2004-06-28 - 11:48 a.m.

i should have gone to the mermaid parade on saturday, but i really wanted to catch up on painting. a called me later to tell me what a wonderful time she'd had at coney island. f called and invited me to go hear her roommate's band. i find their faux-hank-williams-sr vibe pretty depressing, but f has a car and i had to put little effort into showing up. the band in question was actually much better than last time, but the group that followed them i found unwatchable. they were called 'naked idiot' and their name was the most clever thing about the act.

some of f's workmates had shown up and we collected them back to a bar in williamsburg. i realised in time that they'd spent all day at the beach with my exboyfriend. i was relieved to find i didn't mind talking about him too much, especially since they were just bitching about him.

i haven't been to pride in new york since i first moved here, so i was excited when tank invited me to a champagne brunch before the parade. we gathered at tank's new apartment and lazily caught the JMZ train over to a luscious spread in chelsea. the view from the roof was luscious, but the party never really cohered for me. i was a tiny bit relieved when the plan shifted to cocktails on the west side highway. i drank something called 'love in idleness' which put me in the right frame of mind. salmon and i chatted about books while tank and his beau discussed megapixels. pixietart called in shortly and we met up with her for a bit of the parade route along christopher street. after a final round of drinks at sweet and vicious in soho, and having walked the better part of lower manhattan, we split into groups of boys and girls. salmon, pixietart and i grabbed a cab back to brooklyn in search of fish tacos.

i invited the girls back to my pad for smokeables, and they talked me into a jaunt on the rooftop. i'm embarrassed to admit that i have not been to the roof of this building, despite having lived here for more than six months. we climbed the four flights of stairs just as the sun was slipping behind the second tower of the williamsburg bridge. snapping photos and waving aside cigarette smoke, pixie announced to us 'i am so happy right now'. i was forced to agree.