i dreamt a met a guy named tristam shandy (sp?) "oh," i said, "like the character from the novel!" he grinned and i realized that everyone must say that, so i apologized. once i knew a girl named anna heim. though german, she'd studied in america and had grown to expect the inevitable response to her name: "oh! like in california!"
but having never read tristam shandy i have no idea what, if anything, sir shandy is like. or what put it in my head to begin with.

running errands for karen in georgetown to-codered-day knocked me out with a headache. she dismissed me early and i've spent the subsequent hours huddled in the dark of my room. before i left, i noticed on a proposal she was sending out that last in a list of "contributions" she had written "ester ____, office work, $800." it had never occurred to calculate the dollar value of my pro bono services. such a nice number, 800. to think that i'd donated that much to a worthy cause! wow. without even realizing it, either.

last nite jamie lana tamar and i gathered at a park midway between our houses. we rehashed dreams, debated vibrators (tamar: "i don't want to have an intimate relationship with something made of plastic" lana: "you can't say things just to be quoted!" me, continually, "click BOOM!") which need a better name, decided "drive" should be rechristened "true love waits," after an authentic abstinence-only education program -- because, really, isn't the song already a cliche? at least among the 12 people who've heard it? -- and bathed in Off, which lana had thoughtfully brought. she offered it around saying, "west nile?" it's august. we're all just getting through it as best we can.