September 5, 2001

I'll start posting some of my Mix Tapes in the day logs from time to time, as i am way too lazy to send burned CDs overseas to participate in The Great Grand E2 Mix-Tape Lotto .

First one is Nightflight - thru the night, to the light, a tape i composed while driving through the night (it's hard to write graffiti on a USR PalmPilot Personal while driving), for the sole purpose of giving you a feeling of comfort while driving long distances alone in the dark.

1. Bruce "The Boss" Springsteen - I'm on fire
2. America - Sister golden hair
3. Sanatana - Black Magic Woman
4. Fleetwood Mac - Go your own way
5. Boston - More than a feeling
6. Pulp - Disco 2000
7. Allanah Miles - Black Velvet
8. Steppenwolf - Magic Carpet ride
9. Meat Loaf - Bat out of Hell
10. Deep Purple - Fireball
11. Golden Earring - Radar love
12. Dire Straits - Sultans of swing
13. The Eagles - Hotel California
14. Berlin - Take my breath away

I think all of these songs are -or have been- amazingly popular so i don't have to comment them.

19:38

Many mixed feelings about the day.

Work was quite sweet for a change. I was assigned to be the project manager for some small projects we're working on. While this doesn't really make a difference in one way or the other, it at least made me feel a bit more significant and trusted. Furthermore, a client was actually pleased with our work, and I got some praise from the boss as well.

And then I had a doctor's appointment about my knee. After twisting my leg around and hearing me describe the symptoms, he told me it was probable I had torn a ligament just as I suspected. However, my recent X-Ray showed a possibility of cartilage damage, which would be very nasty. Usually medical professionals tend to sugar code things, so when the doc told me straight that such damage for someone my age was really really bad, I must admit I freaked out a bit.
So now I'm waiting for further examination, having all sorts of nice thoughts about having an unworkable knee in my 30s running through my head. Great. In some ways it may be a good thing for us to get reminded of our mortailty every once in a while.. but I could live without it. (bad pun intended)

Oh well, I think I broke even.

Okay, so I've been a freshman at Cornell University for almost two weeks now! How exciting!

It turns out that metacognizant is also a freshman, although we do not live in the same dorm. We are, however, in the same chemistry class! Imagine that! I think Everything2 should expect new and great things from us.

I am officially a bio major, which may end up killing me. I am taking Chem, Calc, and Bio plus a required freshman writing seminar.

My bio class is an autotutorial class so I get to teach myself everything and we only meet once a week. With the increadible flexibility and freedom comes tons of work. It's amazing that I've yet to complete a full week of classes at college, I'm already stressing about the work. It's not healthy.

I am, however, having a wonderful time here at Cornell. The campus is beautiful and huge so that no freshman 15 for me!

So onto bigger and better adventures at college!
From Cornell with Love,
Queequeg.

I've been whizzing around the nodegel for the past couple days, and I have run across quite a few interesting phenomena.

1. Low level people with cools
2. Very low level (4th is the lowest I've seen) editors
3. Two different nodes with the same title The Perfect Pint, although it may change if you go and check it out.

My guesses on why anomalies exist are:

1. Perhaps they got cool power before the rules were finalized. Or perhaps they deleted a mess of writeups that dropped them to a lower level.
2. I think this was explained here but it is still screwy looking to see that [$] symbol so far down on the Other Users Nodelet.
3. It may be an E1 conversion issue. I notified the management.

In other news, I got an email from girlface. She is in India in case you were wondering. I wrote her because I wanted one of the books she had listed on The Great Grand E2 Book Lotto. She said that she left her books in <smartass>The Great Satan</smartass> (my term, not hers). I guess I'm out of luck. If anyone wants to trade books, check out my list. I was particularly interested in her Gandhi book.

---

On another noders advice, I emailed dem bones an idea for a superdoc. *Shudder* I hope he doesn't smite me with his pimp stick.

I love my dentist. I don´t often see him, since I still avoid going as much as possible, but today their was no way out, since two of my teeth really hurt, i. e. they do on an on and off basis. So this morning we met again, me and my dentist.
I had an appointment at 7.30, a cruel time in my opinion, especially because then it was still dark and raining when I got on my bike at 7.00. It´s really weird because every time I meet this man I am struck by something special- he is neither extremely good-looking, nor is there any special feature that singles him out or attracts me to him; maybe it´s his good memory, his voice and the way he seems to care about the people he deals with. When I was first treated by him and he had to do a root treatment he called me twice to ask how I was the next day and the day after that.

Anyhow, today I was out fast again, so I went to the next doctor, as it was still early. I am not as old and ill as I might appear now, actually I can´t remember another day when I saw two doctors before 8.30 in the morning. But I have an iron deficiency and need to get injections, two more to go this week. On monday I nearly collapsed again, because it´s quite a shock for the body once the iron hits you and I had the feeling as if I couldn´t breathe properly, it´s as if your lungs tighten. I had to remain lying for quite a while and my blood pressure was checked constantly. Still, I don´t like going as much, because I really like the nurse that always gives me the injections. She is a cool woman.

Then I ran back home, briefly saw my friend and cycled back to University to start working. I help out on the so called Junior Year Programme, which is an exchange programme for North-American Students who arrived yesterday. They were given a lecture by our boss ( who also dwelled on the drinking habits of students in the past exchanges and advised the students to try not to get drunk every night, but to behave like the European students, who, according to him, never go out to get drunk on purpose..well, didn´t know about that).

Anyhow, afterwards we split the students in groups and went on a trip through the city centre. Luckily it had stopped raining by then. It was the first time for me to do this, I had only been told what to show them, which I did. I don´t know what my collegues told their groups, but we had a really good time. I pointed out some shops , the Deutsche Telecom to get a phone, a cinema, which has really comfortable seats, because it used to be a sex-cinema, the market, University buildings, where to get onto the internet for free, the library and the law and economics Seminar, until I finally met with the other groups at the mensa, the German cafeteria.
I will see them next on Friday evening, when we will have a Chinese buffet and a little welcome -party in our club- am already looking forward to that.

I try and take the feelings away by absorbing myself in the mundane: cooking, cleaning, going for a walk, having a cigarette; but this only leaves me feeling hollow.

I fear to indulge myself in this, I fear to try and find any richness or beauty in it, where I would've abandoned myself when I was younger and wiser. Perhaps it is that I fear not living up to my own standards, or that I don't think I can reach the stars anymore. I don't think I can do what I need to, what is both necessary and appropriate.

I think it provokes something close to 'rage' in me, however little I understand of that feeling. I have to stop myself, and try and deal with the world for just a second just another second until it stops and calms and stops and stops and just fucking shuts up and

Then I am myself again.

...

There is a poem by Dennis Lee called Deeper. A quote would not be inappropriate:

Often at night, sometimes
out in the snow or going into the music, the hunch says,
"Deeper."
I don't know what it means.
Just, "Push it. Go further. Go deeper."

I thought that this poem represented what I've been feeling, and although the poem still speaks to me in some ways, it isn't what I thought it was. This is not a hunch I feel I should follow; it is a drive, something as primal as sex and somehow more complex, more jaded.

I could exhaust all the words I have ever known trying to capture its essence, to trap it in metaphor. The notion itself is so inadequate as to be laughable.

But still, I find myself typing.

...

I wonder if those around me have the patience or capacity to tolerate me, if I withdraw and soul search. If I settle into meditation, speaking only koans, or begin to act with excess, would they understand? Would they think that this was a choice I had; to feel, to think, to be forced to act on this?

Perhaps they would assume that I am choosing to exercise what I consider to be 'freedoms', when in fact I am finding myself with none. When I find myself forced into a path of action, without recourse.

Perhaps a worse fate would be to find myself in the thick of melodramatic prose.

...

Still, I am urged deeper, against all logic or emotion.

Beyond choice, desire, or rationale, it is my fear that if I do not go, I will lose myself in the effort of keeping my head above the water, and that would be the greater loss.

It is simply a question of whether I choose to prepare for it, and take a breath before diving, or find water tearing the air from my lungs.

I have never learned my lesson about taking early morning classes. I don't know whether the bias towards crushingly boring comes from my mental state at seven in the morning or just the selection of classes offered at that time. My incredibly abbreviated attention span is the unfortunate side effect. I stagger into class, stunned and haggard every morning and robotically take sloppy notes for an hour. Early morning classes make me question my motivations for attending college.

I've decided to start up another t-shirt deal as soon as Yoon and I get settled into our new place. I used to screen shirts to sell outside of the artsy movie theater near my place in San Francisco. At one time you could buy bootleg Chow Yun Fat and Jet Li shirts from me anytime a movie from Hong Kong was playing. The main difference is that I want to create things instead of cashing in on the stupid white people jumping halfassedly onto the next cool area of fandom. I'll obsessively detail the happenings with that stuff as they develop.

I find it worrisome that people in Denver still find the Stanley Cup victory the immediate topic of conversation on the bus. Hearing people talk to each other on the bus is a good thing in general but the extended gloat-fest is getting into the ridiculous now.

There are way too many papers to type, lectures to hallucinate through, and phone calls to return in the world. There are too many SUVs, Starbuck's, and 7-11s. Denver has given free license to whatever corporation expresses interest in the city. The sprawl of the city is increasing exponentially each year with pessimistic projections putting Denver on par with Los Angeles for overdevelopment. Being a pedestrian is becoming difficult here. I think that is a bad omen for my future in this city.

OK. So that was a little too my testament to the world for me to be comfortable with. I will pack up my soap box for the day and go get some coffee before work.

I start today. No more excuses. I am sick of my sorry fucking excuses. I am gonna do the Body for Life program by Bill Phillips. I'm not in bad shape...most people would assume I excercise regularly. Hah. I recently quit smoking cigarettes. (That SUCKS...don't ever start. But after the first two weeks the payoffs are great..taste and smell come back like someone's jacked your ass into an amplifier.) I am cutting down on drinking beer. Between these two I need a stress relief.

Mostly I'm tired of being skinny. I am SICK and FUCKING TIRED of being introduced as the "smart" one. Would someone want to be introduced and the braindead supermodel? That's what I feel like when I get introduced as "smart". My friends mean well...they think I am being complimented. I am not dumb. Is that something to be proud of...certainly. But I want it ALL. And I want to prove something for every smart kid out there. I'm gonna make a difference in my physical appearance because if I can then everyone can. I am hoping that during this 12 week program that I can shed some other bad habits, like laziness and procrastination.

How can I expect a healthy mind and spirit if I leave the body out? My father is mentally happy, and I think he's OK spiritually, but physically he's in terrible shape and it is an enormous struggle for him to change his habits. I want to form good one here and now, so it's never a terrible thing to overcome.

My good friend Scooter is in a rough place emotionally right now. He's just come out of the closet to his family and friends, and his boyfriend dumped him six weeks after. I think my girlfriend and I are about to split. (You know how you are supposed to treat live as a learning experience? I have learned one things. Sometimes you can do everything right, and STILL not be the right person for someone.) We are gonna do this program. He's in DC and I'm in Alabama, so we are gonna use email to keep each other informed and encouraged.

We are both in need of some emotional strength and right now a physical image change will help us both.

Wish me luck guys.

Besides...we might make it as contest champions and win the 100000 dollars!