What is Amnesia Vertigo?

2004-06-20T23:39:00.000-07:00

Been working "alot" lately, enough to keep myself busy in between trips to Best Buy (got myself an iPod), and sleep. My bed here at home has given me some weird sleep problems. It doesn't really support my back enough, and my neck was so sore last night that I started to develop a sharp headache in the early morning. It sucks, so I'm working on configuring my bed to best last me while I'm here for the next... month.

I sent out about seven resumes today to different editing firms in the Los Angeles area. Most of them seemed of "entry level" or thereabouts, so I'm hoping I can land one of these positions that should be paying out 30-35 grand a year. I'll be a very happy camper if I get a phone call in the next two weeks regarding my resumes.

2004-06-15T22:02:00.000-07:00

I'm all moved back home, but there is still a ton of shit in my room that doesn't even belong to me. This spawned an argument between my mother and I, and even though we're on good terms now, I want to be out of here by the summer. There is just so much in this house that it is so unorganized that it is driving me up the wall. I still haven't been able to set up my computer yet because there isn't ANY free space in this house.

All this spawned a quasi-frantic (and semi-depressing) job search in the LA area. Sent a few resumes here, joined a few agencies there (monster, la times career finder), and I just hope that I can secure a job to come home to after I'm done with the Eurotrip.

I went to the Credit Union yesterday and opened a checking account, which was sort of a step into the "adult" world those speeches kept alluding to on Friday night. I also got a nifty check card for Europe. Went to Best Buy today and got myself the Aqua Teen Hunger Force DVDs along with Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 2. I'm going to go back on Friday and get myself an iPod once my Visa goes active on the check card.

Watched Harry Potter last night with Wes, Emily, and Amanda Stone. We're supposed to go see Prisoner sometime this week, but I haven't heard a damn thing, which tells me that I really am back in Redlands, ha.

The post-graduation pangs of nostalgia and depression are starting to wear off, despite how much I've tried to get myself sad over the whole deal. I mean, I was really broken up about it for the first day or so, but after that I realized that I had bigger things to worry about-- my damn passport hasn't come yet, I'll be unemployed with a degree (something you can apparently do a lot with... if it's your specialization when you go for some sort of Master's) by the end of July, and my checking account will dry up very quickly if I don't have some sort of job to keep funneling it paychecks.

"Real World", right. I watched that the other night. It still sucks.

2004-06-12T21:58:00.000-07:00

Graduation, if you let it, can be very depressing. That and if all your friends are staying behind for another year or two. But enough of that! I have pictures!

I love my dog!

Right before graduation, in the rose garden.

Back at the dorm, after the ceremony.

That's me, some black chick we picked off the street for the picture, and Will. JUST KIDDING! That's Amber in the middle, one of my best friends from Cal Poly. Will was my roommate second half of sophomore year and I got him to switch his major to English. Score one for the CLASS team, ha!

The C6 knows my mom makes a big deal out of these sorts of things...

Painfully ironic...

All better!

The other ones I look ugly with red faces, double chins, and the like, so that's all you get!

2004-06-10T23:19:00.000-07:00

Residents are finally moving out and it's a damn relief, except that it takes up my time. I should be cleaning up my room and getting it ready to leave on Monday, but I'm lazy and there's shit everywhere, and man, I just don't feel like starting yet. It should be relatively easy to pack up anyway. I just need to figure out where to store my English books. I haven't sold books back to the bookstore ever, heh.

Oh yes, of course. I graduate tomorrow! It should be fun. The family is coming down here around 4:30, and we'll be going to dinner, taking pictures and all that fun stuff. Afterward, I'm going out to have fun. I've been quite nervous lately about finding myself a stable job after graduation. I mean, I should be fine before I go to Europe, but when I get back, it's really time to get serious. If there's one thing I could do in my college career, it would be for me to apply to more grad schools, and do a little more research on job opportunities. I will be allowed to go to the career center over the summer, so I'll plan on coming in every once in a while for help finding jobs.

I also want to write more over the summer. In particular, work with Cory in developing his "Bluefields High" scripts, and working on my own opus story. I always have figured the best way to develop ideas is to get the basic plot outlined and have a solid ending set up. Well, I've got the plot just about hammered out, and I've been very happy with the ending I came up with. All I need to do now is to put it all into words. Hopefully, my degree will help me in that area.

There's a few things I want to get after graduation, gifts to myself: an iPod, the ATHF DVDs, and some clothing. If I let myself loose in Best Buy or Hollister, I could easily reach my credit card limit. Movies to look forward to this summer: Dodgeball (so I warmed up to it...), Fahrenheit 9/11 (liberal left at its best!), Spiderman 2, King Arthur, Anchorman, The Bourne Supremacy--oh shit, Europe after this! The Villiage will be long out by the time we get back...

I've rambled enough! Godspeed Cory (and MAtt)! We did it!

2004-06-01T17:58:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I've posted. Might as well get this thing updated before I turn 100.

The RA Evaluations are going around the upper management, and I've gotten consistent mediocre marks. I won't contest that. I've done a mediocre job this past quarter. To my credit, my interest in the job dropped drastically when they fired my friend and beloved (to both the staff and the residents) staff member. After that point, three of us on staff just stopped caring. The system is fucked, so we pretty much stopped caring. My door was no longer open for residents to say hi as they passed by (not like they did in the first place...). The only legitimate claim on my evaluation is that I didn't follow through with an effort to get to know my residents. I'll man up to that one. I'm one shy sonofabitch, and I told them that in my interview. I suppose I should go on with my sentiments that I don't care. But the fact of the matter is that I DO care. I care what people think about me. So the question is if I should make excuses for my lack of effort in this position, or shall I just bend over and take it?

To the flip side of that one, I'm graduating in about two weeks. That certainly is expected to be exciting, and it sure as hell makes up for the shit I'm putting up with right now as an RA. I woke up in a panic this morning, realizing that I wouldn't be seeing my friends I met her for a long time, if not at all. A slightly depressing though, and I do intend on keeping in touch, whether it be through AIM or what not, but the fleeting despair that I feel about leaving my buddies behind is really starting to get to me.

Speaking of friends, some of the C6 spent Saturday night hangin' and drinking. It was a good time, and I sure as hell enjoyed hanging out with life-long friends, in a group, again. It seems that through these past four years we have pretty much hung out over the summer, and sparse break times during the school season. We are THE Boys of Summer, and I truly feel like that song is our group's theme song, despite Justin's nomination for "Lovely Buch of Coconuts." While I don't indulge myself in the beverage drinking for our get-togethers, I'm constantly enthralled by the alocohol selection. I mean, it's just FUN to stare at bottles and bottles of booze. Certainly, before our group again disperses after the summer is over (and I know D is going to be spending lots of time in San Diego), I'd suggest we make a little field trip to a place known as BevMo, the Costco of liquor stores!

I'm also running a new internet browser called FireFox, and I highly suggest its use over Internet Explorer.

...and to think could have spent this time devoted to my would-be-joke-of-a-geography paper.

2004-05-11T14:32:00.000-07:00

Cool. Blogger has a new format. "Dashboard." I salute you, blogger. *salutes*

Pai Mei would be proud of me. I just ate a whole bowl of Chinese food with chopsticks. Took me long enough to learn. Now only if I could break through wood that lies two inches from my fist...

2004-05-05T21:27:00.000-07:00

FATkins Diet

2004-04-29T22:58:00.000-07:00

There are these big tinted windows by the writing center. Whenever I walk by them, I glance in their direction to make sure my stature isn't all hunched over. It was by this off-chance of glancing in the windows that I noticed I've got a big butt. Not like a big ghetto ass. Just a round guy's ass. I dunno. Anyway, I made my observation in front of two male friends of mine, who started laughing. I later brought this up with one of the clericals, and she confirmed that I had a nice big butt. She didn't say it was necessarily a bad thing (she is black herself) because a guy with a butt is better than a guy with no butt. I wonder if mom had a romp with a talldarkandhandsome man before she met ol' pops.

I'm becoming dependant on my glasses. Whenever I take them off, my vision warps, and my eyes hurt. People seem to like them, though. Gucci designer frames, bitch.

2004-04-29T20:30:00.000-07:00

Those new Burger King commercials crack me up.

2004-04-28T00:01:00.000-07:00

When it becomes available, I'm getting a GMail account with Google. That shit looks hard core.

I went bowling tonight and played six games... my longest set ever. Worked on my hook throw and managed to tag 128, 130, and 149... my highest scores yet! Then I came home and started looking at bowling ball/shoe prices.

2004-04-23T20:12:00.000-07:00

I got this in the mail today, expecting it to be the official rejection letter:

"For the past several years, the Department of Film and Television has been grappling with the issue of how best to meet the demands of the large number of prospective students applying for our two-year graduate Screenwriting Program. This problem is especially vexing because a number of the applicants are uniquely talented and exremely capable. The selection committe was faced with the unhappy task of turning away many writers whom they held in high regard. It is only because of the very limited number of spaces availible that they could not be accepted inot the MFA Program.

After much discussion within the Department, a one-year, non-degree certificate program in screenwriting, taught at night at UCLA School of Theatre, Film and Television, was initiated in Fall 1994 and has recieved a highly enthusiastic response... This nighttime graduate level certificate program has academic oversight by the Film and Television faculty, and is taught by the UCLA graduate faculty as well a distinguished entertainment industry professionals, including writers, studio executives and story editors. Upon successful completion of this one-year program, each student recieves a certificate in screenwriting."

So that's it. What do you guys think? It sounds a little fishy to me, as well as a little intriguing. It would certainly land me more script-writing experience, and would also relate me to UCLA faculty, should I decide to try to apply again next fall. But then again, this could be a little money-mill in which they squeeze as much money out of suckers so they can send a football player to Ohio to play a few games. I can easily picture myself sitting in a classroom with several middle-aged balding men trying to perfect their coming-of-age scripts. And they very well could have sent this letter to all 3,000 people rejected from the MFA program. It is $4,000 for the whole program, night classes, Fall, Winter, and Spring quarters. No degree. Just a little certificate I can hang on my wall along with the half-naked women in bathing suits. What do you guys think?

2004-04-19T14:07:00.000-07:00

So I suppose I need to do a little explaining. Yes, UCLA did not accept me. I felt like shit, and I feel like shit, but life goes on. I'm trying to not let it get to me, and for the most part it isn't. I talked to Cory the other day and he said something along the lines of, "You've been in school for 18 years, it's time for a little break." And he's right. A break is something I need and deserve after all the education I have endured for the past score of years. If going to Europe in the middle of summer isn't an attempt at relaxation, I have no idea what is. I guess this is sort of forcing me to 'grow up,' which, given my nature, is extremely hard for me to do. School is all I know right now. But I know that I need to eventually go out and make a living for myself.

However, one of my biggest character attributes, one that I'm sure many of you won't argue with, is that I'm one stubborn son-of-a-bitch. There were several things wrong with my application. My statement of purpose was idealistic and lacking in direction. I know it was, and probably wasn't the smartest thing to put in there, but it was what I generally feel. Another minor thing is that I feel the rushed job of my application process was a severe detraction from the overall 'me'. An application that is recieved two days before the deadline would attract trenchant eyes. My writing samples could have been tweaked just a bit. I'm completely confident with Boy and Girl, however, Memoirs of a Godsent was written in my sophomore year and remained largely without editing.

So what's the plan now? Getting a job in the LA region is my first priority. Establishing a place of living is second on my list. I have a friend here at Cal Poly who I get along with quite well and we've been making plans to get an appartment. Hopefully, I'll be able to write over the summer, more of the scripting nature, and then I'll be applying to UCLA, USC, and Loyola in the fall. Early fall. I'm already planning out that process... securing two of three excellent letters of recommendation by the end of the summer shouldn't be too difficult... it's just a matter of finding a third, instrumental candidate for this process. Anyhoo. Six weeks 'til I graduate.

2004-04-16T18:28:00.000-07:00

I did not get into UCLA.

2004-04-15T12:36:00.000-07:00

Upper management in UHS fired one of the RAs in my building. He was the energy, nucleus, of our staff and they fired him. Without him, I think we're lost and uninterested in our jobs anymore. It has brought disillusionment to the RA position, showing what ugly faces the management at UHS has. We've had our thoughts before on this, but we get to see the truth at the expense of one of our staff members. I remember when I came into this position, I was ecstatic beyond words, there was so much I wanted to accomplish as an RA. But now, I'm just apathetic. I'm practically doing the bare minimum to keep myself off probation. It just goes to show how fake some people really are when you finally get to see what they're really about.

I got my optical prescription filled last week and my glasses should be ready any day now. Um... they're Gucci, so I think I'll be stylin'. I want to buy more clothes for myself, but I also need to save money for the EuroTrip that seems to get longer and longer each time we talk. Not a bad thing, just seals away more spendable cash.

The internet has been especially heinous in the residence halls as of late. You may see me sign on and off of AIM four times in five minutes. That would be the unstable internet. It is so unreliable... if you try to send an email message, it would sometime lose connection right as you click 'send' and then you lose all the information you typed and no message in your outbox. Its total and complete crap, and UHS isn't doing shit to fix the fucking problem. A couple of our residents went through the hall and asked for a petition for a new router (the 'route' of all the internet problems... heh) and presented it to the lead technicians in housing. They pushed the petition back at the residents and told them to tell the petitioners to stop using the internet so much. WTF. The purpose of ethernet is so that you could use the internet any time of the day you damn pleased. I'm seriously beginning to consider a dial-up connection because it-- in all honesty-- is far more reliable than the joke of a broadband connection we have now.

Okay, that's all for now.

2004-04-06T12:50:00.000-07:00

Dictionary.com's word of the day:

Word of the Day for Tuesday April 6, 2004

vertiginous \vur-TIJ-uh-nuhs\, adjective:
1. Affected with vertigo; giddy; dizzy.
2. Causing or tending to cause dizziness.
3. Turning round; whirling; revolving.
4. Inclined to change quickly or frequently; inconstant.

I especially like it because it has a variation of my AIM handle in it.

The "vertigo" part, geniuses.

2004-04-04T19:05:00.000-07:00

Wes and I were talking... and I was watching The Chamber of Secrets... these movies are growing on me. Anyway, when I was inquiring on the Hogwarts Houses, I stumbled across this:

You belong in Hufflepuff!

Not Your Average Harry Potter House Quiz
brought to you by Quizilla

2004-03-31T12:28:00.000-08:00

I've gone through my whole first day of class thing, and I'm even luckier than I was before. I was sitting in my Modern Drama class looking through the scheduling book (which also lists GE requirements in it) and my grad check and I realized that one of the classes I had planned to add was not on this list. A bit worried that my graduation time may totally get fuxored, I left in the middle of the syllabus reading (I had this professor twice before, he takes half the session going over the syllabus) to go see one of my counselors. When I got there, we looked some stuff up and I found out I didn't have to take History of California, and I had satisfied one of the requirements on my grad check over two years ago.

I went back to my class jazzed that I wouldn't be in a boring class (the professor had a reputation) for four more hours of my week. Starting out to be a great week. Ayup. And I'm off today, so yay.

2004-03-30T14:34:00.000-08:00

I'm such a dork. The Animaniacs Theme is now my cell phone's ringtone. Tee hee.

2004-03-26T18:31:00.000-08:00

Sorry I haven't been updating lately, it's just that I haven't had much to say these past few weeks.

I went to get an oil change for my 4Runner on Wednesday, and it took a little over two hours. It was quite annoying, because it shouldn't take more than fifteen minutes. I just sort of stood around feeling like a jackass while the mechanics walked back and forth, not even acknowledging me. "I FEEL SO AWKWARD!!!" So when my vehicle is finally finished, I go out to the service desk for the guys to bring my car back to me. As I'm standing there on the sidewalk, the attendant looks at me and asks, "Modeling or something?" I dangle my keys for him and he gets the hint, I wanted to say, "Go get my car, you ass-clown." But I'm not a jackass. This is the last time I use my dad's automotive 'hookups'.

Uh... we also got a new widescreen TV at the house, it's pretty cool. MacGyver is on TVLand, so I was pretty stoked about that.

My right eye is getting progressively worse and worse with it's short-sightedness. Eye appointment on April 6th, and probably a pair of glasses or contacts in the mail two weeks later.

Hours at the writing center have been nearly cut in half. Not really a bad thing, I'd say. It gives me a lot more time to myself, which is a much needed change, compared to last quarter when I was innundated with things to do every day of the week. It'll be a nice relaxing quarter, classes should be relatively easy, wrapping up and all to graduation. I'll be taking Modern Drama, Publishing, Geography of California, and History of California.

I still haven't decided if I'm going to have a grad party yet. I'm anticipating a ton of people showing up, which would only fray my nerves for keeping things under control. Matt doesn't need an anneurism a week after graduating from college.

Anyway. That's all for now.

2004-03-19T17:13:00.000-08:00

Finals week is over and spring break has begun. What do I have planned? Absolutely nothing! Couldn't be happier either. I may have another straight A quarter, but that depends on a few things. I have a four-day work week starting on Saturday morning, and ending Thursday night when I head back to Pomona to do my spring break coverage for Friday. Then I get to wait out the weekend and wait for Spring Quarter to start. Eleven weeks later, and I'll be a college graduate. Amazing.

My RA job isn't going too bad, I'm having a good time with my staff and such. It's just that the management at our school is filled with a bunch of bumbling monkeys. One coordinator actually got fired for doing such a poor job, and others are doing sub-par jobs as well. Including the one for my own building. T

here are black phones all over campus. A resident on the second floor got a hold of the number of the phone next to her room and started giving it out to her friends and family. It has technically turned into her personal phone. Our staff devised rules for the phones and started posting signs as well as informing this particular resident that she would not be able to use the phone for personal calls. She disregarded our requests. So one night, the black phone is ringing and one of the RAs picks it up. The person on the other line asks for the resident. He tells the woman on the line that the phone is not for personal use and she would have to get in contact with her in a different manner. Things quickly started to heat up and ended up asking for the RA's supervisor. This parent is so upset about her child not being able to use university property for her own personal use that she has brought this situation all the way to the second highest person in Housing Services. In addition to this bullying (which severely irritates me... it should not have progressed this far. The girl is not allowed to use the phone. Period.), the RA who had the incident with the parent was required to write a letter of apology to the resident. What the fuck. Talk about undermining authority.

This, of course, has gotten the rest of the staff all hussied up, and we're just waiting for that phone to ring, or even catch her using it. I looked up possible offenses she could be doing, and I've counted up to five. It'll be great when we finally write her ass up for something... it'll be like getting the mafia for tax-evasion. Either that or we could have housing send the girl the school's phone bill. That would be great.

Alot of what I just said probably doesn't make a lick of sense, but I'm using the excuse that school is out and I don't have to thing straight for another week. Ha.

2004-03-17T00:40:00.000-08:00

Because I have nothing to say and I'm feeling slightly sick.

2004-03-06T15:00:00.000-08:00

Who says Super Mario Bros. doesn't have a storyline?

Part I
Part II
Part III

Um... nothing much to report. I'm doing apartment hunting in the LA and have come up with a few places so far. Hopefully the hunt will be more fruitful in the later part of Spring and Summer.

Finals are coming up.

My short story is getting published.

I may need glasses. My right eye is blurry. I have to schedule an optometrist appointment on Monday.

I found out that if you drink lots of energy drinks, the vitamin B will make your urine glow in the dark.

The high school was holding a car wash today. I'm soooo glad I don't have to be exposed to budding young women for the rest of my life. Checking out these girls was creepy and hard enough on me.

I was in a really good mood on Friday for some reason. Maybe it was because of how many people I felt like I really helped at the writing center. Maybe it was that I only had one week of the quarter left. Maybe because the school week was over. Maybe I'm more optimistic about UCLA. Roughly a month by the time I will find out. That's the last mention of grad school I'll make in the blog, at least until I actually find out.

Recited the first 18 lines of the Canterbury Tales General Prologue on Thursday. Got a B, which ain't so bad... try memorizing and speaking this in a Middle English accent (think Gypsie dialect from Snatch):

Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote
The droughte of March hath perced to the roote

And bathed every veyne in swich licour
Of which vertue engendred is the flour

Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth

The tendre croppes and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his half cours yronne

And smale fowles maken melodye
That slepen al the nyght with open ye

(So pricketh hem Nature in hir corages)
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages

And palmeres for to saken straunge strondes
To ferne hawles kowthe in sondry londes

And specially from every shires ende
Of Engelond to Caunterbury they wende

The hooly blisful martir for to seke
That him hath holpen whan that they were seeke.

...and Eric, I know you lurk here, so let's stifle the urge to correct me, okay?

2004-02-24T22:01:00.000-08:00

In my newest Minesweeper exploit, I have defeated expert mode using no flags! God, I'm so cool.

It has been raining for the past six days and I couldn't be happier. I walked to the libarary on Saturday in the middle of it. I had a rain jacket on (my snowboard jacket) and it was lightly raining, so I wasn't soaking wet. The rain just really relaxes me, and especially when there's a lot of lazing around in a warm room, the rain is even more relaxing.

I got an A on my Chaucer midterm, which pretty much settles me in for the final grade of the class. I'm fairly certain I'll be getting a grade of thereabouts. The Shakespeare paper I wrote last week wasn't returned today, but that wouldn't matter anyway since I didn't show up for class. Tuesdays are killer for me. I come off of RA duty on Monday night which puts me in bed at around 1:30 at the latest. I then have the 8am Chaucer class, followed by a 1 on 1 with my supervisor, then work at the writing center, followed by Shakespeare, followed by the RA staff meeting. This puts me at some free time at around 5pm after 6 hours of sleep. Those that know me will know that I get very cranky when I don't get enough sleep.

So that whole schedule was listed just to say why I skipped Shakespeare. We supposedly finished up with Richard III, at which point I was fucking sick of. We then were supposed to start on Romeo and Juliet, which is a played out Shakespeare play, especially in a high college-level class. So I slept for two hours and now here I am.

I saw Iron Jawed Angels on HBO the other night. A nice little HBO special on the women's sufferage movement. I was expecting man-hating lesbians, but I was pleasantly suprised with this movie. It was well made and didn't really make me ashamed to be a man. That's extra points from a member that belongs to the untargeted audience.

No more today.

2004-02-22T13:05:00.000-08:00

Last week was a rather hectic one. Between work, class, and RA stuff, my schedule was crammed. Tuesday I had to cover for a neighboring hall's RA because they were taking one of their staff members out to dinner. Wednesday I had a mocktail program, and on Thursday... oh loatheful Thursday... I had a Shakespeare paper (where I needed to stage the ending of Taming of the Shrew because of it's open-to-interpretation ending) due along with a Chaucer midterm. Wasn't over yet! Friday morning I gave interviews for next year's RAs, both of which I recommended for hire. Then I come back to the halls (after a friend buys me lunch) to be on duty for the weekend. Duty weekend isn't so bad, except for the fact that I'm missing out on a hundred dollars of working hours at the Dairy.

I puked last night for the first time in six months. Quite a record, if I do say so myself. I swear, the anticipation is the worst part of vomiting. Anyway, remember kids: Cup o' Noodles and Reeses Pieces don't mix well in the tummy.

Ralph Nader announced that he is going to be running for presidency. What the fuck. He was the same guy that tipped the votes in favor of Bush back in 2000. He's at it again. I was hoping the guy would sit this election out, with the hope that he would realize we have a dumbass sitting in the seat of power with his greedy fingers over a few dozen red buttons. This isn't to say that each and every Democratic candidate should have an anti-Bush stance, I'm just saying that once we had a great chance at getting a better leader at the head of this country, Nader comes and pisses all over that. I understand the guy has a lot to say on the bullshit duopoly the Democratic and Republican parites have on this country, but this is not the time to be tipping the scales in favor of Bush. I just hope that people in the Green Party see that their candidate cannot possibly win, and that this little bid for change is selfish.

I don't know. I guess I wouldn't be so passionate about this if Bush didn't line the rich's pockets with gold while giving it to the middle class without even the thought of lubricant, brainwash citizens with blind Patriotism, wasn't a warmonger, and wasn't a total and complete dumbass. Maybe he'd be an okay guy if he didn't have all those douchebag qualities.

I discoverd a nifty little feature on iTunes the other week. They have a little radio feature. you just click on the radio button and then it streams a bunch of music to your computer. You can pick a bunch of different genres, and the sound quality is pretty decent. In addition to that, it tells you what song you're listening to at the top of the screen. Really cool. I just wish it played Kevin & Bean clips. Ha.

I need to memorize the first 18 lines of the General Prologue from the Canterbury Tales this week. And develop a half-decent middle-english accent. S'all good.

And for those wondering, my hair is no longer red. It was pink for most of yesterday, but it all washed out this morning. It's (my hair) getting really big. I need a cut. Badly.

2004-02-18T11:12:00.000-08:00

For some reason, I woke up in a good mood this morning. I went and showered, brushed my teeth and everything, then come back to my room and see that I have a new email message:

"I am pleased to inform you that your work has been
accepted for presentation at our 2004 Creative Writing
Conference. You will receive a letter by the end of
the week with more details about the conference, but
please plan on atttending the conference and
presenting."

After that, I was just... happy. A big, stupid smile plastered over my face as I walk around campus. It helps, since I have to write a Shakespeare paper tonight, along with studying for a Chaucer midterm. Tally-ho.

2004-02-14T19:17:00.000-08:00

My mom gets the Oriental Trading Company's catalogue each month. Usually, the catalogue lists various decorative pieces for the next upcomoning 'American' holiday. February's is no different. A bunch of Easter merchandise dots the pages of this one. Normally, I usually disregard the chocolate bunnies, the plastic eggs, the Peeps... but I they had an odd page to go with this particular catalogue. It was people who celebrate Easter for its actual purpose. But I think the Oriental Trading Company missed the point with the stuff they have in this catalogue. Here are a few:

Cross-Shaped Suckers... Fat-free and a Best Seller! Excellent Christian virtues!

Cross-Shaped Sucker Rings... if Jesus had a ring pop, this would be it.

Testamints... Individually wrapped in Bible verse wrappers. Wow, religion and great breath all in one mint!

Tangy Tarts Scripture Candy... Each roll has 15 assorted flavor candy pieces in a Bible verse wrapper. Do 'tart' and 'Bible' even belong in the same sentence?

Bible Verse Fortune Cookies... "Judgement day looks very bad day for you"--in bed.

"Smile! Jesus Loves You!" Saf-T-Pops... Individually wrapped with safety handles. Fat-free. Kosher... um... yeah...

...and last but not least...

Five-Inch Chocolate Candy Crosses... sacrilicious!

2004-02-13T13:05:00.000-08:00

Haven't talked to what's-her-face for about a week now, so that's that.

I was driving home today and passed up a CHP black and white in the carpool lane. After I pass him, he breaks the double yellow to get behind me. He keeps merging right, but dammit, that scared the shit out of me. My heart dropped into my stomach when he did that. I was only going 70, and I know CHP officers like to pull over people who go well over that speed, but still, a harrowing experience.

I noticed something on Monday night as I was standing in line to get my food. I get up. I go to work. I go to class. I come back to hang out a little, then eat dinner. It's dark and the day is over. My life has been starting to get a bland rhythm to it. And when I think about it, I don't think it would be much different elsewhere in my life, perhaps during the height of my career. It'll be the same thing, minus classes. A rinse, wash, repeat cycle. I mean, it's all something to do, but I would rather make the time go by with a more enjoyable activity. Currently, my days are dashed before my eyes, I'm starting the seventh week of classes on Monday. Fifteen weeks later, I graduate. It's going by so quickly.

What would I do if I had a nice, lottery-sized financial backing? I'd probably travel. Do something with myself. I'd be one of the lucky people who could extract themselves from the rat race. Donate money for a cure for cancer. Buncha other fun stuff, I'd hope.

I guess this whole stream of thought boils down to the age-old question, "What's this life for?"

2004-02-09T21:58:00.000-08:00

Behold, my new desktop:

Yum.

2004-02-08T21:54:00.000-08:00

I've been trying to put my finger on something for a while now, and I think I just about got it. It always annoys me when I see the film nerds over at IMDB spread their god-like knowledge about just what a "good" movie is. Something I think is one of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back's redeeming qualities... the satire on self-proclaimed movie aficionados who, for some reason, think their shit smells like the sea breeze. Anyway, I'm getting completely off tangent here. My point is that to these film nerds, a movie just isn't a movie, it's a film.

It's not the meaning behind the word that bothers me, it's the way it is used. It seems to have a bit of a pretentious connotation to it when these sort of people use it. That's not the only word that boils me with irritation. Concerts are now "shows". Referring to a "show" as a concert would only give us something in common with those ignorant mainstream music listeners. Similar words also appear in my area of expertise. Poetry and stories are referred to a "pieces". I'll, of course, use this word. The thing is, I try to use it as a synonym, not a word to completely replace a common and practical word that has long since been used.

Just an annoyanservation.

Um... I... don't have much more to say.

2004-02-06T23:06:00.000-08:00

I got back my first midterm today. I have this avoidant-but-not-really-necessary tendancy to not look at midterm and test scores when I get them back. Its like I don't want to know what the bad (or good) news is. (Un)fortunately, the grade was written on the cover of the blue book, so I was forced to gaze upon my grade: an A. How magical.

In my Shakespeare class, we had to act out a scene in Richard III without actually speaking any of the words. We could make sounds, act, but no words. As the participants went around the room, I had the brilliant idea to have my partner and myself cluck like a chicked and moo like a cow in place of our lines. Imagine an angry clucking and an apologetic mooing. By the end of our scene, we had the class rolling. It seems I used my alloted piece of brilliance for this quarter. Oh well.

I finally got my grad check back, and I am indeed on schedule to graduate in the spring. There are, I feel, some discrepancies of whether or not I should have to take some classes, but regardless, I am signed up for the ones I need. I will have to add on of them-- History of California-- the teacher was kind enough to allow me entry into her class after I emailed her about it. The grand thing is that any one of the three sections of her class could fit into my schedule. Awesome possum. I'm all set.

Stress is normally something I can do without in my life. I mean, when shit starts frustrating me, I just leave it at the door and try to forget about it. Thing is, I like some of the ideas coming from politics, but some of the trash that gets out there just turns me off of the subject. It's so painfully biased that it plummets out of the realm of intelligence. This guy's column, segment, whatever is charismatically named "My Word", which is so damn arrogant in itself-- which hints at likeness to God-- that it hurts me. It bewilders me, which is why I avoid politics.

I doubt anything interesting will happen this weekend. If it does, you'll be sure to find out about it. Or not.

2004-02-03T20:11:00.000-08:00

I registered for classes today, my first--not to mention only-- priority registration. I'm in Modern Drama, Publishing, and Geography of California. The first two of those courses should finish up my run from the English L&L cannon here at Cal Poly, and the geography class is for upper division synthesis that I don't know if I really have to take yet. If I do have to take these classes, I have to sign up for another one, most likely History of California, through the hellish add process at the beginning of each quarter. Otherwise, I'm dropping geography and taking another English class called Narrative in Film and Literature. I have to take 12 units each quarter I'm at school or something shitty happens to my mom's insurance policy. And I'd start to have to pay back the student loans. Not cool.

I talked to my friend s'more about this "gorgeous girl" and I've found out some intersting things. Nothing that I'm going to share with you guys, but what I've learned so far is both daunting and intriguing. She's been talking to me a bit regularly on AIM... I think it's at the point where you know someone and you're waiting to see who IMs the other first. You know, usually a way to gauge a person's interest in you. It's her turn now. What I will tell you about this: I mentioned something the other night about wanting to make a good first impression, but then she interrupts me with two things. One, she is single. The downer to that is that she isn't looking. This only confuses the hell out of me because this chick calls up some guy (me) she doesn't even know to say hello and break the ice. Now, what the fuck is that? I'm not going to persue that thought much because I know in my heart that all women are fucking psycho. I'm just gonna be cool about it.

I'm not sure if my story got forwarded to the Pomona Valley Reveiw for submissions, but we did get the stuff from the graduate writing conference. It's going to be put into a little supplementary book, and we'll need to visit it later in the quarter. My professor has told the students in the class to be mindful of what they say about certain pieces because the authors may be in the class. I want him to disregard this when my piece comes under fire. I know that everyone who read it here enjoyed it, but you guys are biased friends. I kind of want some criticism from some hard-nosed sons of bitches, and I don't want our professor to intervene with, "The author of this story is in our class. Please be mindful of your comments." I want the bitter truth, you know?

I'm going running tonight, and I hope I don't die. Thanks Cory and Wes for getting my mp3 player back to me.

2004-02-01T23:02:00.000-08:00

And... uh... people suck. I'm starting to get the feeling that she called my ass to toy with my puny and easily manipulated mind.

2004-02-01T01:14:00.000-08:00

That was weird. I just got a phone call from a gorgeous girl. And then we talked for two hours online. I told one of my friends here that she makes my heart skip a beat everytime I see her. He tells her this at a frat party. Apparently, she thought it was really sweet. She somehow got a hold of my new phone number and rang me up. Wow.

2004-01-31T13:26:00.000-08:00

I was one hell of a dreamer my sophomore year. Literally. I heard about weblogs around that time, and decided to use it to catalogue the dreams that I could remember when I wake up. I just remembered that I had the site a few minutes ago and was looking through some of the stuff that I dreamt. I'll periodically post them here for reference's sake. And filler. It seems like a week's worth of dreams. This one is from December 11th, 2001:

I went to University California Santa Barbara to visit some friends there. When I arrived, I was greeted by a group of people, and a certain black female student who was very interested in my genitalia. After that was all said and done, I left from where we were, and ran into a very interesting person. He was rather rude, and mean- and he challenged me to a fight in the University stadium. I obliged, since I didn't like the guy much anyway.

When I show up at the stadium, I find that the stands are packed with people and they're all rooting for me. The guy I'm fighting has a huge resemblence to Ben Affleck, but I'm sure its not him. I find out from one of my friends that the guy I'm fighting is some sort of demon, and the only way to send him back to where he came from is by defeating him in a fight. I'm not really phased by this little revelation, and I go into the center of the field to face him. We do a bit of wrestling, most of which, I kick his ass in. Right before I was going to win the match, the demon wiggles his way out of my grasp, and proclaims, "We'll finish this tomorrow!" He dissappears.

After this fight, there was a lot of celebration, because most of the students at the school thought I was going to vanquish the demon. I had essentially become a hero. For the day of the final fight, a few of the students gave me an orange T-shirt with a wildcat printed on it and the letters WTC. They said orange and black were the school colors and the wildcat was the mascot. (I'm aware that niether is true) There's some stuff happening that I can't quite remember- I don't think it held much relevance to the dream itself.

So on the day of the final fight, I go to fight the demon-Affleck lookalike. Like the previous day, the stands were filled with people, all cheering for me. We start fighting- the demon had gotten alot better than he was the previous day. He was whooping my ass. I wanted to take a break, and dragged myself to a bench. My orange t-shirt was sitting there beside me. Figuring I needed a bit of inspiration, I put the shirt on, over my white undershirt, and the crowd started cheering wildly. I went back to face the demon, and he still ripped me a new one.

When he was about to finish me off, my friends joined in to try to help me. Three of them came in. The dream shifted to a 3rd person perspective, and the fight now resembled a Super Smash Brothers fight. One of my friends even resembled Link. I looked a bit like Ramza from Final Fantasy Tactics- which oddly enough, wasn't in SSB. There we were, all kicking the living daylights out of the demon, when the wall we were standing by began to crumble away, revealing a pulsating purble-blueish portal that led straight to hell.

Seemed that the demon wanted to take me with him- I got sucked into the portal as well (still in the 3rd person), and the wall started to reform itself to it's original state. My friends quickly did some little trick and pulled me back through the portal before it closed completely. I rolled out of the portal, dodging a blast of the portal that tried to pull me back inside. Slowly, the wall closed itself, and the demon was gone.

2004-01-28T22:24:00.000-08:00

Today I had...

s'mores pop tarts
a Dole orange juice
a Six Dollar Western bacon cheese burger
an order of fries
a Coke
a glass of Mountain Dew
a bowl of beef tortillini
two slices of turkey
mashed potatoes
and turkey gravy.

And a cookie. Can't forget the cookie.

2004-01-27T23:48:00.000-08:00

Lesse...

Mom got a two month old puppy. Golden Retriever, of course. She tells me Cloud likes him well enough, though I think my dog will be a little bit jealous of all the attention this new addition to the household is going to recieve. Kevin tells me he's really small, as all puppies probably are, I'm just a bit anxious to see him. This makes me wonder if my mom is expecting me to bring Cloud with me when I move out to LA. I've been doing apartment searches at LAtimes.com, and most of the places that came up allow large dogs to be there. The only thing I'm worried about is my dog getting out and getting lost. Not to mention my mom may have formed a little emotional attachment to him while I'm here at school for the workweeks. I want to bring him with me and then I don't. I want what's best for my dog, y'know?

I was bored in Shakespeare today so I decided that I would try to list all 50 of the 'states. I did. Coincidentally, right after my Shakespeare class, I had a RA staff meeting and we had to list state capitals as a exercise.

I'm getting extremely nervous about my classes for next quarter. My grad check still hasn't come, and I'm relying on that to tell me what I should be taking in the Spring. Registration for me is February 3rd, so I have less than a week to find out what classes are left on my checklist. Just a bit anxious. It's the 4th week of classes. Seven more and I'm on the last leg of this Undergraduate shit. God willing, I'll be hittin' UCLA up in the Fall.

And this is seriously the funniest comic I've seen in a long, long time.

It's a pain-in-the-fucking-ass to get my dad to try to get my cell number changed, so I'm just going to surrender and use the new one I got for Verizon. (909) 435-5338

2004-01-23T22:44:00.000-08:00

KCAL FM is offering a listener either ten thousand dollars or a trip to a Nevada brothel for a one night stand with a hooker. Maybe we all grow conservative when we grow older, and I certainly feel that way when I think this contest is just another example of how pathetic our society is. I would hope that people who call in for this contest are calling for the 10 g's and could get laid on their own merits.

2004-01-21T00:30:00.000-08:00

A few days ago, I was slaving away, trying to find out the name of a song that was being played in a Battlefield Earth preview. I ring up (or IM, as the case may be) our local musical expert out in the frozen midwest to get his opinion. He tells me it's called "Requiem Rave". Okay, so I have a name. When I get back to school on Friday, I scour iTunes, and other file-downloading programs for this song. Nothing comes up. Then I do an internet search to find it.

Bingo. The track was produced by a company called Immediate Music. You can't download it anywhere, and their music is copyrighted out the cornhole. They do have the track availible in a Windows Media Audio format for sampling purposes. The only way you could get the track was to apply for one... which means you have to be apart of a film company or something. They make music for the big boys and they don't sell products to the public. So I right-click the link, just to check and see if I could at least "save as". I could.

I couldn't just import this track into my computer's mp3 player... it was a protected WMA file. A friend here advised me that I should get a "streaming ripper", which basically records any sound going through your soundcard and saves it to a wav file. After this, I get another program that converts WAV files to mp3 files. Here I am, very pleased with myself and the help of my friends. Took a lot of work but I suppose it was worth it.

What a worthless blog entry. Oh yeah. Dean's list is 3.5... I had a 3.3... not this quarter, I guess. Blah.

I bought a 20 dollar bookshelf from Wal-Mart that took me an hour and a half to build.

I keep worrying on whether or not I'll get into UCLA. It's not the end of the world by any means, but it's something that I've had my heart set on doing for a while now. I guess the problem is that I haven't looked at doing anything with myself past the grad school thing. The "real world" is just five months away.

I was reading The Knight's Tale from the Canterbury tales last night and I realized that just about every line (with the exception of small portions of dialogue) rhymed. The entire collection of tales runs at about 305 pages, with 2 columns of lines on each page and about 35 lines in a column. Now I'm no math major, but with the complete Canterbury tales, Chaucer rhymed over 21 thousand lines. Ponetically. That's fucking amazing. Especially when manage to make the stories comprehensible and interesting.

I'm not having as much trouble as I thought with Middle English as I thought I would. It's much easier than I thought. Makes Shakespeare look like a Golden Book author.

This is starting to look like a bullet blog, which is, I swear, unintentional. I figured that talking about my miraculous discovery of being able to put together an mp3 wasn't that interesting to some people and that I should make this entry worth reading. I guess I had more to say that I originally thought.

The Van Helsing trailer is out at apple.com, and I saw a hilarious comic referencing it over at Penny Arcade. Yeah. Stupid stuff makes me laugh.

I got back to my room today and there's a huge water spot right in front of my door. I'm hoping it's just a custodial error and not some twisted resident who decided to take a whiz on my doorknob.

Speaking of taking a whiz...

I once blasted James Joyce for being a flow-of-conscious writer.

2004-01-19T20:04:00.000-08:00

I was watching TV the other day, and I saw the most ball-achingly terrible commercial ever concieved in the mind of man. Figures that it would turn out to be a McDonald's commercial. So I guess they're in the middle of pushing their ungrammatical "I'm Lovin' It" campaign to the African American crowd. Bunch of dudes playing basketball. In rollerblades. Complete with protective gear. I can't even sit here to try to comprehend that.

That sort of thing happens when a bunch of bored seven year-olds and realize the err of their ways when they fail to blend their two loves together. Imagine all the sports you can strapping on a pair of rollerblades. Volleyball. Think about a six foot girl getting caught in the net like a marlin because her momentum carried her at a thirty-mile-an-hour speeds.

Nothing I can fathom can even compare against the painful memory that McDonalds has scared onto my brain for the sake of some minority customers... who are probably more insulted that attracted at the prospect of rollerblading and basketball.

I don't even know what to make of the new SPAM commercials yet.

2004-01-16T22:05:00.000-08:00

Here it is 10 o'clock on Friday night and I'm bored out of my mind. I'm sitting in my room. I can hear my mom listening to her latest tape of Dr. Phil's talk show. I can't shake the feeling, but Dr. Phil seems to spew, non-stop, psychobabble to the saps on his show. Earlier today, I was flipping through a TV Guide and I saw all of his health food stuff that he has all packaged with him strutting on the label. There's also some self-help book sitting on the kitchen table that my mom seems to be in the middle of reading. He seems like a fucking crock and he's puppeteering a dozen different scams at once.

I bought the first season of the HBO comedy Curb Your Enthusiasm starring Larry David. A worthy purchase, since I can't seem to stop laughing at everything that happens to that guy in the show. Anyone who I've mentioned this series to seems to love it. Last weekend I also bought Sleepy Hollow and Underworld, along with Max Payne 2, a sequel to a game which I really enjoyed playing. The Max Payne games are like a twist of comic books, film noir, and shooter games all rolled into one. They're really gritty and do a great job of paying tribute to film noir.

Which is something I can't say for one of the entries we've recieved for the Pomona Valley Review, the editing class I'm in this quarter. The piece I'm talking about coincidentally is a film noir short story, but, in my opinion painfully fails at what it tries to accomplish. The class was split on whether or not to reject the piece. It was brought to our attention that it was supposed to be a satire, but the problem was, it was being too satire-y. I mean, satire is supposed to be subtle, and the way this story was written, everything was overwritten for the sake of the genre. The dialogue made my heart hurt. I could find a better plot on toilet paper.

Today in the Writing Center, we recieved a flyer for a Cal Poly writer's conference, where there will be significant monetary rewards. Some of the entries may even be forwarded to the class I'm in for consideration. I'm planning on submitting my short story that I posted here a few months ago, if at least to bump that crappy story out of the maybe stack and into the reject pile. I mean, if the class is willing to accept something that pains my very existence, they would think I'm a fucking modern day Chaucer. I'll compare myself to Shakespeare when I actually start writing screenplays and such. Heh. Anyway, I can't analyze poetry very well, so that's why I'm so critical of fiction. Most of the stuff we've gotten for the journal is poetry, and if we're going to have fiction in it, goddammit, it's going to be good fiction.

I always thought my papers had awful conclusions and I see that from of my blog entries that it carries over. Oh well, something to work on these last two quarters.

2004-01-14T21:28:00.000-08:00

So I got my "new" car on Saturday afternoon, and I'm rather pleased with it. Its got all the groovy trimmings that a boy my age could want-- six cylinders, stereo sound, CD, moonroof, sunroof, and all that jazz. Its even got a nifty Cal Poly liscense plate frame on the rear.

Saturday night I went airsofting with Wes and Jeff. Airsofting is like paintballing, but with life-like weapons that shoot plastic BB pellets. We first went to Kimberly, but there were some kids there-- we scared them off then played at Smiley.

Sunday, there was a bowling tourney at Empire Bowl. I did pretty terrible compared to everyone else, but I did a personal best. Scott and Mike (the bosses) got the highest score so Tammy decided to split the winnings among the diary boys. I love my job!

I was going to do a run-down of my classes, but I'll pass. Naming off, even describing "bossible" prospects is somewhat depressing, if unrealistic. If you're dying to know my classes, I'm taking Shakespeare (Taming of the Shrew, Romeo and Juliet, Midsummer Night's Dream, Henry V, and Richard III), Chaucer (Canterbury Tales), Magic in Literature (stuff I've read before), and Professional Editing. A nice cannon for this quarter, I'd say. See you chill cats later.

2004-01-09T00:29:00.000-08:00

Let it be known that Vanilla Pepsi tastes like shit.

2004-01-05T12:18:00.000-08:00

It would seem that God is all too eager to smite me in the form of an auto accident. We all know... or at least heard of my little (or big, as the case may be with my insurance company) accident out in San Berdoo before Christmas. People lived, and I was thankful for that. Well, on Friday, my dad and I went out into Santa Ana to look at a 4Runner that I saw in the AutoTrader ads online. Well, we're sitting in the hellish traffic of the 91 (it's raining, by the way), and we slowly start to pass an overturned accident. My dad goes, "Oh shit!" and a purple pickup truck sideswipes my dad's car, goes on to rear end a brand new Mercedes, then proceeded to T-bone the same vehicle... the Mercedes got spun out in front of a semi truck, which completely stopped traffic. The little pickup continued onward and plowed into the rear end of a larger Chevy-looking car. So my dad's car wasn't completely ruined... the side panes of his Saturn (which are mostly plastic in composition) were cracked and his driver's side rear-view mirror was hanging by it's wires.

After that, we went to Carl's Jr. to get some food, then went to a paint store for duct tape to fix his rear-view mirror, only because the thing was going to fall off eventually. We were going to just go home, but I convinced my dad that we should just check out the car anyway, not make the accident all for nothing. So we went and looked at the car, it looked pretty nice, and made arrangements to take a look at it again on Saturday... when it wasn't raining. So I packed up my dad's beat-up Saturn with all my school shit (had to be back in the halls by noon) and we left for Santa Ana at 9:30. We got a second look at the 4Runner, test drove it around, and got the vehicle for 600 dollars less than what the man was asking for it. Unfortunately, we didn't have all the money together yet, so we put a 500 dollar down-payment for the car, and then left for Pomona. The plan is to pick up the vehicle next Saturday after I work. I'm so excited.

More information on my classes as I go through them. Tuesdays and Thursdays are killer, class starts at 8 and I don't get back to my room until 5. Ouch.

2003-12-28T21:32:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking lately. Nothing in particular, but without school, I can allow my mind to wander outside what I normally would let it go.

I got into an accident about a week ago and was thinking... what would happen if I had died? Not like where I'd end up or whatever. Just like... who would cry? Who would show up at the services and such? What the hell would my parents play as the tribute music? Who wouldn't notice? It's kind of useless to ask these questions, and by no means am I expecting people to answer them. Just ponderances. If that's a word.

There are these times when I get a feeling... I guess in the center of my chest... that just seems to get heavy. Not heavy, I suppose, like a surging energy that needs to be released. I'd compare it to going in the middle of nowhere and just shouting your lungs out. When I was thinking about it earlier, I decided to call it a "soul-cry". Not because it's my soul, and it's sobbing big fat tears, but that's the closest metaphor I can formulate. Something deep and transient in you that you can't release... or shouldn't release... or want to release. All this abstract and deep talk seems to muddy up my mood, and I'm sure a night's sleep will make everything a-okay.

Which reminds me. One of the things I loved most about Boy Scouts was the deep conversations we had on our campouts. Those talks always threw me into a highly elevated state of being, almost like I was dreaming, and it's something I sort of wish could happen more often. By default, I am an extremely nostalgic person anyway, so these sort of rememberances shouldn't be all too bizarre.

I asked Wes at work today what he would describe each of the six as, with a single word. I didn't really have a word for everyone else in mind, but I did for myself: shy. As I think about that now, I certainly am very shy, but it doesn't make up a lot of my personality traits, or account for all of them. I know I'm very quiet, but I don't think it's fair to call myself something as excluding as that, especially if it is me that is doing the describing. I think I'm settling on "Dreamer", which, when I think about it, I've known I was all along.

...

I guess I should have some sort of brain poo every so often.

I go back to school the morning of January 3rd, which is a Saturday, for all those lacking in calendars. My grades are in: A, A, A-, B+, C. The C is for Spanish. Who'da known.

2003-12-20T19:47:00.000-08:00

Today is Justin's 22nd birthday. Happy birthday, buddy.

Finals are now over and I've been home for about a week now. I stayed at the dorms for a few days last week to cover my holiday shift, and nothing interesting went down. I'm not sure how my grades are looking, not so bad, I'd guess. I am worried about how I did in Spanish. I got a D on the midterm, a C with the curve, so hopefully I can pull out a C for this quarter. We should have our grades by the middle of next week. A Christmas present from the Cal Poly Registrar's Office, I suppose.

Next quarter is going to make my testicles hurt... and they're already throbbing in anticipation. My classes should all be a blast. I've got Professional Editing with one of the professors that I take regularly. We edit the Pomona Valley Review, a magazine for local writers. Then there's more Shakespeare, with the same guy I had for last year's basic class. I also have Chaucer with a professor who is supposed to be really good. The class I have been looking forward to my entire college (English-lit) career is Magic and Spiritualism in Literature... I've heard some of the stuff on the reading list, and I'm really excited.

Then, of course, is my RA position. I need to do more programming this quarter, along with staff-building stuff that I will have to do; retreats, weekend coverage, incoming RA interviews, and other ins and outs. Oh yeah, I picked up another five hours at the writing center for this quarter, which means I'll be working 16 hours a week there, and 12 hours a week at the dairy. Plus RA shit. *sips some Red Bull, does a Joe Swanson Impersonation*

Bring it on!!!

I'm considering applying to be an RA over at UCLA while I'm (hopefully) doing graduate study.

I had a lot to say, but now, I don't. Hmm.

2003-12-17T14:45:00.000-08:00

Filler until I decide to detail the past two weeks... which is hastily escaping my memory.

You are the grammar Fuhrer. All bow to your
authority. You will crush all the inferior
people under the soles of your jackboots, and
any who question your motives will be
eliminated. Your punishment is being the bane
of every other person's existence, because
you're constantly contradicting stupidity.
Everyone will be gunning for you. Your dreams
of a master race of spellers and grammarians
frighten the masses. You must always watch your
back. If only your power could be used for good
instead of evil.

What is your grammar aptitude?
brought to you by Quizilla

Well... I am blonde-haired and blue-eyed.

2003-12-09T13:02:00.000-08:00

I saw The Last Samurai on Sunday night. The movie exceeded my expectations, which were pretty high, to say the least. The weird thing is, for how good this movie is, there isn't (or wasn't) a lot of hype surrounding it. Anyway... it'll be on my "must buy" DVD list, whenever it comes out... probably summer of next year. Puh.

My first final of the week is in less than an hour, so what better thing to do than blog. I mean, it's pretty much futile to cram anything further about the Wide Sargasso Sea (A prequel, if you will, to Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, for you literature studs out there) into my head. The final is in essay format, so I have a bit of leeway as far as creativity and paper formation is concerned.

After that test, the shit really hits the fan. I have to start studying big-time for my spanish test, which I will be taking on Wednesday. We could take it three times during the week, but on Friday, I have a gigantic grammar test I need to get a fairly decent grade on, and that class will determine whether or not I make the dean's list this quarter. Dentras del examen en espanol, I need to start writing my final resarch paper for my joke-of-a-RA-class. It's pure shit the things they make us do in that class, in addition to our RA responsibilities. It's stressful, it's pointless, it's graded by fascists, and it's worth GPA points.

Perhaps I'll have nicer things to say at the end of the week. I checked up on my application status at UCLA and the site said that I would recieve official notification between March and April. Jesus. At least in that time, I can continue to send them further "enticing" information about myself, including probable qualification of the dean's list and a higher (God willing) GPA.

Good day(s).

2003-12-03T18:35:00.000-08:00

Reds, what do you guys think of a gift exchange or secret santa sort of thing during winter break? Could be fun to do, something to hang out and do. Just a thought.

2003-12-03T00:15:00.000-08:00

Blow up the world. Amber, one of my staff members, just sent this to me.

2003-11-27T12:07:00.000-08:00

This is going to be a long one, so bare with me.

I was told by a few people that my last post made it seem as if I didn't like my grandma much. I didn't mean to get that feeling across. Death is a gray area for me. I'm not sure how to deal with it. I'm avoidant of it when it is eminant, and when it actually happens, it's just a normal thing of life to me. My mom, aunt, and uncle all took it very bad. I didn't want them to think I wasn't grieving, because I was... blank stares don't normally convey much emotion. Funeral services were all finished by Tuesday, of which, I almost missed the cemetery funeral because I took the 91 Van Buren exit, rather than the 215 Van Buren exit.

I rarely have a completely shitty day. I mean, days where I just don't have any fun and everything that can goes wrong, does. Last Saturday was my Paintball Program with the residence halls. I came home of Friday to cash checks, get a haircut, go to Jeff's suprise party, and other little tasks. So I planned on waking up at 6:00 AM and then driving to school to meet everyone going there. Well. You know that static that comes between radio stations when you're trying to tune a dial radio? Well, sometimes my radio tends to tune into that rather than Arrow 93. I sit up at my clock and see that it is 6:33. I had been sleeping for a full half hour before the silent hissing of static woke my ass up. So I'm swearing as I get out of bed, bring stuff into the shower, and I'm out of the house at 6:45, paintball gear in the trunk, fatigues on my body, and ready to haul ass to Pomona. When I pass that big strip-mine looking thing in Colton, I lift up my right leg and feel for my wallet. My heart drops as I feel nothing within the fabric. My throat was now sore from the explitives, mainly directed at my piece of shit alarm clock, and I had to drive back to Redlands.

When I finally do arrive in Pomona, I stop by my room to print out some directions to SC Villiage and grab my running shoes. I then spend the next half hour deciphering the worst directions ever concieved in the mind of man to find my way to this place. Through Chino. Dairy capital of California. Say no more, say no more. I finally connect with my buddies at SC Villiage and we organize and get paint, rentals, wrist bands, and other necessities. SC Villiage, by the way, has the worst set up ever. If you want gas for your gun, you have to get a ticket at the ticket window. Then you have to walk a quarter mile to the fill station and stand in a rediculously long-ass line to get your 12oz tank of CO2 filled for three dollars. Don't worry, there will be more bitching about CO2 later.

So we all are ready to get going on our first game. We all jump into the trenches and make our way to the enemy. Once we start seeing people, we fire off a few shots. Well, other people shot off some paint. I just shot CO2. It turns out that I had a feeder pin in my gun turned the wrong way so my paint wasn't feeding into my gun. I had to push them into the gun after each shot fired. The best part of this was that I got the most kills in the day-- five-- with this excruciatingly slow semi-auto fire. The funniest part of it was when I popped up and shot a guy right in the gut and I hear him go, "Ugh!" It was great.

Fast-forward to two games later. My gun begins to sputter. Right when we're getting surrounded by the enemy. I call myself out, and head over to the ticket booth and decide to rent a tank... I think my tank is faulty because the guy said that it was leaking slightly. I endure 15 minutes of inconvenience and stupidity (I think the cow shit makes people stupid) and finally get my hands on a new tank. I screw it onto my gun and gas begins to spew out at the connection. The tank had a faulty o-ring on it, which keeps gas from escaping in the connection. At this point, I'm ready to hit the CO2 tanks with a pick to see what happens, I'm so furious. I get a new o-ring on my tank rental, and go to find my group. My gun works great for the next game, I'm feeling better. Then, the worst thing that can happen in paintball, happens to my gun. I chop a paintball in the chamber. This basically means that a ball is crushed and snapped in half by the cocking mechanism. My gun is out of commission. By this time, my day was ruined, I turn in the rental, say goodbye to my friends, and head home.

Saturday night, I hung out with Cory and Wes while we did Cory's dad's suprise birthday party. Matt: I don't drink alcohol because it makes me sick. Caitlin: It makes everyone sick.

Sunday I went to Fry's to get new equipment to build myself a new computer. I bought a motherboard, processor, case, and 512 mb of the best memory for 350 dollars. Spent some time putting that stuff together with Robert, one of my friends and staff members in my building. The drivers for certain devices started going ape-shit Tuesday night, which basically forced me to buy a new hard drive on Wednesday. Aside from all the crap I had Robert go through to get my computer up and running, my new setup is awesome. I have little blue and red lights inside my computer case with a see-through side bay that allows you to see all the innards of the case.

I got back my Spanish exam on Wednesday, and I ended up getting a D on it. The professor gave us 10 curve points for them, so I actually have a C on it. I participate fairly often in class, so I think I've got about a C+ overall. I'd like to get a B in this class, but I'll settle for an "average" grade. My other classes I expect to get A's in, so I'm pretty certain I'll make honor roll again this quarter. I want to keep it up. If I get Dean's List (which is honor roll) the next two quarters, I'll have two years of high honors at Cal Poly. That will be totally sweet and should make me more attractive to UCLA. Not to mention I get those awesome tassels for graduation.

I'll leave you with some Cedritos Staff Comedy:

Scott: What did the graffiti say?
Robert: It said RA Matt takes it up the ass.
Matt: No, it said RA Matt gives it up the ass. Get it right.
(Gay Hall Coordinator Jay steps further into the office.)

Have a great turkey day, and great time at R3:3 HP. I'm on duty. I talked with Cory about this last Saturday but... winter break will be a time of clubbing. Yeah.

2003-11-19T20:11:00.000-08:00

I'm on duty at the front desk and I'm really, really, really bored. I just watched Spaceballs--a birthday gift from my friend Will-- and now I'm on to The Bourne Identity. So what better thing to do than to blog. Classes are going marginally well, especially my language ones. I'm getting increasingly better in Grammar (got to retake a nasty test), and I'm doing just dandy in the Structure of Language. I have a presentation for a paper topic in Modern British Novel tomorrow, and on Friday it's the infamous Spanish test. I would be glad to get a C but I would really like a B or an A. It's going to be tough.

Two big paychecks coming this week, one from the Dairy, and my first check from the Writing Center. Big money. I've been contemplating spending it on frivolous things, but I keep wanting to just store it in the bank.

My grandma is probably going to die tonight. She has been having complications with her digestive tract for the past month or so. She's only about seventy years old. She's a heavy smoker. The doctors could not operate on her because she would not live through the surgery because she couldn't breathe through it. I'm at peace with this. I love my grandma very much, but her time has come, and I accept that. I'm more worried about my mom right now. My friends that smoke: please. Smoking may not directly kill you, but it sure as hell can cause some fucked up shit to happen. I can't cry for my grandma, but I will cry for my friends.

I think this whole thing with Lana has just given me confidence. I refused to fight with her, and I'm trying to be the better person here. It's up to her whether she wants to remain friends. Hopefully I'll be able to talk to the pretties much easier now. As pretty as she was, I was able to get to know her and charm her with relative ease. We'll see. Maybe Winter Quarter. With my luck some bitch will come by and break my damn heart.

I won't be able to attend this year's Ramadan party. I'm on duty. You folks have fun.

2003-11-17T21:38:00.000-08:00

I'm sure most of you know this already, but girls are fucking psycho. No, I'm not an asshole for laughing at her legwarmers. I'm a fucking asshole for laughing at them. Whatever, yo.

2003-11-16T23:07:00.000-08:00

Hrm. Did my dreamcatcher program tonight. About seven people showed up, so I let everyone make up to three 'catchers. The general consensus was that it was a good program and really fun. I only wish I could've gotten more help with the crafting part from the Native American Student Center, but oh well, it worked out fine without 'em.

I'm good at pissing girls off. I walked to class with Lana on Friday. She wore legwarmers with her little open toed heeled shoes. Which made me laugh. She asked me if I was laughing at her, and I responded with a resounding Yes. After which, she got pissed off and called me an asshole. I didn't want to pick a fight with her, but I told her that she shouldn't take it so seriously. Then she gave me the silent treatment.

The whole deal with her is that she "loves her boyfriend, and at the same time, likes me and would like to see where that could go". So it's a delicate situation, at best. I told her that it is a decision that she needs to make on her own. I said that "love" is far stronger that "like", which is pretty much digging my own grave for this one. She's extremely emotional right now, so it's hard for me to hit the right buttons. A lot of what I do seems to tick her off at every turn. I don't know. Whatever. Drama.

I have a Spanish test on Friday that I'm extremely nervous about. I mean, it's the first and only test before finals and it's in the eigth week of classes. The test is going to be twenty-five sentences in English that will have to be translated into Espanol. No rinky-dink "I like cheese" sentences either... they're going to be doosies. Ah well. Four days 'till zero hour.

2003-11-12T09:42:00.000-08:00

If you have any taste in music whatsoever, you will download "Meant to Live" by Switchfoot. Good day.

2003-11-11T15:36:00.000-08:00

Bloggiversary?

2003-11-11T15:35:00.000-08:00

I like to cheat the system. Particularly a system that charges you an assbreaking amount to see a two-hour movie. We discovered, while seeing Kill Bill at the Krikorian, that you can buy you tickets through an ATM machine via your credit card. Pick your movie, showtime... as well as the ticket you would like to buy. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, I bought a child's ticket-- six dollars-- for Kill Bill. Hopefully the... "flaw" will still be in the system when the winter movie season comes around.

I went to some trading outpost in Glendora to buy supplies for a Dream Catcher program I'm putting on next Sunday. When I was all finished shopping, my total was around fifty bucks... about two-thirds of my programming budget for this quarter. And I still need more shit! I think it will be an awesome program, I've always liked how dreamcatchers look, and making your own is probably even more satisfying than buying one. Today, Veteran's Day, we're having our hall barbeque, headed up by myself... I've got about 40 participants, so that's probably our largest program turnout this quarter.

So Saturday night my dad and I went to the new Sports Chalet in Redlands. It's a nice store, but I didn't really find anything I wanted. They do have just about everything you could possibly need for your sport-like needs. So we skipped out on Sports Chalet and headed over to Wal-Mart so that I could buy paintballs for another program I'm doing on the 22nd-- paintball at SC Villiage. While we're waiting for the illegal worker to come and help us out (the paintballs are on a top shelf with all the rifle and hand gun bullets) I start to wander around the sporting section in Wal-Mart. When I come into an aisle, I see, at about four feet high, shelves filled with buckshot. Shotgun ammunition. Not behind the counter where it should be, but right on the shelf. Take as many as you want. Hey, the boxes aren't even sealed... just steal a few casings. I was seriously disturbed about that and was considering calling up the management of the Redlands Wal-Mart to ask just what the hell is shotgun ammunion-- potentially more dangerous than rifle and pistol bullets-- sitting on the shelf for anyone to take?

I might be taking Lana to Jeff's suprise birthday party next friday. Problem is she needs to find out if she can go, and I need to get ahold of Erin, Jeff's girlfriend who is coordinating everything.

I was allowed to retake a fascist Grammar test yesterday, and I have a good feeling that I did waaay better than I did the first time... a low C.

More news when it comes about.

2003-10-30T20:38:00.000-08:00

How cool is this? I just got the Indiana Jones Trilogy on DVD for free. One of my friends in my Modern British Lit class recieved two sets of the Trilogy for his birthday. He said he would feel bad if he went and returned the second set, so he offered it to me for free. I hesitated at first, insisting that I pay him at least something, but he declined and said that he would give it to someone else. So I accepted. This kind gesture fills me with hope again for the human race. I suspect that the weekend at the dairy will change my views right back to where they were.

Hm... I might be going to a party in Riverside for Halloween with one of my old roommates, but I'm not entirely sure yet. I was going to ask Justin if he wanted to come, but then I remembered his comments on some other blogs that he may be going to SB for the weekend. I don't like going solo to these kinds of shindigs, so I may just stay home for the night.

I'm all finished sending all my materials to UCLA. I FedEx'd my supporting materials yesterday morning for a nice and ball-aching sum of eighteen dollars. Letters of Recommendation are in the mail. Now all I have to do is wait. And wait. For like five months. Jesus Christ. I just realized that I'm turning 22 in less than two weeks. I don't feel old, but knowing this little fact puts everything into perspective for me.

Oh yeah. I should hope that you guys like this in preperation for this. I plan on seeing it with some RA buddies. Catch you g-funks later.

2003-10-27T23:47:00.000-08:00

Alrighty. I'm officially nervous. Three minutes ago I submitted my graduate application to UCLA. Tomorrow I will be going over to a post office in Walnut to first-day mail that shit over to UCLA. I will be submitting that really short story posted below along with a 26 page, four chapter introduction to a story I began writing my sophomore year at Cal Poly. Tomorrow I have a meeting with my instructor for British Novel to go over the short story, which she liked. I'm going to ask her to fill out a letter for me. After that meeting, I'm going downstairs to meet with the Shakespeare professor I had last spring to have him fill out a letter as well. He's already agreed to it, I just need to find the papers I wrote for his class and let him take a look at them.

Tomorrow I have a midterm in my Modern British Novel class. I usually do quite well with in-class midterms, so I'm not particularly worried about this one. Lots of elbow room to work my shit. I just hope I don't get a topic where I don't have jack shit to work with. Friday I have another midterm, this one in my English Grammar class. Though this class is a lot more technical than others, I still feel like I have a good handling on the material. The teacher thinks I'm a smartass though. In a charming sort of way.

My tutoring job is going pretty well. I like the job, it's pretty easy. Most people come in with complete papers and just ask you to hunt for grammar errors. Decent papers I don't have problems with. ESL students, however, are another story alltogether. You'll read through a paper and you don't even know where to begin. Well, you do, it's just the grammar is tough to sort out. The problem is that you don't want to tell them what word should go here, you want them to find out for themselves. Much of the time it is the wrong verb tense, missing or wrong article, inappropriate preposition; that sort of thing. It gets a little hectic and stressful because you want to help these people, but their stuff is such a mess, you have to go through their paper sentence-by-sentece reconstructing things. Luckily, students are only limited to a half an hour with a tutor because of demand, so they can't take up all your time. Not a bad deal, since, for the majority of my time there, I've done reading and homework for my own classes. *knock on wood* Eh, I know we'll be flooded with students as the quarter starts to tie itself shut.

KISS ME, I tutor people.

2003-10-25T23:38:00.000-07:00

The Chinese got it all wrong. This isn't the year of the sheep. It's the year of the dumbass. Now, I know I've gone over how stupid some of the customers of the dairy are. However, it isn't always bad to reinforce ideas. There are two things I hate. I mean I really, really, really hate. I'm not a hateful person. But I loathe, I despise these two things. One: when someone asks for a dairy product with "the best date". Two: when people need fifty-pound bags of ice and pull up on the opposite side of our fine establishment. I could go on and on about how I flippantly hate these things, but just take my word for it. I do.

You may have noticed that the Inland Empire is on fire. It's sad. I don't like seeing the sky black with soot and smoke. The fires didn't really impede my drive home on Friday, as concerned as I was about it. Friday night, Matt and I went over to Tony Roma's to visit with Justin. After some generous bartending by Justin, the three of us went over to check out Justin's pad. Nice place. I worked today, my anxiety on full throttle. Bought a clay pot and some gravel for my bamboo plant my dad brought back from Florida. Came home, crashed on the couch and then caught Kill Bill again with my brother, Wes, Matt, and Ben.

Ho-hum-hi. What else. Oh yes. My UCLA application is due in less than a week, and I just have a few more things to take care of. I hope to mail off the supporting materials on Tuesday at the latest. All of these consist of a Statement of Purpose, Supplementary Information, and Letters of Recommendation. I need three letters and I've only confirmed one that will be filled out for me. I've got a professor that is willing to fill one out, but he wants to see some of my work I've done in his class, along with the grade I recieved and the statement of purpose I'm submitting to the Master's program at UCLA. The other professor I'm hoping on is my Modern British Novel instructor. I asked her to read the short story posted below and she told me on Thursday that she enjoyed it. This is particularly compelling because this professor happens to be a literary critic. She said she'd fill out a Letter of Recommendation if she liked the short story and if I did well on the midterm I have on the coming Tuesday. That's pretty balls-to-the-walls because the application materials are due roughly four days after that. I hope the department is willing to wait a bit for other information such as transcripts and letters.

Movies I would like to see by the end of the year: Matrix: Revolutions, Gothika, The Last Samurai, Paycheck, and Return of the King.

2003-10-21T17:22:00.000-07:00

Curve ball!

2003-10-20T19:32:00.000-07:00

If I weren't heterosexual, I would say that all a guy needs are his friends. Within 12 hours, the entire C6 posted a reply to this, and I am truly thankful to each and every one of you. You guys are one hell of a confidence booster.

In other, unrelated news, things pretty much went down the shitter with "that one girl". Situation normal, all fucked up!

Also, The Station Agent looks like a pretty darn good movie, if the preview has something to say about it. One of my fellow RA's let me borrow Boondock Saints and holy shit, I liked that movie within the first five minutes. Rock on, rock on.

Nothing much else to say. I got a ton of shit to do this week.

2003-10-19T02:08:00.000-07:00

Hey folks. Got a little favor to ask y'all. See, I need to write a few short stories for my application to the UCLA graduate school, and I decided that I needed feedback on one of them. I will post it here. What I would like from you: some constructive criticism. What did you like? What did you not like? Was there any part that confused you? Are there parts that could use some elaboration? Are there any glaring grammatical errors? Please be aware that this short story is the first draft and is approximately six pages in Word. If you can help me out, I'd love you forever.

*****
The young man sat in his uncomfortable seat, spinning a cheap ball-point pen between his index finger and thumb. His posture was slouched, compliant with that of the typical, uninterested college student. A blank stare on the boy’s face gave the impression that he was enamored in the professor’s lifeless droll that was supposed to be a lecture. Endless doodles scribed in his folder betrayed the student’s lack of interest in the lesson… yet from a distance, it also gave the notion that he was indeed paying attention. Occasionally, his eyes would follow the seconds hand of the clock until it completed its jaunt about the face of the timepiece. The arm would then duplicate the sweeping radar-like path at high quartz and his eyes would follow until they tired of counting seconds between minutes. The young man appeared as bored as could be.

This was merely a façade within a façade. Although he was genuinely disinterested with the subject-matter of the class, his attention was centered about a girl sitting a few seats forward to his right. His attitude in the class was used to attempt to hide his affection for this young woman. The boy’s behavior towards the class resembled hers with much congruency. Her wavy brown hair was pulled back into a sporty pony-tail that would whip to and fro across her back as she cracked her neck. The pencil she owned would pass between her hands and she would sometimes nervously chew at the base of the eraser. When the pencil was not in use—either for her tactile stimulus, or chewing habit—it would rest on her conventionally pierced ears.

The girl would sometimes lean forward to stretch her back, or rearrange her body so that she was more comfortable. At these moments, her underwear would peak out above her jeans. The young man always took these opportunities to steal a glance to see what she was wearing, which, more often than not, was a thong. He would always look away, ashamed at his pseudo-deviant behavior, as well as weary that another student may catch him in the act. Of course, there was no doubt that any heterosexual male in the class wouldn’t miss the chance to peek at a gorgeous girl’s lingerie, nevertheless, he felt reluctant in glimpsing at her undergarments.

Occasionally, the girl would avert her attention from the boredom of the lecturer to inspect her surroundings. At this time, the young man would put on his front to feign disinterest in her actions. He was in a good position to keep himself out of her wandering survey of the classroom. As her sparkling emerald eyes passed over him, he couldn’t resist the urge to glance in her direction. Their gazes met for a fleeting half second, right before the young man nervously ran his view in the opposite direction. He could feel his thundering pulse within his throat as his cheeks began to grow hot with color.

He would have liked to believe that she didn’t notice his behavior towards her, but women his age seldom disregarded such attention. She certainly wasn’t stupid—by any stretch of the imagination, so he had no reason to think that she may have been oblivious. He knew she knew. That was a taxing thought. He really had nothing to fear… she didn’t look like she resented the attention. Didn’t she smile when their eyes met? He couldn’t remember.

He had a reason to be nervous today. Today was the day. The previous weekend, he ran through the normal status report when he gathered with friends for the weekend. The boys would converse of possible prospects at their respective schools, as well as sexual condition updates with steady girlfriends. A normal conversation carried out between young men concerning the opposite sex.

“There’s a girl in one of my classes,” he mentioned sheepishly, as it became his turn to turn over some information, “brown hair, green eyes. Cutie pie.” He swirled around his drink, watching the carbonated bubbles float to the surface. The young man was the designated driver that night.

After a short pause, one that was comfortable with his group of friends, someone pried on, “…and?”

“I don’t know…” he glanced up, “should I even bother?”

One of his friends shrugged as he sipped his ale, “Do you know her name?”

“No,” he said, forcing a laugh, knowing that he was about to get prodded for not being able to obtain a simple fact.

“Have you talked to her?”

“No, not yet,” he shook his head, then added, “I want to.”

“Look,” one of his friends started, “all you have to do is just talk to her. By the way you’ve described her so far, she doesn’t sound like an ice queen—“

The young man interrupted his friend, attempting to hide from the advice, “I only told you she has green eyes, brown hair, and looks c—“

“Oh, come on,” the other interjected. The young man let him continue, “We know your type. You’ve never liked the stone-cold bitches… well, you have, you just never considered pursuing them. Not your type in the long run.”

“Thanks Freud,” he said, sipping on his Coke.

The first crossed his arms, “Seriously, man. All you have to do is talk to her. You’re not asking her to marry you. Just do it.”

“Do it,” the others echoed.

“I don’t know,” he mumbled shaking his head.

“Do it,” they said, louder this time, drawing attention from the rest of the bar.

“All right! Okay!” he hissed, trying to get them to quiet down. They kept chanting. “Shut up! I’ll do it, okay? Damn it, shut up!” His friends began to quiet down when they were satisfied with his agreement. The conversation floated comfortably away from his girl situation.

The girl had finished her survey of his section of the room, and had returned her attention to the professor. Once he was sure she wouldn’t be peeking around the room, the young man allowed his eyes to fall back on her. Today would definitely be the day. The conversation with his friends had increased his confidence significantly. He had spent much time planning out what he wanted to say and ask in their first conversation. Simply thinking about the future dialogue thrust his heart into a higher pace. It was good practice, though, for the real thing wouldn’t be much different, as far as his nerves were concerned.

He would catch up to her after class got out and the students began to leave the room, “Hey.”

She would most likely reply with something as equally simple, “Hi.”

The goal after this was to strike up a conversation, preferably about something they both had in common, “Pretty boring class, huh?” He assumed this was the case because of her conduct during the class.

He imagined her of the outgoing type, “You said it! I have trouble keeping my eyes open.” Or something of that sort. He would laugh if she made an amusing comment.

“So what’s your major?” he would ask. She would tell him, and then he would tell her his. Unless she seemed as if she wanted to carry on with the conversation, he would say, “Well, it was great meeting you…” holding out his hand. She would shake it and they would exchange names, most likely parting ways afterward.

He would go through this plan—or variations of it—once or twice a day, simply trying to get himself ready for the actual situation. The first meeting between the young man and the girl was not the only situation he simulated for himself. He sighed, staring at the clock above the professor’s head, declining to count the seconds.

“…my dog somehow figured out how to open up the French doors to the backyard. So one day, it’s raining like hell, the garden was all muddied up,” the girl said, smiling, lowering her gaze into her cup of coffee. She shivered as a cool autumn breeze blew through the patio of the coffee house.

The young man shook his head, half-groaning, half-laughing, “Oh no…”

She looked back up at him. Her eyes were his weakness. The girl continued, “Yeah. She got the screen door open, and then went to work on the French doors. Once she had them open, mud… all over my mom’s brand new carpet. My mom was so picky about this carpet that we had to take our shoes off at the front door.”

He laughed, “My dog was hyper—wanted to play with a tennis ball or Frisbee twenty-four seven, but he never tracked in the Brea Tar Pits.”

The girl giggled, “Hey, everything turned out all right. Nothing a steam-vac couldn’t cure.”

“Of course not,” he smiled, finishing off his own coffee, “I guess the point is that you love your dog.”

She smiled inwardly, seemingly embarrassed to show him too much of her feelings. The girl blushed slightly, “Yeah, that’s the point. So…”

He waited.

“When do I get to see you again?”

The boy was pulled from his daydream when the professor diverted from his usual teaching discourse by asking the young man a question. He could have glanced down to his notepad, but he doubted the lecturer had any particular interest in the swirl of star fields, mystical creatures, or elements scribbled on the papers within his folder. The professor, of course, was not satisfied with the young man’s lack of an answer, so he requested that the boy pay more attention. The young man nodded his obedience.

The verbal lashing stung a bit, as well as the burning stare that he received from his classmates. As the disturbance subsided, the young man caught the tail end of a glance from his girl. He could barely see the slight smirk as she brought her own attention back to the instructor. He didn’t know how to interpret the smirk… perhaps she was glad that she wasn’t the one caught staring off into space. Maybe she was amused. Who knew.

Despite his warning from the professor, the boy allowed his mind wander again.

He pointed at the sky, “See the red one?” She drew close to his arm so that she could follow his aim, “now follow it back this way, you can sorta see it curve around back on itself. That’s Scorpio.”

The girl opened her mouth as she gazed at the stars, “I think I see it…”

“He’s against the back-drop of the Milky Way, so just look for the brightest stars in that area…”

“Waitwaitwait… lemme see the star map again!” she sat up, tracing out Scorpio with her index finger next to the candle light. She glanced back at the sky, “Yeah, I see him!”

The silhouette of his smile was shadowed on his lips by the small flickering flame, “Good,” the young man put his hands behind his head and watched the sky, “glad we came out here now?”

She poured a little wine into a glass and sipped a bit, winning back the attention of the young man, “This is one of the best dates I’ve had in my life.” The girl offered the glass to her companion. He gently waved it away, but motioned for her to come towards him. As she got closer, the young man placed his hand on her cheek, softly moving it back towards her hair, caressing her face. He paused, just before he kissed her, and then slowly pressed his lips against hers.

The boy blinked as he left the corridors of his imagination. The fantasy ended there simply because he did not think to consider where it would go from there. He had his ideas, but he liked to leave those undetermined. Things are sometimes far more satisfying when they come as surprises, his daydream was no exception. The clock told him that the class was almost over, roughly fifteen minutes before he would force himself to talk to her.

He stole a look at the girl and noticed that she was busy with drawings of her own in her notebook. He smiled. At least they had something else in common. Expecting no further sudden movements from her, he allowed himself to gaze at the nape of her neck.

Before long, the sound of students packing their folders and backpacks told the young man that the class had just been let out. The professor futilely called out the reading assignment for the night. The boy’s heart rate picked up as he timed his bag-packing with that of the girl. She took a while to do it, and her slow demeanor was starting to fray his nerves. By the time she slung the bag over her shoulder, he was more than ready to go. He timed himself so that he was a few moments behind her.

He wanted to wait until they were in a less restricting area to talk, and he figured that the walk outside would be a better choice than the crowded hallway. As he followed her, he dodged bodies as they came at him, pardoning himself if he accidentally bumped into someone or stepped on a foot or two. His speech repeated itself in his ears like a broken record. After nearly a century of the chase, he breathed fresh air, and increased his pace in order to catch up with her.

Do it, he told himself. They were about seven feet apart and closing.

Do it! He told himself, more forcefully. He could feel the reluctance setting in. Less than five feet.

Come on! Do it! His mind screamed. His heart dropped into his stomach as he closed his eyes trying to call on the courage to simply talk to this girl. He had already made up his mind. He made up his mind when he walked into the classroom. He made up his mind when he got up in the morning. He even made up his mind when he promised his friends.

Sighing, his heart defeated, he walked past the girl.

2003-10-17T14:09:00.000-07:00

I severely dislike President Bush.

How do you like your 87 billion?

2003-10-16T22:24:00.000-07:00

On Monday night, I had my first "real" incident. The situation was pretty sticky, but overall, our staff handled it to the best of our abilities... which was pretty well. My coordinator was a bit unhappy with the way things turned out as far as notifying higher authority, but that is the way things sometimes go.

Last night, two of my RA buddies and I went to see Kill Bill. Each time I see a movie by Quentin Tarentino, I like the guy's style even more. Japanese sword play is always really fun to watch, and the over-the-top violence associated it made it even better. I'm eagerly awaiting Volume 2. Heh. In the mean time, I need to look into getting Resevoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction.

My mom and aunt were on their way back from visiting my sick grandmother in Camarillo and stopped by Cal Poly to take me out to lunch. We went to BJ's in West Covina. I had a peppironi pizza, ceaser salad, and introduced my mom to the Pizookie. We talked a bit about how I was doing, my plans for graduate school, and my resident advisor position. They came back to look in my room-- mom saw my KISS poster and shot me a glance, I shrugged and grinned. She slipped me a $20 for the weekend and then said goodbye.

I have doody this weekend, so if I'm bored enough, I'll toss out another post.

2003-10-12T23:29:00.000-07:00

Stuff like this makes me sad.
However, Stuff like this makes me happy.
Then again, Stuff like this makes me sad again.
No problem, Stuff like this makes me very very happy.

A bit of Taoism?

My mom got back from Italy last night... practically went straight to bed. And so did I. She was very supportive of my interest in applying for grad school, though she didn't really think that Screenwriting would be a good idea, considering the difficulty in cracking into the field. I'll be going around this week to all my professors for Letters of Recommendation.

My internet is back up. Thank god. Apparently my penis is still too small to pleasure my woman, and my health insurance just won't cut it these days. By the week's end, I will buy Matrix: Reloaded and Kiki's Delivery Service. Miyazaki's movies just keep amazing me, and hopefully this one will follow suit.

2003-10-10T15:38:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time, some zit-faced, anti-establishment little fuckwad of a computer nerd created a dandy little snakey-poo that would go around and shove it's mini-snakey-poo into the collective asses of computer networks. Thinking that they were taking a futile and Boo-urnsish attempt to stab at Microsoft, they hit nearly every personal computer in the country. Well, this snake... worm, found its way onto the Cal Poly servers. It didn't necessarily infect every single computer connected through the residence hall network, but it did manage to snag the servers. And if you know anything about the MS Blaster Worm, it will shut down the infected computer within three minutes. Thus, Cal Poly was without internet for about nine days. And that's why you haven't seen "Amnesia Vertigo" signed on your buddy lists this week.

Life is good, I suppose. I really like a girl that lives in my building, but I'm kind in check (as in chess)... she has a boyfriend. A boyfriend that she's fighting with at the moment. I could go on and on about her, but I'd end up jinxing it, and no one wants that. Aside from her, two other girls have been hanging out in my room for the past few nights, just chilling. One will be highlighting my hair on Sunday when I get back to Cal Poly for the week.

I decided that I'm going to apply for Grad School. Today, a bunch of schools came to the quad and were handing out brochures and shit. The ones I'm interested in are UCLA, USC, and UCI... all for screenwriting degrees. I haven't really spoken much to my parents about this. My dad knows, but mom has been in Italy for the past two weeks, so I haven't had the chance to spring it on her yet. We'll see how it goes.

Wish me luck on both the internet and my applications. Adios.

2003-10-04T16:54:00.000-07:00

Thursday night I dealt with my first semi-emergency as a RA. Our toilets were backing up on my floor. Exclusive to my wing. Being the first one to catch it, I immediately put an OUT OF ORDER sign on the door, and made sure each of my residents knew that our toilets wouldn't be useable until someone was able to fix the blockage. That was that.

Another cool sidenote: for the first time in three years, there is writing on my whiteboard. From women. It's the little things.

In the past twenty-four hours, I have spent over 200 dollars on DVDs. I also went to Pier 1 imports in San Berdoo to see if they had those nifty egg chairs. They did, and they were 140 bucks for the whole thing. Besides making an ass of myself by having Michelle McDaniel haul out the cusion and deciding not to buy it, I got an idea of what color I wanted. Anyway... back to the important thing: movies. So here's the list of the DVDs I bought: Back to the Future Trilogy, Bowling for Columbine, Contact, Die Hard Trilogy, Face/Off, Gladiator, Romeo + Juliet, Saving Private Ryan, and Spirited Away. I also just ordered Red Dawn and Tombstone off Amazon.com. I think I'll be good for the next month... up until Office Space and Super Troopers comes out in a double-pack at Best Buy.

That is all.

2003-10-02T20:28:00.000-07:00

I dreamt I got a tongue piercing last night, and I forgot about it until I saw one of my staff members later today eating lunch and I saw his tongue stud.

The first quarter is under way. I start the week with Spanish, which is basically review. It should be a boring 10 weeks, and hopefully I can mine an A for it. Jenny from last year is in this class. Following Spanish I have Structure of Language and Grammar, which are fairly devoid of women, but I think I'm starting to get over that. One of my friends of three years here at Cal Poly is in both of these classes, so I talk to him alot. They're both very structured classes, so there isn't really room for creativity as far as essay writing goes. Wednesdays I have a RA class with the rest of the RAs on campus. Should be relatively easy and laid back.

Tuesdays and Thursdays, I have Modern British Literature-- an upper division class with some refreshing reading and discussion. The scenery is a little better in this class, but not by much.

I was going to discuss something else, but I forgot. Life is very surreal right now.

2003-09-28T18:52:00.000-07:00

This is the best site ever. EVER.

2003-09-23T15:48:00.000-07:00

Sweet underaged goodness. The freshmen all moved in on Sunday, and we've been doing welcome week activities in the time in between. The first night was Casino Night, a night that got me addicted to craps. But I still didn't win any of the damn raffle prizes. Last night was the Hypnotist show... wasn't nearly as good as the one I attended in my frosh year, but it was still entertaining to say the least. I got up around 9:30 this morning so I could do three hours of front desk duty. Uneventful, so I spent most of my time playing my GBA.

I went around campus after that, taking care of various errands... grad check (eep), writing center tutor application, and then I finalized my class schedule. Structure of Language, Grammar of Modern English, The Modern British Novel, and Intermediate Spanish looks like the tentative schedule. Not to mention the RA class I need to take. I'll give the usual run-down of each class as they start.

Bonding more and more with the other RA's around. Went to a hooka bar sometime last week, I don't remember what day, since the past two weeks have sort of blended all together. All I remember is that one of the guys accidentally bought 20 dollars worth of scratchers tickets because he thought the lotto machine gave change. He only won two free tickets. Saw Underworld on Saturday night, which was a pretty cool movie. I would say that I got what I paid for. It could have been far more enjoyable if the dialogue wasn't so corny. The Resident Evil: Apocalypse trailer is one of the most innovative previews I've ever seen. It's not on the Quicktime website yet, so just keep looking for it when you hit the theatres.

2003-09-18T00:04:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm still training for the RA goodness at Cal Poly. The whole experience has sort of been blurred into one big conglomerate of boredom, information, emotion, and paint markers that get you high. Christ, I don't even know what day it is right now. My mom will be coming to visit me tomorrow. She's gonna bring some supplies that I forgot when I first moved in, among other things, a poster detailing the universe and constellations, printer paper, and other shit I can't remember right now.

Our welcome week is themed as "Let the Magic Begin at Cal Poly", so we should incorperate some form of magic into our hall decorations. I decided to do a dragon's cavern. Got a giant four foot eyeball staring at you from behind some stalagtites, treasure chests filled with gold foil, and other really cool shit. I'm really proud of my floor so far because it looks great and has potential to be even better.

The housing staff treated the RAs and some other staff for welcome week to two hours of free gamin' at Game Works, and that was pretty fun... then again, playing video games is always fun. After that, the guys I rode with went to In N' Out-- food an' fun. I'm getting along pretty well with just about everyone at training, and building some great friendships with the people on my staff along with some others that I hang out with on occasion. My bitter and sarcastic humor is strangely accepted and appreciated with them.

We then went to a housing complex off campus... one that I was completely unaware of. This place rests up on the hill near some of the agricultural stuff. I swear to God the architect must have had Friday the 13th in mind when he dreamed this place up. Most of the walls are glass, and the base construction material is wood... so it looks like a giant see-through log cabin. We went up there to chase away a bum that was bugging one of the female RAs that was up there alone at the time, and ended up staying for a few hours. Mostly just implanting terrifying thoughts into her head. We played some mind games, some of which were Click Click Bang, Green Glass Door, No One Can, and Sculptor.

I put out a fire with a fire extinguisher today... wasn't nearly as fun as I thought it would be. I could have put the damn thing out if I pissed on it.

2003-09-12T21:14:00.000-07:00

I'm going to link this blog to my AIM Profile for a while, so if anyone new finds their way here, welcome. Please remember that my thoughts here are uncensored, and tend to be a bit exaggerated, so please don't take offense. Sarcasm reigns supreme here.

Today was the first of two days of diversity training here at Cal Poly. It isn't as nice as you'd like it to be. It is emotionally draining, and an extreme downer. We started off with the same lame icebreakers. Then we needed to introduce ourselves to the group, and identify ourselves. You know, "Hi, I'm Matt McCullough, I'm a white male heterosexual," and then give a little schpiel of what you expect to learn during the next two days.

Then we did the heartbreaking activity. Certain opressed groups in the room were asked to walk over to one side, and then told to contemplate the fact that they were regularly discriminated against. It ranged from ethnicity, to sexuality, to mental illness, to alcoholism, to body weight, and everything in between.

That activity is when the waterworks started. People started to tear up and cry when they contemplated the horrible oppression they have faced in the past. I'm the kind of person who will tear up and cry if I see someone else doing it, so it sort of fucks me up. I find myself to be extremely lucky and blessed not to have encountered any of the shit the other people had to go through. You just want to go up to someone and hug them, let them know its alright. I'm... me... so I kind of just sit there... Weak and Powerless.

I know I talk and sometimes act like I'm the fucking shit and nothing can stop me, but you know what? I'm a softie. I like seeing people happy and comfortable. Bad vibes put me into a bad mood. Idealist, I guess... or that's what it's described to me as. The experience I had today was taxing not because I was witness to the anguish spreading through the room, but because I felt like there was nothing I could do to help them, right then. I had to picture myself fighting their demons. It was all that I could do to make myself feel better.

Tomorrow, Saturday, is when we finish the last day of D-Training. Afterwords, my staff is going to Aneheim to eat dinner, then we'll be playing broom ball later in the night. Fortunately, I have a grand selection of comedy DVDs... that ought to help with the vibes.

I hope the Laughlin group has fun...

EDIT: Brain dumps tend to be full of grammar and spelling errors.

2003-09-09T21:26:00.000-07:00

It's about 9 PM on Tuesday, and I'm kind of tired right now. Not tired like I want to sleep tired, but tired like "I've done a shitload of work" tired. Yesterday was basically a day of icebreakers where we get to know the people in our staff, as well as start to meet the staff of other halls. A lot of the stuff we saw was by-the-book, which means it was rather boring. Like today, we did a little communication survey that was supposed to tell us what king of leader we are. Mine said I was a creative introvert. No shit. Many of the other RAs shared my concern as most of the staff should already know what kind of person they are without a test. Hell, I told them in my interview that I was very quiet, yet very introverted. Even that is changing, though. See, three of the people on my staff are very quiet already, with the other two being rather outspoken. I'm much more comfortable with these guys, so I start to open up and joke around, and as a result, I get a rather appreciative response to my humor.

I don't get how some people can be so malicious. What drives other people to wreck property. I couldn't believe the freshmen of my dorm from last year could be so disrespectful to others, as well as the place in which they lived. My school just spent millions of dollars building new residential suites. These suites will be opening for the fall quarter. One building at least. You see, last month, some fuckwit broke into one of the buildings... they placed the faucets over the counter tops and turned on the water. They broke one of the windows on the third floor and brought a firehose up there and turned it on. The building was flooded for eight hours before it was noticed. They brought in a team to dry out the building, before any toxic mold (think Cory and Wes' kitchen cupboards in Santa Barbara last year). The point is, no residents-- 180 of them, mostly Juniors and Seniors-- are now relocated to the Shilo Inn, an off-campus hotel. What the hell is wrong with people? I mean seriously, what the fuck? I should stop now, since I would only continue to pair different explitives in different orders to express my frustration with the human race. I think we've hit an evolutionry rut.

OWWW! YOU FUCKING FASCIST!

2003-09-07T19:50:00.000-07:00

Wowzers. I just (today, at least) moved into my RA-styled dorm room at Cal Poly, and all I can say is that I need more shit to fill out all the space I have! I'm serious... this room is probably a bit larger than my room in Redlands, and that's fantastic! I got up at an amazing 8:20 AM to arrive at Cal Poly at around 10:05 in the morning. My dad and I brought all of my school belongings into the empty building, with no hassle of moving in with other students. Once we got everything into the room, I dismissed my dad to allow myself to put the place together myself. I have a good sense of Feng Shui, so I think my room came together rather nicely. As I was making my bed, I came to find that I was missing something. My comforter. I can't sleep without something like that, so I make the 40~ minute trip home just to pick that up. I also grabbed a case of water and a mini calendar my mom brought back from Hawaii.

After that I went to Best Buy over in West Covina, expecting to pick up the Family Guy Volume 2, along with a surge protector. I didn't get Family Guy (it comes out Tuesday), but I did get The Big Lebowsky, Half Baked, and Dark City... all of which had a special deal about them, one way or another.

So then I sat around my room a little, watching the terribly edited version of Office Space on Comedy Central, when I realized that my coffee-making supplies weren't yet complete. So I gathered myself up again and went to Stater Bros. where I got sugar cubes, a coffee scoop, and some chip-like goodies to hold me over until we get food priveledges at the Commons.

Not sure what else to share, since the rest of it goes downhill from the story above. As if that weren't boring enough. I need to be at training at 9 in the morning tomorrow, and I'm kind of looking forward to it. Hopefully I'll have some excellent stories to tell of the training goodness.

And I was thinking about this today, when I went through Burger King... I know how some of my customers at the dairy piss me off to no end with some of the stupid shit they do. Am I, the epitome of all that is perfect in the world, capable of pissing people of with stupidity? Do I make people want to spit in my hamburger when I order it with ketchup only? I try not to let foolishness slip through when I go out in public, but I wonder if I have habits that I consider normal to be incredibly frusterating to other people in the consumer market. Ah well.

2003-08-29T19:05:00.000-07:00

Okay, so Cloud is wearing a little red bandage on his paw. The good news is that the growth was not cancerous... it was described to me as an infected "mass of ingrown hair". The bad news is Cloud won't be able to play frisbee or go on walks until Tuesday. I am happily relieved that my puppy is okay.

I enjoy listening to music. Music is what keeps people going. The problem is, when you hear a song for a while, you tend to get a little tired of it, even though you enjoy it. I'm guilty of listening to the same song twice, maybe three times in a row before I hit 'forward' on my MP3 player, but only when I'm in a certain mood to hear that song. Occasionally, I'll even get sick of listening to the 709 tracks on my play list and close it down.

Then we get to the radio. Radio stations are known for playing the top 40 of whatever genre it is that people like the station for. And hey, I know I'm probably going to hear the same song at least twice in my seven-hour shift. But seriously, it gets old. I love the Atari's cover of The Boys of Summer, but goddamn KCAL and X keep playing that song, its starting to get on my fucking nerves. Ever hear of ruining a good song? They're well on their way. The Red Hot Chili Peppers had a new album out, with a few songs that I'll rate as "meh". But KCAL and X keep shoving those same songs down my throat, and my "meh" slowly turns into an inchoerent psychotic rage. This isn't just me. Practically everyone at the Dairy is fucking sick of the Chili Peppers.

And this condition is with radio stations whose music I actually like. When I tune into KIIS for whatever reason, most likely annoying commercial breaks on the other stations, I swear to god, Christina Aguilera's "Fighter" song is on. Every single goddamned time I tune into that station. I can't imagine what the normal listeners go through while listening-- oh wait, they have peanut-sized brains, they don't realize they've heard Simple Plan five fucking times in a row. KIIS music annoys me the most, so that is why I'm more volatile towards the station. My point is that overplaying music ruins the song. That's the ultimate irony, since music is meant to be enjoyable.

God bless Arrow 93.1, huh?

What the shit is this? Did you know Jessica Simpson and Nick Leche have their own reality Osbourne-esque (teeniebopperized, as if the Osbournes weren't mainstream enough...) show on MTV? Who can possibly have any interest in this show? I could barely sit through Sorority Life (abundance of ugly chicks anyway), and I'm supposed to watch this? I think reality shows in general are painful to watch, but this is sadism at its finest. The commercials make me cringe. Regarding MTV, I heard that Madonna, Britney, and Christina all kissed. The sad thing is that I don't fucking care. The golf channel is more interesting.

2003-08-22T20:21:00.000-07:00

Cloud has a "growth" on his paw. I took him to see the vet Thursday, and then went to Ontario Mills with my brother. As we were pulling into the parking lot, the vet calls up my cell phone and tells me she's done looking at the paw. She tells me that we should get it removed as soon as possible and have it sent to get a biopsy. There is a chance that it could be cancer. It is not good to pull into a mall parking lot and told that your dog may have cancer, at less than four years old at that. Chip died of some sort of cancer three years ago. So I'm walking through the mall trying to keep myself from sobbing in the middle of all those people. I think we wander into about four stores before I finally give up and tell Kevin that we should go home. Without buying a damn thing.

As soon as we get home, I drive over to the vet in Calimesa and schedule a day for the surgery. I cried here and there, and the people working there tried to reassure me that everything would be okay. I'm pretty sure that it will be. It can be a number of other things aside from cancer. And if it is cancer, there's also a possibility that it hasn't spread yet. I hope that the worst case scenario is that they have to remove his entire paw, which is much better than death. Anyway. Yeah. The biopsy will be returned a few days after the surgery (which is Monday), and we'll know for sure what that thing on his paw is.

After I just sat around for the day, trying to convince myself everything would be okay, I decided to make myself feel better by spending money. It worked. I bought the Fooly Cooly DVDs and the Cowboy Bebop DVD set, along with the movie. Then today I wandered around San Bernardino, bought the Bourne Identity and Spy Game, and a partially complete anime series called "X". Then I bought a pair of shoes. Hopefully all this shit is enough to keep me busy until that biopsy comes.

2003-08-21T11:26:00.000-07:00

The Matrix: Revolutions has a new trailer up. Bad ass. Ton of cool movies coming out this Fall/Winter.

2003-08-19T01:33:00.000-07:00

I'm going to the Tyler Mall on Thursday. If anyone wants to tag along, let me know.

2003-08-17T20:59:00.000-07:00

Nothing happens during the week. You should know that by now. Anyway, on Friday, the gang went to see Freddy vs. Jason. A good bad movie, if that makes any sense. And lets just say that the guy I was rooting for seemed to come out ahead at the end of the movie. Nyuk nyuk.

Oh yeah. After work on Thursday, I went over to Cory's place where we hung out for a little bit, took his sister to Starbucks and then we wandered around VONS to look for something for me to eat. I ended up getting the ingredients for a sourdough turkey sandwich. We went back to Cory's, made our sandwiches, some Vanilla Rum and Vanilla Pepsi's and sat down to watch "Happiness". Very disturbing movie, I didn't enjoy it much, and would have preferred The Crow. We started to watch Blue Crush, but got tired and turned everything off for the night. Cory thought it would be fun to knock over my glass of water onto the carpet. That was funny. That night I dreamt that Cloud had died. And in my dream I cried until I was exhausted. I woke up from the horrible dream, and decided to find better comfort in my own bed. Said my goodbye to Cory and drove home.

Saturday. Saturday was a day of drunkeness. Not me of course, but I sure as hell enjoyed watching everyone else get plastered. I lost count of how many AMFs were consumed, but I think it would be very cool to name the AMF the "official" drink of the Reds. Heh. I want to see all the pictures that were taken-- lots of great moments caught on either film or memory stick. Winchels was the the stop of choice after we found out Del Taco was closed for walk-in customers. We hung outside of the donut shop for a half an hour harassing the poor Japanese man who was just doing his job making his donuts. I kept getting visions of the guy leaping at us through the glass windows, screaming a blood-curdling war cry as he chased us off with a katana in his hands. I also got to drive stick again that night, as Slave's truck was parked on State Street, and he thought it would be better to be at Cory's parking lot. And so it was. It took a while for me to figure out how to turn the truck on (I wasn't pushing the clutch in all the way [that's what she said! {shut up!}]), but I got it going after five minutes of fucking around. It drove like my old Nissan pickup.

Went to visit my Grandma in the hospital today. Wes was very cool, and took over the last two and a half hours of my shift at the dairy. But not before I felt like crushing someone's head in the freezer door for asking for the freshest date. I put a bunch of charges on my credit card, and my bill hasn't showed up in the mail yet. I'm starting to get a bit worried.

2003-08-10T13:13:00.000-07:00

The masses should know that Wes has redeemed himself. I have a cool new necklace. Thanks Wes!

Adios to Aaron who left for the frozen north early this morning. You forgot to get Mario Kart from me. Sorry. Anyway, I'm sure we'll see you in December.

2003-08-08T18:04:00.000-07:00

Wes broke my necklace.

So in order to hit up Aaron's going away party yesterday, I had to get Jeff at work to switch shifts with me. Everything worked out great, and I got to have a grand old time with the C6. There was more alcohol than Justin could drink, and it seemed as if we came home with more beer than we left with.

Wes broke my necklace.

Before we headed out to Westwood, I took myself to Best Buy. I bought the Neon Genesis Evangelion box set, Donnie Darko, Grave of the Fireflies, and a 128 MB MP3 player. The MP3 player is extremely cool, and the motive behind getting it is that I won't have an excuse not to run while I'm at school this year. I think I'll be fine if I can listen to my music while I run three miles. Good times.

Wes broke my necklace.

Speaking of my school, I should say I'm pissed. I registered yesterday. For ONE class. The rest of them got filled up. I sat for like fifteen minutes screaming "I'm fucked!" at the computerized Voice Registration system. This is complete bullshit. Supposedly, seniors are supposed to get priority registration. The only thing I got was a priority butt rape by the Registrar's Office. I emailed two professors, requesting that they add me when the quarter starts. I got one reply telling me that if I show up on the first day and the class doesn't exceed University standard, I would be added. That's all fine and dandy, but I need two more classes. There aren't enough people at the Special Olympics to explain how retarded this is. The great thing is that I know everything will turn out fine once school starts. Or so I hope it does.

Wes broke my necklace.

2003-08-05T01:29:00.000-07:00

Check out FLCL, or Fooly Cooly on Cartoon Network. Midnight, Monday through Thursday.

2003-08-02T15:17:00.000-07:00

About two weeks ago, I took a Graduation Writing Test at Cal Poly. It was one of the worst pieces of writing ever composed by me, managing to combine the innane details of a video game, the sentence structure of a five-year-old, and the same amount of sense in a Dr. Seuss book. Recently, the scores for this test became availible online, along with a send-home notice. Expecting a lowly and embarassing score (for an English major), I check out my score to find that I got a 10 out of 12. I then laughed. Like a maniac. That's a fantastic score for awful writing. Am I really that talented?

I saw American Wedding last night and I can easily say that Stifler made the movie. End of story. It was entertaining and enjoyable though. After the movie, Cory, Justin, Aaron, and myself all headed out to San Diego to Neal's new house where we were late enough to miss everyone getting plastered. Including Caroline Emmerson, who seemed to be very intoxicated, despite her assertion that she was not. Some personal highlights of the evening:

On latex condoms:
Aaron: There's a girl I work with who's allergic to latex. Sex must be a bitch.
Me: Aaron. Lingerie is made out of material other than latex.

On Family Guy:
Shee-Ra: Do you guys like Family Guy?

On booze & drugs:
CrossFadedGuy: *fart sound*

On the legitimacy of a party:
Cory: It's not a party unless someone pisses in your backyard.

I should put some Otter Pops in the freezer. I'm starving. My dad brought me back some white nectarines from the store. Oh-so good.

2003-07-30T10:04:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I went to the beach area to visit Carolyn, a friend of mine from CSULB. We hung out the dog beach (which is a supremely cool place) for a little bit then came back to her place so that I could get on the freeway before the blazing inferno hell that is the 91 could congest any further. Alas, by the time I was on the 91, it was a bit too late and my car was starting to act funny. Funny as in the blinkers not working, the battery light on, the speedometer falling past 85 (which is the highest it can go), and all together just having trouble speeding up period. I decided that it would be best if I got off before I hit the canyon where there would be NO place for me to pull off and call for a tow. I did that at a Shell Station in Orange. So I sat and called the good ol' Triple A, and my nerves a bit fried, went into the service station and asked the nice middle eastern man behind the counter if they took credit cards. I got a bag of Sour Cream & Cheddar Ruffles and a bottle of Cherry Coke. Went back outside and waited for the tow truck. When he got there, it took about an hour and a half to hook up the Olds and drive all the way back to Redlands. I got to hear him talk in Italian to his family over a phone. That was cool. When we got to my house, he let down my beat up car, and I got him a cold bottle of water for the long ride home. The only good thing I got out of that ordeal was a free Coke product from my bottlecap.

When I was actually on my way to Costa Mesa where Carolyn lives, where you take the 215 interchange from the 10, I began to think a little. I thought, it would suck to lose control of the car and crash through the guard rail and fall a few hundred feet to the concrete below. Supposing that could have happened, I imagined what I would think about in my last seconds. I know I would definitely consider the people that I've met in my life. The problem, I think, is that I would want to rest my thoughts on someone-- or something-- right before I stopped existing in this world. I couldn't do that. I couldn't choose, much less even begin to think about who I would let my thoughts rest on, should something like this happen to me. It got me thinking about people in other situations like that. Someone who truly has no time to consider something like that, or decide on a final thought before the final moment. Fodder for a some wacky movie plot, I suppose.

And while we're on the subject of freeways (to a degree), I had an experience that made me realize I'm somewhat slow-witted. My wise cracks always come a little too late, or I always think of a fantastic sarcastic comment minutes after the ideal time has passed. My wit is ensuing. For example, I called up X103.9 to request an STP song. The actual DJ picks up and talks to me. I tell him I'm on my way back from Tyler Mall, and he replies with, "Any bubbles out there?" I have no idea what the fuck he's talking about so I say, "No, not really." He asks me if that's all he can do for me and I tell him yep. Then he asks me one last question, "What's your favorite drug?" (typical Inland Empire mindset...) I say that I'm not really into drugs, then he says Okay, I'll see what I can do about the song. Right on. And we hang up. Five seconds later I say to myself, "Robitussin. Robitussin is my favorite drug." Not only was it brilliantly funny (fuck modesty for now, it was), but it would have made ol' Bobby Sato feel like an ass for trying to promote the retarded drug culture.

And if I seem a bit surreal right now, its because I watched End of Evangelion two nights ago, and that shit still makes my head hurt. Seriously, if you like mindfucks, try out the series and then the movie. I'm making sense of it through some internet resource sites dedicated to the series and movie.

Alrighty kids. Peace out. Who liked the thunderstorm the other night?

2003-07-25T22:30:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, I got a call on my cell phone while I was at work. It was a number I didn't recognize, so I was kind of suprised to find out that it was Cal Poly University Housing Services calling to let me know they had an opening for an RA position and asked if I was interested in the position. I was. To make a long story short, I'm saving $7000 this school year, which is making my parents incredibly happy. So that was that. I'm still kind of suprised, and unbelieving, but yeah, I'm very happy.

As a little celebration present to myself I went to the Tyler Mall today and spend an unheard-of (at least for me, anyway) $400 at various stores. Some clothing from Hollister, a belt from Abercrombie because Hollister belts are kinda sucky, two Anime DVDs: Akira and End of Evangelion, a CD alarm stereo for the new (single!) dorm room, a pair of Reef sandals, and some socks. Bling, bling, motherfuckers. Upside your head with a bottle of Coors and all that shit.

I probably spent two hours the other night looking at posters that I could adorn my new place at Cal Poly with and I think I can settle with the extremeley hot "KISS" door poster (Calvin Klienish "ad" with two chicks kissing) and a more dreamy Map of the Universe which has some pretty nifty stuff on it. Its gonna be a cool year, and I'll probably move in sooner than I usually do. I also get to help the fresh 18-year-old-innocent-freshmen-poon move in during their Welcome Week.

When I'm at work, I try to be as nice as possible to our customers. If I get attitude though, I cut out my personality and treat them the same way they're treating me. For the most part, I think I come across as very friendly. When I went into Abercrombie and Fitch today, my sales clerk was a complete asshole. I was nice and friendly. I'm normally nice and friendly to strangers. This arrogant little sonofabitch treated me as if I were something lower than him. He didn't want my business. When you normally get your change, how is it usually given to you? Nine times out of ten, its handed to you in your open hand with human contact. This douche bag motherfucker drops my change onto the counter for me to pick up, completely bypassing my open palm. 'the hell is that? I just spent forty bucks in your store, you cock, so give me a little respect. I walked out of there feeling as if I wasn't welcome. Maybe it was the two gigantic Hollister bags at my feet. Fuck A&F, you snobby east coast pussybeasts. Loosen up and chill out. ~Love, California. Dude.

2003-07-21T23:34:00.000-07:00

I'm convinced that there is a secret Elderly Ninja training camp somewhere in Redlands. I also believe that they use the Alta Dena Dairy as a live training exercise course. They send one of their initate Old Lady Ninjas in and rouse of the dairy boys with her terrifying abilities as a Ninja. First of all, these Elderly Ninjas show up out of fucking nowhere. And I mean nowhere. It's seriously like, **POOF**, and there's an Elderly Ninja standing next to you. You don't know what the hell to do either because you're afraid they'll cut your throat out with their double edged Katanas and swiftly hobble off into the night on their tennis ball walkers.

They're silent too. When they speak, it is cold hearted and too the point. Very Ninja-like, don't you think? And once they pay for their ("horribly overpriced") quart of two percent milk, its over, you're fair game. Don't let those moo-moos fool you either. Its the traditional garb of the Old Lady Ninja. That shit doesn't make a sound and its cheap.

Some of the old dude Ninjas are pretty creepy too. Some of them don't groom their fingers, so they've got these eagle-talon fingernails that can easily pluck your eyeballs out should you witness them jacking any of the cottage cheese (small curd, of course). As if gettting your eyes plucked out wasn't bad enough, you can see some of the super secret Ninja poison shit they soak those fingernails in. Must be pretty potent too because it turns their fingernails yellow, so not only will you have to deal with missing eyes, you'd have to deal with an infection so nasty that it would make penicillin wish that it was never shat out of a bacterium's ass.

Today, an Old Lady Ninja appeared out of nowhere, right beside me. She was staring blankly at the new-old Hostess stuff we have.

Me: Holy fucking shit, where did you come from?
Old Lady Ninja: I've been standing here for five minutes.
Me: I'm-- I'm so sorry. What can I get for you? (I'm trying to remedy the situation so she doesn't mark me for death)
Old Lady Ninja: I would like a quart of one percent milk.
Me: We... ah... only have half gallons as our smallest size.
Old Lady Ninja: All right, I'll take that.
Me: Would you like anything else? (I'm trying to get her out of there for fear that I may urinate myself)
Old Lady Ninja: Patience, grasshoppa. (I swear to God)
Me: Pardon me?
Old Lady Ninja: May I have a bag?
Me: S-sure... it's going to be one nintey-nine. (she gives me a dirty look) Nintey-nine cents. ('nother dirty look as she opens her Old Lady Ninja Bag which has, among other things, a full set of throwing stars) Free.
Old Lady Ninja: (as she is thinking of the thirty-thousand ways she can kill me with a pack of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups) Thank you. You boys are so nice to me. And its so hot outside.
Me: Well, w-we try. (I say as we stand in a puddle of expanding yellow liquid)

I turned around to cancel the "sale" on my drawer when (I swear) my shirt falls cleanly off my body. It had a clean cut at all the seams. I spun back around to face the Old Lady Ninja, but she had vanished into the night.

This encounter was only with an initiate Elderly Ninja. I can say that I probably be dead if I encountered a Ninja from Plymouth Villiage, which I suspect is their prime base of operations. The only advice I can offer you if you ever encounter (you may not even know it) an Elderly Ninja is to just remain calm and do exactly as they say. Don't even think about facing one of these Ninjas without at least a squad of heavily armed Navy Seals. Even then, your chances of surviving are slim. Be careful out there folks. You never know where those Aged Ninjas may lurk. Redlands is full of them.

2003-07-19T19:43:00.000-07:00

So much for going to the Fairplex and getting tatt'd up with my friends. Its not really a problem, actually, its just something different we should all do together instead of going to the fucking theatre, Starbucks, or the Falconer every night.

I got up this morning exhausted from last night, watching all you kids get plastered. The last thing I remember is someone saying something about Cory passing out on the toilet. Vomiting for two hours... sounds like a blast. And you guys wonder why I don't like to drink. I didn't mean that as a pot-shot at all, and I'm really happy that no one bothered me about it last night with the exception of Gina. She ended up puking in the bushes behind the kegs anyway, so I think she sees where I'm coming from.

I walked outside to a beautiful morning. The clouds were literally silver and the air seemed clean and crisp for a sweltering summer in the desert hell that is the Inland Empire. Hauled ass home in the jeep, showered, and left for the gas station. I got two Red Bulls and a sweet roll to wake my ass up, but for some weird, unexplainable reason, I'm immune to caffene. So yeah. I arrived at Cal Poly at about 7:45 in the morning, and walked to the building the test was at. We were supposed to write for 75 minutes and rate something. I wrote on Final Fantasy Tactics because I knew a lot about it, and that would make the task that much easier. I was also exhausted, and didn't want to think too hard. I hope I pass. I don't care. I'm a goddamned English Major so I should have the VIP access to whatever the hell I want. Or something like that. I finished up and drove home, talking to Brandy from Upland to Redlands, which probably kept me alive and not dead from falling asleep at the wheel.

I came home and slept for three beautiful hours and checked the mail. I'm on the Dean's list. Again. For the third time. Which means I'm on the President's Honor List. Which (probably) means I get cool tassel-ey shit for graduation. Go me, go me. One year left. One year.

2003-07-16T23:20:00.000-07:00

Amnesia Vertigo: really freakin' hot in there
Forfour: geez
Forfour: man
Forfour: it must suck if someone pukes
Forfour: that would stink
Amnesia Vertigo: it kinda smells like puke when you first walk in then you get used to it
Amnesia Vertigo: like an asian's house

2003-07-11T01:44:00.000-07:00

After working tonight, I have decided that all the retards come out when it is dark.

Stuff I love: waterfalls, rain falling on pavement, breezy spring days, the scent of orange blossoms, my friends, my dog, my family, that feeling you get right before you sneeze, a good movie, a good book, a good video game, a bad movie I can bash on relentlessly for years on end, cartoons, toys, television, the beach, a slight breeze at the beach, what the mountains look like on a clear winter day, lush green meadows up in Yosemite, brunette chicks, nice girls, big dogs, fast cars, speeding down the road with all the windows down and the radio blasting, staring at the stars and getting vertigo, singing classic rock songs with my pals, deciding what to eat, deciding what to drink, rain on the roof, rain in general, a good laugh, morning breakfast smells, fruit, light-eyed girls, those tiny gym shorts with [insert university name here] on the butt, the feeling you get when you find out someone likes you, laughing so hard you can't breathe, the feeling you get when you buy something really expensive-- car or computer or home, dreaming, dreaming that I'm a hero of sorts, contemplating existence, deep conversations, observing friends, swimming, waking up in the morning like you can take on the world, going to bed and falling right asleep, good music, watching after my drunk friends, and knowing that there are people who've got my back.

2003-07-07T18:07:00.000-07:00

I work at a joint that allows you to see a plethora of different vehicles a day. I see everything from brand new BMW Z4s, to trucks with dick lifts that are almost over two feet, to ricers with wings as big as a 747, to jalopies that can barely make it out the driveway. My job allows me to survey a ton of different vehicles on the market. Some of these machines are tributes to our species. Others are a crime against man and god.

Have you seen some of the vehicles out on the market today? The Scion, for example? What an abomination. It looks like Toyota tried to turn a fuckin' Chevy Astro Van into a goddamn Micro Machine. Then there's the Honda Element. Honda makes excellent cars that last a long time. The boys in the design department probably all got together to see who could design the ugliest quasi-SUV chasi and release it onto the public like a zombifing virus. Pontiac tried the same thing with its horrifying Aztec a few years ago. I see a few of those out on the road once in a while... I chuckle. Probably like the car companies that manufacture these people-carrying pieces of shit.

Then, the car I hate the most of all, the one that throws me onto the ground where I begin to twitch in an epilleptic siezure is the PT Cruiser. Ugly. Ugly. Ugly. Ugly. Seems like some douche with a ZZ Top Fetish couldn't leave his goddamn car nostalgia back in the 60's where it should have died. Instead these inventors weren't satisfied with car shows. They had to redesign them into a hip-and-more-areodynamic-for-the-new-millenium spawn of the devil. What drives me up the wall is that these cars are somehow gaining a following. People get together and drive their ugly-ass PT Cruisers around town so that they all know that at least a few other people bought an ugly-ass car as well. At least they all stay rounded up so when the time comes they can be cleansed from the genepool... they can take their cars with them.

I can't even begin to fathom what may posess people to buy ugly cars. It sure as hell can't be the price tag because there are better looking cars for the same price. There are certainly better ways to bring attention to yourself than through the ugliness of your vehicle. I don't know... its exhausting to try to understand the stupidity of people. Go to my happy place? Don't mind if I do.

2003-06-29T23:10:00.000-07:00

JUST FOR SHOW

(results contain pictures) What kind of ANIME BOOBS do you have?
brought to you by Quizilla

2003-06-27T13:04:00.000-07:00

"Hard alcohol is two testicle beer penis." -- Justin

That is all I have to say. We had a blast.

2003-06-26T13:53:00.000-07:00

It seems as though Blogger has reinnovated itself. Good for Blogger. Anyway... I just finished a can of Sierra Mist... still being held in the plastic rings. I also devoured a bowl of Hormel Spicy Chili. I feel especially white-trashy.

And happy 21st to Cory. I guess we're going to a bar tonight, huh? (Cory turned 21 yesterday... I guess he's coming to town today, or that's what I'd assume from the text message.)

Alright, allow me to brain dump. Don't worry-- it's not a "Boo-hoo, why don't girls like me" rant. I just finished watching a anime series called Neon Genesis Evangelion. I must say I was blown away. Final Fantasy VII blown away. Anyone that really knows me, should find that to be particularly interesting. Well, I'm sure you're not interested in that I was blown away, or how it has to do with my fascination with a particular video game, and to be honest, I'm not really interested either. What I would like to explore is how these sorts of things manage to pluck my strings. Not even that... sort of like... the actual feeling you get from thinking about the things that... well, blow you away.

I guess I can start off by saying that when it gets down to the muck of it, it sort of makes you numb. Sorta fuzzy-feeling, very lucid. Almost like you're dreaming. I guess it would be easiest to describe as your conscienceness in your dreams. The you in your dreams. Very weird. Very few works have put me in this... "catatonic" state. Final Fantasy VII, definitely. Just recently, Evangelion. A story I read in Literature of Science Fiction called Childhood's End-- and maybe to a lesser extent, The Forever War-- all these things (and probably a few others I have neglected to mention) have the stuff to initiate the hungering nostalgia that I always seem to crave. The thing that does it for me is the story. I like a good mindfuck. Keeps me on my toes. Thing is, I don't know if I'm preaching to a deaf audience. This all may be very unique to my psychology, I don't know. Describing this stuff is like trying to teach complex math algorithms to a five-year-old. Not that the people who read this are five.

It'd be so much easier if I could go, "Hey, you know that fuzzy feeling?" And someone replies, "Yeah, its weird, isn't it?" And I say "Yeah." And we think about it for a little, then start making fart jokes.

Indeed.

2003-06-22T18:33:00.000-07:00

Grades are out for the Cal Poly populace! C+ for American Literature, A- for Shakespeare, A for Literary Theory, and an A for Elementary Spanish III. That'll put me on the Dean's List for three quarters in a row. Am I on fire? Tsst. Yep. Smokin' hot.

2003-06-21T12:11:00.000-07:00

Not much to say. We all know what I did. Work, play, and sleep. Alls I hafta say is BAILY'S BROWNIES. I AM YOUR GOD. Seriously. You all laughed at me when I mentioned it. WHO IS LAUGHING NOW? Just kidding. I love you all. But not in a gay way.

2003-06-09T01:42:00.000-07:00

So. It is finals week. I need to read two-hundred more pages in a book by tomorrow night and have a nice little essay written up about it. And I need to have that essay not suck. I want at least a B- in this class. Otherwise, finals shouldn't be that difficult. Tuesday morning at 7 I have a Spanish final... one that I am probably going to put an hour into studying... which is a lot more than I usually do. Then Tuesday afternoon, I go and turn in that essay that won't suck. That night I'll be finishing up a Literary Theory paper-- I just need to tack on at least four more pages, so I don't really forsee any terrible problems with this. Shakespeare, WE HAVE NO FINAL (!!!), so we're gonna talk about what a big a-hole MacBeth is. That's on Thursday. Friday, I move out. And I'm actually looking forward to being home for once. Probably 'cause I'll be working, and I love my job, so... yeah.

I got the Animatrix last week, and it has some really great animation with some excellent Matrix-related material to boot. I definitely recommend it. Saturday I worked with Wes, and will again this coming Saturday. There's this chick-- a... "big-boned" chick (and by big boned, I mean T-rex, style, okay?) and she always tips us huge. Huge as in 8 bucks. That's nice. Yeah, so I let her tab two 20-packs of beer... and we got 8 dollars just for a 12-er of Carona, so... well, me and Wes are speculative on how much we're gonna get dropped this time. It is lookin' good though.

Hm. I don't have much else to say. I just want to get this painfully uneventful year over with. Good luck on all your finals and what have you. Congratulations to Ben Daugherty, class of 2003. International "player" for life. Love ya, bro.

2003-06-02T19:54:00.000-07:00

On Friday, I brought home my Playstation games and DVDs. This Friday, the books go home, along with other tidbits. On the way home, one of my tires split open while I was going at a steady 70 mph in the third lane of the ten freeway. Swearing, I pulled the car over to the shoulder, then started to craw up the closest offramp and into an ARCO servicestation. Changed the tire, made some phone calls to the parents about new tires, then went to work to wash the olds... I felt filthy just sitting in the damned thing. When I got to work, Scott asked me if I wanted to work for him. I accepted.

I worked with James for the rest of Scott's shift when something rather interesting happened. James went to help a lady in the carwash with her soap brush. After a little bit of conversation, she immediately became a bit irritated and started pesting James. James is not a man to pester. Once she felt a little bit of his "aura" (I guess you'd call it), she asked to speak with the manager. James told her that the manager wouldn't care. So she asked for a main office number. He said we were a franchise, and he could refuse service to her if he wanted. She said, "Fine. I have family anyway." James comes back to the main building and tells me what happened. I told him the last part sounded like a threat. A few minutes later, this lady comes up to me and asks me what time my buddy gets off at. I tell her three. We really get off at two. I'm a sharp one, huh?

So how gay is that? Lamer than I care to describe anyway. This lady, well into her thirties, decides to rely on elementary school discourse for solving her fucking problems. Seriously. What a bitch. Nothing happened anyway, but still... its fun to talk about stupid people. I went home and napped for a while and started watching the first half of The Matrix.

Saturday I worked with Kerry who was extremely hung over from the previous day of drinkin'. I took up most of the stoking work... which means I made a shitload of ice. My dad and brother came through with the Olds and its brand new tire. Joy. I drove that home later and beat Enter the Matrix, and finished The Matrix after my dad was done with the television. I have one and a half papers to write this week. The half of one is a rough draft. At least it isn't three papers.

Excuse me. I need to fill the other 75 gigs of my computer with porn. Later.

2003-05-26T15:21:00.000-07:00

I would like to again add to the Matrix hype machine. The Animatrix (Mainframe menu, second box, March 2003 trailer) looks great. Great. I'm watching this thing at Matt D's and we're like, "Hell yes. Hell yes." Some of the episodes are availible online for download, and I've seen two-- they are amazing. Brilliant. More to add to the story of The Matrix. Go watch it. Be hyped.

I also got myself Enter the Matrix, which is the Video Game adaptation of the movies, which is extremely fun to play on its own. I was coerced into buying this after Justin told me he finally broke down and bought it. Hell, if Justin liked it, I probably would too. I also bought a new 80 GB hard drive for my computer... my tiny 15 GB is running on its last amount of space, so I decided it was time to upgrade.

It is very fun to talk about Family Guy with your friends. Probably even better to watch it. Which I'm sure we will when JUSTIN buys the Season 1 & 2 DVD set. What a good man.

2003-05-25T21:16:00.000-07:00

This reminds me of a joke. This guy, he comes into a bar, walks up to the Bartender and says, "Bartender, I got me a bet for you. I'm gonna bet you three-hundred dollars that I can piss into that glass over there and not spill a single solitary drop."

The Bartender says... he says, "Now wait a minute. Let me get this straight. You're trying to tell me you're gonna bet me three-hundred dollars that YOU can piss standing over here waaay over there, into that glass, and not spill a single drop"?

The guy looks up smiling and says, "That's right."

The Bartender says, "Young man, you gotta bet!"

The guy says, "O.K., here we go, here we go." He pulls out his thang. He's looking at the glass, man he's thinking about the glass, he's thinking about the glass, he thinks glass, he's thinking of the glass, think glass, thinking about his dick. Dick, glass. Dick, glass. Dick, glass. Be the glass. Dick, glass. Dick, glass. Dick, glass.

And then 'SWOOOSH' . He lets it rip! And he's ...he's pissin' all over the place, man! He's pissin' on the bar... he's pissin' on the stools, on the floor, on the phone... on the Bartender... he's pissing everywhere EXCEPT the fucking glass!! Right.

O.K. So, Bartender, He's laughing his fucking ass off, he's three-hundred dollars richer. He's like, "Ha Ha Ha Ha." Piss drippin' off his face. "Ha Ha Ha Ha" He says, "You FUCKIN' idiot, man. You hit everything EXCEPT the glass!! You owe me three-hundred dollars punta." And he goes, "Excuse me, just one, one second." Goes in the back of the bar, and in the back there's a couple of guys
playing pool. He walks over to them... comes back to the bar and goes, "Here you go Mr. Bartender, three."

And the Bartenders like, "WHAT the fuck are you so happy about, you just lost three-hundred dollars, you idiot!"

The guy says, "Well, you see those guys over there? I just bet them five-hundred dollars a PIECE, that I could piss on your bar, piss on your floor, piss on your phone, and piss on YOU, and not only would you be not mad about it... you'd be happy..."

Desperado is on.

2003-05-23T12:50:00.000-07:00

Download "Sun Rises Down" by Acroma. Now.