Daydream of waitress

"I can't come into work today, I've got bad allegeries and my head is killing me,"

It would be perfect.

Holding onto his waist and leaning into the curves. My ponytail hanging outside the helmet, dancing in the wind. The strings from my cut-off jeans shorts whipping, tickling my thighs. The sun blaring on my shoulders. I squeeze tighter and chuckle when he drops gears and pushes the speed limit.

Drinking cold beer after a dip in the lake. A slow dance while he hums a tune from The Band or Bob Dylan. Ringing the water out of my hair. Wearing the musky, flannel shirt that was stowed away in the saddle bag. Goosebumps the whole way home.

7 minutes of being 23
Analytical Separations
Solvent Extractions
Gas Chromatography
High Performance Liquid Chromatography
large redeye
blueberry bagel
dEUS, "worst case scenario"

That's me. I remember dancing on the pool table. I don't remember being slouched over on the side of the pool table. And I don't know which happened first. You can read Grayson Currin's review of the last night of King's at www.indyweek.com (Image taken by Derek Anderson)

I miss King's


My birthday is on Friday and I have no where to celebrate. Well, there are plenty of places I could go. There is the Jackpot- not my crowd on the weekends, somewhere on Gleenwood Avenue- too fake, the Alibi- almost like the Jackpot but in a basement, Slim's- too smokey. I could list many more bars or clubs and I would find sufficient reasons to rule them all out because the only place I want to go to is King's. I want to dance and thrash my body to rock n' roll. I want the bartenders to tell me happy birthday. I want to drink one too many PBRs and wash my hands with terribly cold water. I want to chat with Mike D or Dave. I want to run into people and talk about music. I want to feel at home. I want my King's back- that's all I want for my birthday.

NOW
I am cranky and frustrated, and leaning towards extravagant. I want to take my blog title and have it plastered on a towering brick wall, construct a water balloon sling, and decorate. Paint-filled balloons would burst on impact and add a bit of artistic, stress relieving flare- chartreuse, electric blue, deep teal, pale pink, faded yellow, vintage orange, perhaps a light latte.

But rather, I will dive into the box of mail and search for new music.

confessions of a dj

record sales are down, file sharing is rampant, the future of internet radio is bleak, my favorite local music venue has closed--- lord please let me have a future in the music and radio industry, i really don't want to have to use my chemistry degree [insert sounds of frustration with quantitative chemical analysis lab]

This is an assignment I had to do for my English 315 class (Advanced News Article Writing). The assignment was to describe the brickyard, a central area on campus.

Kelly Reid

ENG 315 Reavis

3/1/07

It’s ten past nine o’clock and my cowboy boots are soaked. My feet feel cold and heavy inside the wet leather, but they still move. I can’t stop myself from dancing to the music. Bombadil is playing a toned down set in the breezeway of Harleson Hall. Their charming, honest folk music tries to warm the cold air but the fierce rain fights back with gusts of damp, chilled wind. It’s the last night of Shack-A-Thon and a thunderstorm has left this area of campus deserted, except for three musicians and audience of four.

Hours earlier the middle of North Carolina State’s campus was bustling with students. The large brick lain field sprawls out almost 75 feet in every direction from the center and is the plaza of central campus. This week eleven student organizations have built shacks in the middle of the brickyard to raise money and awareness for Habitat for Humanity. The shacks are in four rows; assembled like a village with brick allies running between each row. Most of the shacks resemble traditional houses, but there are two that stand out: a tee-pee and a giant rectangular prism that looks like a radio.

Two students from each organization are required to be at their hand-built, temporary housing 24 hours a day for five days straight, which entails spending the night. Three nights ago I suffered through a long night inside the radio. My dog and I spent the night in the shack for WKNC. I went to sleep on top of a four-foot long mattress with my pillow and quilt. I awoke with a backache and the cheek of my face planted on the cold bricks.

Thunder rumbles and the last notes of “Jellybean Wine” chime from the xylophone. The rain is pouring from the sky and small creeks run through the brick allies of the shack village. I clap my hands and cheer, lighting flashes. I turn to my buddy Nick,

“You ready to go see Valient Thorr?” I ask. He looks at the brickyard. Our cars are parked on Hillsbourgh Street- at the top of the hill, on the other side of the library, past the brickyard.

“Yeah, let’s do it,” hey says. We roll up our jeans, pull our jackets over our heads, and make a dash for our cars. The water has made the bricks slick. Running up the brickyard the toes of my boots cut into the streams of water and I can feel the cold liquid leak through the stitching of my boots.