Dream: Polka Dots

Last night I dreamt I encountered my ex and a friend who had turned into cats.

My ex was sporting a pair of Beckettian burlap pantaloons. Both of them had colored the tops of their heads and flanks with yellow and red polka dots. They were coming back from a Halloween parade.

Making small talk, I asked my ex, Were you the only…pets there?

As the words left my mouth I realized the term “pet” might be perceived as belittling but it was too late.

Subtitles with Chez Bryan Ong

There are people who like to sing.



And there are people who like to dance.



There are people who will do both, singing and dancing. There are people who like watching singing and dancing, but not together, as in a Broadway show.


There are forms of singing and dancing that have slipped out of style, past any hope of retro-revival, but not so far gone that anthropologists have begun looking into it.



I like things when they are half-way gone. I like the recording of a song.

Subtitles with Chez Bryan Ong

I don’t miss him. I just miss how often I used to laugh.



The problem was this: He didn’t know what he was a monument to.

Titles of my next two books

Walking around the new neighborhood. Came across this tiny restaurant and had some mediocre lamb soup noodles therein. A young white guy came in after me and started talking in Chinese to the clearly delighted shopowner. It was pretty simple stuff, but his tone was pretty good. There should be a phrase to describe the exquisite agony of observing a white person speak your mother tongue better than you do.



Another instance when Chinese comprehension would have been useful.



The interior proved equally mysterious.

So long, 37 Spring St