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Time: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 00:28:03 GMT
Everything server: Apache/1.3.9 (Unix) Debian/GNU mod_perl/1.21_03-dev
Number of nodes: 664664 (1460 new since August 22, 2000)
Number of users: 18262 (38 new since August 22, 2000)
Number of links: 3161818 (24885 new since August 22, 2000)

Node to user ratio: 36.396 nodes per user
Link to node ratio: 4.757 links per node
Link to user ratio: 173.136 links per user

New Nodes: [Is EDB a he or a she?] [Nodes about Everything are just masturbatory] [I Care] [Editor Log: August 22, 2000] [The Mathematician, the Physicist and the Programmer Joke] [August 22, 2000] [Charlie Fox] [Portrait of an Ass-Grabber] [conflict] [Your Happiness Doesn't Matter] [prosciutto] [goatfuck] [Homo neanderthalensis] [Never Join a CD Club] [Sheepshead]

Users Online (45): [nate] [dannye] [tregoweth] [hamster bong] [ophie] [tftv256] [ailie] [Gamaliel] [deep thought] [Stride] [kamamer] [Yablo] [Hermetic] [no comply] [simonc] [BelDion] [dpride] [ithron] [ifeeldizzy] [kanon42] [Ater] [miridiri] [Big Willy] [TheNastyCanasty] [sockpuppet] [AU] [TDO] [Dialogue] [different42] [0137] [winmute] [lemuru] [continuity] [viper281] [liha] [DaveQat] [Johnny5D] [Deadbolt] [tj9582] [Revera] [ntshane] [KetsuYa] [TinCanFury] [core] [ChildeHarold]

JeffMagnus node count: 4036 (1 new since August 22, 2000)
JeffMagnus experience: 9503 (20 more since August 22, 2000)
JeffMagnus experience to node ratio: 2.355 XP per node
JeffMagnus nodeshare: 0.608%
JeffMagnus node of the day: The 106th Congress

It is still yesterday, the 22nd of August, as I write this

I am so happy. This is the first time I have ever been in the snapshot...

More to come, unless I don't make it to tomorrow.

Update:
I made it to tomorrow/today. It looks like a good day.
Today I get my new projects at work. I don't know what they will be, but at least I will have something to do now.

I will probably buy Mindrover today. Go to cogintoy.com and get the demo. It is a really cool little game.

ugh. It's back to icr for another day of pain. But i'm gonna call getzburg so should be alright.

ugh a bug in a rug! I made it into the snapshot, how odd/weird/strange.

help me help you!

Today is Krishna's birthday. I know nothing about him, other than his birthday is celebrated at midnight on the 23rd of August. I do know that legal proceedings with a person you cared about and considered to be a close friend hurt. But, such is life.

Today is (well, will be) the first day of the new semester at NMSU. And for once I'm not dreading it.

In fact, this is the first semester I can remember where I was looking forward to (rather than dreading and/or getting suicidally depressed over) the "oncoming traffic," so to speak. I think it's because I actually have a lot to look forward to.

See, last semester, I had returned to grad school having been defeated. It was a fallback, and it almost felt like a cop-out. But this semester, I have a fellowship, I have research, I have a TA position (which I'm definitely looking forward to - I'm TAing the graphics algorithms course), and I'm really stoked right now because in the past 3 weeks I've gotten a HUGE chunk of my first album done (and, in fact, I only have one song left to record in order to call it Done).

Yesterday I was in OfficeMax, gazing at the incredible selection of graph paper and legal pads trying to figure out which kind I wanted, and I heard a familiar voice ask me if I was getting ready for the semester. I turned to look and it was my advisor. We had a nice long chat about the coming semester and academia and the like, and apparently this is the first semester in a long time which he is looking forward to as well. His primary research project is gaining a huge amount of momentum (not to mention a lot of grad students who actually care about the project and are as impassioned about it as he is), and I think he's overall happy about the courses he's teaching this semester (probably because myself and two other of his grad students are in it, as all three of us were in it last semester and gave him a hard time - in a good, MST3k sorta way).

Let's see. I'm taking Operating Systems (taught by my advisor), Networking, and... um, some other class I can't recall the name of. I'm looking forward to all three, in any case, since all of them are useful and pertinent to my own research interests and, specifically, to my thesis project. That's one of the really nice things about being a grad student - you decide which courses you need, not a bunch of professors whose heads are stuck in their collective ass.

Oh, and another nice thing about this semester: for various reasons, huge amounts of the faculty left. Yeah, it's got the whole department under a lot of stress, but a large chunk of the ones who left are ones that nobody liked anyway. (One was "asked to resign" for abusing his tenure, one who is notorious for having never gotten over the Prolog hype of the early 80s suddenly left for UT Dallas...)

Unfortunately, a few who left are also well-liked and respected. The department head's wife got a dean position at U. Florida Tampa, the resident AI guru left for greener pastures (I dunno where she even went off to, and didn't even know she left until a few days ago)...

But in any case. I'm looking forward to this semester, my advisor is looking forward to it, many of my friends are looking forward to it... from this perspective, things are good.

I can hardly wait. :)

Sunday morning I leave for college. Home is here in Delaware. School is there in Brooklyn. I am glad to be moving out and getting away from constrictive parents and all that stuff, but she is here. And she will be a high school senior.

So now what? We'll do our best to stay together. A year and ten months is a lot to just let go of. I want to marry her someday. We are in love. Life has been beautiful. But now things are going to be suddenly and overwhelmingly difficult. I am unsure as to how to proceed. I want to tell her that it will all be all right. Everything will be fine. Love overcomes all things. I just wish I was more sure myself. I know we can do it. I just hope we're strong enough.

I don't know why I am writing this. I am unsure as to what I hope to gain. Perhaps writing and hoping for the offchance that someone who has been through it will read it and sympathize. But every life and love is different. If it was meant to be, it will be. Que sera, sera, no? Si.

(sigh) Goodnight, everyone. I love you, lauren.

Okay, time for a break in format here. Today has sucked. I didn't manage to go out and get the library books I wanted, I've been called on my favorite distraction technique and I can't use it due to moral honesty anymore, I couldn't find a decent pair of shoes without a white strip that goes black in two months due to the shoemaker conspiracy, my father thinks I eat like a horse judging by the intense pressure to buy more, more and more food for three days of being alone, my anxiety is making me gibber quietly and I'm starting to become violently ill. And college starts on Monday. The only good thing that happened today was a decent meal at Original Thai and a call from Tom, slacking off at work during his second day of employment.

I don't think I'll be noding for a while - expect me back in a week or so.

Woohoo!@ Went to Six Flags Magic Mountain Los Angeles today. Much fun.

Got there just after it opened, no waiting in line for a ticket. Thankyou AOL-Time-Warner. Went with my girlfriend. Much fun. There is a picture of us http://dipcard.com/?s=6622iawde There. Yes so sue me i payed money for a picture. Whatever. Goliath was fun, the little dinky gold rush one was fun, batman in the dark is fun. The poopy carosel operator closed on us right when we got to the thingy. Grrrrr. Oh well. Viper made my head hurt, the harness was too small, so i kept hitting my head on the god forsaken thing. It hurt for a long, long time. Oh, and the first time i went on Goliath, i completely forgot to hold my breath on the long drop down. It's scary to not have _any_ air in your lungs going down at 85mph. I almost blacked out later in the ride, couldn't catch my breath. Isn't Asthma fun?

On the way back we got in 'n out.

Yesterday | Dizzy->Day_Logs() | Tomorrow


9:15 BST

I'm going to have to be extra careful in the way I deal with my project leader from now on. It looks as though his is going to single me out from the group as a person he can take his frustrations out on. He's just sent me an email berating me for not following group policy when I set an password on a demo system - There is no group policy on passwords, he's just using it as an excuse.

Thankfully I'm not alone. My colleagues have expressed support, and are also concerned at the way this new project leader is disrupting the group.

If there is something to be said, he will say it in such a way as to annoy the most number of people in a given group...

13:10 BST

My Mother has invited me over for a takeaway this evening as my stepdad isn't in. This means that I won't be forced to watch football (soccer to you non-UK'ers). I hope we have Chinese food!

16:20 BST

Tip of the day! Not as good as fondue's below...

When administering servers, buy a yoyo. While the servers are rebooting, improve your yoyo skills. (Rebooting is a frequent and lengthy occurrence when using a Microsoft Windows NT 4 Cluster)

OK, so I haven't written a daylog in maybe two weeks. The habit stopped when some really bad work vibes started, and my days were consumed with said vibes. Having chosen a not-so-anonymous handle for E2, and having made a decision to not be the anonymous guy, it felt really quite scary to daylog my weirder-and-weirder days.

The days are still weird, but I understand what is happening, and am trying to be awfully grown up about assuring me and my family's happiness. Anyway, enough of that.

Since my last daylog, I turned 34 years old, which has actually been pretty cool. Never been one for the big birthday bash, this last one was no exception (Gemma made me dinner at home and I got loads of spoiling). I do feel more grown up though, more than 33. I got a really great Swiss watch in stainless steel with the most minimal face from Gemma, and a few cards and flowers. I liked it

E2 has become a good friend, I understand the ebbs and flows better, have made some nice friends and met one or two kindred spirits. I've found a mothernode of content to upload over the past two days, as my Y2K Tokyo vacation is fast approaching so I've grabbed all my travel notes for Palm V-ing and that has inspired me into a noding frenzy.

Sensei (bless him) has been very patient with me, bugging him night and day. I'm a little worried about him though. I hope he gets a hug today.

Molly has also been sick, poor little thing. Got a rough guts from eating garbage which is her forth favourite thing (after sniffing, sleeping, and eating). Made her some organic chicken bits in a little olive oil for dinner, and she is feeling better. When Gemma was in her coma some years ago, Molly was my best possible friend, and I told her I'll forever be in her debt. It's still as true as it was then. She's such a good dog.

I was saddened when those folks added their names to I quit. I think DMan is a loon, but I can't help liking him a whole lot. I saw him sneak in to E2 a couple of times today, and /msg'd him a cheery hello, but haven't heard back. I hope he does come back, and I think he should be made an editor. DMan needs a hug. Lometa was nice to me, had a ball with eclip5e, and dragoon was a tolerant, if somewhat bemused friend.

Well, in the last couple of days I have had a couple of chances to visit the machine rooms downstairs. I love the machine rooms. I would actually abaondon my desk (which has a window seat I'll have you know) to work down there. Underground. (I just took a few minutes to node machine room, as no-one else had. Well there was server room, but that wasn't the right node for what I wanted to write.)

Just got an email containing a story about a woman driver in Paris, who drove into a Metro entrance (for pedestrians to walk down to the underground station) thinking it was an underground car park. There was a great picture of her car blocking a walkway (with stone steps, and a handrail on it by the way). Great stuff.

Sheesh, my XP to Node Ratio is just over 6. Is that good? It feels good, which is what counts I guess.
... Having done a bit of research, it doesn't come very close to some people with extremely high XP/Writeup ratios, but never mind.

Well, today has been fun. Node nicely.

15:07 EET

Autumn, baby!
For the first time in ages, the temperature graph on the MTV3 website has 0 inside its range! Now if the line just would drop below that magic 10..
Everybody else at the office is cursing the weather, but I'm smiling while sitting here in my long-sleeve shirt. I can't even remember the last time a T-shirt wasn't sufficient! Too bad that with my luck, it will be +30c again next week.

Speaking about the changing season, some person/people living in the building next to my friend has gone a bit too far. Their apartment window got decorated with christmas lights in the middle of august!
Now, seriously. I love xmas as much as the next guy, but isn't this a bit overboard?
I am thinkin about getting those ridiculous lights to my window as well this year. If only to annoy our new neighbor. But with a room already full of colourful psychedelic lights, would they even notice the difference?

It sucks to see DMan quitting. No matter what I think about his aggressive political rants and such, at least most of what he nodes is quite intense. If I would quit E2, would anyone even notice? Hardly. I write bland and boring stuff most of the noders never even read. I don't fight with people on the chatterbox or participate in heavy debate nodes. And I'm quite happy with myself, even if I am an evil politically correct individual. :)

Actually I have nearly quit noding on 2 occasions. When my lack in English skills combined with my usual incoherency caused a node of mine to get misunderstood and myself hated by lots of people, I was quite close. Thanks to the two noders actually trying to help me correct my mistake, and special thanks to the childish asshole who invited everybody to an XP pack rape. You know who you are. The second incident was learning a writeup of mine was nuked with no sensible reason whatsoever. But instead of just accepting my defeat, I decided it's better to make backups and node on. I don't quit.

Ok, before leaving I still have to squeeze a bit of work out of myself. My mom is making her kickass chicken jambalaya tonight, and I don't want to miss that. Although rare, there are moments when living with parents is not that terrible. :)


Today's Writeups
Roland SH-1 | Roland SH-2

Nodekeeping
CEM 3340 / 3345 | Roland | Roland Jupiter-6 | Roland SH-101

prev daylog next daylog

I've been sick for a few days, so it's been kind of worthless to write daylogs. I lay around in bed and drank tea with lemon.

Today I went shopping for some basic stuff for my upcoming trip to the dolomites. I got to my car, and there was a parking ticket on it. I live in a neighbourhood where it's quite hard to find parking spaces, especially when you come home late at night. There are quite a few pavements that are illegal to park next to, but the city inspectors, or whatever you call the people who walk around and give parking tickets, turn a blind eye. I've spoken to some, and they told me that they understand how difficult it is to find a place to park your car, so if they see a car with permission to park in the district, parking in an illegal spot, they'll turn a blind eye, as long as it's not blatant (like 1 meter from the pavement). I was parking half & half, where I was not disturbing car or pedestrian movement. I guess the ticket-giver just had a fight with his wife or something.

First of all I scrunched the ticket up into a ball and threw it in the bin, because I'll be damned if I pay for a parking ticket right next to my home. It's already happened a few times. I never paid, and I will never pay. I once even got towed away. I sure learned from that. Never again. Now I park in a way that makes sure they can't tow me away.

What an interesting last 24 hours I've had.

My ex called me at work yesterday wanting me to help her pay last months bills... I DIDN'T LIVE THERE LAST MONTH... bitch... Nothing is enough for her, she keeps wanting us to go out and do something, saying,"I don't want to lose you Tex." WELL THEN WHY THE HELL DID YOU FUCK PAUL? Well, this I suppose made her think, her answer, I kid you not was, "Good point." What do you say to that?

Looks like I finally got all of my stuff settled into the new house, everything looks really nice, it's a bitch keeping the cat out of everything. There's no telling how many random computer parts he's ESD'd by now.
The Linux project is at a stand still, I don't know when I'll have time to start tinkering with it, I've got alot going at the moment.

wednesday morning

another day, another dollar. work work work.

i had another fairly sleepless night last night, though not for the same reasons as yesterday. last night i had to pee and pee and pee. about every hour i woke up again and peed. i think the barium kinda dried me up (think cement mix in your intestines), and so i guzzled water all evening before bed.

it's hump day! huzzah to wednesday! the day that shows the week is halfway done, and we can coast downhill until friday.

had dinner with my sister last night... she gave me a shot of depo provera (she's better at giving shots than my doctor). the shot itself i barely felt, but now i feel like i was slugged a good one in the left shoulder. ah well. i love depo. it doesn't seem to be making me any crazier than usual this time, i don't have to remember to take a pill everyday, and (JOY OF JOYS) i don't have a period.

to my man

i love you. i am at work and i am thinking of you. of your hands on my lower back (in my tickle spot). of your chest under my cheek as we fall asleep. of walking behind you so i can see your ass as you walk.

Evening...

17:08

Well, I got the cell phone working. The problem was that I pushed Ctrl+Tab+left arrow when I was supposed to push Shift+Tab+left arrow. And you thought all Nokia cellphones are fun and easy to use? =)

170 kb free of 2 megabytes and this thing is already having hickups... actually, nothing worked either when there was less than half meg left. O tempora, o mores.

Well, I think I should just re-format this damn thing, but I have a BIG bunch of stuff here I want to save. Like, tail jokes Reno has sent me, and other interesting messages from him.

Hmm, I think I'll go to movies tonight... I have only 20 mk left, but hey, I have two free tickets! =)

Oh yeah: DayMetaNoder is now in a bit more wget-friendly place...

23:15

I went to see The Patriot... I like historical movies, but still, I found it kind of funny that the protagonist gets a gust of vigor when he sees the flag. Oh, how patriotic, what a hero! *sniff* *boohoo*

(Actually, I liked the movie, just that it had some, er, obvious symbolism. See The Patriot node for a lot of other good points =)

And I noticed the fux0ring cell phone doesn't work afterall. Damn damn damn damn! Well, at least it gives signs of life...


Other day logs o' mine...

Noded today by y.t.: tail joke

I meant to write yesterday, but I fell asleep in the guest room while waiting for my dad to finish playing Diablo 2. The last thing I remember was asking "Dad, you done yet?" and he said "yup, just about." But then, he had been saying that for about an hour. Something about having to finish a level before saving. I don't really know (or care). My mother woke me up around 11:30pm and told me to take my contacts out if I was going to fall asleep already. I mummbled something that made her nod and go away. Woke up this morning at about eight or so, and since this is my first day off in a long time, I decided to go back to sleep and get up at 11 for The Price is Right. But one can only sleep for so long. So here I am.

Yesterday was awful. I woke up after numerous nightmares (see Dream Log: August 22, 2000) and went to work. Had to deal with an enormous number of unhappy customers who all wanted to return "defective" merchandise or complain about not finding corn holders in the Grapevine pattern. We also had five skids waiting to be put out in the back room, all of it being Christmas stuff. But I ended up singing with Lisa while we set up the seasonal display after lunch. I called Meagan from work and asked if I had missed band camp on Monday. Of course I had. I had completely forgotten about it. But I was much happier sleeping at Schmoo's house, so no complaints. We have a three hour marching band practice every day this week, and every week to follow until the football season is done. I hate it already.

Back to this morning. I checked my e-mail for the first time in a couple days and found a message from Darci (see The Twisted Hate Quadrangle for more info on that) saying that she was going to be back at West Ottawa this year. No problem, right? But not only that; she was going to be my locker partner. Nice. Guess I'll be finding somewhere else to keep my books this year.

Overall, a yucky past few days. I'll let ya'll know how the rest of the week goes. Peace.

Chicago: one night
Las Vegas: eight days
Chicago: two days
University of Illinois: eight days without a phone line or permanent internet connection

AAAAAAAAAARG. But everything's all cool now, yo.
Well, I'm posting this from Mozilla M17. Color me impressed, it's at least as stable as Netscape, most of the features work, themeing support is there, and the sluggish feel to the GUI is gone. Bad ass!

I got two more ear piercings done yesterday. (I'm only up to three, stop staring...) They don't hurt at all, like the first one did.

The Texas A&M gay conspiracy has been out doing a little guerilla sidewalk art again; big pink triangles with "We won't go away" under them chalked in front of several buildings on campus. I can't decide if it's a funny turn-about on all the homophobic bathroom graffitti around, or sad that it's the only way they can be noticed around here.

Today I spent playing around on my new computer system. I some how managed to fry my last one. I think it was the trip back to college that did it. But this new one is nice. Now I can get my porn. I mean do my work quickly. I also spent a good part of today sitting in front of my fan and play pick out the freshmen from my dorm room. It's a great game just look out your window and find the person with deer in the headlights look on there face.

I got an interview.

I have an interview with a local, successful internet company on Monday for a tech support position. I am not sure if I really want to do tech support, but it can't hurt go to an interview.

I ordered a bunch of new clothes from various outlet stores on the web, like Eddie Bauer, Land's End, and J.Crew. I hope that they get here soon. I will need some new threads for my interview since I wore my interview outfit to the job fair on Monday. That's how I got in the door for this company. I guess those job fairs really are a good thing.

It's a little after noon, and I feel like I've done a lot of things today. I got up early to go to the doctor since I have picked up a sore throat and cough somewhere. Since I rarely get sick and my throat hurt so badly yesterday, I decided to go to the doctor. I seem to have a nasty virus, so I'm drinking lots of liquids and resting. This isn't hard to do since I have no job to go to. I also went to the grocery store to get food. Then, I came home and got the job interview set up.

I saw my trainer yesterday. I lost 10 pounds, but by his calculations, it was 10 pounds of muscle. I'm not sure I believe him. My shorts and other clothes have been fitting looser than before.

I think I will attempt to work on my comic book nodes I've been writing on my home computer for a while. I'm starting to feel headachey, so I might take a nap instead. I really need to work on my website, but I am just not in the mood today. Maybe later I'll feel better.

Nodes That I Wrote Today:
I'm giving up on Netscape
remember those former employer nodes I promised in another day log? Here ya go:
egghead
egghead.com

CD’s I’ve Listened To Today:
Negativland - Escape from Noise

Today’s Horoscope on my Calendar - Be a realist while the Sun confronts Saturn and Pluto. No time to foll around with savings and assets. Enormous progress can be made in literary and scholastic endeavors as the Moon contacts Jupiter. Pick up new computer skills.

Christianity is stupid. Communism is good.

Somebody stole my coke bottles off my desk!!

Since they are fairly rare in my part of the world, I have some of those little glass Coke bottles on a shelf on my desk. I also was amassing a collection of empty tins, which I keep forgetting to take out. I look around after lunch, and notice that they're all gone! They've probably been gone since Friday; it's Wednesday now. Shows how observant I am. One of the side effects of being in the zone all day I guess.

But oh well, after all, Coke bottles are one of the things that probably don't express your personality as much as you think . . .

I stepped out onto First Avenue, and found it was drizzling. I didn't have an umbrella with me, but upon reaching the entrance to the subway, I stopped and stood under a tree to smoke a cigarette and gather my wits (organizing my mental .todo for the rest of the day) -- there's No Smoking in the subway, so I might as well smoke one now. I gave cigarettes to a couple of passers-by. They'd asked first.

I went underground to catch the L train. I got on, and the doors didn't close; we were all aboard, but going nowhere. Then a woman's voice on the PA:

Your attention, please... This train... is not going where you expected it to go...

...interrupted immediately by a real conductor, asking the police to nab the woman and issue her a summons. Apparently, she'd been trolling for a few minutes prior to my boarding the train; I'm sorry I missed it. We stood for a few more minutes, as, presumably, the cops either caught her or gave up the search. We heard no more from her.

While waiting for the 5 train, headed for my aunt's house in the Bronx, there was a steel drums player, playing Glenn Miller's "In the Mood". Not a good idea -- the guy playing "Imagine" on a saw made a lot more sense. I tuned it out, and tried to remember the main melody from the passage of music I heard in the excellent Harold and Maude, having seen it for the first time yesterday. It was one of those pieces of "classical music" that gets played often, and I normally tune it out, associating it with the old "K-Tel for classy dudes" commercials for a mail-order 100 Greatest Classics LP boxed set.

John Williams did those commercials, not the Star Wars guy, but the British actor whose main US claim to fame was briefly replacing Sebastian Cabot as the valet Mr. French on the sitcom Family Affair. The unemployed Mr. Williams did a fine turn extolling the virtues of this great boxed set, as snippets of every too-familiar classical melody played in the background and the list of titles scrolled up the TV screen. His Etonian voice made it clear that if we wanted to be classy dudes, we had to order this set. Only $9.99, plus shipping and handling.

But I digress.

This passage that I heard in the movie, something I'd normally tune out, was one of those "100 Greatest Melodies" that played in the old commercial, but instead of tuning it out this time, I actually listened, and enjoyed it; it rocked, with it's own inner logic, and sounded far from the moldy, prissy artifact, that I (when young) thought it was. (I'm referring to a passage from Tchaikovsky's first Piano Concerto; mad props to Google and IMDB, for I was stumped). Even after becoming a listener to "classical music" in college (it was required), I gravitated towards living composers like George Crumb and Karlheinz Stockhausen, and thought ill of "that old stuff"; my composition professor was into Sibelius (more modern than Vivaldi, but far less radical than Crumb and Stockhausen), and I looked down on him for that. For that, plus the fact that he was about Five Foot One.

I reached my Bronx stop, and headed out to the street. The drizzle had turned to rain. When I got near my aunt's house, I had one last street to cross, before walking half a block to the front door. A Good Humor truck sped by -- the rain was keeping the customers indoors, perhaps.


The nurse says it's time for my nap.

this morning, i found that i was crying when i got out of the shower. and that scared me, so i cried some more. for about ten years, i had this overwhleming feeling of doom i couldn't shake. for the past year, it's been absent, and i haven't missed it, but it seems that it's back. i was thinking about my parents, and about trust. having a revelation, really. i was taking note of my tendency to screw things up, always.

i'm mad at myself. really, truly angry. mad enough that i had to wear the black sweatshirt today, and that's not just a piece of clothing, in my life. this is me hiding, hiding today because i can't stand myself.

i don't think it used to be this bad, but if i look back, i see the pattern has always been there. i get too comfortable, too happy with something, and then i start plotting against it. i find an excuse to fight, or i do something intentional only as far as my subconscious is concerned and watch as the other person disappears. it's fucking stupid.

god forbid that anyone should ever win over that part of me i don't even have a name for. i've been in love, but there's something i've had to hold back, and i don't know what it is or why. truthfully, i fall in love easier than most, because i've adapted to the short time span of most of my relationships. i guess it's about control, and this is where my parents fit in and why i made a self-pitying ass of myself this morning. once you turn over the secrets of what you really are, you cannot just get up and go if a situation gets dangerous. you may not be able to go at all. i don't know, because i've never done it, but this is what i theorize.

when i was younger, i had a backpack, because i had to go to school and needed a place for books, etc. but everything that meant anything to me - and my possesions often hold more significance than they ought to - was in that backpack. i was a teenager then, and had decided the whole idea of running away was mostly self-defeating, so that wasn't the reason. i just realized that i was not in control of my life. i could be sent anywhere, pulled away from the familiar at any moment. but i had the important things in my life, and my black sweatshirt to hide me, so i was ready to go.

fiction gets me in trouble. because i rarely tell the truth about my feelings. i just don't, and see above. but they always come out when i write something, projected onto someone else as allegory or metaphor. i figure they're safe there. but..

i took a creative writing course and got about two chapters into the text before i decided it had no relevance to my grade. but in the first chapter, the guy talked about using people you know as the templates for characters, and how many friends he'd lost in doing so.

maybe all the introspective egotists want to be writers, because we always know that we see the truth in people no one else sees. but i, at least, spend too much fucking time examining and exaggerating things to see what i find, and i miss what's really there, in me. i miss reality, what's going on, the obvious consequences of my actions. the hypocrisy, the pretense of apathy, the self-righteous cruelty, the overanalyzing, and the concealment of the emotion that runs through me like molten regret. and the last is worst, because i show the rest, confess to them, but never specify the nature of what i really feel. that's giving too much away. and it could be used to hurt me, and i can't allow that.

that's the doom. i can stay safe, or i can learn to trust people. and if i stay safe, i won't get hurt, but i'll always be running, because that's what you do when you're ready to go anyway. but that's what i know how to do, what i'm good at, the skill i've been trained in. the other thing, honesty, that's something i don't know. it seems that for it to work right (which is, not to work at all but simply to be), you can't work at it. if it takes effort, you've perverted its purpose. the truth shouldn't be a gift i battle with myself to give, it should be the first, natural reaction.

you see what i mean about self-indulgence. anyway, the point was, i'm a fucking genius.
Today was odd. I woke up late, reset my alarm and slept more. My coworkers said nothing. I did some work, and i did some noding, I went to lunch and did more work. I am now home, noding a lil more, then I have a party to go to tonight, laundry to do, groceries to buy, and sleep to get. It's been a long and boring day. But it's payday, so it can't be all bad.

This weekend I drove to Sheboygan and stayed with my friend Angie. (see The greatest compliment I ever received) I saw the Dave Matthews Band in concert in East Troy outside of Milwaukee. The concert was the best I've been to yet, almost surreal. I was in the 11th row, close enough to hit Dave in the head with a ball. (I'm not the worlds greatest QB). I went with my little brother. Bad idea. We don't get along very well, and he was his normal inconsiderate self. We left for the concert about 5 PM, and at 5:30 I started to get a headache. I reached for the Advil which I had bought for seven dollars in a gas station on the way out to Wisconsin. What I didn't yet know, is my brother took it inside earlier and didn't put it back. Under any other circumstance, this wouldn't be that big a deal, but going to a live concert, from Dave Matthews, eleven rows back, with the worst fucking headache I've had in well over a year tends to put a damper on things. So the concert was fantastic, I could bear the headache up until about the fourth to last song, where my head just pulsated, and then the two hour drive home at midnight, while my punk-ass brother lays back and sleeps. Ouch.

Other than that, I had a great time at my friend Angie's, I met her father while he was sober, and I met her horse Zammy. Life is good.

Scraggly man-on-the-street muttering to himself in a loud voice about having to be on time to catch a bus. I, partially overhearing, turn to see if he was asking me for the time. He takes offense:

"Whassa matter? A man likes to talk to himself... you're not so hot, you're not so different yusself, with yer buttons... yer talking to yerself with buttons..."

I smirk and resume postering.

Because the bill-posting poles are scraped into a tabula rasa every Monday night I spent four hours on the 21st promoting the next Living Closet as the first post! on these pillars of the public eye. Less than 24 hours later, biking through downtown en route to another area I had not yet postered I am shocked and more than a little peeved to discover that someone has systematically torn down or covered up all of our posters on one side of the street for something like a 20-block streak. Doing something useful to divert the pressure of my boiling blood, I use the posters I had on me and put them up twice as securely, all four sides thoroughly taped. The re-postering eats up the time I would have been postering another neighbourhood, so that gets moved to today (two days to showtime - and I haven't seen any posters put up by any other organizers anywhere)...
So en route to yet another neighbourhood, passing through downtown 24 hours after the 24 hours after, I find that many of the new posters have been either a) torn down or b) covered up with promotions for an "online community" appropriating the name of the neighbourhood in which our event is taking place. (I think there's still time to compose something nasty on the subject of the-drive.com to recite on Friday night, but it does seem awfully indulgent - not that that isn't at the heart of most poetry performances.) So again I am suckered into re-putting up the posters rather than getting to the other parts of town which haven't been spammed yet. Downtown -is- vital; it's where the most people pass through. But the spirit of the Living Closet is of diversity, so we aim to get people in from all over Greater Vancouver... unfortunately I'm now out of posters. Some more are being dropped off here this afternoon, but we're losing valuable eye-minutes here!

Grrr... I HATE postering!

Stepping into my milkshake mecca (a summer essential) I sit down on a stool and note that my favorite waitress is there. (Shaved head, one of those infuriating small-of-the-back tattoos which is always partially covered by some article of clothing that it may never be accidentally seen in full. It drives me mad. Two friends, without me, asked to see its entirety and she gladly complied, but I cannot bring myself to be so forward. Instead I merely boggle my peripheral vision at every opportunity, crossing my fingers every time she turns around or bends over to reach for something under the counter. Yeesh, as if women needed to make their butts even more attention-drawing than they were before.)

(Context: the past four or five times I've come in there over the past couple of weeks, they've either been just closing or out of ice cream.) It's nice to know that our missed opportunities for interactions are remembered, but GOOD GOD, WOMAN! Don't jerk me around like that when vital things like MILKSHAKES are on the line here! Actually no, I'm charmed, a condition which doesn't much ameliorate my doggy-eyeing of her the tattoo compels.

Finishing my creamy apple injection (that sounds unnecessarily sexy) I ask if I can put up a poster for our show on their wall-o-promotions. She giggles at my politesse (apparently asking permission is not de rigeur for indoor postering on private property) and even goes so far as to suggest a couple of expired events I can poster over. As I'm putting up the poster, a (h07 ch1x0r!) customer approaches me and starts asking details about the event - location, how to get there, cover, when it starts, what kind of performances, and as I unload my encyclopaediac knowledge of the topic on her (me being the most senior, at a bit over one year, volunteer in the outfit at this point) her smile gets bigger and bigger. I finish with a brief spiel about the group's mandate and philosophy and tell her I hope to see her there. She glows and says she'll -definitely- be there. In parting she asks if I can spare a poster for her but my arm anticipates her, left hand already sending a flyer her way.

Aw bjyeah... I LOVE postering!

in our last episode... | p_i-logs | and then, all of a sudden...

You want this in leyman's terms or Windigese? Fine, Windigese it is. See, I just got home from tasting the temptaions of the local gay bar...no, I can't remember what the freakin' name is, I was getting anihilated, therefore really having a hard time focusing on small details. Well, it's nearly the only bar that stays open 'til 2;00 around here, and well, I needed a drink. By myself. All there is in the house is beer and frankly, I get really sick of the taste of beer. ( Even if it's Guinness.) Why? Because I don't like taking my time if I have someplace I want to be. Now. I have what I would affectionately call a liquor personality. Vodka, tequila, rum, basically anything that takes a relatively short amount of time to consume and the effects are felt within moments. Hey, I'm a girl, I like being a lightweight. I'm very low maintenance that way, see?

Back to my point....do I have a point...Oh yes...the gay bar and their Wednesday night Kar...Kari...kare...When they sing...and there's words on the bottom of the screen which I can't for the life of me think how to spell now. Yeah, that. They had a lot of that, but your's truly was not the least bit interested because she only sings when she thinks no one hears her. I think I have a fairly decent voice, I just don't feel like sharing. I'm shy, too, so you know how that goes. Any shy people out there? Yeah, I'm talking to you.

Why a gay bar? I'm not gay. At least not generally speaking. I am not presently a practicing homosexual. I'm actually presently not practicing anything but low-level coding. Why? Because I've moved into my box. Yup, brand-spanking new geek material here.

Once again, back to the bar. Hopeless, and I wasn't even looking. If I was looking, I could have walked down the street to the other bar and defended myself from jock assholes who are no more concerned with my brain or personality than they could be with whether or not I prefer demi-cup or seamless. Okay, maybe I would get more of a reaction by telling them what kind of bra I prefer, but that is besides my point.

{Rambling] again. But at least I have an excuse this time. Thin blood. I just wanted to drink in peace and quiet, and I got it until the karaoke got fired up. But mission accomplished. I'm schnookered and pleasantly so. I won't even tell you about the day that drove me drink in the first place. But cheers, and now I'm gonna go hop on Pirch and talk to people I don't know from Adam.

It was an ordinary day, followed by a truly wonderful evening. A friend of mine had a dinner party for her co-workers. The part of her team that came were seven people from seven different countries. We had a great time discussing language and culture and the fact that people getting shot is not an unusual occurrence in Naples. I feel reassured about this info. I've spent a lot of time in Chicago and now I know that I'd feel right at home in Naples, Italy.

I also heard that Survivor was first a television show in the UK. Apparently the British version didn't make it though. The people became very angry with each other, then built a canoe and tried to escape from the island. At that point the show was cancelled. Thank goodness our American Survivors are made of sturdier stuff! Hey - I just heard on TV that Survivor has ended. I wonder who won?

I was again reminded that most of the worst that our media offers is exported to foreign countries. Apparently Jerry Springer can now be seen in Brasil. I'm embarrassed about that. Between this and the fact that we couldn't learn metric if our lives depended on it (we're the last nation in the world to convert), we look pretty dumb. I'm glad that people from other countries take time to evaulate US citizens on an individual basis.
I had genuine green tea for the first time tonight. It's very different from tea that I had had before. And I think that I could definitely acquire the taste.

I'm really thankful that my friend invited me to the dinner party, even though I'm not working with the team. My life was getting too dull and introverted again. Friends are precious.

Oh yeah - and I decided to take the offer from my employer's subsidiary. I"m not happy about it at all. But I don't qualify for unemployment if I pass on the offer, and I don't have anything firm from the company that I intend to work with next. I always said that I wouldn't be a corporation's whore. Well, here I am. They're going to lock me in a 6-month non-compete. Which means that when I do decide to go work for the competition, I can either go directly and face a lawsuit, or go six months without work or unemployment or any form of income. I guess even I can't tell the difference between a prostitute and a consultant. Or maybe I'm a slave now. Who knows. Kids, if you're listening, always think hard before joining a major corporation. They'll lie to you to get you in, then try to block you from getting out.

Sheesh - I had a great night and now just ruined the mood by thinking about work. Bad me.
5th day of intense coding.
i've been coding at least 15 hours a day. smoke less, eat less, drink less, think less except for the problem i'm solving, and sleep less.
my finger prints are getting thiner.
get up at six. jump in the train to the office. sit at the desk and run emacs. then i'm good to go.
i love coding, but i'm tired. phisically and mentally.
so, i took a longer break this afternoon. got 20 oz coffee and a pack of cigarette. sat at the staires infront of the office building. i was thinking random stuffs watching people passing me by and cars/trucks on the street.
then i saw the container with big 'EVERGREEN' sign on the side. i've seen this containers when i lived in seattle area. it was funny to see the container here in tokyo. why? i don't know.
i started to think about people up there. i've seen some notes of those people, but haven't kept in touch with them.
i was there a month ago. i'm living in totally diffrent life as far as my sorroundings are concerned.
i miss my life there, but i can't tell which one is better.
no matter what/no matter where i live, i'll do what i gotta do.

then i threw my half smoked cigarette and went back to the office to do the thing i gotta do.

<<   {hojita} Day Log Navigation   >>

Today was definitely an ordinary day. Not much actually happened. I felt like an absolute baka for forgetting my sister's birthday until today. It was August 21, 2000, and it's not like I didn't -know- that, but more that I just had too much going on with taking far too many hours to realise that Linux doesn't play nice with PnP OS=Yes, moving in, starting classes, and trying to coordinate band and fixing other people's computers. *mgrin*

I'm really start to wonder what's worth my time in life. I get these guilty feelings when I'm doing something "useless" or "non-productive". I feel like maybe I should be learning, or building, or coding, or bettering myself. Yet, there's so much time spent in my life doing things that don't matter at all. Maybe that's not really a problem, and nothing really matters at all in the long run, but it doesn't stop me thinking about it.

There was a stray cat on the side of the footpath by my dorm today. It's been out there before, very kawaii with its black body and white socks. I didn't have much to do yesterday afternoon and so I laid down my backup and sat down against a lamppost. The cat (named Eric by one of my friends, and Simon by another) was trusting enough to just climb in my lap and start purring. I sat out there in the breeze for what must have been an hour just petting the cat and enjoying the atmosphere.

I've begun yoyoing (word, dizzy!) as I walk around campus. Being that I seem to be the only person doing this, I get a lot of strange looks. *frown*. But, it's relaxing in it's own sort of way, and I'm starting to get a much better feel of how to yoyo, and the correct way to do loops and tricks. It's almost that I want yoyoing to become something mindless that just happens without much thought. Not that I don't like thinking, but it's relaxing to just do something without thinking about it. Not that I'm very good, but it's an awful lot of fun.

But both of those things I would classify as useless. There isn't any point to me sitting down on the side of a road to pet a cat. There's no real point to me whittling away my time yoyoing. I feel guilty. Am I here to yoyo? Am I here to pet cats? What's the point of it all?

Sometimes you just have one of those mornings where you are really tired cause you were out club hopping until 4 am and than had to show up early to work.. You have a load of paperwork to do cause your boss haven’t been in all the last week, and all of a sudden it’s everyone's birthday this weekend. You are out of coffee and you are boycotting Starbucks after looking at your last Visa statement and realizing you spend 150$ a month on caffenated beverages. That’s half of your rent, and since you are an adult now, you have possessions and a pet and a computer, and ending up on the street is not such a good idea. You still haven’t washed off your make up off your face, and the smell of cigarettes is lingering on your coat, but you must smile and pretend like this morning is making sense even though your eyes are blood shot and you think you might have done one too many of those pink shooters, then you remember you didn’t even drink last night cause you were the one driving, and wonder why you wagely smell like liquor, than you remember some random spiky haired creature who you might have locked lips with, or perhaps it was your clumsy friend that spilled half a glass of Sex On The Beach on you and that explains that lingering smell of alcohol. You are starting to think that if you go in the back and take a nap, no one will notice, but then you look at the time, and realize you must go and make plans for this evening. I guess it’s just one of those mornings.

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