after the usual amount of wake up adjustment, i left the house to run errands. i returned my sister's library book, briefly stopping inside to see if i could find anything worthy of reading. i remember i use to go to the library and leave with armful of interesting books. nowadays, most visits don't bear fruit and i leave empty handed, my world further moving away from literacy.
next, i went to city paint on mass avenue on the border of cambridge and arlington. they're one of the few places around here that carry benjamin moore paints, and i went there to find out how much it's going to cost me. 
price: about $25/gallon, but this month benjamin moore is having a sale, $3 less for every gallon bought. that's good to know, but i think i'm going to need something like 10 gallons worth of paint, and that's just color. home depot will supply me with more primer and probably the ceiling paint (white is white, i don't need name brand for the ceilings). i bought a roll of rosen paper, and only later did i realize it was twice as expensive as home depot, and of an inferior quality.
at the house i covered up the rest of the floor with the pink paper. now the only place that's not covered is the bathroom, all 780 square feet minus that area. it's kind of surreal, the whole house decorated with pink floors, like some ultra-girly interior designing or maybe somebody spilled a tank of peptobismol. it's the worst in the kitchen, because the walls are also currently pink.
i moved up a few tables from downstairs, making sure to horseshoe the feet with soft padding so they don't scratch up the floor. 
i reassembled the cable setup in the living room, everything perched on top of a barstool, my temporary home entertainment system. i unpacked the two appliances my grandmother gave me, microwave and toaster oven. i played around with thm a little bit, reading the manuals, but i didn't cook anything. for lunch i had cereal after walking across the street to star market to by some milk (and a box of tissues and a carton of ginger ale).
my day was spent lazily at the house, occasionally doing some more clean up work (patching, sanding, vacuuming, the usual). sometimes i'd take a break, get something to drink, watch some television, walk around the empty house. 
i took a shower because i felt gross, afterwards feeling all refreshed as i walked around topless. i pulled some wires and got the ibook connected to the internet in the guest bedroom. an upright twin size mattress served as a windowshade, blocking the only window in the guest bedroom. i popped open the sofa chair mattress and laid down on it when i felt tired. i drifted to sleep, my first nap in the new place, downloading some songs via limewire, playing some tunes. the audio book of sun tzu's the art of war was playing softly on the ibook's small stereo speakers when i became unconscious. slowly the sun went down, afternoon became evening, the room changing from light to dark.
lying on the mattress on the floor of the guest bedroom of my house in the dark, it occurred to me just how free i am. i absolutely have no obligations. i haven't been this free since i was a little kid, and even then i wasn't that free because i was still a child and limited to what i can do because of my age. but now at the ripe old age of 28 years old, i am faced with inifinite possibilities. i mean, i can do anything i want, i have no job, i don't live with anyone, no girlfriend to take care of, no pets, no debts (other than my mortgage), and for the next few weeks my parents and sister are away so i don't even have any family to be concerned about. my employment benefit covers my mortgage, and what's left takes care of my bills. of course this will all end once my unemployment benefit runs out, but just for this brief moment in my life, i am experiencing an unbridled kind of freedom, and it's exhilarating! i can do whatever i want, go wherever i want, sleep as late or as early, there is nothing i can't do!
i woke up and had dinner, a tuna fish sandwich my mother had made me two days ago before she left. i washed it all down with a bottle of ibc rootbeer, drinking it by the open living room window, watching the stream of people carrying bags of star market groceries back to their homes. when i finished my rootbeer i left the house and returned to belmont.
although originally i wasn't planning on it, dan and i ended up going back to the coolidge corner theatre tonight for the midnight showing of master of the flying guillotine. 
"one ticket for that oriental movie," i said to the ticket counter guy, recognizing him from last night when i had asked for a bring it on ticket. one of the female ushers was dressed like a cheerleader, and another usher was wearing a plushy rabbit costume, standing behind the concession counter. 
dan and i ordered drinks, i couldn't help but to admire the attractive tattooed woman working the concessions. the movie was playing on their largest first floor screening room, a stage area more befitting of lavish broadway production plays than merely for the projection of simple movies. unlike bring it on or even the story of ricky, the theatre got filled, dan and i flanked on all sides by other movie patrons. i didn't think this film would generate such a large draw but i guess i was wrong.
master of the flying guillotine, made in 1974, is apparently the grand daddy of all spectacular kung fu films. it's about a blind priest who's also the emperor's assassin (the eponymous "master of the flying guillotine"), 
out to avenge the deaths of some of his disciples who were killed trying to assassinate the one armed boxer. the flying guillotine in question is this horrific device that's part frisbee, part beekeeper's hat, and part instant decapitator. the first time you see it in action your jaw will drop over how unbelievable it is. the movie's sort of shlocky and the production value could use some work (considering the time that it was made, i suppose it's not too bad, but the whole time i was watching the movie i kept on thinking how much this film deserves a remake with better special effects), but the violence is addictive (although i almost fell asleep during the very last battle) and the story is quite compelling. 
there's a definite xeophobic streak throughout the movie, all the bad guys (except for the blind priest) are non-chinese: japanese swordsman, indian yogi master, and thai kickboxer. a good part of the movie are scenes during a fighting tournament that's being held in the town, which plays out like a video game, two fantastically sounding opponents duking it out. part of the fun is watching the next round of fighting and seeing the next set of exotic fighters! and did i also mention the extremely infectious electronic music? i want that to be my intro music for the foreseeable future.