see what i do with too much time on my hands? plotting to clean out my dad's attic and sell all my 80s toys on ebay. he's a packrat and has saved everything. the woman he married is also a packrat, so the house is quite crowded. organized (he's an engineer), but crowded. i was told (only half jokingly) that i'd be charged a storage fee if i left stuff there. :) browsing ebay, i found my annie lunchbox, the old fashioned metal kind. mine is used, not new with tags, but someone is willing to pay almost $100 for it! crazy.

i have said to myself that i need to sell some stuff...now that i am jobless and will have free time again, maybe i should be planning a trip down to my dad's....

according to the 'tips' in my yahoo email today:

Today's tip: Did you know writing in ALL CAPS is considered shouting?

so is all lower case whispering? shhhh.... ;)

i can't believe my tour d'alissa is winding down. i don't want it to end! so many fun/funny/interesting things have happened, i hope to remember it all. bonnaroo was a blast - so much good music, good people, good times. for everything that went wrong last year, everything went 'right' this year. only 3.5 hours of traffic going in. (compared to 17!) had an awesome campsite - still far from the stages (as was everyone else, it seems), but really close to the exit. got really lucky there - was on the very edge, not boxed in by any other cars, huge campsite, cool people camping next to us, an empty campsite on the other side (the people switched sites), not muddy. the parking gods were good to me. :) got outta there in only about 20 minutes, too.

the lack of rain was amazing, really - looked threatening most of the weekend, but never really rained. there was still mud everywhere, which made me wonder just what would happen if it really did rain! the soil had this weird 'bubbliness' - there was water pooling underneath the soil, i think, but the topsoil was dry. when you were walking on it the ground would act spongy, as if you were spacewalking. with the amount of drugs consumed that weekend, i'm sure this was pure entertainment to many there. :) only problem was once one *did* explode, it became yet another mud puddle. ick.

did experience one rainshower - at a very cool time. nickel creek was onstage, prefaced a song with a comment about the stormy clouds and a song about a storm. the song they performed was about a lighthouse and its keeper:

I am a lighthouse, worn by the weather and the waves.
I keep my lamp lit, to warn the sailors on their way.

I'll tell a story, paint you a picture from my past.
I was so happy, but joy in this life seldom lasts.

I had a keeper, he helped me warn the ships at sea.
We had grown closer, 'till his joy meant everything to me.

And he was to marry, a girl who shone with beauty and light.
And they loved each other, and with me watched the sunsets into night.

And the waves crashing around me, the sand slips out to sea.
And the winds that blow remind me, of what has been, and what can never be.

She'd had to leave us, my keeper he prayed for a safe return.
But when the night came, the weather to a raging storm had turned.

He watched her ship fight, but in vain against the wild and terrible wind.
In me so helpless, as dashed against the rock she met her end.

Then on the next day, my keeper found her washed up on the shore.
He kissed her cold face, that they'd be together soon he'd swore.

I saw him crying, watched as he buried her in the sand.
And then he climbed my tower, and off of the edge of me he ran.

I am a lighthouse, worn by the weather and the waves.
And though I am empty, I still warn the sailors on their way.

soon after the song started it began to drizzle. as the song continued, it started to rain harder. it became a beautiful long, drawn out jam as it begain to rain harder with the crowd cheering. just as the song ended, the rain ceased and didn't return. it was a really cool experience...with the timing so right. very cool. just 'cause i like 'em, here are lyrics to a nickel creek song i love, even though it makes me cry. i was almost glad they didn't play it at bonnaroo - i didn't want to lose it...(hmm, my memeory is terrible, i may have posted these here before..)

Where am I today? I wish that I knew
'Cause looking around there's no sign of you
I don't remember one jump or one leap
Just quiet steps away from your lead

I'm holding my heart out but clutching it too
Feeling this short of a love that we once knew
I'm calling this home when it's not even close
Playing the role with nerves left exposed

Standing on a darkened stage, stumbling through the lines
Others have excuses, but I have my reasons why

We get distracted by dreams of our own
But nobody's happy while feeling alone
And knowing how hard it hurts when we fall
We lean another ladder against the wrong wall

And climb high to the highest rung, to shake fists at the sky
While others have excuses, I have my reasons why

With so much deception it's hard not to wander away
It's hard not to wander away
It's hard not to wander away

wow, has it been awhile. been on the road and computer-less. caught the dmb shows at darien lake and blossom. the blossom show was as close as i've ever gotten to my 'dream' setlist. more about bonnaroo soon...i have a lot of computer-y stuff to catch up on. suffering from the realization that my return to 'reality' is immenient, and i am not looking forward to it. having too much fun, i guess.

Saturday Jun 21 2003
Blossom Music Center

Don’t Drink the Water
Satellite
Granny
One Sweet World
Crush
Last Stop
When The World Ends
If I Had It All
Cry Freedom
So Much To Say
So Right
Dreaming Tree
Grace Is Gone
Don’t Burn The Pig
Stay

__________________

The Maker
Two Step

wow. say goodbye would've made it perfect! oh well...guess i just have to keep going to more shows! :P

go confidently in the direction of your dreams and life the life you’ve imagined. - thoreau

5 states. 2 countries. many many hours on airplanes. it's been great, if tiring.

after some time in southern california, flew to durham, NC. then drove back to my house/work in reidsville, 2 hours away, packed everything into my car. it was a weird feeling of 'how did i get so much STUFF here??' combined with 'how nice is it to be living out of what fits in my car (and i can still see out the rearview mirror)!'. had very little sleep before i left so cal (flight at 8am, up at 5am to catch it. traffic at 5:30am. yup, definitely southern california), lost three hours, 2 hours driving, another hour at tar-jay in search of a stove, cooler, and plastic storage bin.

first the bin i wanted didn't have lids that fit...me and another woman (also iso the elusive lid for the 32 gallon bin) finally tracked down a red-shirted target employee. (only after trying to get the attention of two other target shoppers who wore red that day and were mistaken by us as being employees), who also could not figure out how there were 10 or so bins and no lids. there were 30 or so lids for the smaller bins - and only about 20 bins. either there's a bunch of people who went home with a lid that was too big (why oh why wouldn't you look to see if it fit before you left the store?), or there are lid gnomes running around laughing at the two perplexed women in the storage department. for some reason, two small bins didn't seem like enough, and the 48 gallon one just seemed *too* big. fortunately, 20 minutes later, 4 lids were discovered. on to picking out a cooler. didn't realize there were so many to choose from - not just small medium and large, but with wheels, without wheels, ones with those funky lids that don't 'remove' and are awkward, ones that plug into your cigaretter lighter (when will they stop calling them cigarette lighters? cell phone chargers is more appropriate these days)...after way too much debate with myself, ended up with a turquoise 'picnic basket' model. finally, a stove. saw the sign for the generic coleman two burner. grabbed two bottles of propane, and with it nearing 9pm and a lot of packing yet to do, headed to the cash register. amazing how much time you can waste when you really should be packing, not purchasing. he rings me up.

$130.

what? oh, oops. the stove above the $40 coleman sign was the $80 model. i thought picking up the stove took way too little time. trudged back to the stove dept. and picked up the cheaper model. (above the sign for the $60 stove. go figure)...finally, at almost 10pm rolled into my house in reidsville, which was now filled with the college age counselors for summer camp. i felt old. and really happy i wouldn't be there this summer, sharing both the phone and the internet with 20 people, not just 8.

spent an hour arragning and rearranging stuff...bonnaroo pile, canada pile, california pile, do-SOMETHING-with-it pile. then prayed it would all fit in my car. it did. :) after a couple of fitful hours of sleep (the sounds of mice running through the walls was a little unnerving. never noticed it in my room, but heard it in the room i ended up sleeping in), hit the road to nashville at 5:30am, with a stop at the greensboro starbucks. :)

8 hours later....rolled into nashville, had lunch with liz, who was so very kind to store my stuff while i roamed around the northeast and went to bonnaroo. nashville airport. flew to baltimore. changed planes. flew to buffalo. (airport number 5 in 3 days!) drove to the toronto area. which is where i've been since last wednesday night. thursday morning it's back to nashville and bonnaroo.

whew. it's a strange feeling...not really feeling like i have a home. i was sent an 'invitation' (e-invite) for a party and whitewater rafting at 'dan's house' in sacramento. apparently, it's not my house anymore. not that i was planning on staying there past the summer, but it is odd to think of it as not being my house already. the best (and worst, i suppose) part about it is that i'm not bothered by the fact that i don't have a 'home'. i feel like i *should* be worried about this fact, but it is also a overwhelming 'free' feeling. i don't want to go home and face all my 'other' stuff. i've survived without it for this long - how important can it all be??

on something completely unrelated, i really miss climbing. :(