Hi, weirdos.

You guys know that when I call you weirdos I mean it in the most affectionate way, right? As in, you crazy weirdos who care about me, don't you know you should be off reading Salon or Mother Jones or anything more educational and enlightening than this dumb blog? That's all I mean. I don't mean it in a pejorative sense. I don't even think of "weird" as an insult. All the best people are weird.

Anyway, I thought I'd just get down a boring, fourth-wall breaking sort of hello post, because I've gotten a few nudges over the past few days from friends online and off, making sure I'm okay. I'm totes okay. And I feel more than a little bit guilty that the cut-vein-bleed-all-over-page sort of posts I occasionally write make people worry. I'm not sure how to handle that. If I should stop writing those sorts of posts, or if I should just try to make a better effort towards staying in touch with this space, or IG/Twitter or whatever, so people don't get anxious when I'm silent for days at a time. I don't mean to be a drama queen or an attention whore, though I can see how it would look that way.

I've had a pretty good week, actually. I've been in a much more positive and calm space than I've inhabited in months. A sort of transitional space, I think.

On Friday I went and listened to some trance music, which was even more fun than I'd hoped it would be. That afternoon I'd made a very difficult phone call that I'd been putting off, and it was kind of stressful for me. As in, my hands were shaking when I hung up. So after that I wanted to blow off some steam. Not even that, really - that's a bad way to put it. I wanted to check out for a little while. And I felt like I deserved to, after that phone call. So I ate some mushrooms and went trancing. I got there way too early and was way, way too high too soon, so there was some comedy with that. Near-empty dance floor, scattered pairs of (mostly male) kids, and yr blogmistress, trying to stay upright and anonymous, off to the side by the speakers. Eventually the club filled up enough to where I could close my eyes and just float away in my head. Every so often someone would tap me on the shoulder, wanting to dance or talk to me or whatever, which, if you've ever gone trancing, you know is incredibly annoying. At one point I felt someone tug my shirt and I opened my eyes to see a teenaged boy holding his iPhone up to my face, with "I think you're cute" typed on the notepad. He could not have been more than nineteen years old.

I put my hand on heart, tilted my head, and made an Awww face that I knew would give me away for much, much older than him. Then I cupped my hand against his ear and said as kindly as I could, "That's very sweet, thank you. But you can tell I'm pretty dialed in, right?" He nodded, chastised. I asked him his name, told him mine, and shook his hand. Then I explained that I was just here for the music, but that he should have a good night. By the time we were done speaking, the poor kid looked like he just wanted to flee. A lecture from mom was not what he'd been expecting.

The visuals were incredible. There was a beautiful garden, that was the main thing. And some kind of crazy tribal dance thing going on - very sexual. All these dancers, positioned around me, dancing for me. Very bizarre. When the lights started, it was all over. Crazy, pulsing geometrical patterns that looked like...sound. It's hard to explain. I was smiling and laughing, my eyes completely shut, a total outsider in a crowd of micro dress-wearing twenty-somethings. Okay, I exaggerate slightly. There were some older people. But not many. Anyway, it was fantastic. Every so often I'd take a break and go downstairs, where there's a smaller room with another DJ, and couches lining the walls. I'd sit for a while, catching my breath, taking it all in. Some kid in head-to-toe neon came up to me while I was curled up in the corner and asked if I was okay. "I'm great," I smiled, and looked at him as levelly as I could. I knew I looked high as hell and that he'd probably seen me dancing alone upstairs.

"You look like you're having an amazing time," he laughed. "I just wanted to make sure."

Mushrooms do crazy, crazy things to the passage of time. They make tiny folds in it, so that a five minute period can feel like five seconds. Or they'll take long, slow drinks of it, sucking all the minutes out of an hour and then spitting them back out all at once. It's incredibly disorienting, but not in an uncomfortable or scary way. There's also some of that with, like, my spatial awareness. I'll just blank out for a few seconds at a time, and "come to" again, and it takes a moment to realize where - and when - I am. Like waking up from a dream, only you lose track of which is dreaming and which is waking.

I stayed until a little bit after two am, then walked the four blocks back to my apartment, feeling amazing: uplifted, independent, free, happy, optimistic. And no crash the next day - that's the best part of shrooms.

So that was Friday.

On Saturday I felt like walking around outside, in a crowd, so I took the bus to Glendale and just wandered around The Americana for a couple of hours. I tried on $1000 dresses in Barney's, just for fun, and ate an overpriced and under filled prosciutto and mozzarella sandwich for lunch. The cashier who sold me the sandwich and I had a three minute conversation about what flavor of San Pelegrino is the best. I was excited to be trying grapefruit for the first time that day, and he was promising me it would be my new favorite, even over lemon. He was kind of cute, so after I finished eating, I sort of lingered around the counter hoping he'd pop back out from the kitchen and see what I'd thought of it. But he didn't. Instead, another employee who didn't speak English very well asked me if I needed anything else. When I tried to tell him to tell the other cashier that he was right about the grapefruit, he just looked at me blankly. "Never mind," I said, and left.

I tried on some Chanel frames at an eyeglasses store, then went back later to try them on again, then went back a third time. I took a picture of them in my hand to post to Instagram, but when I saw the state of my fingernails I realized I couldn't post it. Instead I asked an employee if she would mind cleaning the lenses for me. She frowned and stared at the frames I was holding. "Well, you do know you'd replace the lenses, right? With your own prescription?"

"Yes," I explained. "But I'd like to see how they look without smudges, before I buy them. They're kind of expensive, you know?" She didn't say anything, but she took them from me and wiped them down with a rag behind the counter. I didn't buy them, but I can't stop thinking about them. Instead I bought a pair of baggy, roll-up khakis on sale at Free People, which was very exciting for me, because they are exactly what I've been looking for. I also really, really wanted to buy these, but I resisted. I have decided that women's underwear is some of the most ridiculous stuff on the planet. I plan on writing a post about it.

I missed my bus on the way back, and had a half an hour wait for the next one. My phone battery was nearly dead, and I sat on the bench watching the power percentage drop down to single digits, listening to music and scrolling quickly through Instagram. A guy I drunkenly gave my phone number to at Coachella texted to see if I was free that night, as he'd be downtown to see some band. I lied and said I had plans, and my screen blanked out before I could read his reply. I had a forty-five minute ride back home, and pretty much crashed after walking Chaucer.

That was Saturday.

On Sunday night I went out to Hollywood with friends. And met someone. With whom I have a date tomorrow. Oh boy, I can hear the squeals of excitement pouring forth from all quarters. SETTLE DOWN, PEOPLE.

I suppose I should back up and tell that story, because that's been The Most Interesting Thing of The Week - and I will, but Chaucer needs a walk, so gimme a bit and I'll come back and finish, because cliffhanger posts are dumb and annoying.