i've been running full force, and finally my body has caught up to me.

on possibly one of the most beautiful (sunny, breezy, warm) and eventful (boston underground film festival, my roommate making butter-sugar crepes from scratch, many plans for social m-eatups, and burning star core et al at p.a.'s lounge) weekends, i'm house-bound (bed-bound? couch-bound?) with wicked chills, a wracking cough, zero appetite, and a throat sorer than the sox-yankees rivalry.

inadequate sleep, frequent nights out, incessant stress (both physical and emotional), and altogether busy-boddying has reduced me to this sniffling, swaddled heap o' mess that's wearily typing right now.

it hit me like a truck on friday afternoon, when i explicably began mumbling and zoning out during a brainstorm meeting at work, and then later on (at the warmly irreverent grub gone silly reading at boston's grub street writing center) i just knew i'd crash and burn immediately. my lungs raw. my lymph nodes swollen. i turned down a movie-in with two wonderful friends. it became (and evolved into great variation) a complete surrender to this virus.


see? it was indeed silly.

yesterday i was quite useless. somehow i survived a sweaty, dizzy 5 minute walk to fetch emergency supplies at walgreens (it's a vague memory). a medley of tea (thanks alexis!), throat lozenges (thanks ricola!), and homemade veggie soup (thanks carey!) somehow carried me through. lots of reading material and a late-night heartfelt chat miraculously brought me into a slumberous dreamland, shivering even in three layers of clothing and two down comforters.

therefore, it comes with some relief that i can still sort of work, since my fingers are not (surprisingly!) afflicted with some horrible symptom. but yeah, i can only take house-calls now. i invite you to come by see me croak, and in exchange for a potential contagion i will love you forever and ever.

pretty fair deal, no?

ok, so enough with the painful self-indulgence. on a lighter note, here are some photographs of food, which always manage to perk me up. it's also a brief synopsis of the past week.



tuesday, i was running around all over tarnation doing sourcing, research, and interview for some upcoming dig pieces. during one delicious break in the day, i tucked into a vietnamese lunch at pho pasteur at the harvard square garage. i had way too many convenient meals here back in the day, but it's still reliably tasty. because they take credit cards for minimum $10 orders, i splurged on (admittedly gummy/sticky) fresh summer rolls (the yummy peanut sauce gets a megaboost from extra dollops of chili sauce) and a small bowl of (#15?) beef pho. naturally, there was much subsequent nose-blowing.

wednesday evening post-work was night 1 of 2 of 80108's representation at shecky's girls night out.



some semblance of what 2000 women smashed in the cyclorama look like. (pix by joe baz)

luckily, meals were expensed to offset the pain of 10 extra hours. on wednesday after we packed up, joe (our marketing guru) and i went to pops restaurant, literally right across the street from the bca in south end.


his decontructed salad with big leafy romaine, a strip of bacon, and a mean slab of cheese.


my lovely rhode island clam stuffies! tasty and savoury, if not a tad salty from the bits of chorizo. extra points for cute presentation. although the bread wasnt earth-shattering, i especially enjoyed the butter housed in a mini-porcelain dome.


great minds think alike, i suppose. we both got the crispy-skin salmon, which is the most decadent thing to come out the sea (short of toro). the sesame rice was perfectly seasoned, and the slices of (caramelized?) miso-soaked turnip were astoundingly good. the salmon skin was so crispy (like bacon) that one had to use a knife to get through it, but the fish itself was well-prepared. along with a glass of sparkly pinot noir, i was impressed that i was stuffed after all was said and done.

the service was pretty good (our waiter was especially attentive at making sure everything was okay) and although we felt sort of guilty being one of the last ones out (the kitchen closes at 10:30pm) they didn't seem to (outwardly) mind at all. dinner for two came to around $70; with tax and tip, total was $87. on my own, i could imagine coming in for a drink and/or a hearty appetizer, but despite that it's on the more 'affordable' end of south end eats, it's still definitely indulgent.

okay, thursday: lather, rinse, repeat!



shecky's gone wild: two random interested people, me, and ryan rose weaver (rogue boston freelancer and 80108's invincible editor). at this point i think i did feel a little fatigue setting in, but there wasn't much i could do except keep going.

afterwards, four of us youngin's collapsed at nearby franklin cafe, a cozy, comfy south end hangout. not dirt cheap either, but probably one of least pretentious places out there, and great for late-night bites with friends. highly recommended.


i tried taking a photo just as an experiment, but yeah, this place is dark. here is my lamb shank, visible through a mega night-goggle high-contrast tweaking. the brandy-soaked apricots are insanely potent, kind of like the soaked plum at the bottom of a bottle of umeshu. the dish on the whole is super tasty and filling, but you need to watch out for large swaths of fatty lamb skin. don't worry, it makes it all the more delicious.


so i did the embarrassing and did some flash-work at the table. forgive me. but here you can see the feast laid out in all its glory: if anything, the bread/hummus starter is unbelievable. we shared a seared shrimp appetizer between us, and if you can dare to believe me, those brussel sprouts were mean tasty. buttery, crispy nuggets of vitamin-packed greens.

so after all this, i think my immune system packed up and said farewell.

i hope we will reunite sometime soon.

tonight, i feel like a cat that has lost her way home.

things have unfurled within the last few days, as if i were standing still amid a uncontrollable disintegration. i'm more active than ever, in all respects: vigorous productivity, hustled distraction, social cultivation, domestic recourse. but it all seems cinematic in a way; is this an overcomplicated drama? who is in control of this script? why are all these characters coming in and out, being constructed in these ways?

my sensibilities are wracked with flickers of violent tension and an equable calm. at one given moment things are crystal clear, at another it all seems to shatter in a thousand deadly pieces.

i make it through the days via the satisfaction of small things. walking over industrial bridges, flipping through the glossy pages of new york magazine, relishing the juicy bite of one fresh orange.

in despite of these pleasures, it's as if my insides were coated with shiny black.

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in other news, 80108 is rarin' live. hyperlocalized and authentic insider info txt msg'd to you, all authored by impassioned city expert/enthusiasts like myself. i encourage you to check it out! we're servicing a ton of cities all across the country. boston's the homebase, but we have awesome writers all over, including new york, san francisco, l.a., philadelphia, washington d.c., denver, atlanta, etc.

if you're in boston, i'll be at the shecky's girl's night out tonight and tomorrow night hyping up my Boston:Style channel for 80108. clothes + cocktails + cyclorama, that kind of thing. the event is sold out (that is, to the public), but i DO have an extra pair of comp tickets for either day. email or comment if you want to claim them! :)

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my radio show, sans serif, is now on monday nights 7-8pm EST. groove your little glitchy, jazzalicious goodness with me, either through real-time streaming on wmbr 88.1fm or with truly podcastable archives listed all in a row here. liu's loves lately are my brightest diamond's remix album, tear it down and clara hill's house collaboration, all i can provide. i just want to wrap myself within these sonic layers and pillow-collapse, dizzy with warm somatic rhythm.

not like i'm counting down or anything (she doesn't tickle me in the right places like victor & rolf manage to do), but madonna's collection at h&m debuts this thursday, march 22.

everything is in variants of black and white, and i'm a tad underwhelmed by the classicism of the silhouettes. i'm warm to the abstract floral print dress, and who doesnt love a well-made leather jacket, but the separates of trousers, sweaters, and skirts are as plain-jane as your banana-republic variety. i have a hunch that the runaway successes will be the attention-getting accessories, like the wide shiny belts, the M-emblazoned sunglasses, and any bags or shoes that come along for the ride. the shirt-dresses are kind of interesting, but i feel that it'll be so hard to accommodate a wide audience (wide- or narrow- shouldered concerns, plus shaping around the bust, makes it a very difficult fit). one of the dresses in the online lookbook is so bizarrely draped that it makes the mannequin look pregnant. and that catsuit? about as unpalatable as those awful tracksuits.

however, this is one of my favourite looks of the collection:



although it does strike a biting resemblance to one of the breakout looks perfected by precious project runway darling kara janx. i mean, check out the sketch for madonna's collection:



and now observe kara's design:

anyone can make a kimono dress, yes, but the resemblance is all too uncanny.

especially for a third of the price, and by supporting a worldwide fashion corporation instead of an independent designer. but i digress.

i must confess the real appeal of this whole M collection is the creepy, slickly surreal film produced for the campaign. check it out on h&m's awkwardly flash-designed website. i highly prefer the 'director's cut' over the original version, only because it shows more of the story. something very bizarre about the victim being an asian schoolgirl and lots of underwear shots amidst italian sunglasses and a non sequitur crying fembot. madonna's inexplicably looking corporate sexy with the paper shredder and her black riding crop.

it it it it it!

dont! think it;
you need to know it

the point is made clear.

if you want to bypass all the muck on the official website, here's the director's cut of the film right here for you instant-gratification types.

i get a funny feeling in my stomach while reading this article in new york times' sunday style section about boutique dressing room mirrors that allow others in your remote online social network to pitch in thoughts and recommendations.

the first thing that i thought was ridiculous was the overlaying of the virtual image of clothing on top of one's reflection. mapping 2D (an image) onto 3D (a human body) seems really bizarre when it comes to choosing actual clothes. otherwise it's just a simulacra, a paper doll psychology. why are we putting the premium on 2D (the screen, the image, what can be broadcast onto the web) over actual reality?

so, putting people into actual clothes is low-tech (albeit with a smidgen more time, effort, and yanking) and you can still send pictures out into the ether. i dont understand the logic of the projected overlays except for the companies to issue out more looks per minute like some sort of holographic catalog.

and there's this element of trust. you'd trust your friend or sister or mom who comes with you into the shop; do you really trust your friends ('friends') out there? also, why limit yourself to just your social network? would it be worthwhile to have a more democratic process, opening up the voting / input to anyone who's out there and logged on to this network?

reminds me of this project i did back in 2004. (gettin' out the excavation gloves.) at this time, myspace was probably embryonic and facebook was just pushing out the harvard beta. however, the point of the work was to get to that psychological effects from acceptance / rejection / judgment from those in the remote digital sphere. invisible, voyeuristic input from those who can publicly access your image.

here's mirror mirror from my physical computing course at harvard. (hi professor huang!)

have we progressed at all in 3 years? in 6 years (the overdesigned, overtechnologized prada soho flagship opened in 2001)? i dont know the answer, but something must explain the queasiness inside.

happy st. patty's day.

a tall mugful of earl grey tea in hand, its wisps of steam warming lips. the window frames a silver blend of snow, rain, and dew, a low windy howl in the distance. boston's irish energy is fantastically tempered by an act of god. coincidence?



this doesnt say it better. freezing drizzle. it may be sweeter as a frozen dessert than a daily forecast, methinks. but as long as i am warm and dry (or, at least my feet), i am in a stable mood.

last night i slept for 12 hours. this morning, a workout and a bowl of cereal. glasses askew.

i'm still recovering from my return from sxsw. don't know if it's the ongoing grey, low-pressure weather, or a cataclysm of acclimation from warm sun, intense A/C into long flights; high consumption levels of texmex bowing to homestyle stirfry. it could be the massive amount of catch-back and email frenzy to follow, which is not so much as unenjoyable as it is a bit tedious. high payoff, though.

such is the same as blogging and flickring, back to a situated routine. a bit everyday, time well spent, my existence documented, redeemed, somehow.

a quote referenced at the festival: if you're not on myspace, you don't exist.

i'm not persuaded by that argument, but try replacing 'myspace' with written documents, photographs, letters, emails, journals, scribbles, notes, recordings, snapshots, memories of others. traces of self. truly, does anyone hear when a man falls (alone) in the forest?

yesterday we were hit from the blizzard. i felt smug until i was forced to leave my workplace, and proceed (for about the next half hour) to get pummeled with tiny ice pellets in my face. after each leg of the pedestrian journey, my bag was laden with a thick layer of snow. i went to fetch milk and toilet paper from whole foods like a sensible citizen, and trudged home through shin-high drifts with completely tread-less boots. (these are scheduled to arrive today.)





the night beautiful, i feel asleep to the pelt-pelt of frozen showers. but here we are the next day, it's more wet than white, and i just want to continue with my warm tea.

in case no one believed my exaggerated rainy plights in austin, here are some shots from eviltwin, aka andy beaumont, who caught the wet evidence.






song of the moment: múm, póst póstmaetur, off friends of the random summer. energy crackling beneath a silent expanse.

last night, after a bleary flight of infant hysteria and a creepy airplane neighbor ("hi, would you like a sandwich?"), boston and i reconnected. i'm safe and sound, still hating the mbta (aside: i thought it was hilarious that the renovated mbta website was nominated for css excellence at the sxsw web awards), and able to sleep again in my own bed.

today, grey and drizzle lull me to quiet moments while i kick around my suitcase with way too much austin swag.

i also got a haircut, which was very much overdue. you can see how long my wild tresses had ravaged in the previous post illustrating my taco experience. now i'm lean, mean, and ready to sweep my bangs a'gin.



some random notes from the crevices of my mind:

- there are too many sketchy ATMs in downtown austin. everywhere you look, there they are, those standalone machines with no-name banks and that do the bare minimum of dispensing crisp cash. as someone rightly put it, 'looking for an ATM? swing a dead cat, and you'll most likely hit one.'

- everytime i get tempted to buy a playstation2 (for the sole purpose of riffing to guitar hero) or the nintendo wii (for the sole purpose of battling millions of cutie-manic-pie rabbids) i think of all that money and time that could be better spent on live concerts, films, and books. therefore, i just need to make friends who'll let me hijack their consoles once in a while. (where are you people?)

- even though i was psyched to see a relatively diverse mix in attendance of sxsw interactive and film, some things still tended to bother me. first, many of the panels that dealt with design, engineering, or entrepreneurial motifs were predominantly (if not wholly) male. maybe it was just the combination of panels i attended, but from blog to book, design aesthetic of the indie developer, five tips to make your podcast listenable, and tv comedy of today were all male.

whereas females popped up on more social-oriented issues: all panelists of under 18: blogs, wikis, and online social networks for youth and do you blog on the first date? were women.

not to mention, aside from designer paula scher and journalist leslie savan), all the designers or experts interviewed in the helvetica film documentary were white males. i'm not out to go on some gendered rampage, but it's interesting to note the disparity.

- on that note, conference-goers were probably 80% caucasian. not like there's anything wrong with it... wait, what am i talking about? there's something seriously wrong with it. but i wont merely rant, as i know i can actually do something about it.

- crap! i missed meeting the ceo of zappos! probably lucky for him, since i dont know what i would have done. cried for joy and hugged his knees?

- i learned that texans live and breathe chili con queso. also, tasty migas. i think i need to go back to catch up on my huevos rancheros.

- not like this is breaking news, but the y-chromosome set is a peculiar one. however, i am deeply enjoying the illogics. it's reminds me that relinquishing control is a rightful, ongoing lesson. björk says it best in it's not up to you. vespertine is my soul soother, curling up into lush snowsound.

as always, i'm behind on the blogacious nature of photos and text published in a timely manner, but for now i can offer the tantalizing link to my full set of sxsw 2007 up on my flickr.

here's but a taste.

it's strange how sometimes the best way to fix something is to first break it completely.

in shards, pieces, a phoenix rising from the ashes.

i am so, so stupid.

because of my naivete and seeming bravado, i ate the nuclear taco.

because i ate the nuclear taco, approximately 90 min later i vomited on east 6th & brazos.

because i vomited, my stomach feels like it's being burned alive by an army of trogdors.

because my stomach feels burninated, i'm back at the apartment trying not to die while literally twelve parties are being set in motion in downtown austin.

by the way, this is not the first time i've gotten sick while eating something superspicy. i love love LOVE spicy food; i adore it, i crave it. but only certain peppers--namely the dried roasted red ones in chinese dishes and hyper-potent scotch bonnet oil--seriously irritate my stomach lining to a most tummy-clutching discomfort. for most people, the pain is on the tongue.

that part's easy.

i almost think for me it's a chemical allergy to something in the pepper production or preparation. in any case, you would think i'd know better, right?

here's the story: apparently 'nuclear tacos' is a sxsw tradition, where they set up a bbq party + tent outside boasting the hottest tacos in the world. lest you think i'm nuts, there were actually a lot of people there! you had your choice of hard corn taco shells or soft flour tortillas; the potent fillings of nuclear beef, hot beef, nuclear veggie (more like beef-esque soy-protein product), or hot veggie; and toppings of cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and sour cream. as we waited in line, we saw many a pink-faced diner exit the premises, sweating, crying, swearing. i pooh-poohed them as total wimps. naturally.


here's the cutie indie ice-cream truck right outside the premises, apparently to salvage burnt esophaguses. one guy literally ran from the bbq, yelling, 'need, ice-cream, NOW!' he looked pretty desperate for a creamsicle or something.


the oh-so-welcoming sign at the entrance. i wonder if they put the signage there to sustain the campiness of it all, or if they were legally contracted to do so. you have to wonder.


i love the composition of this pic. these guys are bravely concocting the killer taco innards. out of the frame is another mellow dude putting on some rubber gloves. by the way, the air is full of the hot, spicy smoke. just hanging around the tent, you can feel it already tickling the back of your throat.


you probably dont want to get too close, buddy.


so here is my lovely dinner, before the devouring. the flour tortilla holds the nuclear beef, and the other dollops are the nuclear and hot veggie just for curious sampling. by the way, the weather could not have been more perfect! thankfully the thunderstorms from last night gave way to delightful sunshine early this morning.


thanks to sooz of exploitboston who took these pix of me. (ever notice there are never photos of me because i am always the photographer?) anyway, here i am, totally confident, totally healthy, totally happy. little did i know how wretched i would be in two hours...


chowin' down. it was definitely high on the spicy scale, but it wasn't tastebud suicide. i figured i'd condense the time spent in burning pain so i sort of gnarfed it down fairly quickly. pretty tasty, you could still taste the beef, but i do confess to blushing, sweating, and blowing my nose at copious frequency. however, i felt pretty darn good next to a woman who took two bites of her hot beef taco and declared defeat. ha, i thought, see, i am someone who can take it! as always, my competitive spirit persists, even when it comes to inflicting gastrointestinal pain on oneself, as it (later) became painfully clear.

hence, eating this taco was a foolish move. and i am not dancing now. :(

here is my night instead:


and you, dear reader. that is it. that all i have as comfort for 11pm on a monday.

p.s. pix on flickr. tagged with nucleartacos. it's the truth.

torrential, torrential rain.

dampened spirits? oh no.
dampened body? yes.

nothing feels better than taking a taxi home and jumping immediately into a hot shower after being completely drizzled on by chilly overhang and leaky tarps at austin lounges with plenty of outdoor expanses. basically, out-and-about discomfort hits the threshold when your feet are sloshing in their shoes and your bare legs are wet with dirt clods, spilled soda, and recycled rainwater.

however, i had a fantastic day, including enjoying enchiladas at guero's (the chicken al carbon was delightfully seasoned with a refreshing oj-based marinade), meeting christine of pointy sticks (she had marzipan from mike's pastry in her trunk, totally by coincidence), watching 'does your soul have a cold?' (utterly poignant, the cinematographic rhythm at perfect cadence), going to the shortbus dvd party (i'll catch the panel with director john cameron mitchell tomorrow), seeing ze frank (once again) host the web awards with to-be-expected zaniness, and going to a party sponsored by chow.com!

excellent resident pulled pork, by the way.

i predict i will have incredible opportunity wasting even more time on the internets when i get back home: checking out all the sites nominated for a sxsw web award, plus watching back episodes of lonelygirl15 and arrested development, in addition to consuming the ugly betty season 1 dvd. i mean, this it total conjecture, and i probably could spend the hours instead doing much more meaningful things, such as updating my blog (speaking of which, tonight i met some blogger.com reps and lavished my utter gratitude for the magic of blogging software) or solving fermat's last theorem or something.

but honestly, where would bree be without me?

holy moly, there's so much going on and so many people and things and events, it's wonderfully overwhelming. went to a slew of panels yesterday, great things to share, i'll post more when i have a chance to breathe. (i'm choosing not to take my laptop to the convention center because i have enough stuff to lug around from morning til wee, wee night.) anyway, i'm sure you can find hundreds of bloggers feverishly dissecting each interactive panel to bits in real-time... (trust me, i saw them)

there are probably like six parties going on at any given time. last night i felt like a true old fogey pretty much exhausted at 2am (granted the day before i also went to bed at 2am, and this pattern will probably continue ad nauseum) while i'm sure everyone else feted until 5ish or so. chalk it up to my amazingly sleep-hungry brain. snooze snooze snooze. oh yeah, i'm also a dork who loves catching those early morning talks. but i had a great time and met some amazing people last night. somehow ze frank fit in the picture. not sure.

here are a random slew of photos, in no particular order, because i'm lazy.



the building on the right is the tallest in the city and has a super cool crystalline design. viewed from the angle, it totally looks like totoro. (see it?)



i'm so glad i was familiarized with guitar hero because i came to sxsw because admitting that here would be terribly embarrassing! at the hi-lo lounge, there are a ton of artisan guitar hero guitars mounted all over the place. i kinda get it now. kinda.



a midnight snack at katz ("never klozes!"), an enormous cobb salad. and infinite amount of pickles. trust me, the waiter saw how quickly i was chowing those down and was like, 'want more? seriously, they're just free-flowing from the kitchen.' but i think five pickles made a pretty good dent in my pickle quota. this restaurant itself was super-strange... not sure i'd go back. but it probably does wonders when nothing else is open at strange hours.



lis sylvan and hubby misha. she's happy, eating beans, and pregnant! yay!



waiting in the queue on friday night for the film festival opening party. this is where those excellent chips and salsa were hiding out. the fox and hound is totally gone, but at least you can clamor around the space like stealthy hyenas.



the dig! the dig! the dig!!!!! i was so excited to see boston amid the austin. seeing this gives me some semblance of credibility when i tell people what i do. i just shove this paper right into their skeptical face.



the 'under 18: blogs, wikis' panel. lis from the lifelong kindergarten group at the mit media lab and smg-alum danah boyd (in the awesome fluffy animal-eared cap) helped lead the discussion. i've never heard danah speak before, but i'll just say: SHE. IS. AWESOME. i cant describe it, but she's terribly on target and she argues with a super-convincing blend of academic, personal, and pop-cultural backing. go danah!



lunch as las manitas. this place was packed for lunch! also, i loved the tshirts worn by the servers... it had a faux academic shield and 'university of rice and beans'



i dont think anyone can eat a tortilla chip more gracefully than nicole (fellow chowhound). the salsa in austin in general is so freakin' good.



dorkbot in the haus. lots of blinky lights, random robotics, and generally silly hijinks. loved it! also, met the MAKE / CRAFT zine peeps and rocked out to 'stringless' capacitive-sensor guitars and a dj inexplicably dressed as a star trek shipmember.

until next time, i will be your faithful blogger who basically tells you how ridiculously good beans with lard are. trust the others for picking apart keynote speakers kathy sierra's words of wisdom. i'll be catching a film screening later tonight, a documentary ("does your soul have a cold?") about mental illness and medicating depression in japan. should be fascinating.

over and out.

hey, really tired. lots of walking, lots of keeping my eyes open amidst a moodily dark-lit social scape. some notes:

- earlier this evening went to the ginormous whole foods to pick up some small things like cereal and milk. i dipped in for 10 minutes but honestly you could spend hours and hours in there! combine the comprehensiveness of the new york time warner center whole foods and the expansive mindset that is texas, and the result is this absolute city block bursting in organic carnivale. more photos and stories to support this universal awe. (there's an area larger than my apartment just for grinding nuts into butter. really.)

- saw paul rudd at the opening film festival party at the now-defunct fox & hound tavern. i basically was an arm's length away but too fantastically chicken to ask for a photo or something. very chill in the crowd, very handsome :)

- the food at the main outdoor party was pretty good. beef and chicken soft tacos (made to order!) topped with fresh pico de gallo. plus lots of tasty chips and salsa, with more flavor and spice than to be expected. just ignore the vat presentation, and dig in... (just what i needed for my seriously suffering stomach)

- between the fox & hound, and the instances flitting in and out of molotov and hi-lo tonight... it kinda got a bit weary from socializing in an event that's loud, crowded, and filled with strangers, all who are cavorting and huddling in their own social circles. i'm doing my best to meet new folks (those who know me can attest i'm not a wallflower!) but it still can be a tad awkward and frustrating. i hope to meet more people in less high-profile style tomorrow during the panels and screenings. plus, a bit of sadness does yet creep; i have still some serious stuff on the brain, tugging at me from going-ons back in boston... things that are not easy to forget.

- i organized a chowhounding event tomorrow! saturday, 12:15pm, at Las Manitas on 211 congress ave. sxswers: meet & eat. i hear the tacos are transformative. must resolutely confirm this fact.

i should get some sleep tonight, because i dont think i will have many more opportunities to do so in the next few days! goodnight austin, goodnight b-austin.

i am finally here in austin, still in one piece after a long late night yesterday (it being so cold in boston i wanted to self-implode), an emotional spree, less than 4 hours of sleep, and a bleary-eyed flight through chicago. already i am feeling the energy and the overwhelming festivity of it all, not to mention the tropical climes and the fitful alternations between sticky breezy warmth and sterile hyper-air-conditioning.

i'm in a lull just before heading out. i'm staying in a loft apartment with a new-york-based filmmaker who is awesomely sweet, a fantastic sxsw veteran, and spectacularly hooked up.

so far, some thoughts on the day:

- there's a native bird that caws so mournfully and sharp, it's like a child crying each time; they're black and congregate above, in the branches

- the happy hour phenomenon is crazy here. once 4pm hits, nothing is sacred. we were starving and went into mccormick & schmick's, not necessarily a place i would find either tasty or affordable. however, with purchase of a drink (i even just got iced tea) there's a menu that's cheaper than your wildest dreams. even more so than half-priced specials at grendels! $1.95 for deep fried pickles, $2.95 each for soft fish tacos (deLISH) and spicy chicken tacos and flash fried calamari, and $3.95 for a lamb gyro. unbelievable.

- i'm overwhelmed by the enormity of panels, parties, events, functions, and even side things like dorkbot, barcamp, and lots of private group mixers. i'm planning on going to a bbq for design bloggers tomorrow night, which should hold some tasty meat for my waiting, excited stomach.

- at this quick mixer earlier this evening for the film disturbia, i spotted a woman wearing a wmbr 88.1fm bag slung around her shoulder! it was totally fate, and she indeed was from boston and just a fan of the station. love it.

ok, i think we will head out soon. lots of sweat and silliness, and it's the first time in weeks (no, months) that i'm going bare-legged. let the warmth (and not the bugs) overcome me tonight.