Category — Don't leave Multnomah County. Ever.

Okay, so my first trip alone in the city was not what you might call a “success”. In fact, you might call it an “embarrassing failure”.

Everything started out fine. I had on my new sweater, purchased with the advice of Melissa Lion, and a pretty top and uh, shoes and stuff ( I was trying to describe my outfit to paint you a word picture but I got bored halfway through – sorry) and a handful of quarters for the light rail thingy that only takes quarters or suzerains (SUZERAINS – say it to yourself, it’s fun!), so I felt confident and relaxed. The ride in took about two minutes and I walked up to the correct exit from the underground area but as I came out onto Van Ness everything went to shit.

It was totally dark and cars and crazy dudes were whizzing by and by me (respectively) and I got all turned around and confused.

So I consulted my iPhone Google Map Application and started walking in the direction it told me to, but no matter what I did, the little blue circle kept taking me back to Market St. IT WAS SO UPSETTING.

I finally had to call Dane and admit that I was lost. This made my feminist confidence whither up and die inside me. Also, I was on the verge of tears and I had to pee really, really bad. I hate having to pee – it just makes everything so much worse. Plus, I was getting really sweaty and I may have forgotten to put on deodorant. No deodorant in my new sweater I bought with Melissa Lion. Boo.

Finally, I made it to Dane’s office and I was supposed to call him so he could come down and let me in but the call kept failing and I almost threw the goddamn iPhone across the street where a bar was conveniently located – a bar I was now convinced would be my place of employment in my new life as The Lost Girl in An Unfamiliar New City Who Overcomes Many Obstacles By Being Really Plucky and Positive and Renovating the Bar and Saving it From Being Shut Down, Thereby Winning Over the Hearts of Her Crusty Mean Old Boss and His Patrons.

This movie will be called Home Alone 4 – Adventures in Babysitting in the City at Coyote Ugly: The Musical!

I’m sure my next venture out will be better. Right? RIGHT?

It’s not too late to become a shut in, is it?

I took a break. And OH MY GOD did I feel guilty about it every day. I was ever so worried you guys would think I didn’t love you (But I do….OH I DO….you should see the collage I made of my feelings for you – it’s magical and avante garde and rife with puffy pegasus stickers.)

I’m back now, though. The effexor seems to have leveled out and I feel fairly normal. I still have all of the anxiety but no more effexor fuxin’ side effects. The fall out however, has been tough. Instead of spending these last two weeks with our friends who have tried to invite us to things, I’ve spent the majority of the time under a blanket drinking endless cups of Good Earth tea and managing my heart palpitations. I watched a lot of bad tv (The Ghost Whisperer), worked out every day (while watching The Ghost Whisperer), and took a lot of baths (to get The Ghost Whisperer off of me). I said weird uncomfortable things to people who spoke to me at the dog park and became irrationally mad at any dog who wouldn’t play with ZZ.

I went back to the Dr. for a follow up visit and lady exam. She asked if I minded having a Physician’s Assistant from OHSU do it, you know, for practice. I said sure, because what else could I say? She was standing right there. Anyway, she was really pretty and we giggled a lot which sounds strange but wasn’t.

And now I’m packing and voting and we are planning on going to the Mercury’s election night party tomorrow night at The Doug Fir but I think Matt and Sue Davis are mad at me because we rudely canceled on them at the last minute for a dinner party a week or so ago which is something I never would do normally, but I am just not normal right now. I sincerely hope they’re not too angry because I plan on hugging them until it becomes really, really awkward and then maybe crying a little on their shoulders.

Have I mentioned I’m moving to SAN FRANCISCO?

On SATURDAY?

On Wednesday night I dragged my drug addled body out of the house and somehow made it to Backfence PDX.

I’m really glad I went because I won’t get many opportunities to see Melissa, Barb, Alison, Zoe, Intern Meagan™, or Intern Nathalie™ before we leave for SF. Dane went with me, because he is supportive and because he really likes those girls. And they like him. And now I feel sad, thinking about all of the friends we’ve made in the last year who we will probably NEVER SEE AGAIN.

Excuse me.

BOOHOOOHOO *Blows nose* BOOOHOOHOOO *shakes fist at “God” or whatever* BOOHOOHOOOOOO

Moving on….

The brightest, sparkliest, moment in my Backfence evening was getting to meet Beth Lisick who wrote Everybody into the Pool and Helping Me Help Myself. She was just terrific. And incredibly gracious to me – a shy, goofy, awkward, shiny haired stranger asking for her help in a new city (she lives in SF). Plus, I thought her jacket was super rad. I wanted to touch it. Well, fondle it. I wanted to caress it. KEEP IT TOGETHER KIALA.

Did I mention that I was sober at this thing? Well, I was. And it turned out just fine. Not, you know, awesome, but fine. And no hangzieties. The Effexor still makes me feel sedated so I’m not sure this really, truly qualifies as being sober, parfait.

Finally, last night, the stupid Effexor kept me from going to a fun thing at our friend Erik’s. (I am keeping a list of these offenses, Effexor, and when it gets to ten I am KICKING YOU TO THE CURB) Instead I stayed on the couch, not drinking wine, and watched Stylista on the CW. It was not as much fun as going over to Erik’s. Meh.

I reserved the moving truck yesterday. I can’t believe this is really happening.

And I am more than happy to answer them for you today.

By now you’ve all had over 24 hours to let the moving away news seep in (Melissa Lion has had a little bit longer, but her path to acceptance is steep my friends – much like the hills in San Francisco as was pointed out to me by my friend Ned Lannamann) and I imagine you’ve got some simmering resentment, curiosity, and bewilderment in your stockpots of love or whatever.

So ask away – throw your questions into the pot and I’ll bring them to a roiling boil!

Relocation Specialist Kiala™ is here for you.

(Oh! And yes, the blog is coming with me. You people are all I HAVE. Well, you guys and the Effexor. More on the Effexor tomorrow.)

Dane and I are moving to San Francisco.

Some of you already know about this via the Twitter and some emails and, I don’t know, the carrier pigeons I had my Seneschal send out last week.

Sorry. In my grief over the puddy we’ve been overdosing on The Tudors. It comforts me. All that velvet and leather and mother of pearl and boots and the political, courtly intrigue! It’s exactly how I imagine San Francisco to be. I’m right, right? With the velvet, etc?

So yes, we are moving to San Francisco in less than one month and I am FREAKING OUT. We had to break our lease here (expensive) and I don’t know if you know, but the rents in SF are not like the cute little ones we have here in Portland. Instead of being filled with magical bunnies and puppies and kittens, the rents in SF are made out of whatever the opposite of that is. Cholera, maybe.

And don’t give me any of that you could move to Oakland and commute into the city business. I know there are parts of Oakland that are great. Not for me. If I’m moving to San Francisco, I’M MOVING TO GODDAMN FOGGY DIRTY SAN FRANCISCO.

I want to ride a cable car (a real one and not one of these Fisher Price trains we have here), and eat rice a roni, and get mugged and die in an earthquake. I WANT TO HAVE IT ALL.

Also, I’m going on anti-depressants. Whee! And I have high blood pressure. WHEE-ER!

It really, truly seems like the universe is compelling me to make MORE serious life changes and do LESS relaxing. Don’t you agree?

We finally watched The Hills season premiere last night and I would very much like someone to tell me what happened to the other 27 minutes of the episode? Because what we watched? About five minutes of rehashing the same Audrina/Lauren/Lo love triangle and Spencer being a hungover douchetroll.

Oh, and Lauren went on a date with a talking set of dentures.

Did anything else happen?

Next week’s episode had better be um, I don’t know…MORE.

*Also, I still stand firm regarding my stance on healthy food blogging other than Couch Cubicle (Arielle gets a pass because she knows the difference between their and there and she is irreverently funny).

First, some business.

Win a date with Superfan Erica! Click here. Cliiiiickkkk. Do it.

Next, I’ve been reading Updike’s Rabbit is Rich (well re-reading…sort of….I never finished it before due to a lot of pressing divorce issues, such as getting one) and boy does he nail the kind of spoiled, backward, insular, non-sensical thinking of young Portland people.

Nelson Angstrom, Rabbit’s prodigal son who does indeed return home from Kent State in a fit of anti-establishment angst and passive aggressive mewling, embodies every single hypocritical east sidecentric, anti-revitalization, the rents are too high for me to continue making my art in my garage while I work part time at Floyd’s person in this town.

“I hate ticky tacky apartments and condos. I hate crummy old inner-city blocks getting all revitalized with swish little stores…it all reminds me of Kent. I came back here to get away from all that stuff. Somebody like Slim acts so counter-culture sniffing coke and taking mesc and all that, you know what he does for a living? He’s a biller for Diamond County Light and Power, he stuffs envelopes and is going to be Head Stuffer if he keeps at it for ten more years. How’s that for Establishment?”

I know, kiddo. It’s confusing when you don’t want to become the thing you hate but you also don’t want to be the thing you are. But jesus, please – stop wanting to keep Portland dirty and broken just so you don’t have to grow up.

I may have had fourteen margaritas prior to this outing. Megan may have had fifteen which actually is NOT why she ended up gunning her car onto the grass and then back onto the raceway. That happened because she is awesome.

Justin took these pictures – I think while driving his car at speeds upwards of one million miles per hour. He’s like the paparazzi. Or magic.

Last night was so weird that by the time we made it out of the movie screening around 8:45 and over to BJ’s Bar and Kill Grill (or whatever), I was what a medical professional might have described as hysterical. The movie was honestly so bad, it was incomprehensible, and the guy running the screening was a little miffed at me because we showed up at like 2 minutes to 7 which is rude, I guess. But I’m SORRY. It’s not like I was late and MY GOD THAT MAN SHOULD HAVE BEEN APOLOGIZING TO ME. In fact, he should have rubbed my feet and brought me figs and iced tea while he was apologizing because the movie was so god awful. It was offensively horrible. I think that movie gave me PTSD. For real.

Anyway, I was in a real state, as my grandmother would have said, when Justin and Megan picked us up outside the theater and by the time we pulled up to the bar/shack/future place where our dead bodies would be found, seeing this on the bumper of someone’s SUV DID NOT HELP.

So the place was a little smaller than our bedroom and this was the KJ. On the serious. He actually turned out to be really, really nice.

Clackamas KJs: A breed apart

And here is me singing Cuts Like a Knife. I love Bryan Adams.

I pretty much cleared the room. All three feet of it.

Kiala: It feels so right

Makers and Diet Coke: A Portrait

And here is where I prove my love to you, my Frookies (thanks Crissy!), by posting this picture of myself where I look like a man in drag because the woman (?) behind me is so FUCKING AWESOME with that lighter. Right?

Two inches closer and it all could have gone horribly, horribly wrong.

And then Dane sang some Tenacious D (Tribute). It pretty much ruled.

Dane: Ruling. Pretty Much.

Megan agreed with the ruling. And Justin was distraught at the thought of following him. So he didn’t. Everyone understood.

Emotions. So many of them all at once.

And here you will see two ladies dancing. You’ll note how different this looks in comparison to when orange girls in tight jeans dance together.

Ladies love to dance. Not just the orange ones.

I don’t know what else to say about last night, other than that BJ’s was either the best or the most worstest ( I KNOW THAT IS WRONG) place I’ve ever been.

And now I need to nurse my mild hangover with eight diet cokes and some sushi.

Good Day!