0900: Economics lecture. I fucking need to go into this, cos I've not been in for weeks now.

1200: Maths lecture, need to go in to learn!!!

1300: Statistics practical. Actually, I'm not sure if there is one this week, it might be off cos of the exam on Monday...

1500: Maths tutorial. I didn't hand in the homework for this week, so I don't wanna go into this.

1700: working in Argos again. argh...

Later: night out w/ Lynsey's college, but I don't know any details yet.


I missed fucking everything today... Tony gave me a xmas card today, and i gave him a sleeping bag to keep him warm.

I put my brother's Playstation in to get fixed, (it seems like the lens motor is buggered).

I get off work at 1900 2night, and I'm goin straight home to meet pigpoo, and then heading to Reds in Sauchiehall St. for the party.

I need to form a group to make a group web page for Apps & Imps... it needs to be done for Tuesday!!! argh...

I've seen this appear on a series of hand written help wanted signs for a diner in State College,Pa on College Ave.

the first
LATE NIGHT COOKS WANTED
APPLY WITHIN.
VAMPIRES ARE WELCOME!

the second
ATTENTION VAMPIRES!
LATE NIGHT LINE COOKS NEEDED.
APPLY WITHIN

Now I know there is something of a goth or vampire community here in State College,Pa...but I'm not sure what to think of this. Either this is a hearty gesture from a local business to a small group of dissafected (if that's what they are) folks, or there is a reason why so many little children have been going missing. I swear I am not making this up

Highs and lows. Mostly lows. Low lows. And some highs. Not too high though. Low highs and low lows make for a low, not high, day. Allow yourself a moment to sit back and bask in this statement of the obvious, brought to you by kaytay.

Fell asleep to the sound of mad pen scratchings on index cards as I hurriedly took more and more notes to study for my french exam before the evil sleep devil overtook my pathetic mind. The war was lost, as always, and I was whisked away to dream hell, full of indirect object pronouns and irregular subjuntive verb stems. I woke up with more knowledge than when I fell asleep, however, which leads me to believe hell is a nice place to live.

The exam went well, even if it did cause me to chew myself to pieces with nervousness. I was done half an hour early, with enough time to make it back to high school for some A.P. Statistics. You know I was excited.

My locker wouldn’t open. I had to go out to lunch in the freezing snow without a coat. I am constantly cold even with a coat, hat, scarf, mittens, and several layers of sweaters on. I blame a lack of superfluous body fat. To go out into the elements protected only by a hoodie and a pair of jeans was miserable. But my cramps kept me warm. Not really. They just made me more miserable, despite the thirty seven Advil I had taken.

note: I didn’t really take 37 Advil. Subtract 17, add 9, and divide by 56. Now cross all that out and write “three.” There. That’s how many I really had. Please do not worry about any possible overdoses on my behalf. The prozac prevents that.

I had a splitting headache all day long in addition to severe crampage. Wonderful. Taco Bell was unable to sooth my trouble body parts, so I bought a bagel when Bobby and I returned to school. Bagels make me feel good.

A.P. Psychology was entertaining as always. We leaned what a schema is. I always thought it was a make believe word the cognitive therapists invented to describe my hate for yogurt while I lived in Iowa, but I guess they were telling the truth after all. Education can be enlightening at times. We did a class activity which involved telling a story to one person (who happened to be me), and then having that persron tell it to another person who didn’t hear it the first time, etc. etc. It involved a TWA 747 Bowing plane being high jacked to Cuba and the pilot, Jane, threw a microphone at the person with the gun after the steward, Jack Swanson, brought him to the front of the plane. I recited the story almost word for word to the person after me. She happened to be a little brain dead, and simplified it to something along the lines of “plane, Cuba, gun.” This ruined the experiment. Bitch.

Seventh hour was interesting as well. My group of four performed our play, entitled Quiet Thyself and Die, Wench!” It was a success, mostly due to the impressive soundtrack I had created to accompany the dialogue.

  1. The Last of the Mohicans theme song
  2. RammsteinTier
  3. Phantom of the Opera theme song
  4. The Prodigy - Break and Enter
  5. TMBGIstanbul

The play that was put on after ours was quite a spectacle. The writer of the script completely lost it whenever one of the other actors so much as added a nuance to one syllable that he didn’t approve of. It was extremely frightening – he started banging his head against the wall in frustration at least three times. I can only wonder what would happen if something really bad happened.

Driving home was interesting due to the plethora of snow. There were huge banks along the roads where the plows had deposited the extraneous white stuff. It would have been impossible to go into a ditch without first demolishing a snow bank. Is that safe?

My brother was fired from Pet Supplies Plus five minutes after I dropped him off. He called me when I got back home (another half hour drive) and said he needed me to come pick him back up. But there was a slight problem: the garage door was frozen shut. Nice. My headache picked that time to resurface.

I am now avoiding homework, trying not to fall asleep, and listening to cheesy Christmas music without meaning to.

I need another 37 Advil.

Today was a relaxing day. Actually, I fretted a lot and almost raged impotently, but nonetheless it was a relaxing day.
Or at least as relaxing as it may be in the situation.

The Situation

Job

Still don't know if I am going to have a job in January. Nobody else knows, either, and misery loves company. So we are all very chummy.
The ones that come to work, that is. A lot of people simply declared an early Christmas, starting with yesterday's Virgen de Guadalupe holiday. I predict that Christmas will stretch well into January, probably up to the 15th.
There is no money, so I can't buy anything: even toner or pens are beyond the means of the Institute for now.
As soon as money gets in, in January, we will stupidly spend all of it, of course.

A typical situation at work. I tell her "The file you sent me was in some bizarre Word format, could you please save it as RTF and then re-send it ?". But since her mind has storage for only one concept, she blithely resends exactly the same damned file. The pain, the hurt.

Feelings, SO, Luv

Grievously fscked up, thank you. My SO and I are in the middle of a relationship crash. I am beginning to get homesick. I don't know if I can stand this country anymore.
Due to my bitterness, I am pointlessly mean.

The plus side

I am two writeups away from Level 7. But that carries no special powers so ... I am reading Under the Volcano. And I re-read a book by Bruce Chatwin, What am I doing here ?. I started a novella by Clifford Simak, but it sucked horribly, so I stopped at Chapter 2.

Oo- the lava flowed onwards

My friend Lona, who was married back in September, is already pregnant. She told us before yesterday's electrodynamics final.

Fuck, Lona, what the hell are you thinking?

I'm pretty disappointed in her.

Oh no, I'm going to finish my degree, I'm on the pill... We won't have kids for quite awhile, she said back in August, when I found out they were getting married. Except now she has a job interview Friday to go work at a bank.

They usually hire full-time people, Lona.

I'll be back next semester, she tells me. And next year. I'm going to go to class part-time.

Lona, you're going to have a newborn baby next September. Just a year after you told me you were getting married.

It makes me so mad. She could have done so much with her life, but because of her stupid fucking husband and her stupid fucking religion, she's going to stay at home, have 18 kids so she can go to the best Mormon heaven, and probably drive herself crazy.

Lona, you lived with your parents up until three short months ago. You're not ready to be the mom yet.

I can only pray that this life, being the dutiful wife and the dutiful Mormon is making her happy.

She sure doesn't seem happy.

And I can't be happy for her. When she told me that she was pregnant, all I could think of to say was, "John's family must be happy." (They are all very Mormon, while her family, who paid for three and a half years of university, is definitely not.)

It's just a year and a half more to go, Lona. Finish it, you've got something to show. Don't throw it away now, dammit.

December 13, 2000

10:23 PM:  It's amazing how much one's state of mind
influences one's self.

Today I started out in the bad state that I had been in 
previously.  Did some boring errands, etc.  Went out to
lunch with the 'rents and hated it.

Later this day, I got online and saw her online.. Rather
than waiting to see if she would message me out of fear
that she was annoyed by me and I would upset her, I sent
her a message.

Me:  Herro
Her: Hello smello
Me:  Did you guys have school today?
Her: Nope
Me:  Cool

Small amount of conversation.  Enough to let her know I am
there.  I dropped the conversation, and said nothing else,
just in case my fear was true.  If she wanted to talk she
would message me.  More from me could just be annoying.
5 or 10 minutes later:

Her: lalalala

Alright.  Guess she does want to talk.  What I've noticed
is that rather than asking me a question, she'll just try
to prompt me into taking action.  We had a nice 
conversation online and I started feeling better.  As I 
signed off I asked her if it'd be ok if I call her later
tonight.

Fast foward:  I call her.  She is watching a TV programme.
Conversation is almost non-existant.  Most of the time
spent is in silence, me wondering what to do.  I wondered
why she'd do this.. Well, what I ended up doing was telling
her I'd call her back later.  She mentioned she was just
about to let me go.  In retrospect I probably should have
just honestly told her I don't enjoy talking to someone
who is preoccupied.  No one likes someone who can be walked
all over..

Anyway, I called her back a few hours later, established
an outing for us this Saturday and exited cleanly.. 
Cool.  ( :

Yes.  I do know I overanalyze.  When you have little 
interests like me, it's about all you can do.
Sigh...

It's been a busy week. Finished up my Christmas mass-consumerism, the kids will be happy. I took some time to talk to my oldest daughter about responsibility. I told her how she conducts herself will determine when she begins to drive and when I give her a car. She has a couple of years to go yet, but I wanted to get her thinking about taking care of "stuff". The most expensive things we buy for her tend to get left outside or underneath mountains of shit in her room. I had to explain to her that having a pile of laundry on your computer monitor is not a good thing, as it tends to get warm and die a stinky death.

My last college final has been completed for this semester. Out of twelve college algebra classes taught this semester, not one single person was able to complete the exam. I was not able to get to two problems. Since it's a 20 question exam, I'm starting with a 90 at the most... and that's making a huge assumption that I got everything else right. Gaggles of irate students descended on the math department chair to complain. If they curve it I'll be OK, since about 40% of those who took the exam only answered half of the questions.

My suggestion to those of you who are young is to go to college NOW. Don't wait until you have kids, it's a real bitch to go back to school. Take classes when your responsibilities only involve taking care of yourself.

It's GORGEOUS outside. Everything is covered in ice. The pine trees are weeping with the weight of it. Each blade of grass is thickly covered. Cozmo didn't quite know what to make of it. He pranced around on it, refusing to go to the bathroom on it until I was absolutely insistent.

So due to the weather I'm willing to bet the office is going to be dead empty. It's just as well. Working on yet another escrow has put me even more behind on my main projects. I have so much to accomplish today and so little time. I am so stressed. I must have dinner this evening with my boyfriend for an office function, but I just don't know if I can accomplish everything I need to in such a short amount of time. In addition for everything I need to do at work, I also have to wrap Christmas gifts, clean my house (it really is a wreck), do laundry, and start packing for Christmas at Mom's (oh yeah. I still have to pick up her other gift, too).

I guess I'll figure it all out.

But it's really GORGEOUS outside. Everything is sparkling.
I got started on the final version of granma's gift last night. it's an outdoor step-stone, with a broken glass mosaic of a cross on it. I had intended to do something involving a cast of my face, but it didn't work out to my satisfaction. It needs to be grouted sometime before we head to Pennsylvania on Saturday.
15:31

It's been a while since my last day log. 99.9% of you probably don't care, but since simonc asked about it..

Nothing that special has happened, though. Exept last friday, when our firm headed off for an epic Christmas party journey to Tampere. Some carting, a nice dinner in a decent restaurant plus lots of hard liquor.
Yes, I must confess I got drunk for the first time in 13 months. Hard drugs is something I can't stand, but how can one refuse when the company hands you bottles full of them and urges you to drink up? It was all fun, but I'm not in a hurry to go boozing again in an another year or so.
Otherwise everything has been pretty normal. Getting pissed off at the boss, stressing over work and staying up way too late working with music.

Today has been good, though. I showed some of my new design ideas to the boss and he liked them! This is not something which happens every month, let alone every day. Then again, I got a lot of complaints for him yesterday so this must balance out the books.

Ophie's entry made my face turn green of envy. I would pay anything to see some ice here, and don't get me started on the snow. It looks like winter is not going to arrive at all this time 'round.
Sure, Finland's Al Rokers are telling us we'll be getting below-zero temperatures and the good old white stuff here this weekend. But that has been said before with the opposite results. I don't believe it until the first snowflake melts on my tongue but not on the ground.
The tourists flying all the way here from the US and Asia must be even more disappointed than I am. If this keeps up and global warming keeps rolling, the stereotype of Suomi will be a land of eternal rain and darkness. Which isn't nearly as cool as the land with constant snowing plus polar bears & Santa's elves walking on the city streets.

Every cloud has a silver lining. At least I don't have time to get depressed about the crappy weather tomorrow. Yep, it's time for an another Xmas party of epic proportions, this time at Jope's house. I'll give you a detailed report about it later, if I survive and my lawyer says it's Ok to do so. :) Time to get out of the office. I'll be back later to node something besides this day log crap.
Let the downvoting begin!


23:51

Well, BIG surprise!
The meteorologists were wrong once again. It is now confirmed that the thermometer won't hit below freezing point in a long while here in the "south". So this basicially means that on christmas eve we'll most likely get a ton of rain, no sign of the sun (which I have seen maybe twice in the last month or two) and pitch black darkness from 14 o'clock.
*sigh* .. I saw it coming.

Tomorrow's christmas party doesn't seem that promising anymore either. Most of the crew are planning to go and get wasted at some bar, and I'd rather spend my friday night at work than in the middle of blind drunk dumbasses trying to score and/or to pick a fight. I don't mind being sober in the party, but you wouldn't catch me dead in a typical ethanol joint. I got bored with those places years ago.
Besides...
I refuse to consume large amounts of alcohol just because everybody else does.
Who the hell implanted this you-can't-have-any-fun-without-destroying-brain-cells mentality into the Finnish genes? Now there's a part of the stereotype that will remain true as long as there is one Finn left alive..
Looks like it's going to be a normal boring Friday. But I'm used to it.

Oh yeah, Dubya won that thing keeping merkins (at least the 3 of them who cared) on their toes. Good for him. I'm looking forward to seeing something else than the endless election coverage in my newsfeed.

17:43

I can't believe this has happened.

Let's see:

  • I woke up at 14.00 or so. Yeah, you heard right.
  • The Inttttternet connection failed. I'll spare Usenet for tomorrow because I could get to net so late...
  • The mouse didn't work (again!) so I needed to open it up and see what it had eaten. Surgery revealed about a metric ton of Grade 1 EU directive-specified shit that was quickly removed. (I should carry that to department of chemistry and ask them what it really was...)

    OK, I admit it: I'm a software type, not a hardware guy, so putting the mouse togheter wasn't possible with my faith (well, actually it was, but I was afraid that I would break it). It's still in pieces now. So, I just took the mouse that came with the machine - OEM version of the very same Logitech rodent - and plugged it in. Luckily for me, X11 now supports wheel of the OEM version of this mouse, it didn't do that earlier...

Well, that's about that. I wish my awakenings will become more controlled...

19:59

Downloaded some MGS music and pictures...

...maybe I'll get an used PlayStation just to play the game without need to dual boot. =)


Other day logs o' mine...

Noded today by y.t.: xkobo GRUB Nelonen

Updated:

Heard Gore concession speech on car radio on the way home last night. I thought it was beautiful. Didn't hear Young George's speech because it hadn't started by the time I got home, and home is another world.

Picked up an artificial Christmas tree - our first - after deciding that a real tree was too much hassle. I was pretty shocked at the price tag, though.

This morning a rose bush was lying across the path. At first I thought the wind had blown it over, but later when there was a little light I saw that it was those damn gophers that bit through all the roots. Don't they have anything better to do?


added later at 23:21 utc

Anyway, I wrote myself a little script to check my number of writeups and tell me how many I need to get to level 5, and how many to level 6. Then I thought I'd check on the total w/u's needed for the higher levels, and whoo wee the requirements have jumped! I've gone from needing 64 writeups to needing 514 writeups.

Not complaining, mind you; glad I kept my old level. Just that the only level that really means something to me is six because then you can put up a picture. Oh well.

it's my birthday tomorrow. hope to fuck it's better than today. today's been minor ups, big lows. god, i'm bored. tried inflicting pain on the PFY but even mindless violence is boring today. tomorrow is also last day of this contract. they're not renewing. i'm glad. tempted to quit E2 altogether earlier on. wrote something fiery and close to the edge in response to something stern and well meaning. was immediately followed up with a whole bunch of insipid, middle of the road niceness that soars in rep to the high thirties.

i wish you had balls. i really wish.

My neck hurts. A lot. This might have to do with the fact that I got may ass kicked by the neighbor boys out in the snow last night. Two of my roommates and I, and three of the neighbors trudged out into the snow, and wrestled until we couldn't feel our toes and our fingers anymore. I managed to run all the way across the park, to the river while we were waiting for one of the boys to get ready. This is no small feat, mind you, because in some places the snow had drifted up to my knees, (and I'm 5'9". I ran just the same. Mine were the only set of tracks out that far. (I'm pretty proud of that. hee.) There's a snow angel under a tree by the river. Hopefully someone else will see it before it melts.

When we came in, frozen, we went upstairs and offered hugs to our other neighbors. Who, declined because they had to "study or something."

Good day. Good day.
Woke up with nothing to do but study for my final for Astronomy. Stupid Astronomy,

I HATE YOU!!

Alright maybe not hate because you're cool but ehh, whatever. I got up and noded my dream, or did I? Hmm, it's all so fuzzy. I chatted with some everythingians, I played some Rogue Spear, now it was time to get studying.

I had some nachos, which were mm mm good. I studied some more worried the whole time about how I was going to do. I was running late so what usually takes me 23-25 minutes to get to took me 17 instead. I was driving kind of fast. hehehe, no coppers.

BAM BAM!! ON THE DOOR BABY!! YA!!

I'm walking to class when I spot a friend of mine that I hadn't seen for some time, Cindy. We hugged and she told me I was walking her to class. Grrr, I was almost late already. I obliged (sucker!) and took her to class. We hugged again and I picked her up (her being only about 90 pounds) and swung her around twice. I got dizzy and put her down, she went to class.

I walked to class now pretty late, I get there and the door is locked! I knocked on it and waited a good 2 minutes before the professor finally opened the door. I got in and realized I had neither a scantron OR a pencil. GRR!! Luckily a friend of mine had one and gave me his spare.

THANK YOU!!

Finished my test in 17 minutes, EASY!! There were some I know I got wrong, stupid grams to kilograms crap!! I don't remember that, what was that, 7th grade?!

DAMN YOU PROFESSOR!! HEHEHE!!

Ehh, I went home and downloaded some songs, talked to a friend of mine who was kicked off by dem bones I'm sure. Her name was JoltPunk, hehehe, sorry bones, you know I love ya!!

Went to church later, we ate out at McDonalds, went to my house and watched some Backstreet Boys' favorite videos. Those bastards had the nerve to put their video as number one. They had all of their videos as numbers, another one was number 3, the rest, ehh I didn't care about. My friends didn't end up leaving until 1:26 in the morning! And I had work at 6:30!! Well I had to get up at 6:30 but you know what I mean. GRR!! Went to sleep....ahh, beauty sleep, I need much more than 5 hours, much much more.

Nothing really special happend to me today, apart from i was told if a miss another band rehersal then i will be kicked out of the jazz band (gee what a shame!) no honestly this band is really bad, half of the players are teachers!!

Over the last few days been thinking about the romance between random_monkey (one of my best mates that i have known for about 14 years) and nine9, and i have really have no problem with it, if thats what the monkey wants then its fine, the same goes for nine9 as well, earlier i spoke to him for the first time and hes seemed like a decent chap!

i had a most delightful music A-level lesson today, i had to look up what influenced certain composers and make notes on their technique such as Handel, Bach and some other composers that i cant remember (and like i am really bothered!), why cant teachers teach jazz instead of classical, sure i know that all the building blocks of music were really laid down by these people but sometimes their music is just soooooo boring (last week i fell asleep listening to bach in lesson)

Had a phone call from my brother who hopefully comes out of the RAF tommorow, he has been away for about a week and he has had enough, i mean the guy was up till 2am in the morning sowing labels onto his kit!!, but hes coming out for good so thats that i suppose.

What a fscking week.

The fact it was my birthday on the 12th should have made things better, but since I haven't been home yet I have only received a small smattering of cards and a quick call from my parents.

Also have an insane amount of Computer Science work. As fondue mentions in yesterday's daylog we have some Concurrency coursework due in first day back after Christmas, and since the course is badly taught by a droning German Professor, and the notes are even worse, I'm not quite sure what to do. We also have some AI work to do...

On top of all this we have a massively important Individual Project.

fondue and I are working on different bits of it with a phD student who had a long rant at me yesterday for not pulling my weight. I am supposed to have a UML level design done by tomorrowish and am meeting him on Monday - Why oh why do I have to meet him after the end of term? Aaarrrggghhhhh!!.

Then there's the fact I am moving home tomorrow from the house I am in at University now. I am looking forward to going home, but not to the actual act of moving all of my rather inordinate amount of stuff, which has to be done tomorrow. So there's that stress too. Oh yeah, and I'm quite badly broke. Yeah I'm a student but still - most annoying, especially at Christmas.

Then there's my personal life.

Not good - of course - but getting weirder. Usually I am quite happy in my singledom. Ok, not really, but I have come to accept it, and get on with my life and not worry. as much. So it of course annoys me when I meet girls I like and don't know what to do, and have to just try and get them out of my head.stop the voices. Then I puzzle about this, and this is worrying about girls and that is something I though I was past.

See it all goes back to: any sufficiently nice person is indistinguishable from someone who likes you. The first girl of the week is the flatmate of a friend of mine. I was pretty sure she had a boyfriend when I first met her, but that isn't important, since I'd still like to puzzle out her flirting (or not). I met her and her friend on the way home one day and she asked where I was going. When I said home, she said she'd go home too (her living near me) and split from her friend to accompany me on the train. She also invited me out with her household and friends to a club the day after. I went with my housemate, and she seemed pleased that I'd shown up. Unfortunately I won't see her for a while now so I'm trying to forget all that. I left the club we were at early to go somewhere else and then something even better/worse happened.

At the second club I went to was a girl I hadn't seen since before the start of term. And I really really like her. Fortunately, by now, I had forgotten about her and but then she goes and shows up at a club I frequent. The cheek of it all. She did, however, remember my name, which was good, and I of course knew hers. Even though I usually dance for 70% of the time at a club - especially when they play some good metal or hip-hop, I just talked to her from when I arrived until the end - 2 hours. Being the gimp that I am I didn't ask for her number or anything and have already convinced myself, probably quite correctly, that she was humouring me. She wasn't that warm towards me when we were all going off home though I'm not sure if this is because she doesn't like me (in that way) or the opposite - because after all that I didn't do anything.

I asked if she was coming the following week and she said the person she goes clubbing with wasn't going out then, so she couldn't. I said I was going and she said she might come as long as there'd be someone she knows there. Of course, I could have got her number to arrange things. But that would have been far far far too easy.

So that's another person I have to try and forget.

Daft Thursday (a four hour live broadcast by glasgow university student television)
Aah, what fun. I got to Jim's Bar at 10-ish, and found very few people there. Most of the techies had been setting up from midnight (when the bar closed) till 6am. I was shortly sent out to hand out fliers, and found various things to help set up before noon, when we were supposed to go on air. But we didn't. Tapes needed to be dubbed onto the G3, which all the prerecorded stuff was being aired from, and the Mac which was doing all the captions required a monitor which wasn't fucked. But we eventually went on air at 1.14pm, not too bad..

I was the man behind Camera 3 for the most part. It's not too heavy, but at one point, there was a DJ doing a live set. Nobody told me beforehand that this set was ten minutes long. Trying to hold a pro camera steady on your shoulder, while also trying to keep a good shot isn't all that easy, especially since you start to get back pains after a couple of minutes. But I managed it, yay :)

Oh, and I was heckled by a comedian too. "Even with a face like yours, you shouldn't have any trouble getting the girls with a camera like that on your shoulder". Bah.

I'm gonna go to bed now.

And I have an exam at 9am tomorrow and don't have a clue where it is.
fantastic...

Complaints. I spent the last two days in Orlando listening to complaints. I love my family but the negativity binds me into an angry, sad being that I don't want to be. At least I was able to convince them not to take me to a theme park.
We watched president-elect Bush's speech last night. When has asked his fellow Americans to pray for him and the reuniting of our country, I raised my hand to the screen and gave him the finger. My Buddhist step-mum screamed bloody murder. I wish he'd realize we aren't all god-fearing folk.
The complaints followed me home today. I hope my heart doesn't blacken too much.
Yet another squirrel. Alive this time. Trying to hide in the plumbing behind my camode. Charming. Chased dog and cat out of bathroom, got squeaked at, threw towel over fugitive, grabbed the rodent and tossed it into a big cardboard box. Waddled out of house with big box, waved as the thing hurtled away from me as fast as it could. Jeez, squirrels! Did I mention that one was obviously male? Screamed one last time that I am indeed getting that cat a bell for his collar.

Banged out 24 prints...5x7's....I decided to float them on matboard. They look good, I am.....pleased? The title is 'Ties that Bind', and pictures two ropes entwined with this organic sloppy heart shape in the center. Done in greens, blues, turquoise, and yellow. Have twenty four in cooler tones, now to do the warm tones. Found the squirrel when I had all of them layed out trying to number them. Lovely.

Was rudely awakened last night, say about one o'clock. I had left my front door open, and had fallen asleep on the couch, as is very usual for me. I was awakened by something coming over and sitting on the loveseat next to the couch. I thought I was seeing ghosts until I heard ficus' big booming voice, "How's it going?"...Um. Can we say, 'may I have my fuckin' privacy, seeing as it's pretty obvious I was sleeping and now am scared out of my wits because you didn't even knock'? He just got up and said good night.

I don't get him. I just really don't.

Final Exams Are Over!

...And there was much rejoicing.

The last exam was due at 10:00 a.m. I left the house early because there was still a little bit of ice on the roads, especially over the bridges. People in Texas do not really know how to maneuver about ice on the roads, and, naturally, traffic backed up quite a bit. I reached my professor's office at 9:55 a.m. to hand in the paper.

Completion. Accomplishment. I hope to God I pass.

At long last, I received the recording of my music that I have been slowly adding to since September. What a revelation! Listening to myself on something other than a dumb Walkman recording made me realize that there are a lot of things about my music that I would like to change! I cannot believe I did not hear the dissonance of a minor second between the vocal line and a strong note in the guitar part earlier. But then again, I was the one singing. Of course I didn't notice. I also realized that I am a very sloppy guitar player. I know that I could be good if I tried. Note to myself: practice makes perfect.

I wish my techs would stop saying the word supervisor while they are talking to customers. But that was a rant for another time.

I walk through the clouds of uncertainty. The month has gone by too fast. Everything seems like it should be tying up loose ends by now, but it is not and it is driving me insane!

I wish I could go to DEUM but I have to work. Así es la vida.

I wish I could dream the future.

11:34 PM

So today we had the big christmas party. Over 100 people on a huge four-story yacht for 4 hours.

This was also my very first time out on a date.

I left work at 2:20 and picked up my dress shirt which I had ironed at a dry cleaner. I got a quick haircut, then went back to my apartment, took a shower, dressed up (dress pants, dress shirt, jacket, tie). I was going to stop by the mall real quick to pick up some cologne, but I saw the parking lot was packed, so I passed it by. I wound up in a traffic jam while heading over to meet everyone, and found out I was going the wrong way anyway when I called them to tell them I was going to be late.

I got the right directions to Amanda's house and arrived there around 4:15. I met Amanda's sister and mother and managed to immediately step on Sara's foot when I went to greet her. At least I got that out of the way in the beginning :)

Sara, Chris, Amanda, and I all got in one car and left at around 4:30. Sara was wearing a one piece black evening dress with an open back and two slits in the skirt. She was beautiful. Chris and Amanda wore dark-colored clothing as well and looked pretty sharp.

We arrived at the boat at around 5:00 (an hour early), so we walked around a bit. We discovered another boat that was the same size with the same name a block down from where we were parked. Everyone started gathering around the first one though, so we lingered around there. I got a lot of complements throughout the night about how nice I looked. I normally go into work with a very causal set of clothing, typically including tacky hawaiian shirts. So I guess a lot of people were stunned to see me in a formal attire.

At around 6:00 everyone boarded the boat, but it didn't leave until around 6:30. It was 4 stories tall, the top two are open mingling areas with a bar on each story. The second story was a dining area, and we didn't go into the first story area; it looked like a living room setting. As we travelled down the water, we saw many houses decorated for christmas. Some of there were quite elaborate. Most of the boats were decorated as well. I think throughout the whole night, I didn't see any other boats as large or larger than the one we were on.

After about an hour and a half of crusing down the intercoastal waterway, we had dinner and then dessert. Finally they cranked up the music and there was much dancing. I was dragged into it by a co-worker, but Sara didn't want to dance in a large crowd. She stayed by the side and just kind of danced by herself. Several other people tried to convince her to join the crowd, but she resisted.

At around 10:00, the boat docked back where we started. We all departed, and I got a few pictures, as well as getting someone to take a picture of Sara and I.

We stopped by Dennys, while still all dressed up. I had a hot fudge sundae and some water (I was really thirsty after the event). Sara had some of my sundae. After eating, I tried to refuse her payment for the bill, but she put her money down as a tip.

We drove back to Amanda's at about 11:00. Sara and I hugged and agreed that we had a good time. I complemented her again; she was very pretty. She had an hour drive back home and had to get up early, so she had to get going.


Some deeper, personal thoughts

I loved the way she kind of casually scratched at my back as we sat. Actually I liked it just sitting closely next to her. Every time she touched me anywhere, on my shoulder, my back, or just holding my hand, I felt really good. I have a hard time reciprocating these kind of actions. I don't know why. I want to, but I feel like I might do something wrong.

I kind of went into this event assuming that Sara was just tagging along to be there with her friend Amanda, but she was following some of the rules of a regular date. I told her I don't know much about the protocols, and she said she felt the same way a nd that we would just "make it up as we go along". We were pretty close together for most of the party.

We held hands going up and down stairs and when just walking around. She usually intiated any contact, except I put my arm around her once while we were sitting (that was actually hard for me to do).

So I figure that she was more of a date than just being a friend who was along for the ride. I kind of figured this when she paused for a moment as everyone was getting into the car, but by the time this clicked in my head that she was waiting to see if I would open the door for her, it was too late, she had already opened it herself. Doh! Bah. Next time, I will assume the opposite, no harm can be done that way.


I am kind of tired, but I feel good. It was one of the best days of my life so far. I will probably remember it forever.

I think I'm going to get to sleep a little early tonight.

Life is good.

The war is over, and I have come out with a few bruises and some plane tickets.

struggleStruggled all day long. I was feeling pretty low today. Thursday is yet another day when I have to deal with stupid people for a good deal of the day. That wasn't what was getting me down so much, really. A great deal of this was attributed to the fact that there is a good chance that the friend, who was supposed to be graduating, may not be able to walk tomorrow, because he is not finished with one project. Then, to top things off, I get news that my manager (or the guy who thinks he's my manager today) doesn't want me to go down to LA on Friday either. (For the graduation that may not happen.)

"There are some scripts I'd like you to write for the IMAP server product," he says.

"I might not be in tomorrow."

Frown.

It was determined that the SO wasn't going to come to LA with me. Why should this bother me? I haven't really known him that long, but somehow I was really hoping we could spend some time down there.

At this point, I will go to LA if my friend miraculusly remedies the situation in the middle of the night tonight, but otherwise I will stay. It might be a good idea to stay anyway. I will be doing a lot of traveling in the next 6 weeks, and cleaning, doing laundry, and various other such things, might be a good idea.

My mood started to pick up after adding to my new living sculpture of soda cans, old software boxes, liquid oxygen, and other random trinkets that has begun to organize itself out of the mess at my desk that I wallow in.

After much intense battle, frustration, and miscommunication], I was able to obtain tickets for the trip to Germany. That was a battle I would not relish repeating. Things are a bit too disorganized in the office these days. I also found tickets to New York for only $280. That was a pretty decent deal, if I do say so myself. The tickets I found to Munich were about $603. Decent, but they could have been better.

It was such a relief to finally have that over and done with. I feel as though the weight of a thousand seals has been lifted from my shoulders. I celebrated by going to the Oakland Chamber of Commerce cultural mixer. That was interesting. Free food is good food, however. Only in Oakland, would such an event be so colorful. It was held in a bar in China Town.

I am so pathetically geeky that I actually went back to work after this. I finished up some crap, and went home. Upon arriving home, I wanted nothing more than to collapse. Somehow one of my co-workers managed to convince me that I should ride my bike, in the rain, back to the office, so we could go to a local blues club for a nightcap. It was a nice mellow time.

Now, the cat is perched on top of the monitor batting at the mouse every time I move it.

Today they put up the surveillance cameras in our new office facility, and I am in the cross-section between three of them. None are actually focused on me or my workstation, but they are not fixed and at anytime I could look up to find a beady black camera eye staring at me. The camera network is Joe's baby; they are digital and all over the place.

The worker putting them up is young, cute. He sees the look on my face and winks, Yeah, Hon, this job ain't gonna be fun no more. My manager jokes about it, he says that all three will be trained on me, face, profile and screen. They can't get enough cameras on you. Joe wants to make sure you're not having fun.

Joe. Joe Joe Joe. Joe is a friend-slash-boss, how awkward is this? It is getting there, I can feel it coming.

Today? Took my lunch break late, passed Joe sitting in the reception area. He puts his hand up to his ear, Call me he says. It's dinner, or a walk, or a fake urgent meeting in his office. It is let's just chat. Here comes complication; I can feel it.

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