On my way home today I reached into my pocket and found my finger nail clippers. I remembered that I put them there so that I could cut my fingernails on my way to work. John handed me an asian pear today and told me that it had been blessed by the Buddha. For all practical purposes it had, sitting in the show room surrounded by statues in wood and metal and stone of the Buddha and those like him. There was a Chinese New Year party at the space on Saturday. John handed me a red envelope on Monday, my Chinese New Year bonus. There was one dollar inside of the envelope. He also handed delepe an envelope but I don't know how much was in that one. Today as he was handing me a check for three days work I showed him my empty wallet. Do you need some cash he asked me. I think the envelope was supposed to be a joke, the glory of anticipation and the fact that I'm too old for those kind of handouts. Plus I'm his employee, not family. The fruit was placed in the bowl as an offering. It was quite delicious, maybe the best asian pear I had ever had. Lately I had been feeling kind of off, and was thinking that maybe this blessed pear would solve something. I realized that the reason I had been off was that I was fatigued, after a busy weekend and finishing a manuscript for some deadlines, and then back to work and tomorrow I teach. Tonight I am going to take it easy. When I get fatigued I get goofy. This is funny sometimes but it makes me feel a little crazy. I am growing a beard. I wondered if clipping one's nails on the sidewalk was socially acceptable. Setting a pear on the counter at night will increase my chances of eating it the next morning. Come to think of it, I ate a mushy pear this morning. Bosh. Bosch. Whatever they're called.

i had a dream last night where i was watching the simpsons and they were playing basketball the characters from the simpsons like mr burns and lenny and smithers and the police chief and all that and the guest star of the episode was tom sellick if that's how you spell his name and he got hit in the head with a basket ball and fell over and his head was damaged it was bleeding and oozing this green ooze and he was dying obviously and all the characters gathered around him as if this were on tv i was still dreaming that i was watching it though i don't remember watching i just remember the episode and all the characters were standing there on the basketball court standing over him as he was oozing this green fluid and he knew he was dying and was making statements like thank you all for supporting me and more complicated sentiments but as time went on the things he said would get simpler as if the green ooze was his personality and finally he just said stupid things that made no sense and died and i woke up as if that were some kind of nightmare one to watch on television and looked over at amy who was sleeping and thought how could i go back to sleep after that because it was disturbing but i did anyway waking up periodically and reminding myself not to forget and now saturday morning i still remember pacific standard time last night i lost thirty five dollars playing poker

without further ado here is the latest installment of jen and erika's travelling projecto fabuloso moving from blog to blog and now its here enjoy

Don’t you have a map?
A collaborative, traveling essay in letters‘twixt Erika Howsare & Jen Tynes.
Part 12, J to E-

The Student BODY IN CONTRAST

A shine. To you an apple
waiting. A buff brown
collar, around the corner
thing. Will not believe in
G.S. except in slang,
mandatory. A CONTRAST

is like a little bell you break
to remember winter. A bell
you melt down. Tinkling. Slang.
Yellow bus stop
for me, yellow bus stop
stinking. There is no BUTTONS
here, BUT A BLACK BOOT

is to hang-over what art
is to exercise. Monitor it all
weekend. Fill the public air
with persons, site-specific food
aroma and the experience
SHAMS itself. The video
cassette recorder is
JAMMED and full of tape.

RECORDING
It used to be much easier to
speed them up. Not easier
but physical. Not easier but
of childhood. Of childhood
stills? (I made every album
sound / Every album sounded
like The Chipmunks.)

PUT A BOW IN YOUR HAIR
and change the conversation
Red heart of a mouth at the
bus stop doesn't know those
androgynes in plastic dresses,
with flower names. What about
you, in the dusty place one
conversation makes it? What do
we agree on about good and
evil?

E responds to J when and where it's appropriate.
Please visit http://www.horselesspress.com/amap.html for the whole hog.
Email Erika & Jen: editors AT horselesspress DOT com.

presidents day make room for baby i meant to go to work and i did go to work i just didn't make it instead i went to the bus stop and smoked a cigarette looked around with my hands in my pockets listening to smog the kids got heart the kids got heart the kids got heart and looked around and waited the bus didn't come the bus known as seventy two r didn't come the r is for rapid the bus never came so i called in to john and said hey i'm not coming i'm going to go home and do my own work and so i did i walked back around the lake stopping at the mini market asking for printer paper and they had none so i bought a newspaper after standing at the drink coolers and wondering if i wanted any of that and asked the man behind the counter about printer paper and he suggested i go down the street to the ups store and sure enough they had some for the exorbitant price of seven dollars but i bought it anyway lazy of me i guess and came home sat down read the paper and booted up the computer again presidents day saw an article about the big heads carved in virginia the south korean u n head and sports the all star game and product placement and what not jet blue etc but most importantly of all i got an email from jen and her and erikas project that will be posted here in the very near future which is exciting more exciting than presidents day perhaps a day off in the blue sky a windy day in the apartment with its windows closed in california its not so cold anymore and i can see my hands from my perspective amys in santa cruz the apartment feels like its not entirely mine right now the methods of cohabitation and a refrigerator full of food that i didn't buy to eat for lunch a box of something good

The stoplight was green but there were no cars to go. I walked across the intersection.The town is empty because I have my headphones on. Sitting in the cafe window two men with glasses are having breakfast. Intellectuals need their space. The grey cat was scared yesterday. Are typically more reserved. The day was limping along and suddenly it came over me. Bagel and cream cheese. Nate has stopped eating meat. Leeks he said he was buying leeks. Who can blame him? Last night we ate the lamb sausages that Cecil gave us. Who's Cecil? I'm not sure. The sausages were pretty good, full of mediteranian spices, all orange and smelly. The book said lamb is typically better treated than most other meats in this country, due to the fact that the market isn't as big so therefore its more of a niche for small farmers. Is that what they call them? Farmers? To cultivate, pasteurize. This really should of been written in a notebook sitting in the sun, came out today. Herky Jerky. Sentences and Periods. Where's John? Right now I'm having a small fantasy that he is laying dead in the back of the store/office, I mean, what if he is. It's possible. The patio that wraps around our apartment seems like a good platform to break a window on. A shadow passes over the pulled blinds and the motion light comes on. When you have something you worry. What do I have? Something I worry. I really enjoy riding the bus. The last time I did repeatedly was when I lived in Seattle. The Laughing Elephant. Pioneer square. Last night I stayed up late getting ready for class. To do a better job and enjoy oneself.

after some trouble with the stealing connection surfing on the airwaves around the lake and buildings around the lake we finally come to the screen that allows for interface and a waiting and a button pushing a checking of systems and gauges like meters and colors that tell us when to try again like a car's fuel gauge a check the brakes light and the brakes work fine but i better check them and so on and so forth this morning finally making an effort to communicate to you the fact that there is a time in the morning before i go to work and after i get up that is perfect for this kind of thing this running on at the mouth and the day through my small window in this room is half shaded and half light a blue sky with a thin layer of cloud above both and there is little more happening asides from some kind of statement in modern architecture a big blank surface and not a sign of the neighbors or a bird flapping through the frame but this is of no importance we can simply look around the small space i'm in and recount past memories or imagine the future then it was great a picture the scene a fourteen set of pans a small green man with a large heart a winter scene in the orange light of the street lamps that reminds me of swimming at edgewood the entrance to the pool on the back of side of a hill overlooking the lake if it weren't for the trees but in the winter when my hair is wet freezes at its tips fanned out from underneath my hat always asking for a ride home the lake was visible through the lack of leaves and the dotted lights of houses across the lake at least according to the picture i in fact only remember listening to the extremely loud bass of james' car stereo was tired and the orange light reveals itself at the entrance to the back road a street called jefferson named after a president leader of the free world its time to go to work

i haven't wanted to write an email lately the business of moving and starting a new job has rendered my schedule a busy time of year like the holidays where everything is new except for the hours of the day say breakfast starts in the morning and on monday tuesday wednesday i go over the buddha museum where i write the little blurbs and then thursday friday where i teach them writing in various forms so now that leaves saturday and also we have moved in to a gigantic apartment where the space is almost too much to say that things have been busy and the push of different forces have rendered my schedule a work in progress trying to find a way to get everything that needs to be done done say the ocean is a pool of water and on the bottom there are rocks and people have never been to the real bottom but once they have then a postcard and to take holidays there and back earmarked for fun and funny times the push of the teaching makes my buddha musuem time that much more enjoyable due to the fact of sitting alone in an office and writing is much more familiar than standing or sitting in front of a group of writers but standing is certainly more exciting and fear provoking which is nice to say a move towards the center middle road less is more something like that now and again i'll make a push we can talk about it later get back on the horse the bike ride for a while wobble a little pass a test buy a new bike at wal-mart as a reward