I can't even begin to describe how much I hate waking up alone. This morning, I had tears in my eyes before they were even open. I had a sweet dream about someone I love and I expected to find him there when I woke up. Instead it was just an empty bed with overpriced sheets. Now I'm depressed and miserable and lonely and ...you get the idea. I also hate walking through airport arrival gates to find no one waiting there. Even if I know that there is no possibility that anyone will be there for me, I still scan all the faces searching for who knows who. Being single sucks sometimes. Today is one of them.

today I woke up alone and hung over. I turned on npr and heard something about a journalist disappearing in ukraine. they didn't get back to tell the story for another 45 minutes or so, and in that time I had woken up enough to figure out that if they just said "journalist," then that probably meant a ukrainian journalist. my first thought was that I didn't want it to be my friend who lives over there and writes for the wsj. but then I thought, what if it's katya gorchinskaya or alex barankevich or vitaly sych or viktor suvorov or anna kozmina or ruslan karpov? I turned on all three radios in my apartment so I could get ready while I listened to find out that it was no one I knew who was kidnapped, murdered, decapitated, and then had their body stolen from the morgue. ah, kiev. I don't miss it at all.

i spent a lot of time with my friend Bella.....she is from the Ukraine.....she was a junior commie back in the day, she detailed the "socialist ghettos" she grew up in. The hush ways back then (the 70s)....her loyal and status quo communist mother and her father considered borderline revolutionary and a town baffoon. she says now, the place has gone to shit. "who cares about freedom of speech if everyone is hungry" she says. She doesn't miss it either.

Cat. i know better than to attempt your consolation. just keep writing about it. there's more.

Cyst, that was my sister doing the report about the Ukrainian journalist. She got a grant to go over there to gather some story ideas and a week before she goes this journalist she was going to interview just disappears. I'm really happy that she's getting the exposure from the story, but I'm worried as hell that she'll get shot or something. Now that I hear the guy was decapitated and whatnot I'm REALLY glad she'll be heading back in a week!

hey. that's cool. why ukraine? I noticed she pronounces "kiev" the ukrainian way instead of the russian way. do you know who indoctrinated her? how long was she over there?

Not sure on the indoctrination, but she's fluent in Russian so I guess she's up on the local culture. She's quite aware of Ukrainian sensitivities about Russia. When she talks to locals she doesn't try to speak Russian first because she's afraid she'll offend somebody. I don't know why she picked the Ukraine, but she's always been interested in Russia and the former soviet republics. The cool thing is that the NPR Moscow correspondant just quit and she's applied for the position...

oh, that'd be cool, but, jesus, I'd hate to live in moscow. my boyfriend heard the npr thing and asked me why this american woman was pronouncing "kiev" as "kee-eev." I told him that she was probably an american or canadian ukrainian diaspora nationalist. how funny that I was discussing your sister this morning.

a friend says that the man had been complaining about harassment from the interior ministry for months before his disappearance. apparently prytula, the editor who identified the man's body, was his girlfriend. ------------------------ Ukraine Journalist's Body Said Found By SERGEI SHARGORODSKY The Associated Press KIEV, Ukraine (AP) - A beheaded body found in a forest was that of a missing opposition journalist who had criticized Ukraine's government, his colleagues said Thursday, but police said it was too early to say for sure. The journalist, 31-year-old Heorhiy Gongadze, went missing two months ago in the capital Kiev on his way home from work. He edited the Internet newsletter Ukrainska Pravda and had a program on the independent Radio Kontinent. Journalists and legislators said he had most likely been the victim of a politically motivated attack, and said his disappearance highlights threats to media freedom in Ukraine. Gongadze was an outspoken critic of the government and of alleged high-level corruption. He had complained to prosecutors about persecution by police. Ukrainska Pravda editor Olena Prytula said a group of journalists inspected a body found in a forest in the Bila Tserkva region Nov. 3. The body was badly disfigured by chemicals. Police experts described a bracelet, a ring and other items found on the body that corresponded to those usually worn by Gongadze, she said. The journalists wanted to bring the body to Kiev, but it was taken away, she said. ``I cannot explain why Heorhiy's body, found on Nov. 3, has been concealed from his relatives and friends,'' she said. Deputy Interior Minister Mykola Dzhiga said experts who initially examined the body could not identify it as that of Gongadze. Coroners will have the results of a more comprehensive examination in at least a week, he was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying. Until then, ``nobody can say for sure that this is Gongadze's body,'' Dzhiga said. Opposition media in Ukraine have complained that authorities have used tax penalties and court fines to silence critics. The government says its opponents claim harassment in order to account for their own professional and financial mistakes.

antigone -- a journalist friend of mine in ukraine would like to get in touch with your sister. can you give me her e-mail address? e-mail me. thanks.