I went back to Governor’s Island with Erin to take down the typewriters and of course it started downpouring the minute after we rented our bikes. In other words, our asses got very, very, very wet. Erin came prepared and had an entire outfit in her purse. Literally her purse is the size of a wallet and she busts out with a whole wardrobe of clean, dry clothes. She probably had like a 20-piece Chicken McNugget meal in there too. That reminds me a of a dude on the ferry wearing a shirt with a hotdog inside of a heart and it said LIPS AND ASSHOLES. I couldn’t tell if it was a band name or if he was celebrating Gay Pride weekend, or if he was saying that he actually likes hotdogs in the real I-like-eating-lips-and-assholes way. Confusing statement. But awesome shirt nonetheless. Anyway they ended up closing the island a little early. Rosalyne (THANK YOU ROSALYNE) also came to help me carry the shit off the island. If you see Rosalyne give her a hug. She loves getting hugs from strangers.

Anyway I had put a little sign on the typewriter tables saying, hey buddy, write whatever you want, just leave the paper in the typewriter. So of course, everyone tore off the paper. Also they jammed the keys, messed up the ribbons, and worked the lever on the Sears Tutor so hard that the spring broke so now the lever doesn’t work. The worst though, was that someone was messing with the ribbon and then WIPED HIS OR HER HANDS ON THE WALLS. There were like black finger print smears on the wall. I wanted to die. Dude. Look at this house. It is old. It is historical. It is pretty. It is pretty because people do not use the walls as a napkin. Dude, use your CLOTHES. Don’t use the damn walls. Don’t be a dick.

Over the weekend there was the Olaf Eliasson opening, the arts crap, and also a SWIMMING RACE around the island. It’s like they really, really, really want people to visit Governor’s Island. And it worked. Everyone I know pretty much went there for the very first time, which is cool. Anyway swimming in any river that goes through NYC seems…toxic. Like you will get all kinds of diseases. However, if you survive it somehow, you will never, ever get sick again. Your immune system will be like hah, encephalitis? I SURVIVED NEW YORK HARBOR, NATCH. On the ferry Erin and I were chatting with this fella who was convinced that the Harbor water was cleaner than the tap water because “there are many drugs in the faucet water.” Like you know, people go into the john and shoot up or snort a rail and then pee or do a big-kid sitdown and then all that winds up in the water system and heroin and coke are apparently not filtered out. I was like shit, son, I should drink more water. It’s one of those situations where you just shrug. I like shrugging. It is a good way to end conversations I think. Hey, Annie, is that thing due today? Shrug. Hey Annie, is the 1 train running? Shrug. Hey there is a lot of drugs in NYC tap water. Shrug. It’s nice.

Tomorrow I an putting up typewriters on Governor’s Island. However, it is going to rain, so I’m not sure how that’s going to work out. They are looking into inside spaces for me, but aren’t sure about it. I can’t leave these things in the rain, they would be so sad and cold. Pony gave me a typewriter that is from the 30’s I think. It’s made of iron, so I guess it might rust if mother nature has her way with it. It also weighs the same as a Hyundai. Which might seem light, but it’s kind of heavy for just a typewriter. JoMo made the tables and they are much nicer and much better than anything I could do (which actually isn’t much at all). I was thinking hey, just take a piece of wood and slap on some legs, call it a day. Then you know, accessorize it with a scarf to hide the fact that it is butt ugly. But I was WRONG. JoMo is an architect. Nothing would ever just be a piece of wood with four legs. So thanks to JoMo and thanks to Erin who is graciously coming along and helping me set up.

Also, someone stole Erin’s TREE. Can you believe that shit? Who does that? She apparently left for like a minute from her shop, and when she came back her tree had been snagged. Why would someone do that? That is how starved people are for trees in this concrete jungle. I mean come on! Take cash monies, take jewelry, take cookies, take five, Take That (oh shit remember them?). But leave the tree alone. It was so happy in front of her shop. It was so cute. And now you have taken it away. The tree is sad. Erin is sad. Shame on you, tree stealer!

So last night I saw this amazing apartment in Greenwich Village. It was in a MEWS! Like a carriage house behind the actual apartment building that is on the street. Very cute. Gardens on both sides! 300 sq ft! It was an illegal sublet but whatever. Anyway I was really into it and the guy renting it seemed really excited about me and I was filled with….hope. For the first time ever. Hope. It feels a little strange and I didn’t realize what it was. And then I figured it out later. Hope. It kind of feels warm and fuzzy, but also sparkley. You know like fairies and ponies and unicorns, shit like that.

And then he told me he had to go with the first person who looked at the apartment. Which was not me. I was crushed by hope. This must be what Hillary feels like. Beat by hope. Bleah. I’m right back where I started. I’m never feeling any hope ever again. EVER. It sucks.

Thanks to everyone who came out last night to the Last Known Settlers show. And, uh, sorry about being so late. Heather got fucked picking me and my crap up due to all the stupid street fairs (I mean how much fried dough could one eat in this town?) and then we got stuck in TRAFFIC in Chinatown/Little Italy. We were both overcome by blinding rage, and guess what, when you are blind it is really hard to drive. There was a lot of yelling involved. A lot of yelling at cabbies and tourists and completely oblivious girls in the middle of the street on their cell phones with their boobs hiked up to their chin, or as Heath puts it, “Wearing their boobs like a necklace.” Indeed. We both agreed that we liked boobs and liked necklaces but as entirely separate entities. Anyway we got to the show, I ran in, set my crap up at lightening speed and then let it rip. Sorry if I blew right past you or mowed you over on my way to the stage. Then at the end the sound guy was haggling us like OMG GET OFF THE STAGE! He said this as I was in fact, TRYING TO GET OFF THE STAGE.

Anyway thanks to everyone, especially Brian who I think has been to like EVERY LKS show ever, and to Steve who came all the way from Westchester because apparently that is where all the hip, old people live now. He got a Homie and a hot pink ninja for his troubles. Also there was a group of “weirdos” there and the only name I caught was Mike. Everyone else was really stingy with the names. Don’t be stingy with names. You have one so you can share it with others. That reminds me of “That’s my name, don’t wear it out! Nyeh nyeh nyeh!” Do you remember that? Ha ha ha, god kids are so lame. And yet here I am, laughing about it.

For all those who want to go to a street fair, there’s one on Lafayette below Houston. Enjoy. Go get some corn. Some lemonade. Some fried dough. A cannoli. And then buy a stupid shirt or a sack of athletic socks for $3. Dude, every street fair in the city has the SAME CRAP it’s unbelievable that it still goes on as it does. And all it does is get in my way on the way to rocking. STOP KEEPING ME FROM ROCKING, STREET FAIRS. I’m on to your silly game.

My band Last Known Settlers just launched a website. You can find it here. You can enjoy our tunes via Muxtape here. I threw all of it together in like an hour, not so bad, right? This is why I love the internets. It makes it easy to make more internets so it’s like continuously exploding all over itself. Very messy. Anyway we’ll be playing a show on Saturday night - 8pm at the Delancey (Delancey btwn Clinton and Attorney). Some come out if you are around. If not, just know you’ll be missing the GREATEST NIGHT ROCK AND ROLL HAS EVER SEEN. Jk jk jk It’ll be like the second greatest night. The first greatest night was when the Hoff sang on top of the Berlin Wall.

Also writer’s block. I kind of have it. It is problematic. I’m not sure if I have to relax or if I have to like get angry. Sometimes I write better when I’m filled with rage. No idea, it’s just like that. So quick, someone, make me angry. HURRY!

My loud Australian neighbor who talked on the phone (loudly) on the fire escape and talked about her Man Trouble (loudly) moved out! I just looked out my window and noticed her unit is empty. Success! Also, she was in big, big need of curtains. I don’t know if she didn’t realize or didn’t care that everyone on my side of the building could see her naked, but you know, not in a good way. Also, she is kind of a slob, but no judgment here. She is gone! I hope that my new neighbor does not suck it. I am kind of surrounded by sucking neighbors so one less is an improvement.

I am in a bit of a quandary. JoMo’s co-worker is moving out of his apartment and there is a chance I can take it. It’s pretty much the same size as mine, if maybe, a little bigger and more like a narrow rectangle as opposed to mine which is shaped like the state of Utah. It’s cheaper, which is good, but I wasn’t necessarily looking to move into a CHEAPER place, just a bigger/better place. The apartment is on 1st St and 2nd Ave which isn’t a bad neighborhood but I feel that I’m a little too old to be living in the East Village. There’s a lot of kids screaming like OH MY GOD BEEER YEAAAAH or CHICKS! YEAH! WOO HOO! At least my neighborhood now is quiet and empty at night. I’m not sure what to do. I hate this apartment but it looks like I’d be moving to another apartment that I’d hate too, it’d just be cheaper. Bleah. I mean I like my neighborhood better, I like living next to good friends, and being a few blocks from the Hudson, but you know, it’s a shoebox.

I was house-and-cat-sitting on the Upper East Side again, this time for the Siben-Manning-Davies family. I realize that is what I do for a living now. I just go to people’s apartments and pick up poop and marvel at how all of that can come out of something so small. A total mystery. Anyway, the S-M-D family has a cat named Bailey who is the most non-cat cat I’ve ever met. And I don’t mean that it’s like a dog, it’s just not very cat-like. Like if you try to chase it, it immediately rolls over on its side. WTF? What cat does that? It’s docile and passive and I am used to Aura’s cat which will fill a tube sock full of rocks and smack you in the balls when you aren’t looking. And if you DON’T have balls, it would find the nearest set and smack them just to send a message. Kind of like how you have to beat someone up in prison right when you get there. This is why everyone who visits Aura’s cat has to wear a protective cup. Anyway this is not the point.

I decided to be healthy and take advantage of Central Park while I was house-sitting. Their apartment is a block away from the park. I figured, OK, Annie, time to jazzercise and run even though nothing is chasing me. Just run willingly in the name of health. So I did it.

It sucked.

First of all, every single plant in Central Park was blooming. Do you know about this? Apparently in the spring, all these stupid green things decide to do stupid things like grow and release anthrax into the air and this causes my face to blow up and my eyes to start watering and my nose to start running and it is like I’m taking a shower in my own snot (in Korean “snot” is translated directly to “nose water” which sounds a lot nicer than it actually is). So I run around for a bit, crying my eyes out, and then I run into a SWARM OF GNATS. Do you know about this? They swarm in like large patches and then ultimately I run through it because I don’t run with my glasses on. Then they decide to swarm around me for the rest of my run. And then when I opened my mouth about half of them went down the hatch and I ended up swallowing it. So my guess is that I ate 20% of all the gnats in Central Park. Good news is that I’m not hungry.

Now, if you excuse me, my entire office is going to go bowling.

The big news today is, of course, Eliot Spitzer and his love for whores. Listen, people love sex, that’s why people have it. People love whores, that’s why we have them. So it is not unreasonable to think that some people love sex with whores. It’s the transitive property. See? Math is useful it teaches you about Eliot Spitzer. Either way, what sucks here is that he cheated on his wife and screwed over his family in public. Like if you are a politician and/or married, you just have to not love whores. At the very least be a little more secretive about your love for whores because people are watching you. That’s what I don’t get. How many sex scandals has our government seen? And yet…there are more scandals. Like dudes, don’t you watch the news? Are you an idiot? Also, paying four grand for a whore? I am clearly in the wrong profession. I think in France every politician sleeps with every whore in Europe and no one seems to care because maybe politicians are not held to the same moral standards, which may or may not be a good thing. Maybe they are just more transparent, like yeah, man, I love whores and you elected me, so what? It is kind of refreshing, but still, if you have a family then you have made a commitment to not be an asshole, you know what I mean? I don’t have a problem with the whores. I have a problem with people being assholes. Either way, our government needs a bouncer.

Invention Deathmatch is coming soon, Aaron B (THE LOSER) and I are working out the details. It will be amazing, especially when Aaron B. dies from losing. He’s going to get Spitzered big time.

I can’t tell if the universe is like, hey Annie, I am down with you let’s be BFF 4-eva k thx or if the universe is like, hey Annie, I hate you and I will slap you on the mouth.

About two weeks ago, I had band practice. You know how moving is a pain in the ass, with all the packing up heavy stuff and moving heavy stuff and then unpacking heavy stuff? Well basically everytime I have band practice it is like moving. It SUCKS. Monthly spaces are too expensive, so we use hourly spaces and that means we have to HAUL HEAVY SHIT across town. So to make my life easier, Heather keeps my xylophone for me because she doesn’t have to bring anything with her, except for her voice, which is pretty portable last time I checked. Meanwhile Andy and I have to bring like two tons of shit. Which is fine. I will move heavy things in the name of rock. DO YOU SEE HOW DEDICATED I AM?

Anyway she accidentally left it in a cab two weeks ago and we basically went into oh-shit mode. That is when you say “Oh shit” several times in a row, in case you are wondering. We filed a report with the Lost Property Unit. This sounds more official than it really is. Basically you call, leave a sobbing message about your lost property, and then no one calls you back because there are more important things the NYPD does than look for your stupid xylophone, like track down criminals and tow cars. Then we called every taxi garage in Long Island City and Manhattan to no avail. There’s literally like 50 garages in Manhattan alone. So as a last-ditch effort, I posted an ad on Craigslist’s Lost & Found, which is like a forum of desperation. It’s full of people who have lost their cute pets and their iPods and their wallets and their grandmother’s wedding ring and it’s like you KNOW no one is ever going to find anything. But I posted anyway. Long shot. Now we have a show coming up so I thought, OK. I have buy another one. THIS SUCKS. So I bought one on Ebay.

Last night I got an email from a woman who was trolling on Craigslist and she happened to work for Checker Cab. And she happened across my ad AND OH MY GOD SHE HAS MY XYLOPHONE. One of her drivers brought it in. I almost peed myself. I was like HOLY SHIT ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? What are the odds?

Then I thought. WAIT A SECOND. I just BOUGHT a new one and can’t return it because it was from Ebay. So that is when I realized the universe was taking a piss on me. I am standing here, wet from piss. I can tell you right now the universe had asparagus for dinner last night.

So now I have TWO xylophones. TWO! That’s one more than I need, and like TWO more than normal people need.

If you are not normal and want a xylophone I will sell one to you.

If you already have a xylophone, and want another one, I will sell one to you.

And in an unrelated note, we just got an email from a kid “What do emo people do? What is emo exactly?”

So I am working at home today and suddenly I heard this INSANE LOUD sound. Like the sound of a building crashing. And I kind of sit at my desk/kitchen table/coat rack thinking, oh man, do I go outside? Do I want to see whatever it is that made that sound? Then I heard the ambulances and the fire trucks and then I heard helicopters and people yelling. So I thought, do I really want to know what’s going on? Am I better off not knowing? I am conflicted. So I think, OK. I’ll go outside, and be that rubber-necking gawking asshole.

Turns out there were a lot of other rubber-necking gawking assholes gathered on my street because they had evacuated some of the buildings in the area. Apparently there was an accident at the construction site for the new Trump “Hotel/Condominium” on Spring and Varick. It’s not totally clear what happened, but sounds like scaffolding fell, wet concrete and debris fell and hit nearby buildings, the 42nd floor collapsed into the 41st floor, and one construction fell to his death. It’s bad. That Trump Tower has been a huge controversy mostly because Trump is a total dick and really sleazed out on this project. It’s a huge tower that’s going up and he had to finagle the zoning in order to do it. Is it a hotel? Is it a condo? Who can be sure!

According to NY Times: Owners will be permitted to live in those apartments for 120 days out of the year, or 29 days out of any consecutive 36 days; when not living there, owners will be able to rent out their apartments.

Ha ha ha, he is not fooling anyone, except I guess for the city officials who let them do this garbage.

Trump had problems with the area being landmark so they are racing to finish the project before the courts decide on it. This means accidents happen. The whole thing is sketchy. But more importantly, IT IS UGLY. Like fine, if you’re gonna be a dick, at least make it cool. But you know, it’s Trump. I remember watching an MTV Cribs (best show ever) with Trump and it totally blew my mind how ugly the whole thing was. I’m like this is a joke, right? LIFE-SIZE CERAMIC TIGERS. That’s all I have to say.