15 november 1996

nov 15

there's friday meetings at minds, one of the things I tell the press I love most about this company;
that once a week, I get to hear and berate slightly the proceeds of the different departments, including finance fiscals sales and marketings
so that's fun; I learn stuff, I engage people, we observe the machinations of our familiars and our collective
today most people feel they last too long - two hours is too long. me, I moved we start them later. especially since thursday is a party night and handing out stickers and wearing an eminds t-shirt could be constituted as work, and since I arrive home at 1 or 2am, and then I have to take notes...
but most people do not feel engaged, and feel like they have a lot of work to do. I guess I like watching pathology on parade

like today, I raised an emphatic point of several weeks, that electric minds needs an inter office backup system. I raised this during eager paul's financial statement - "don't come to me with emergency items"

I was trying to stick one in under the rug
so he and I went back and forth, though I was trying to get the tech guy to answer to the lack of failure protection
finally he did, jim race said his equipment budget dried up over a month ago, he was in fact over budget and was waiting for more funding to buy more equipment
and I recited this moment of clarity from a week ago:
that if jim race had his shit together, had leadership in him, he would have pushed past budget restrictions to buy something that mission critical
cuz if any one of these machines goes down, takes uncopied e-mail, graphics, stories, organization with it
eminds is fucked
more fucked than a thousand or two dollars required to buy backups
the point was made and taken and proceeded
and the next report was jim's, technical report
he was waiting on some approval from paul
he let into paul "when am I going to know" "I need to know"
it was hard to sit through - it was mean retaliation

I worked through the afternoon
had a lot of eminds to do, world wide jam layout with mark
work I actually enjoyed, laying out my own first story especially

but I never had time to type in my notes from last night
this is like a job!
I'm too busy to work on my own shit!

humph.

yesterday I tried to think about my dad.

I stayed late to cover my butt and picked up by barbara late and taken to tapas on valencia
the yuppie lookin' joint next to ti couz
the two of them form a nice bank of privilege
every one looked so hip!
I was in a group of parker graduates and berkeley grad students

PhD candidates

studying shit like "history of consciousness"
a gay? black woman with body piercings
I sat next to her
she wasn't so forthcoming
some woman sat on my left and began querying her on my right
left wanted to connect with right, it seemed

l: I took a class with angela davis,

l: she convinced me that maybe we should have armed revolution!

r: that's nice!

right breaks out talking about astrology,
capricorn, proud is she of her lack of water
I could talk to her a teensy about female writers of the harlem renaissance since I did some of my homework for my HR class at swarthmore

later I discover left is from 90210, literally.
I refuse no one the right to armed revolution

over tapas?
and after dinner, as we are poised at the car preparing for some deep mission club
left is asking, "should I bring my purse?"

but then I have to carry my ID.

how much money should I bring?

you think 15 dollars is okay?

or should I bring 20?
jesus. some revolutionary.
I left both my coat and my backpack, yes even my notebook in the pathfinder

it seems grad students are well endowed
travelling, cars, expensive dinners
I didn't think I should want to write in this environ
I spent the time dancing among strangers
my friends came and went
they formed a circle for dancing, people strutted their stuff
an inebriated latino brokedanced, sort of, for us
I was inspired to achieve the center and shake my ass off

yeah.

eric, who's birthday it was
I raised a toast to him too,
and commenced a group photo

old incest,
sarah bassuk was there,
a baby face libra from the class above

utterly unexpected

and high power audrey, colin her first boyfriend
she's on her second israeli man of recent months
she must just tear through them.

they were kissin' and asqueezin' all throughout.

naomi, zany eric and audrey, and a blonde woman with stressed-out looking hair

group photo. see the happy group? see the large jpeg. happy birthday eric. happy group.

even marian host from atlanta was on hand
eric urged me to berkeley

if I'm worried about class size
he can help me get into grad level classes and seminars
and having a job at the same time is not a problem
most folks have a lot on go

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