i am sodden.

it has rained All DAy in Boston. my shoes were not made for this. also i have, worryingly, become a hardcore cafe crawler - it's getting expensive (but at the same time, what is one to do when it's raining and you're tired and in an unfamiliar place?). also i feel a little down. probably because i have still not had a good night's sleep (it's been nearly a week. hostels are not good if you want an early night!). sorry for all of the brackets. i'm a bit brac

also i saw a book in a bookshop today - yes, i live in bookshops (i bought some books too, o god. oh brackets.) - that was called 'what would Audrey do?'. I wondered if Audrey would have bought the book. almost certainly not.

also MIT students are not so well dressed. i am looking forward to some sartorial relief in NY.

i hope it's sunny tomorrow because i've realised that being miles from home alone in the rain with wet feet is not so fun. bookshops or no bookshops. though it was a nice bookshop.

music: my playlist for this holiday, so far, has been largely sufjan stevens (particularly in chicago, because i'm original like that. favourite song: 'a good man is hard to find' - poignant considering i have not yet found my american husband [still got three weeks though, and i'm only half joking.] also 'to be alone with you'.) and some other stuff - beirut, arcade fire ('cold wind' came on whilst i was wrestling my umbrella over harvard bridge today, i think my ipod was sympathising with me), regina spektor ('samson' is So beautiful. maisie agreed) vashti bunyan 'coldest night of the year'. 'no fit state', hot chip. running theme?



--> --> my plan over the next couple of days is to befriend some hippies and smoke lots of dope with them. i'll let you know how that goes.

hi! so i escaped from the hostel of doom; contrary to my fears i was not stabbed to death in the night by the scary convict-looking men that populated the (grimy) kitchen. i am now in boston after a bit of a mammoth journey, I had to wait in the airport for ages firstly because i left the hostel really early in the morning because it was so gross (flight scheduled for 11.50am, left the hostel at 7.30) and secondly because the flight was then delayed by about an hour. in the wait i had my first cream cheese bagel for breakfast because i was ravenous, having eaten only cashew nuts and yogurt for dinner the night before (was worried that i was spending too much on eating out). like all food i have eaten here, it was good. the bagel had sunflower seeds and honey in it. i had a brief chat with an old black lady in a wheelchair who wheeled over to me and then, when i answered a few of her questions, told me i had a strong boston accent. i was then on the flight, and was kept mildly amused by the american the office, which i think is in no way on a par with the british one. i think gervais' genius doesn't really translate here. then i got to boston, they have an accent here which means that they pronounce 'sure' as 'shoe-er'. a bit like frenchie from grease. was she from boston? the hostel's nice, there are no convict-looking men here as of yet, and no ants crawling by my bed (yes, there were ants. and mosquitoes in the bathroom. and i was half expecting to see a mouse or two in the shower). it's not as nice as the one in central chicago but i feel that that place was unusually good. i had pad thai for dinner from a place a couple of doors down and i'm going to try to sleep properly tonight, because i have not slept well for a good four days or so, particularly not in that last place in which i actually, irrationally, feared for my life (and the two korean girls in my dorm were on their computers until 3 in the morning every night which didn't help with attempted sleep.) oh. anyway i'll stop complaining. i did have a nice last evening in chicago; early on i ran into a fellow hosteller at an open-air chinese music show and we had a little chat about how bad the hostel is, and he asked if i knew much about chile which is where he is from, and i said not really and he complained that most people think that chileans speak portuguese but really they speak spanish. he also told me that gay men always followed him around which he didn't like because he was straight (though i had my suspicions; he was immensely camp). then i saw the sunset with a glass of wine from the top of the hancock tower. the toilet had a better view, ironically, than the bar./ got to go. speak soon.

hi hi hi. i'm feeling a little/very strange. had to leave the Loop and move to a hostel that is quite a way from the centre, in a residential area. i arrived and it was like walking into someone's living room (there is a muslim family running this place, and several of them were sitting around the table), and it's dark, and there's gangs of men outside. the first room they put me in had an open window that was like a metre from street level and had no air conditioning. i asked them to move me so now i'm in a marginally safer-feeling room that's a floor higher up. still. it feels weird not being in the centre any more, i really liked the other hostel, i guess i just took its feeling of safety and cleanliness for granted. and the communal space where you could just sit with other people. and the fact that it was safe to walk down the street outside. lesson learned: do more research (annoyingly i think i should have gone for the one in greektown!). anyway when i first got there i sat on my bed panicking and boiling hot after having closed the window and i just had to call my mum even though i know it's 2 in the morning there. and i know it's selfish but i was on the verge of tears. and she told me to go woth my gut instinct and if i didn't feel safe, to book a hotel - i was tempted but didn't want to be precious about it so i got them to move me upstairs and i'm determined to stick now. i'm here two nights and plan to get out really early tomorrow and spend the whole day exploring chicago and come back late in the evening (after going up the hancock tower to see the sun set over chicago one last time, is my plan). i think i just got a bit worked up and emotional because i suddenly feel a little lonely and tired. i'm going to read for an hour (i'm on to catch 22) and then go to bed (oh and the beds are laid out in a hospital-like arrangement really close to each other, no bunks! intimate.) well anyway, i'm sure this experience is good for me. good night.

i'm running out of money. really fast. if anyone wants to send me some i will be happythanks. i have been kicked out of my hostel because they have no spaces left for tonight, boo, so i'm considering moving either to one in the rather unappealing-sounding 'greektown' or, alternatively, to one that is many many miles away from the centre in a remote corner of town. to me that sounds no fun. BUT! i have booked flights and accommodation to Boston, hooray! stopping over for 5 nights then i will head off to my Final Destination (hopefully not like the film, though I have not seen it) which is the big apple/the big airport/new york to schelebrate my 21st in style/utter poverty. i am once again in the chicago public library computer terminal, it smells of various bodily fluids. yuck. no porn as of yet though. speaking of porn, i saw Bruno last night. how i felt for the teenagers who had gone with their parents. i did find the end (with Snoop Dogg) strangely poignant though. so i didn't Love the film, i thought it lacked structure entirely and was in most places totally gratuitous. but at points it did make me (and the very loud lady sitting to my right in the packed cinema) laugh more hysterically than i have in a while.
today i am extremely tired owing to having got up very early to see if any reservations had been cancelled at the hostel. i got up at 7. i'm tired and feel a bit delirious, and weirdly hungover, though i have not had a drink since wednesday.
yesterday i went to a place called earwax cafe on milwaukee avenue and had very good falafel and a chat with the waiter about haruki murakami (i have almost finished the wind-up bird chronicle, hooray). then i went shopping oh no and bought things oh no. the problem with vintage clothing is that you can't do the guilty return the day after (the Topshop Turn) when you realise you don't actually like/can't afford the things you've bought. no more shopping. from now on i'm staying indoors. in greektown.
i have done lots of drawings this holiday. i feel my energies beginning to channel into a deeper place. dude.
now i depart to wash my hands so i don't catch a nasty publiclibrary-pornsurfing-keyboard-borne disease. you could say, a terminal illness.

all things go

i'm in chicago public libary, in a terminal of a few hundred computers all in ardent use by a few hundred fellow unemployed/destitute. on my way to this terminal i came across someone watching some pretty graphic porn and making no attempt at all to shield the screen. interessant. the library is great, the ceiling of the entrance hall is covered in shrigley-esque paintings that crawl over its vaults like colourful little insects. today i'm a little hungover because last night i went with a few fellow hostellers to a jazz club called the whistler. like many places that i have come across in the states, from the outside it looked like nothing (it looked, in fact, like a funeral parlour) but inside it was a really nice intimate space, with a long mirrored bar and a small stage surrounded by curtains. when we got there we had, sadly, just missed a set by a guy who used to play guitar for wilco and iron & wine (i forget his name) but later in the evening a young jazz band played. they were quite good. i got a little drunk on vodka (the measures are Huge here, and pretty cheap [last night a single was $4]). i have met so many people in this hostel. from australia, korea, france, germany, mexico, holland and, of course, north america. actually i have met surprisingly few americans. and yesterday i met my first brits.
to move achronologically (is that a word?), i spent the first half of the day with a lovely dutch girl from my dorm. we went to the modern art museum, which was a bit of a walk, but we stopped on the way for fuel (i had a "MEGA PROTEIN MEAL!!!!!!" or something similarly named in Starbucks, it involved an egg) so it was fine. i was absolutely blown away by the olafur eliasson exhibition. i have seen his work before but never on such a huge scale; now i think he's a bit of a genius. his stuff included a kaleidoscopic tunnel in which you can see yourself reflected and fragmented in hundreds of colours. a circle of light into which you can step that changes its hue so gently you can hardly perceive it. red to magenta to purple to blue to a stark white light. my favourite installation, though, requires stepping, from the lightfield that precedes it, into a room so overwhelmingly dark that you can't see a hand in front of your face. the dark hisses, and as you continue walking tentatively you meet what looks like a slow-moving waterfall, swirling droplets of water vapour momentarily suspended and captured by the white light of bulbs bolted into the walls overhead. this living sheet of motes and droplets, that escape from a pipe overhead, is absorbed by the floor, which is a dark, soft sponge. i stayed in that room for a while with my back pressed against the wall. it was like a little sanctuary.
after the gallery sophie (who is an artist, and who spent a lot of time talking with me about her art) and i parted, because she wanted to go to another gallery whilst i wanted to go to the beach, just to see it, and i wanted to do some drawing. i made it to the beach but didn't really like it, i was disappointed to find that it was just an ordinary beach with girls in bikinis playing volleyball and screaming kids (i don't know what i really expected!). i stayed for a while, though, and then, after consulting my guidebook, decided that i wanted to see Ukrainian Village. i decided to walk. mistake, it took me about an hour and a half with the sun in my face the entire time. the walk wasn't too pretty either, i had to cross a motorway (!), and it was very dusty. i wish i could read maps. upon reaching the outskirts of the 'Village' it was already about five and i thought i was going to die of exhaustion. i wanted food but came across a vintage shop and i just had to go in. i bought some beautiful brown suede mary-janes. the lady in the shop was nice, she said she worked at a music venue nearby. and she asked me if i was in a band, because i looked like someone from a british band she had seen. haha. it did remind me, though, of meera and my discussion about forming a band with a singer and a sitar. we should definitely do that. after my shoe fest (which replenished my energy a little) i went to sit in a cafe for a drink and did some reading. then i walked to damen station and crashed out on the train, which took me home.

one thing i like about the states is the pink marzipan-scented soap you get in the restrooms. i don't like tax, and having to tip (too confusing). and the way that nobody can understand what i am saying, ever. but i complained about that already.

in chicago if you look down you will often see a little colourful chalk drawing etched onto a paving slab by your feet. i wonder who does these.

also, disaster! i have nowhere to sleep tomorrow night and fear i may have to sleep on the subway or, at the other end, in a ridiculously overpriced hotel. everywhere's fully booked because of the Pitchfork music festival; I wish i was going!

until next time; until my next free hour in the library.

lake michigan

so i didn't make it to borders, but found a barnes and noble. i bought a time out guide to chicago and perused it over a strange tub of food that comprised vegan macaroni cheese, 'cooked greens' and 'bbq tofu'. it was quite nice but, needless to say, massive so i had to leave half. after my trip i had to run some errands, harder when you don't know where anything is/can't remember people's directions a few seconds after they told them to you/can't understand the grid system/can't read a map. i eventually found a post office (possibly the largest one i have ever seen) and queued for about 10 impatient flo minutes to get some stamps for my postcards. i bought the wrong stamps then had to queue up again. then i was sent to the 'manager' to exchange the stamps, a shouty lady who was mean. she made me wait behind this guy who was also a little shouty (waiting for a package to be delivered for 'six WEEKS!' he told me) and eventually, upon reaching the front, she told me to join another queue. luckily the lady who had served me the first time took pity on me with my puppy eyes and fifteen-year-old-looking face and let me go to the front. after this debacle i needed some cake, so went to a bakery but freaked out at how big the cakes were and bought a tub of granola and yogurt instead. tub in hand i walked to lake michigan. it's so big. you can't see the other side. it looks like the sea but with something slightly different about it that you can't quite place. it's a bit like that fake sea in the truman show. ok i have 2 minutes left. this evening i saw sunset boulevard on an outdoor screen in grant park. met some fellow travellers, watched the sun set orange over scattering clouds, and the lights from the buildings started shining all of a sudden. one building was lit up in the shape of a face with two square eyes and a straight line smile. i really like chicago, shouty stamp ladies or no shouty stamp ladies.

HIBLOG!!!!!!!!!!!!! sorry sorry sorry for not keeping you updated. you see, i has been busy. i am currently sitting in the swanky computer room of a rather nice hostel in Chicago, eating these things called 'animal crackers' that i got out of the vending machine. they are little biscuits that taste a bit of orange. i have a camel with one hump in my mouth as i write. i arrived in Chicago O'Hare airport at about quarter to 4, then made my way here by train, which took a while, but which was an incredible ride. the tracks are on suspended platforms above the sidewalk which make you feel as though you are flying through the buildings. like superman. it reminds me a bit, i suppose, of the underground in Paris around Montmartre that hovers over the streets, allowing people and animals to be viewed in birds-eye...oh i can't stop eating these crackers. one bad thing about america is that everything tastes so damn good, and it's all massive. so you either have to buy something, say a sandwich that is the size of a 2-year-old child, and eat it all, thus getting fat, or buy it and eat half of it, wasting the other half and killing the world or, alternatively, get scared and not buy it in the first place, which is what i have been doing, hence my strange snack because i am now starving. i can totally see why there is such an issue with obesity here. so. i'll fill you in on what i have been doing. left san francisco some days ago (no need to be exact [i've lost track of time]. we drove the big sur down to a place before monterey, i forget what it was called, but it was a lighthouse hostel called 'pigeon point'. from my bed next to the window i could see the sea swell and break on the shore. i slept better than i have in a long time, that night. the next day we went to monterey, then santa cruz; san luis obispo with its pink cinema; santa barbara. i hope i have these in the right order. san luis was gorgeous, as was santa b. the beach was endless, and on it was a little inlet that was covered in herons. there were also lots of orange men jogging. - we stayed in a motel called the presidio that had customised sticker-art on the walls. our room was a gothic castle. me and maisie regressed and festooned ourselves with temporary tattoos that i had bought in san fran. i had an owl above my right ankle, maisie had a little fish on her leg. it made me want a proper tattoo. maybe i'll get one - i thought a feather or a bird. but then i might not ever get a job. i must say that big sur is one of the most beautiful sights i have ever seen. watching the coast unwind along the shore. you turn back and can see how far you've come. cheesy i know, but i can see how for some it is a spiritual experience. they have these spots marked 'vista point' all along the road on which you can pull over and, believe it or not, get a vista. but what a sight. endless sea and undulating land. dusty ranch or forest on one side of the road, ocean on the other. the smooth road guiding you gently through, no trucks in sight. at one vista point we got out of the car to stretch our legs and found ourselves a few metres from a huge herd of elephant seals. i felt the same kind of wonder i used to feel as a child watching nature programmes with my dad.

i have five more minutes left of internet time (expensive internet time). a few things:
- i did not like L.A. in my opinion it has no heart, as far as i tried to probe. and if it does, you can only reach it by car (and americans drive fucking MASSIVE cars with huge wheels, even to go and buy a newspaper). and it was ridiculously hot. my owl tattoo melted.
and the girls wear no clothes. my skin disagreed with L.A. also.
- they have a place called the natural cafe in california, the food is incredibly good.
- NO-ONE in America can understand my accent.
- i am so tired i feel like i am on a boat; the liquid in my head is swilling around.
- the flight from L.A. to Vegas was incredible. from my windowseat i had an unobstructed view to the horizon and the rock formations pushing their way out of the plains. blue mountains, mountains, and then flat desert land with not a building or tree on it. roads like scratches across the dust. i felt, looking down on such endlessly varying land, how insignificant we all are but also how nice it is that we are each granted a little time to explore this strange place.

in This strange place my next stop, in the morning, will be Borders, for books, muffins and a bit of a rest. yum.