastry and receives it quite gladly. mimi arrives, and is issued pastry, and receives it with a certain amount of trepidation due to the fact she is currently constructed almost entirely from a chocolate cake with no raising agent that lives in the belly like a foot tall brownie.

we board. seated dispersed assorted amongst the two carriages either side of the cafe car. i meet some dogs for a while; they poke their little noses round the corner in front and i boop. the first class cars have little telephone calls booths. i go there and sit and i make a little music for a while. a little later i visit mimi in the coffee queue in the cafe car and we have a little coffee and then we spend thirty or forty. mimi’s pointing out the window and telling me about the birds. i love to hear about all the different birds and how to recognize the different birds by stance and colour. there are a lot of flamingos who don’t migrate anymore because france is warm enough these days all year. instead they stand around getting pale near rice.

marcel comes up to the cafe from the lower 13 and we all have an early lunch. mine is a salad of two eggs on the gratings of a single carrot, soaked in what appears to be the juice of 9 whole lemons. we split up back to our seats, but the aisle seat beside my seat contains a sleeping passenger that i feel no desire to disturb. it’s clear to see, to me, that she needs the sleep more than i need my seat. i return to the first class telephone calls booth and make a little music for a while and write down on the computer about this and about that.

and we arrive in Paris. or, as the French call it, “Lille”. and we find the moisturizer. and we find a late lunch. and we find our tickets and they are miraculously next to one other. you know, we were meant to be in different carriages. and the journey is easy. and quiet. and i make a little music for a while. and chunnel. and goodbye. and home. and meet harry in the hallway. and “the longest week of my life” and “yes in a good way”. and unlock the door and see boxes and boxes and boxes. and fall asleep in my boots.

wake up.
follow the rabbit.
knock knock.

on wednesday i work, unexpectedly. tighten it up, throw things together. hop on a call.

on thursday i work, unexpectedly. loosen up. throw some things together. hop on a call. at night i go out to newspeak house to see agnes cameron and join a group converting psychic damage about the arms industry into wikipedia edits. afterwards i see orion and gamithra and i talk too much about nothing and drain me too. i find myself in that hallway so many now.

on friday i work, and show some of the things off that i’ve been making and it goes quite well. i’m excited about the conversations in the sidebar. the chat had many messages of people saying things that i’ve been trying to say, but they said them much better than i could. several other people demo’d and each one of them was really fucking good. and i hop on a call. and a story i’ve been since 25/46 shows finale, renewed for two more seasons.

the apartment i wanted went to somebody else. i don’t have anywhere lined up yet. might end up putting everything in storage and living as a vagabond. i’m packing it (my life) in boxes. open a cupboard, touch something, flood of memories of who touched it once before—what kind of love led it here to my hand. and all that love is dead now. and all so far away. i don’t remember even being the kind of person who would feel it. thank god i’ll never have to go through all that again. learning someone. being learned.

but for now i’ll be touching a box of pegs in the kitchen and crying. because of the meaning of the pegs. or the chopping board, cassette tape, spiralizer, envelope, little flag, deck of cards, water bottle matching water bottle isn’t here, power cable, saddam hussein tshirt, knock-off danish jenga set, empty camera case, cardboard box with label maker label, vape juice (mango), eye shadow, broken glasses, vases, talavera pussy cat, baseball cap, single sock, tampons, pads, painkillers, gaming mouse, washi tape, masking tape, instant pot (does anyone want a free instant pot? for free, instant pot, barely used?), little wooden animals, whistle, train ticket receipt, magnetic e-ink screen, ladybird egg shaker, thin blue raincoat, cherries sticker, high heel shoe strap. you know, rich and relentless. need rest and recuperation. sentimental convalescence.

a good thing to learn is how to be uncomfortable. to maintain your connection to yourself when the vibes are all the way off. i don’t know any way other than practice. and it’s gonna suck for a while. and you’ll spend some time like the wax a lot. but there are few things that can make you more secure than knowing you’ll be okay when nothing is. and relax, don’t pull, like a finger trap. accept the worst and plan for it and then go for the gold.

cupknight, 
wheel of fortune, 
page of swords, 
ace of wands, 
judgement,
ace of pentacles.

almost too vibrant.

i’m living canadian hours this week, packing boxes after nightfall. happy international ladybird day week to those who celebrate.

it’s raining in Paris. the lamp light flickers when it splashes off the river. i don’t remember Paris being a city the last time i was here. it’s a city today. i am in the train station. i can’t tell if im inside or outside. up in the sky there is what appears to be a roof. but then, there is rain on the table. and the wind is blowing. stars aligned in corrugated steel?

it is likely that i will have to stay awake for the next seven hours. the peace i reached after so many months of strange and wonderful unsweetened chaos is with me now. it is nice to live in my head, to be alone again. and to be somewhere in time and space also. the time and space i’m in right now is 12:47a.m. at night, in Gare de Lyon Hall 1.

apportion my rations sensibly. that is to say, in a moment i shall drink half of the remaining bottle of Club Mate Zero i brought from the previous country. Then i will move through the halls, to deux or trois and see if there is another story. three hours later, another half.

oh, over the tannoy just now it says the station is closed, and that we should leave for the exits. none of my fellow hall lurkers seem phased. haven’t even looked up from their interactive computing devices.

i see. they really have closed the station.

i did not know train stations closed.

a station with a train to the faraway.

i am surprised, and cold, to learn that the train station closes at night.

it will reöpen three and a half hours from now.

there are a few of us out here surprised with luggage. someone’s iphone just played the 3 note lullaby, time for them to wind down for bed. brutal.

i’ve counted to 500. that ate twenty minutes.

i am out of ideas.

a man has taken an interest in me. that’s never the start of any good story.

he asked if i wanted to buy cocaine. he told me he was going to try on my headphones. i said nah. he slapped me in the mouth. i’ve surprised myself by standing up and removing my sunglasses and stepping into his space and shouting in his face you need to get the fuck away from me right fucking now. he shrunk like little worm and went away. new power. from whence? did not know i had it in me, i’m a whole different woman now things are going to be different around here. perhaps too cold to be scared? i’ll go by the door where there are other people. i’m shaking now like tears in rain i’m shivering i’m cold i’m adreneline.

station reöpened.

just as cold in here.

i’ll compile automerge a few times to warm up.

here’s the train. im sitting with a nice family. im waking up repeatedly.

off the train in beautiful rainy barcelona, and headed up berlin st through london st to paris st and into hotel where lie in bed ate 7 tacos.

i’ve gotten that kinda cold where it goes all the way through, digs in, changes the temperature of your bones. i’ve turned the heat on, it’s 30°C in here with the fans blowing. im overheated, dehydrated, can’t move from the heat. but i’m still cold, because it’s coming from the marrow.

and the next day a train. and things cleared up. and a taxi. a patata…pescado…fish and chips. and i’m staring out the window as the buildings rush by and suddenly i’m completely and utterly alive. “that building is the same distance from me as i am from it” and like an iron bar between my heart and some brick structure built a hundred years before i was born and it’s between my belly and it. chinchon.

and then… oh that’s strange. there were days. more days than there have ever been in so few days. though it’s been that way for nearly ninety now, it’s like that more than ever. and i don’t have any notes. and i don’t think i can describe it now. there is no way, i think. i’m weakened. VCM’d.

each night i slept for at least two hours and i ate most days. notes for next time to manage this better. i got to see many people who i love quite dearly in a deep and abiding fashion, and learn some new people who i have loved quite easily and intend to continue loving for some time.

thursday was a rewarding day.

i won’t talk about it.

i guess i won’t talk about any of it.

i feel as though i’ve awoken after a long slumber. but it’s one of those slumbers where you’ve eaten acid and ecstasy but also you’ve been awake for four days so you fall asleep anyway and you’re lying on the floor on the chillout room and the lights and beats are still going and all your dreams are about you lying on the floor of the chillout room but nevertheless you return vuelves and you’re surpisingly refreshed all dressed up and ready to rumble.

all dressed up and ready to rumble.

anyway, you know. feeling pretty. so tired.

yeah. i can’t write this.

the fifth week of the year. the first of february. i’m on a train to paris. i was meant to be on a bus to paris but then the left leg broke on my glasses. we’ll get to that when we get to that.

the last time we met i was older than he’d ever be. that’s strange feelin, right? any time you meet someone younger than you, you might be older than they’ll ever be. anyway.

my notes from the start of the week seem to indicate that my intention not to go insane is proving to require more adroit focus than i’ve been giving to it. will require intensional, purposeful, ritual. that’s not an oxford comma.

if i get much cuter i’m gonna end up stabbed.

i met pvh and orion for coffee. i went to newspeak house to get mimi’s raincoat. i boarded a bus, i boarded a train, i tunneled through a chunnel and emerged in brussels. i attended fosdem.

i noly got misgendered once the whole time i was in brussels. it was within 5 mins of the one time i left the hotel when i wasn’t dressed like a filthy slut. lesson learned. won’t catch me slippin again. cold outside, dressin like a thottie.

oh that reminds me that sweet and beautiful Val took me to see a harpist play the harp last week and gave me a little mushroom and it was quite wonderful and moved some shapes around.

i was super up in my head and spiraling in confusion over the weekend and tired and hungry and sleepy and shaky at the expense of everyone around me.

but then, something clicked. it’s all chill now. everything seems clear and easy. i get it.

i enjoyed wandering around with marcel talking about this and that on sunday. strange to meet somebody else with a relationship to turbopascal, delphi.

i have many sore muscles in my shoulders and back. i have learned of muscles i was not previously acquainted with. they have never introduced themvelves until now. some kind of eurostar-specific muscle.

i’ll arrive in Paris. 7 hours later i will take a train to Barcelona. and 20 hours later i will leave for Madrid. then a bus to Chinchon. then the tiring part of the month will begin. then i’ll come home and find an apartment and move house.

i think we will soon be pulling into Gare du Nord, so i will bid you farewell for now. we will speak again next week when i have been rode hard and put away wet.

you could draw a cat