it's 3am

and i can't sleep, so here i am, starting the blog process.
i certainly have work work and dissertation work to do, but strangely, my brain does not feel like doing that
nor, apparently, does it feel like sleeping
the real fucked up thing? i just went to sleep less than four hours ago.
i smell a nap for my friday afternoon

so there was much talk of the importance of archiving at IDKE 8-Austin this past weekend, so I want to be able to cross post from my blog to many of the newly created blogs and live journals and what not. so to do that, i have to split up my weekend into reports on my idke friends and my non idke friends (even though throughout the weekend the two intertwined), to save time and writing energy, i am going to create this weird separation. so let me begin with my escapades with my friends in austin that were not affiliated with IDKE 8.

so jes and i left at the ass crack of dawn (4:45 am) last thursday morning to head to the airport for our flight to austin. we were both attending IDKE 8 and jes was also attending the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) conference, b/c really one event a weekend is really not enough. NLG is an organization of politically progressive lawyers, law students and legal workers. basically the kids who want to fuck shit up in one way or another. i digress. airport, early, flight to austin. overall, the flight to dallas and then from dallas to austin was pretty uneventful. on the way there they showed a movie... what was it, oh yes, the lake house with hottie mchotties sandra bullock and keanu reeves. not a real winner- i was able to doze off for about twenty minutes in the middle of it and still got the gist of the storyline in the end. i did like that it was set in chicago. more movies, in my humble opinion, should be set in chi-town. its a very lovely city, if i do say so myself.

moving on. so the plan was when we got to austin, we would meet up with kim (who flew there from atlanta) and get a rental car. this all went smoothly EXCEPT that delta lost kim's small toiletry bag that she checked so she would not lose her $25 bumble and bumble hair product (AGAIN!) once the very nice dude behind the luggage counter got done taking the info of where we were staying (and frankly, hitting on her- he was old enough to be our dad-nice!) we were on our way to the rental car, a nice, four door white chevy.

from the airport we headed to lee and rebecca's house. l & r are friends of kim's from new orleans. they lost just about everything in their apartment in hurricance katrina (though their cats were saved, thank god) and they have just settled in austin after a quick unhappy jaunt to houston. they now rent this lovely house in austin with their two cats lu and paeda (or something like that). rebecca took us to lunch at this delicious mexican restaurant called chuy's (jes and i kept roaring like chewbacca when they would say the name) where i had a divine margarita and some guacamole tacos. they were BRIMMING with guacamole. loved it! all i remember after that was taking a nap in their gorgeous guest bedroom and then eating some delish homemade chili before we made our way to the meet and greet at some place called the cattle company (or something like that). all i know is it had a big ole dance floor and queers were two steppin.' here is a picture of jes, rebecca, lee, kim and r&l's friend aimee. how cute are these kids?



now the weird thing is that a few weeks ago, jes and i had dinner at kate's joint in new york with our friend darrelle and her sweetie (whose name escapes me this late/early). they told us they were going to be in austin for a day or two while we were there, so we made plans to meet up at the meet and greet. here is a pic of jes, darrelle, her sweetie and their cute gay boy friend whose name i can't remember either:



luckily, lee had work on friday morning (she's a physical therapist-sexy), so we went home at a fairly reasonable hour. i am pretty sure i crashed immediately, but i think jes may have stayed up and played video games? or maybe that didn't happen until friday night? who knows. friday day jes and i spent conferencing while lee worked (yuck) and kim and rebecca played and ran around town. we all met back at the house and i am guessing we had dinner but i can't now remember what it was. maybe jes or kim will remember and post about it. friday night was dragdom at this outdoor bar called emo's. the show, for the most part, was entertaining with a little whack racist shit thrown in. it went real long so we left before it was over, in large part b/c there was too much of this:



just kidding. it was more b/c it was late and we were all pretty tired. now kim was a little bit worried she couldn't get a ride home, so she first tried to get in some guy's trunk:



but she had to move to make room for his amp and speakers. so then she tried this random bike:



it took a lot of convincing to keep her off somebody's crotch rocket (very fast motorcycle). luckily, she agreed rebecca's suv was the best way to go.

much like friday, saturday was filled with more conferencing for jes and i while kim, rebecca and lee slept in and then relaxed. i had a IDKE board meeting that went from 8am-11am, so by 3 in the afternoon, i was pretty wrecked. we headed back to the house, had a bloody mary and took a quick disco nap while the other three ladies went over to a friends house for a quick drop in on a party. now let me tell you about this bloody mary for a minute. first of all, it was in lee's gramma's official bloody mary glasses- one of the few things that survived katrina. second of all, it was delicious and spicy and you could not taste the vodka, and third of all-and honestly, to be this was the best part- it had PICKLED GREEN BEANS IN IT YALL. i mean i have never had one of those before. but you take them, and let them soak in some spicy tomato bloody mary mix and you have what i like to call HEAVEN. i liked them so much that after i ate the two complimentary beans, lee replaced them with... TWO MORE. just. plain. good.

that night we had dinner at this adorable joint called mother's cafe. jes got a big ole baked potato and i got this avocado sammie (sense the trend here folks-they know how to do avocado in austin) and we shared. wait a second. maybe we went to mothers on friday night? its blurry to me now. but the take home point- good food. moving on. saturday night was the showcase. now just rebecca went with us at first b/c lee had tickets to some concert. shawn colvin i think, but i feel like she only stayed for the opener, whose name i am forgetting. jesus christo yall, i really REALLY need to stop drinking diet coke. this is what it is doing to me. anywho, here is a picture of cutie mc cuties, jes, rebecca and kim at the showcase:



now the showcase was in this lovely space called the palmer arts center. it is brand new and very spacious and at the beginning- very cold. i brought my video camera to tape and of course my batteries ran out shortly after the beginning of the second half. there were no plugs in the room (except the ones the sound people brought with them) so i was freed up to just watch the show and not worry about if i was getting a good enough shot of it. the showcase also went pretty long so by the time it was over the kids were ready to head home. lee joined us at the showcase, which was a nice surprise. we headed home and i headed to bed, but jes stayed up and whupped rebecca's ass in either tetris or mario brothers. they were talking trash back and forth all weekend:



on sunday morning we slept in (until about 9 or 9:30) and then hung out, had some HOMEMADE blueberry muffins, and then jes and i headed to the brunch and kim stayed back to chill with lee and rebecca, and their cute cats lu and p. here is a picture of lu, the wonder cat:



overall, it was an outstanding (and exhausting) weekend. for me, it was a nice balance of IDKE stuff and then just chilling with lee and rebecca at their lovely house. they were hella great hosts-giving us "keep austin weird" coozies (how do you spell that) and letting us stay in their divinely comfie guest bed. rebecca, who is a singer and musician (sexy), even played us a tune or two. she has the voice of an angel. when her cd is finished? comes out? i will post a picture of it here. i am so glad we got to know them and i LOVE seeing kim with her New Orleans friends. she is even more adorable than usual (if you can imagine that).

ok its almost 4am and my battery is about to die. wish me luck on falling back to sleep.