feeling very good tonight. I had dinner with cj where the restaurant was cute and loud. trendy la. at our table…nothing but real talk, no judgment, all love. and that caramel sauce.

two funny things today:

1. I decided to extend my arm out over the balcony railing while holding a peanut in hopes of a crow landing and perching on my forearm. there were three of them in the tree nearby watching me; they all know me and have been eating my food every day for years. it’s about time they repay me with some urban wildlife glory. nobody landed on me. and a neighbor was watching.

2. I was in an hour-long meeting today (cameras off)…i was talking, making announcements, and answering questions. but i noticed people were acting very cold towards me and not responding to anything I was saying and someone even cut me off and said “let’s move on.” i wasn’t on mute and nobody indicated that they couldn’t hear me. after the meeting I noticed a pop-up buried under other windows saying my mic wasn’t working and to use a different device. haha for a whole hour.

in other news, I got a “no front plate on bumper” ticket today. thinking about the time I had to go to the chp department to prove I had fixed it on my old wrx. the officer walked outside and took a quick glance and then signed off on it. Little did he know that it was just taped on.

12:37 am.

i’m back to playing games. don’t hate.

I used to play wordle and the other new york times word games (on the app) every single day for years. the crossword and the spelling bee game kept me occupied for hours. they are what kept me distracted when I sat by eddie’s side through hundreds of cycles of chemo and immunotherapy and during long days and nights of waiting for him to get out of radiation and surgery. years and years. i stopped playing all of them a couple of days before he passed.

one of my favorite things that we used to do was cook dinner and watch jeopardy!. we did that most evenings for a long time. he used to tell everyone that i’m a jeopardy genius—I’m not, he was just really bad at it haha. I stopped watching the show after he passed.

we used to go to the eighty two barcade almost every single night to play street fighter. he was labeled a “world-class guile” and he loved “killing fools”. we stopped going after he got sick. but we still played at home on the ps4 until he was unable to. today was the first time I powered up the ps4 in more than two years. deweysanchez11 was still logged in. it made me sad.

I played wordle, watched jeopardy!, and played street fighter today. after getting past all the weird or sad feelings, sensory reminders, and memories—I had fun and I could do it and I’m pretty sure that is what he would want for me.

isn’t that how all of my healing and grieving has been going though? sadness followed by radness. this is the weirdest experience of my life. but i’m so grateful for all of it: the haze, the mess, the selfishness, impulsivity; the laughter, recovery, reconnection, and possibility. You.

I love and I love.

1:14 am.

I had forgotten about all the thank you cards that I wanted to write. this is a task that I thought I could have completed by the end of november 2024. then I extended the deadline to new year’s eve. but here we are. it is not an easy job—I’m trying to write real good messages to people who loved eddie, who showed me and the family love and support, and who mean everything to me while I continue on this healing journey.

I went to the hotel lobby bar to write some cards. I can’t tell you which hotel but there are two trees involved. I sipped wine and got through a couple and then tried to write the hardest one—for eddie’s assistant/mentee/work little brother. it wasn’t easy…very emotional; and you are not allowed to cry in nice bars. The man in the suit will ask you to leave.

shawanna came and met me for a round of drinks. she made me laugh. and within the span of an hour I cried, I laughed, and then I cried because I was laughing so hard. life rules.

12:21 am.

I haven’t been sleeping on life. times are being had. twice—déjà vu.

I hope you had a good weekend. i’ve been feeling the love, which has always been what fuels me through the fog of grief and the beautiful madness of life. and this love came to me over the weekend in many forms: fried zucchini, bad texts, rad texts, neighbor visits, snot stickers, dumpling brunch, ear plugs, costco milk, kisses, and hugs. I loved it all.

10:33 pm.

i didn’t drink any coffee or espresso today. But I had multiple matcha lattes. Lotta lattes. Muchas matchas, etc. I fell asleep after dinner.

my neighbor treated me to sushi. Dinner was his idea. Sushi was my idea. Turns out he doesn’t eat raw fish. He also doesn’t eat ramen. Dude is living in the wrong neighborhood (little Tokyo). I learned a lot of interesting things about him though. Motorcycle accident. Jail. Meth. Everybody in the world has interesting things to share about themselves. Even me. problem is, who’s interested in hearing about them?

While scrolling on ig I discovered that skip and Martha engblom lost everything in the Eaton fire. Skip founded dogtown and Santa Monica airlines and is pretty legendary. eddie did the sound for the dogtown and z boys documentary (poster can be seen on my bedroom wall in the starlight photo I posted on January 13). We love dogtown and Sma around here.

one day after skating the Glendale Verdugo skatepark, eddie and I stopped for tacos and margaritas at la cabanita. An older gentleman approached us and complimented our t-shirts. I was wearing an sma natas tee (with panther) and eddie was wearing a blind Jason lee dodo skull shirt. Eddie recognized skip right away and They talked a bit about the documentary. He was very nice. Skip and Martha finished their meals and said goodbye to us and then they left. The server told us that they bought us another round of drinks. It was one of those rare, special chance meetings.

so many people need help after the fires right now. i’m not really going out there and gathering supplies or donating clothing or household items. but I am sending funds when I can. and also making purchases in which the proceeds benefit those who need them. I bought this (you should too):

10:23 pm.

A little bit of a hard time while cooking today. I used to put hot dogs in our spaghetti because eddie and I were big fans of young Sheldon. Well, I didn’t add any hot dogs today (because it was only for comedic effect) but many memories resurfaced. Told you dinner time is the hardest part of the day. In the end, the spaghetti was of course beautiful.

I plugged in the electric blanket so the bed is warm. Nobody else in the world loves their creature comforts more than I do. And I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world right now.

i never have to leave this apartment. Except on Friday I’m going to the dentist.

10:51 pm.