Be this riddle or real?

I know there are whack postings to be found on Craigslist. I know there are ca-razy "Missed Connections" postings.
But this gem was nuzzled in amongst the normal:
one bedroom, Los Feliz.

No more! (wipe your tears away)

The idea of writing another post for my blog makes me cringe. I do believe I am approaching the point of diminishing returns as regards my tolerance for this medium. Me, me me me me. Blah blah blah. My mother and I are forming a unified front on this.
Some people might initiate an antiblog-blog at this point.
Questions? Comments?

I made a list (revised)

I have been asked over whiskeys and at other junctures what my favorite recent movies are, etc. I am never able to deliver the goods. I ramble and get distracted and cannot make thorough recall.
Now I have made a list, inspired by a post on Majikthise, which prods us to list the best films so far of the Oughts, the '00s, because Lindsay was prodded to do so by some other blog.
Really these are not in any order per se. I picked 12 as tops.

1. Fellowship of the Ring, Return of the King , then Two Towers in that order and this counts as one (1) film indeed. I am referring to the Extended versions here of course.
2. Donnie Darko - definitely not the Director's Cut. Ouch. Please, no.Sucked.
3. Wonder Boys
4. Waking the Dead
5. Jesus' Son
6. Almost Famous
7. An Everlasting Piece
8. Sexy Beast
9. Master and Commander: Far Side of the World (creaking! biology! water!)
10. Bloody Sunday
11. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
12. Whale Rider


Special Mentions: Billy Elliot, Atanarjuat,Requiem for a Dream, Tape, Last Orders, The Believer, Dancer In The Dark, Spy Kids, About A Boy, Pieces of April, The Anniversary Party, Fahrenheit 9-11,13 Conversations About One Thing,A.I. (not including the last hour which belongs in a separate category - sorry Alex), In America, Before Sunset, Sky Captain and The, Hedwig and the Angry Inch,I Heart Huckabees, School of Rock, All the Real Girls, Punch Drunk Love, The Slaughter Rule, Rabbit Proof Fence, Laurel Canyon,Adaptation,Liam, the Good Girl, Moonlight Mile, and Barbarian Invasions.

Extra Special Mention, Existentially Questionable Filmmaking Award: Reign of Fire.

Bill Murray's Polonius was good.

The Great Loud Beast of Large-scale-yet-stunningly-intimate Concerts Has Passed Me By

If I were to be my eighth grade self today, my eighth-grade self would be stunned at my out-of-touchness.
My eighth grade self would never have imagined that there could or would be a day wherein I would not know that U2 tickets were going on sale, and she would have probably not believed me if I told her I failed to know the proper time to assume position in a long line to obtain tickets to one of five (5) shows.
My eighth grade self would have pointed to the moulding of my old bedroom as evidence of my once-hearty involvement in all things EastSideDublin-based. The moulding went around the ceiling of my old room, and onto it, in Sharpie-marker faerie-font, I wrote out the words from The Unforgettable Fire's "Bad":
Desperation.
Dislocation.
Separation.
Condemnation.
Revelation.
In temptation.
Isolation.
Desolation.

And then my eighth-grade self continued the tradition in Sharpie marker, all around the place:
Emancipation.
Elevation.
Disintegration.
Violation.
Masturbation.
Injection.
Prognostication.
Oration.

She was so devoted, that girl.
Robyn told me a story the other day about this friend of ours who once was staying in a hotel where it turned out the band was also staying. This friend heard singing and she stood in the doorway of the ballroom and saw Bono rehearsing for a show that night, a small man expressing sound in an echoey room, and this friend said she understood what she previously had not about U2 in that moment.

When I heard this story, the eighth-grade version of my self leapt up into my throat and tried to climb out of my mouth so that it could yip about in jealousy and jump up and down; thus my current self couldnt get obtain words to provide Robyn with a reaction to that story.

I can't speak to you of the holy feeling I get when the white lights go on in all our faces at a certain point in their shows. It isn't ludicrous, it isn't an exaggeration. It is simply very true.

music-makers, dreamers of dreams

Originally uploaded by Sarah Lebo.

I was on the unit last Saturday when I met two fellows.
They were in my patient's room, standing over her bed. She - 6 years old but looking 3 - just stared up at them while they bent over her making bizarre giggling noises and doofus sounds. She, with her left arm swollen for unknown reasons to four times it's normal size, looked up at them, and then looked down to attend to her coloring book.
The two men were not deflated by her lack of enthusiasm. Instead they signed two pieces of paper and tucked them under her pillow and said goodbye.
I heard them giggling and doofusing on down the hall to the next room. I looked under her pillow to discover two autographed pictures of Spongebob and Patrick. Those people were Spongebob and Patrick!
Patrick was tall and looked like Patrick and Songebob was small with a halfway Buddy Holly haircut, smallness being reminiscent of Spongebob. The woman who does the voice of Bobby from King of the Hill was there too along with a Simpson's artist. I got me a Wiggum from him. Chief. I felt like a whore, really really whore-like, for doing this afterwards because those people were there for the kids and not the staff. But I didnt reallly ask for one. I just asked if he did Wiggum portraiture, and bam, there it was.

Last night I heard some excellent people read some excellent things at our 826LA benefit: Aimee Bender read a short story about the Devil and a Skeleton who work for the International Red Cross rowing dead families across a river in Hades; there was a short excerpt about Teddy Roosevelt hunting 'squatch from an upcoming book on Yeti/Sasquatch by Joshua Bearman; a story about a cook working for a famous celebrity, referred to in the story only as 'Monster' and the celebrity's house only as "the Lair" by Jervey Tervalon; a brief display of drawings of "hand signs particular to El Monte flower-picking gangs now facing extinction" from one Salvador Plascencia; and a hot sticky one from Rachel Resnick who is the kind of person who emanates toughness, even through a fitted blazer.
The new site for 826LA is up, so go peek at it.
We are proud.

But this week I learned that I will never again attempt large-volume handsewing projects at the tail end of a very busy week of shifts and pediatric advanced life support certification courses. I watched Gattaca, some TiVoed Survivor and 24, the most recent U2 concert at Slane castle, and heard the director/writer commentary of Return of the King all while trying to finish pillowcases by hand. It went on into the night. It was a moment of futility defined.
In the morning I went to the Pasadena Sewing and Vacuum Supply Store with my sack, my five yards of pathetically handstitched, unfinished and incorrectly sized corduroy and dealt with a strange woman who helped me out in a manner that demonstrated that she didnt really want to help me but since I would probably start crying at any moment, she decided she would.

In other news, there isn't any.

Yer pal,
Lebo

Return the Map,

robinhood
Originally uploaded by Sarah Lebo.

Return
What
You Have
Stolen From Me......Most Fabulous Object In the World...Your Money Or Your Life...
Don't Touch It, It's Evil.

Dream of the Grey Floods

I sleep with my window open. We need well circulated air. I believe in this.
In Calgary, -35 with wind chill, the window over my bed was open a crack, still.
The thunder has been waking me up lately but the sound of rain hitting the wide pool that has replaced the backyard lawn is what goes into my ears and then into my dreams.
I only remember my dreams on days off, when my sleep is not halted at 0515 in the a.m.
I used to also believe that I most vividly recalled morning dreams when it was raining, because my ears were attendant to the sounds of real outside, thereby keeping my deep dream state only waist deep in unconsciousness. The brain can't do everything at once, though we try to make it.
It's the kind of day where you might watch Gattaca.
Water has nothing to do with taxes, but they are done.

A Big Shout-Out to Hallmark

suckday
Originally uploaded by Sarah Lebo.

Dear Hallmark Cards Inc. ,
Thanks for the complex! What a gift! It is such an over-the-top thing to bestow on a person! I don't deserve it! I thought I would be blind to the title that Monday bore, and yet, your present still arrived at my door and now it is managing to make me feel bad! And I'm strong!
No, really, I don't want it.
I don't deserve it.
None of us do.

Love,
Sarah

And also...

I wish to strongly encourage you to read something rare and sweet. It is a eulogy by my mom for Cyrus. It's short and it makes a stain.
It makes me want to delete my posting and start over, to write something better, but it would be futile.

I will not say do not weep - for not all tears are an evil.

I want to say something about Cyrus that would make you twist with tears.
Our regal brother...

I am remembering the night I lay on the floor with Cyrus Lebo for the first time. He had already been a Lebo for many years.
I was slow to love him...this is a sin...today such delay in my appreciation of Cyrus feels like an evil.
For many years I cringed at the thought of touching his belly.

I was lucky you see because in a language without words, Cyrus is also called Cyrus The Forgiving. That night on the floor he embraced me
when he heard I was near, and crying.
Overhead of us, credits were rolling.I had just seen Waking the Dead, and the house was empty except for us.
When I say he held me, I mean he literally
embraced me right there, there down on the floor.
My face was on the berber and he looked at me.

For this I will always be grateful.

Cyrus met you at the door when you came back from being away and he would talk to you. Again, he forgave you and your absence. He would ask you about your travels. Say, what was your favorite beer? Who did you meet. Will you be going away again, tell me the answer is no.
When I say he spoke, I really mean that he did, with intonations and syllables and subtle gesticulations of his mouth and eyes.

Yesterday, mom and dad and sister encircled him, and I was not there but they were with him on the floor, all together. He was on a blanket and he looked at them, he gave and he got love, and then his travelling shoes were laced in a double knot. He boarded the great grey ship and underneath that fur, he became cold.

His like will not be there again.

A Walk On The Stove

IMG_0004
Originally uploaded by Sarah Lebo.

[The following has been jotted down in an attempt to be silly when really I want to be quite something else altogether.]
Last night I saw this wee man and I said: Oh, look, there goes Mr. Frodo again.
The tower of Cirith Ungol is one thing, but the Tablets of Torched Tofu are quite another. He joined us for dinner, and then was on his way.

Research Is My Boyfriend

just like titanic
Originally uploaded by Sarah Lebo.

This week's theme is espresso machine research. This here is the Francis!Francis! X3, and so far it is my favorite.
I cannot afford one today but am being future-oriented instead; I am planning, being responsible and yet not.
I watched Return to Paradise today courtesy of TiVo. Vince Vaughn, pre-puffy. Joaquin Phoenix, not looking good. A movie with integrity simply because it doesnt end well. This is what I also liked about 50 First Dates, that it had the cajones to not end perfectly (eg, she doesnt regain her memory-skills).
Also saw Bad Education today, which was hard for me as it contained episodes tinged with sexual tension as well as Gael Garcia Bernal. on the way to said movie with Libby's pal Joseph, got an americano at Zona Rosa and met the barista who is friendly and remembered me by my ring for some reason and her name is Eowyn.
It was a glossy movie, that is what I can say. It went on too long and became a whodunit when it didnt have to, in my opinion. Music was great however.
Waiting for me on the porch was a wee figurine for my dashboard of Frodo wearing the crow's beak mask and orc armor when he is going through mordor. I also ordered a ringwraith for the same purpose but it is very gigantic and ugly and must be returned.
But enough about me and my opinions!

Thing of the Day

My thing of the day for today, February 2, 2005 shall be:
The video for U2's *All Because of You*.
You ask why.

I tell you.

I tell you: it is because of all the schoolchildren, businesspeople, newspapermen and those without homes,real people. Just hoardes of people completely giddy in public together, in the middle of the day running sideways alongside a flatbed truck.
Completely losing it.

Oh to completely lose it once again, all over, in repeating circles....

Arachnids and Weathervanes

Originally uploaded by Sarah Lebo.

A circus. A travelling salesman. Something Wicked This Way Comes.

I don't think John McCain's aryan wife had a hand in the creation of that scary film, but she could have.
I just saw her on the TV. On The Larry King Show.
No one but Larry King could better embody the definition of the word "sycophant". If you didnt know who he was, that muppet body wouldnt point to sycophantic tendencies, but there you have it.

O My Meaty Palms

When your body feels as if you've been beaten with a lumpy piece of wood after spending two days painting and scraping an old room in an old grey jail in Venice into the shape of something resembling a bosom for the verbal development and tutoring of youth (the meat of your palms bruised somehow, upper right chest wall spasming) it means you need to maintain a regular exercise regimen, and it means you should have done it several years previously.

But it is all done with great sincerity and effort, Lo! for 826LA, even when it pertains to waiting with great patience in a Cost Plus (that microcosm of English-style customer service, wicker and foreign chocolates) for your car to be loaded with tables and for the employees to inform you that they cannot supply you with anything to tie your trunk down in spite of the fact (and you point this out) that Cost Plus itself was born from the notion that millions could be made from the sale of twine, jute, ribbon and raffia.

I want to tell you a great little story taken from Sunday afternoon, but I'm not going to because I dont know how to do it appropriately. I can give you an analogy instead and you can just use those deductive reasoning skills you honed long ago:
Doretta: On Sunday, through a series of circumstances, you commence to eating vegetarian papaya dogs with Philip Seymour Hoffman. Karen, for you, you go shopping for Aerobeds at Target with D. F. Wallace....

Ok. Ok fine. No.. Wait.. I retract!

Today while hiding in my patient's room from absolutely nothing at all, my patient and I watched Elmo's World together. On Elmo's World, children were having their training wheels removed and they were riding bikes unaided for the first time. The boy and I exchanged brief stories of when we learned to do the same thing. Me, I went hurdling into the holly bushes. My patient fell into a ditch in his backyard.

My brain broke up with me.

Tomorrow? I write the GRE.
See, on Wednesday the math was enjoyable and I was able to really focus. But yesterday, while practicing on the computer,
my brain said: Enough, this isn't working for me, I need some space. And thereafter, my mortal coil walked out of the house and left me there, a shell of a person, staring at a PC (which in itself can raise my blood pressure: see Job's new genius) and doing all the problems in the most difficult manner possible. Today I will buy earplugs and drink decaf. Someone told me they saw my brain having souvlaki at Burger Continental with a CalTech grad student in khaki shorts and Tevas, and I think to myself, Jealousy has got to be one of the major flaws in human design.
Then I just gave up for the evening and watched Sexy Beast with Libby and then the Secret Lives of Dentist by myself. Campbell Scott looks a tad like H-to-the-itler with that moustache. I've seen Sexy Beast before, me gusta mucho, but the movie made me think back to last spring when I was in the land of overbaked, plump English people on holiday in Spain with no taste in food or music or beach clothing, and it made me shake my head at the world. Dentists, also, I liked it a lot, especially the bits with Denis Leary, and it made me teary but that's no surprise as the other day as I discovered 50 First Dates did the same.
I can no longer be trusted with simple things.
And I don't know if you watch Lost, but last night the theory I expounded during the very first episode was confirmed: two of the very worst actors and the most useless characters (Shannon and Boone) have had sex with each other in the past. They are stepbrother and sister you see, the token rich white kids, champions of flawless skin and piercing blue eyes.

The End of All Things: Dark Coast

Originally uploaded by Sarah Lebo.

This picture, though dark, should be squinted at.

I just witnessed three disconcerting observations in a row:
Blockbuster using Roy Orbison in TV ads.
The video game with the title "Call of Duty: Finest Hour".
Ethan Hawke and Cowboy Curtis in the trailer for their new movie which happens to be the kind whose entire color palette consists of black, midnight blue, grey and orange. I can see the VHS cover art now.

Here's a good thing: I recorded Dogfight (Lili "Never never ever ever! Don't you even think about it!" Taylor, River Phoenix) on TiVo. This was my favorite movie of the year 1991. I found a frightening webpage "documenting River Phoenix's role" in the film by following a link on IMDB.

Today I graduated from my residency program, which means I am now by myself, with my own patients.
First thing I saw when I came into the auditorium was a large sized Casio keyboard, then two bunches of brightly colored balloons taped to the wall. The nurse next to me said it looked like the set-up for her kindergarten graduation. I had fear in me. I called Robyn and told her not to come, please, it's too tacky. But it wasn't so bad. The president and CEO of the hospital spoke, and when he started, he got all choked up, which was uncomfortable but also touching, because he is one of those men stuffed into a suit about a size too small who usually talks in lingo that is shiny and corporate. He was saying that we could all do what he does every day, but he couldnt do what we do.
Then there was Creed. Oh, defunct Creed. [NB: I know my cynicism is tiresome]. Arms Wide Open, that song, over a montage of nurses and kids and families. Then we had a musical performance. Thank lord this was not someone singing that Whitney Houston song about how children are our future, but a group of wee people, 4 year olds from the childhood development center next door. They sang it's a small world. Well, more like they shouted it's a small world.
The managers of our unit gave me and the two other nurse residents: 1) a hydrangea and 2) ....it had to come sooner or later..
Chicken Soup for the Nurses' Soul.
It's hard to make fun of it because it is all so well intentioned but there are certain cultural attributes frequently found in this population of professionals that doesnt coincide with my particular personal style.

I suppose I would like to recommend a few things:
1) If you can, listen to the song "Silver Dagger", as done by Joan Baez. I never got into her like I got into Bob Dylan, but this song is sad and beautiful. I have been told I should stop listening to music of such description, but to that I scream a resounding No. This is the kind of music that makes me feel human. I don't need to go to Goa for that.
2) If you can, look at my mom's blog . I think she's brilliant but she isn't so sure. You can tell her what you think in your own words.
3) Dustin Hoffman's capoeira, etc in Meet the Fockers. Yes.
4) The streetcar in Lisbon as well as the north and eastern coasts of Sicily.
5)The trailer for Malick's The New World.

Status Rose Paradus; Annus Nevus

I live and breathe.
Via Friendster (which, I know, is SO 2002) I have been able to confirm that one
tall young man from West Vancouver also lives and breathes in Thailand.
According to his pal, he has internet access, is in Koh Samui, and has yet to decide to respond to my "Are you alive" email, I guess.
This is somewhat typical of his aloof nature, so I should not be surprised.

For New Year's, I celebrated 1991. I did this by being slouched under a sleeping bag while sipping Pelligrino, eating those damn Trader Joe's pita chips while watching The Commitments. I think one of my favorite lines is when Jimmy Rabitte Sr says "That's fuckin blasphemy. Elvis wasn't a Cajun" with great rage during an audition by someone with an accordion. That, or when Joey The Lips says "I get snotty with no man".
When that was over I closed the night out with some Twilight Zone marathon and the last of the docs on the Return of the King Extended Edition. In which Philippa Boyens says that if you look closely, at Mozart of Rembrandt (or what have you), the Elves are still with us. That poor brilliant woman gets larger and larger with each extended edition (if you haven't treated yourself yet to the easter eggs on this DVD, do so now).

While in Vancouver over Christmas for a sleepover, we saw Life Aquatic. No me gusta Life Aquatic. The very end tip of the movie made me teary, but all else was flat, and Owen Wilson was bad, and his subplot was pointless. If it had just been about Steve mourning his dead friend, it would have been so much more bittersweet, which we all know is the money shot of these films. My sister made me awesome underwear that say "I Own It" on the behind. If any of you have iSight, lemme know because one now perches on my iBook. There was rain and I went to the gym with my parents and ate dumplings and cold shredded tofu salad at Shao Lin Noodle House and kicked it over two nights with some Frodo and Aragorn.

Now I will drive down to the OC for a sleepover with Nana. She will reinflate me where I have been deflated, I think.

A parade of roses is ambling down the road nearby.

The Shroud

Today in didactics, we had a lecture by a man from the Spiritual Care department of the hospital. The minister man talked about how we should all make a conscious effort to exert nondenominational spiritual support (if we provide any at all) unless the family indicates a specific religion and you feel comfortable participating along those lines. Then he said he was at a family conference once, sitting around a table with the residents, attendings, fellows, RNs, social workers and family members to discuss the impending death of their child and the mom stood up in the middle of it and started speaking in tongues. Minister-man says that he's one of those kinds of Christians that does this kind of thing, so he put aside the nondenominational hat and stood up and starting speaking in tongues along with her. It was a good story. How do you just start speaking in tongues? Isn't there a lead-up to that?
Then we had a lecture on post-mortem care.
Then we went to the morgue, for a tour.
Then the CEO of the hospital talked to us about all the great things done at CHLA, and they were all things related to medicine, noble medicine, rich medicine, respected medicine. I became kind of angry on the inside.
Then at lunch I had a conversation with Daniel, who thinks I should be an MD or an OD and I tried not to think too hard about it.
Then I checked my email: nothing.
Then during break I almost finished O'Connor's Star of the Sea and when Yo La Tengo's Autumn Sweater was chosen at random from iPod it made me nearly teary.
Then I went and bought Return of the King Extended Edition. I really wanted that Minas Tirith stash-box. It would make an incredible stash-box. But it was 30 bucks more than the DVD alone, so I recanted. The insert on the back of the DVD says "50 minutes of new and extended scenes added by Director Peter Jackson". In case there was any confusion, you know - in case you thought the 50 minutes of new and extended scenes were added by Emperor Hirohito or Paul Reubens.

Then, here I am now.

Getting the Geek Blood to Boil

1. Did I mention that I spotted Daniel Lanois at the Arcade Fire show? Pulling his skull cap on immediately after crossing the threshold as he left the show, whereupon he mounted one of the meatiest chrome motorcycles I have ever seen, and went away into the rainy night. It was a Yeah, Bono's Slept In My Guestroom kind of motorcycle. Look for a future review on my mom's blog as mom and sister are going to the Vancouver show, courtesy of Lebo RN. (BTW, both Troubadour shows are already sold out for the 15th and 16th in LA.) I hold one of the precious.

2. I have three tickets to Imperial Teen for this Saturday. One is for me, the others are up for grabs. You can haves them for free, it will be my little Jesus gift to you. I know most of you will be stuffing yourself with Bill Murray paraphernalia instead, but if not, hey, I thought I'd ask.

3. First trailer for Burton's Willy Wonka, aqui. The Wonka bars are the same as in the first movie.

4. It is that time of year, O December! The season when miniature Minas Tirith stash-holders are being shipped nationwide, wrapped tightly beside the blue faux-leather, faux-book DVD packaging we - our kind - have grown to become so hungry for. It will be the last great beckoning of the Frodoiste for quite some time, I think. There is a long teaser trailer for the Return of the King Extended Edition for those with instant gratification problems

5. Very cool piece on 826 LA in the LA Times this week. It is a concise and exciting explanation of what we will be doing when we are up and running.

Your favorite Lone Star,
Sarah