One Year From Now, I Will Be...

[Lots of unqualified respites have been coming my way since yesterday's appeal. Thanks, my friends. It means so much.]

[Because I'm nothing if not a bandwagon-jumper (though I was surprised to note to Violet today that I've never spent any time on Amazon.com or eBay, and very little on Craig's List), I think a little survey in imitation of la Mulher fabulosa is in order...]

[15 years ago I...

-- was about to turn 19, and was about to finish my freshman year at UCSB. I was very into The Rocky Horror Picture Show, "L.A. Law," "Santa Barbara" (the soap), and my friends from the dorm and from band;

-- had just seen my first pop concert, Belinda Carlisle at the Santa Barbara County Bowl;

-- had a huge crush on my friend Mike;

-- was about to get a 3-week-long job on the graveyard shift at the El Verano Quik Stop, followed by a month-and-a-half stint in the cafeteria at the Sonoma Developmental Center, and scorekept for the valley's women's softball league;

-- wondered what the hell I was going to do about this sexual orientation I found myself saddled with.]

[10 years ago I...

-- shared an apartment in Isla Vista with Sean and Rafe, and was working weekends at the public health agency where I was soon to become a full-time employee after really, fer-sure, dropping out of school;

-- was dating my first boyfriend, who was about to dump me, drunk and puking, on my bathroom floor on my birthday;

-- still had a crush on Max, not to be completely alleviated until I started dating Ben in the fall;

-- was very into "alternative music" (whatever that was), but Rafe was in the process of "gaying out" my tastes with intense infusions of Dead or Alive and other Stock/Aitken/Waterman, RuPaul, house music, Taylor Dayne, and various iterations of Depeche Mode.]

[5 years ago I...

-- was living with two women on the border between Nob and Russian hills;

-- had just celebrated one year with John, and (after a crisis involving me dating someone else for a couple of weeks) knew, for better or for worse, we weren't going anywhere separately;

-- was, as far as I know, HIV-negative;

-- had just learned how to use this newfangled thing called the Internet, and had started reading Planet SOMA. (Ironic, considering the tirade I'm involved in right now on David's message board...)

-- had just started working in commercial real estate management, sitting in a cube-farm call center, taking leaky roof and too-hot calls from banks in places like Anchorage, Vancouver, Wash., Lodi, and San Ysidro.]

[2 years ago I...

-- had taken the LSAT, and was just a few weeks away from the blood test that would change my life;

-- was about to get out of commercial property management;

-- was into Buffy, Sex and the City, and The West Wing.]

[1 year ago I...

-- had finished the first year of law school;

-- endured a five-day visit with John's sister that ended badly (not her fault)

-- was enjoying John's enjoyment of Sophie Ellis-Bextor and Kylie Minogue's long overdue U.S. comeback;

-- getting ready for a summer full of concerts;

-- was just as bogged down with illness and general Weltschmerz as I am these days.]

[Yesterday I...

-- went to Kaiser pharmacy out on Geary for the second of three days in a row;

-- watched a couple eps of Sex and the City's fourth season on DVD;

-- coughed, but less;

-- worried about my sick boyfriend.]

[Today I...

-- coughed, still less;

-- called someone I've never met a sociopath;

-- listened to the owner of the Cute Victorian Hotel Around the Corner talk about the Hindu clergymen who are coming to the hotel to do stuff to it (feng shui-analog, etc.);

-- went to Kaiser to pick up antibiotics for John;

-- transmitted invoices and entered April's inventory for the Friendly Neighborhood Cabaret;

-- wore an Aloha shirt from Hilo Hattie's.]

[Tomorrow I will...

-- go to the last Greece meeting before the trip;

-- tan?

-- have a wholly good day with John?]

[Five items I have brand loyalty to...

Tony Marino's cilantro-chicken sausages from Trader Joe's;

Glad plastic wrap;

Casa Sanchez tortilla chips and salsa;

Gillette Mach 3 razors;

Knorr bouillon and sauces.]

[Five snacks I enjoy...

Emperor Norton sourdough snacks (currently loving the garlic and olive oil flavor from Sutter Fine Foods);

Cheese (jack, mild Cheddar, Brie);

Cashew nuts;

Gardetto's snack mix (mmm, the brown toasty crouton-y thingies);

Kalamata olives.]

[Five songs I know all the words to, even without the music....

"Birdhouse In Your Soul" They Might Be Giants;

"Love Shack" The B-52's;

"How Soon Is Now" The Smiths;

"The Time Warp";

"The Tide is High" Blondie.]

[Five games I like...

Taboo;

Scattergories;

Pictionary;

Balderdash;

Boggle.]

[Five albums that changed my life...

"Rocky Horror Picture Show" soundtrack;

"The Queen is Dead" The Smiths;

"Substance" New Order;

"Flood" They Might Be Giants;

"Good Humour" Saint Etienne.]

[Five things I can't live without...

A smile from John;

Cheese and crackers;

Pepsi;

Alone time;

Engaging my brain.]

[Five things I would buy with a $1000...

A top-flight weekend away with John;

New clothes;

I really can't think of anything else.]

[My guilty pleasures...

Certain illegal substances which shall remain nameless;

Cheetos (the crunchy kind, not the poofy kind!);

New maps and map books of places I already have old maps of;

Cheesy pop music;

French fries, incinerated please.]

[Top five musicians lately (or who's in the CD player right now?)

Ladytron;

Black Box Recorder;

Hot Hot Heat;

"Don't Mug Yourself" by the Streets;

John and I had a great day listening to old Dead or Alive the other day while cleaning house.]

[Five locations I'd like to run away to...

London;

Santa Barbara;

the Redwoods;

Chicago;

Kona.]

[Five bad habits I have...

Procrastination;

Picking hairs out of my goatee (currently shaved off because it had gotten so patchy!)

Forgetting romance;

Putting too much energy into people who don’t deserve it;

Rereading books over and over again when there are so many good ones out there I've never read.]

[Five things I would never wear...

Tasseled loafers;

Web belts;

Those half-sandal, half-shoe shoes;

Clogs;

Most body piercings.]

[Five TV shows I like...

Six Feet Under

Sex & the City

So Graham Norton

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (so long Buffy *sigh*)

What Not To Wear (UK)]

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