monday august 20 2001    |    3:33 a.m.

it's late. i slept too much. lucky charms are good. what's new:

the show last night was fabulous. life is beautiful, a big square mediterranean-style courtyard with an elaborate fountain and frogs and shrubbery. around the courtyard are the hiphop room / art gallery, the indie room / dance floor, and the bar. très chic.

the bands played late, once the miami indie mafia (as vic likes to call it) had assembled gingerly around the foliage and stagnant water of the courtyard. the baby robots played first: off to a weak start, eventually built up to something like a cross between unwound and lit trying hard to rip off bob pollard. hmm.

and then argentina curled over their instruments and wow. if it weren't for the dubious acoustics, live music should always happen outdoors. they played "national anthem" and it was hard not to ford the little channels of the fountain to get next to them and just jump for joy. instead i clutched my tiny plastic cup of well bourbon and coke, looked up at the sky every now and again to frame the moment.

papo was ready to bail as soon as the band was done playing -- he'd figured that's all he'd have to humor me through. but there was a dance floor still unexplored and a bar potentially left untapped and bandmembers walking around and ed taking down equipment and all these put-together miami mod kids to watch... how could i leave? vic was nice enough to agree to take me instead, so we hung out for a long while still and then made our way back home through utterly deserted streets (like he said, too far from the water to be bumpin') listening to galaxie 500.

it doesn't get much better than that.

i might stay home and clean the house tomorrow. i vacuumed tonight, but couldn't bring myself to tackle mopping or the wreck i call my room. also, the résumé-sending blitzkrieg needs to begin now. i did a few rudimentary calculations earlier, and at the rate i'm going, i will NEVER leave the parental home to do my own thing. so. i need to get in gear.

apparently -- amazingly! -- some kind and thoughtful soul has bought two albums from my wishlist. this is almost too good to be true: after the initial excitement -- presents! -- i figured that, with my luck, it was probably someone just checking the thing out, liking it, and deciding to buy the albums for himself. but you never know, right? i can't help but be just a little excited...

all right. now to wrap up jules' package.