Jax quit.  She’s gone.  Gone without a word.  Without a trace.  I heard it from some random bitchass new kid @ the front desk, someone who doesn’t even KNOW my Jax.  I nearly punched her in the neck and then ran to the breakroom, sobbing like a bitch.

Ohhh, Jax… where have you gone?  When did you leave?  Why did you do this and why the fuck didn’t I get promoted before you quit?  Oh, sorry… scratch that last part.  But damn you!  DAMN! YOU!  Do you realize how less fun that place is gonna be now that you’re gone?  Who will make sure the staff is having a good time?  Who will add some spice and attitude to the stuffy executive offices?  Who will I run crying to when GayJay transfers me to the Overnight Housekeeping Dept?    I’ll miss you, buddy.  Miss you very much up in here, up in here.  Even though I didn’t get to see you much, it will seriously not be the same at all without you around.  I know you’re on to bigger and better things, I won’t even bother wishing you luck b/c I know you’ll be amazing no matter what else you end up trying your hand at.  I only pray that Adolph & Johnson don’t end up firing everyone and turning this place into “The Four Seasons” (cuz you know they sure as hell want to).  Kinda scary.

I’m going to make it my priority to preserve the memory of Jax.  I’m setting up a shrine in the lobby, full of pictures and collages and bits of random shit from her desk.  There will be stories told of her, so that everybody knows about the cool girl who ran the show; we’ll light votives and sing acapella renditions of “Candle In the Wind.”  I shall hold the torch high and keep the homefires burning in her honor.  I plan to get pictures of all the handsome Hudson Bellstaff Boys with their shirts off for her, cuz she’s kind of obsessed with them and I want her to have happy memories… yeah, it’s uh, all for Jax…

So I got hit with this sickening BORED feeling last night around 10pm. I’d spent my entire day just chillin in my messy room, napping, and watching ZOOLANDER on a loop.  I was so damn bored.  So I hopped my ass on the ever-present A train and went to Times Sq. cuz I knew I’d find something to do there.  I wandered into the new McDonalds on 42nd St.  Have you ppl seen this shit?  I swear, there was a doorman and a velvet rope setup to get in!  It’s like this bigass pulsing industrial metal dungeon with modern lighting and sculptures everywhere, so blatantly hip and pretentious.  I was not prepared for the trendiness (I actually fixed my hair before walking in).  I’m not really a Mickey D’s person, I’m way more into Arby’s.  But ever since the location @ w.4th Street closed and got replaced with Wendy’s (damn that girl!), I’ve been open to new things… I think I’ll frequent this new McDonald’s from now on.  If for nothing else than having a place to go sit at and ppl-watch.

COLDPLAY got nominated for 2 Grammy’s this year!  Woo-hoo!  One for Best Alternative Album and one for Best Rock Performance By Duo/Group for “In My Place” (which I have put back to play on my homepage, in honor of this).  These guys are seriously my favorite band in the world.  GorgeousRoommate and I are going to see them next month (I’m actually stepping foot into Camden, NJ, which shows just how deep my love is)!  All of the nominees this year are exciting, I can’t wait to see who gets what.

Oh, I have been told that GayJay would like to apologize to me for the whole scheduling fiasco… this was told to me by 2 OTHER managers who are not GayJay, so I have yet to get an actual, direct, one-on-one explaination.  But the general statement given to me is that he thought he’d already spoken to me about reasons for the changes and didn’t realize that he hadn’t done so (whatever).  Also, I was assured that the next new hire will be someone who will be taking this overnight shift off my hands.  I don’t know how much trust I put in that… we’ll see what we see.  There are some new front office managers on the scene: a seemingly nice but shady character whom I call Johnson (b/c he’s kind of a dick), and a really uptight German dictator who I will hence refer to as Adolph.  Both of them took an instant like towards me and they’ve talked me up nicely, I hear.  This is a GOOD THING and I’m really glad about it, it means I’m standing apart and my work ethic shows… but have to wonder how long they’ll like me, or what it is that I have to do in order for them to suddenly change their minds.  What if they expect me to switch my schedule comepletely and I say no, or what if they need me to start pulling 12hr shifts and I can’t do it?  They both strike me as very extreme and totalitarian, they’ve rubbed nearly everyone the wrong way.  Our last manager was let go b/c “he was a B+ player, but we need A-list ppl here @ Hudson.”  The Powers That Be have grown sick of our unconventional atmosphere and seem to be looking to take the hotel in a new, ugly direction.  Buckling up now…

In the meantime, can I be this guy?

I ended up catching the late late showing of Lord of the Rings: the Two Towers last night and I wish somebody has warned me about the gore and guts before I bought and began eating my greasy Chicken Finger/Curly Fries Combo… b/c I was so not ready.  Damn that scary little demon-like goblin with the bigass eyes!  And no, I don’t mean Elijah Wood (although….).  I swear, that thing freaked the shit out of me, I was horrified!  I kept my feet tucked into my seat for fear that it would pop out from under me and start shreiking and gnawing down on my leg.  Meanwhile, Sir Ian McKellan is the shit.  Seriously, I want to hangout with him.  I want him to be my grandpa and I want him to bring that magic staff everywhere we go, and the ultra-bright special effects white light too.  He can use it to smite all the passangers on the crowded Subway, beaming, and screaming “You! Shall! Not! Pass!”, knocking them out of way so we can get a good seat.  I’d really like that.  Also, I hear he’s a big old Mary… showed up @ last year’s Academy Awards with some little latin boytoy on his arm.  Gods & Monsters, much?  What a whore.  The man is 800 years old and he’s still workin’ it out.  I love it. 

So my teeth are killing me.  They bug me for a little bit every year, and every year I just ignore it and cry in bed until it goes away…  but I fear that a trip to the dentist is gonna be required.  Now that I have a job with insurance and benefits, I should go do this shit.  I’ve been to the dentist once in my life, i was 7 years old and I got 4 caps on my back teeth.  We were kinda lower-middle class and dentist trips were kind of expensive… I just never got in the habit of going.  Ugh, anyway.  I think I’m gonna have to go soon, my back teeth are throbbing and it’s like affecting my sleep.  I know it’s totally b/c of all the sugar-soaked stuff I’ve spent the past few years consuming.  Stupid Spriteboy.

I had such an awful ride home on the train!  My teeth had been bugging me all night, I had a huge headache, I was exhausted all night @ work, and it had just been a really long shift.  Also, my cash drawer was short $46 and me and Dhalimu had to sit and recount it all and fill out forms and ugh, it was lame.  I was just really in the mood to get outta there.  I waited like 20 minutes for the train and when it finally came, the car I’d stepped into had no heating and I was freezing my ass off (which made my teeth chatter).  I’d been up for too long, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t get comfortable, my teeth ached, my head throbbed… it was hell.  Finally, we pull into my station and come to a stop.  I was nearly in tears, ready to run to my apartment and throw myself into bed.  Well, the subway doors didn’t open, we just moved right on to the next station.  I couldn’t fucking believe it.  I actually went on a ballistic rampage, tearing through each subway car, looking frantically for a subway conductor to yell at and beat.  Suddenly, I’d become one of those subway savages that I make fun of all the time for getting too worked up.  Ugh, it was an ugly scene and I was not doing well.  I’m so glad no one was around to see my sad little moment.

So, Jax, posted on my message board.  Turns out, she spoke with GayJay about his evildoings concerning my schedule.  I have yet to see him since their little chat (in which I’m sure she eviscerated him, cuz she’s like that), so I wonder if I’m gonna get the Evil Eye or something.  Ugh, Lord be with him.  My teeth are driving my insane and I’m in no mood to be berated.  When physical pain is your driving force of energy, you sort of become a force to be reckoned with.

** Big Big Love to my buddy Poly, who currently also knows the ugly, ugly evil of achy teeth.

I am very fascinated by Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal.  They’re kind of the new kids on the indie block, very young, very New York.  They were both in Donnie Darko, which is one of my new favorite B-movies of all time (although way too depressing to ever watch with anyone). This guy Jake is an incredible actor,  He’s basically my hero, he makes the best choices on roles and projects.  I see his work and it reminds me why I want to be an actor.. and then I realize that it’s been months and months since I worked on a single project and once again I’m Reality’s Bitch.  And Maggie?  She’s a cutie.  Getting alot of attention lately for that S&M comedy, Secretary, which I was just plain too sexually intimidated to go and see, but I heard great things about it though.  It was the Official Prize Winner @ Sundance and she’s becoming this huge It Girl.  They were both @ Hudson Cafeteria for lunch the other day and I actually crept my trifling ass into the kitchen just to get a better look.  I don’t know what it is, they’re interesting to watch.  I look forward to seeing more of them both… and if I have to begin stalking them, so be it.

I have way too much time on my hands.

I just read that Men’s Fitness magazine voted my hometown Houston, TX (the 4th largest city in the country) the nations Fattest City… for the 3rd year in a row.  You know what I say to that?  WHO CARES.

Texas is “The Friendly State.”  It’s a world of good ppl, good land, and good eating!  Steaks, chili, beef, spicy dishes, beers, iced teas, big hair, tight jeans, sexy accents… what’s not to like?  So I say, Wear your weight with pride, Texas!  Own your shit!  OWN! YOUR! SHIT!  Stay heavy and happy… and screw those skinny little yankees from the muscle magazine.  They couldn’t hogtie a heffer if their lives depended on it. 

The new entrance to the subway on 72nd Street? It’s glorious!!!  It’s HUGE and well-lit and kind of modern-looking, with all the exposed brick and glass cubes and metal rods.  I spent the majority of my college life using that entrance, and it has always been kind of dangerously constructed.  The stairwells were way too narrow and steep, bad lighting, not enough security, the doors were always broken.  Anyway, this new one is amazing.

My schedule goes back to semi-normal next week.  It was nothing but overnights for these past 14 days and now I’m back to just Tues/Wed overnights, which to be honest? isn’t that awful.  I was scared to death to do it at first, and fortunately, I’ve had to deal with some of the worst possible situations right away—that really took away a lot of the fear for me.  It’s like, Well, it can only get better from here.  So what do yu know?  The overnight shift has grown on me.  I like not having a bunch of managers there to breath down my neck, I like being left alone to take care of my work, I like being trusted to handle what goes on… who knew?  I’m not going to say this to anybody though, I think they should have asked me in the first place before scheduling me, but whatever.  I never did have a talk with GayJay, or with Jax.  I figured it was best to just tought it out and let them see that I can roll with teh punches.  I made the best of it and I’m finding something that resembles a rythym now, so I’m glad I didn’t bitch to anyone.  I am, however, gonna try to get my days off changed so that they’re not consecutive, five days in a row of angry ppl is getting to be too much.

The weather out there is ugly.  All clammy and sticky, I didn’t leave the apartment at all.  I watched the “Sorority Life” marathon on MTV today.  How sad am I?

Talked with my good buddy Lex (and no, she’s not a smoldering bald man in gay love with a Smallville farmboy) today and turns out, she’s losing her amazing rent-controlled apt.  I swear, it’s one of the coolest pads I’ve ever been to.  It’s a bigass terrace apt on Columbus Ave in the west 90’s, overlooking West Side and all its coffeehouse glory.  Her building’s got a doorman, a parking garage… it’s freakin cool as hell.  She pays practically NOTHING for it, too.  Normally this is the type of disaester I would rejoice at, b/c I’m a bitter little man who lives so damn far uptown and pays about twice as much as she does for my place.  But she’s such a cool girl who’s managed to escape the stigma of an Upper West Side Princess.  Plus, she always invites me to amazing parties and introduces me to her hot friends as her “cute, single, not-too-gay buddy Chris,” so I lament for her and her loss.  This is just a damn tragedy, the ultimate nightmare for any New Yorker.  I wish you luck, Lex.  Don’t lose heart.  We’ll find the bastard who’s stealing your lease and have him castrated.

It’s a new year.  2003.  It seems like we were all buzzed about that Y2K just last year, kind of.  Can’t believe it was actually three years ago.  Where’ve I been?  Still not sure.  Happy New Year. 

I rang in the new year with coworkers and lots and lots of music and noise and hugs.  Everybody went out afterwards, I had to stay and work the desk overnight—and the suckage was of extreme measures.  Work was complete and utter insanity, the parties were just spilling over with champagne and confetti and drunk busty blonde girls staggering around drunk, cheering, squealing, and puking their guts out.  Oh wait, that was just Britney.  No kids, I’m not kidding.  America’s Little Pop Princess blew chunks everywhere.  I must say, it was kind of surreal to watch.  She’s a lot shorter in person than I thought she’d be.  The housekeeping staff spent all night scraping that drunken whore’s vomit up off the lobby floor.  I fucking LOVE IT.

There is so much I want to tackle this year.  I’m turning 24 in May and I can’t even begin to explain the pressure I feel about it.  Just pressure from myself, b/c I’ve always identified my adult future by that age.  You’re not 25 yet, but yer way past 21 and it’s time to @ least have the gears for yer future in motion.  In many ways, I feel like I spent so much of 2002 being dormant and feeling motionless.  So, the theme of this new year is MOTION.  Activity.  For starters, I promised BJ I’d start cleaning up after myself better b/c I’ve progressively become this sloven little trainwreck.  BJ’s Cute Girlfriend holds her breath and runs straight into his room when entering the apt. now.  Seriously it’s just gotten too bad.  So, I will clean more, and do it regularly (I think).  I’m also gonna join a gym, get a dog, return phone calls, take better care of my teeth, spend less time in front of this damn computer, and go out dancing more. 

Two cute little Japanese ladies were checking out of the hotel this morning and asked me in their most broken english to take their picture.  They handed me a Sony Cybershot digital cam–just like mine!  I was thrilled beyond belief and pulled out mine, b/c I am endlessly amused by the dumbest shit.  They took my picture and I took theirs.  We were all so giddy!  Not much talking (you know, the whole language barrier thing factoring in) but we used lots of Charades-like movements.  They performed a synchopated interpretive dance and I employed the ancient art of Mime.  It was a happy, happy little moment and I am not ashamed.  Shut up, all of you.