time and space?

silly project

2009-02-27T13:22:00.000-06:00

While looking for employ in this awful job market, I've taken up something fun to fill the void of time I have. I've been modding a Hori joystick for the Wii with real Sanwa arcade parts I imported from the faraway land of Japan. I bought a Dremel drilling tool with some money I received for Christmas from my new mother-in-law. It's come in handy for this project. It's been so much fun that I'm doing a second one with different colors and parts. Here's an image of the first one I did.

turntable

2008-03-13T01:59:00.000-05:00

I was graciously given some cash as gifts by some very generous close family and friends last Christmas, and I decided it was time to indulge in some capitalism. My old turntable, which I had acquired from a thrift store here in Ventura, died in 2004, and I've been without a way to play my records ever since. I remedied this situation last week when I ordered this new turntable off Amazon. I absolutely love getting things in the mail. I would order dish soap and paper towels through the mail every week if they would arrive in mysterious brown boxes with labels plastered all over them as cryptic hails from distant lands.

csuci

2008-02-05T16:42:00.000-06:00

I suppose it takes a certain level of hindsight and maturity to see it, but until sitting in on my first few classes last month since graduating from UC Santa Cruz in 2001, I didn't realize how...geared towards nineteen-year-olds undergraduate classes are. The professors even behave differently. They dumb themselves down, seemingly on purpose. I'll admit, it could simply be that CSU Channel Islands is just a shit school - I already feel that they lack some of even the most basic resources that every institute of higher learning needs - for example, a library of reasonable scope and size. Medical coverage for enrolled students. Maybe UCSC was just that good, or the CSU system is just that bad, or perhaps the situation of federal and state funding for public universities is just incredibly dire.

Whatever it is, I don't intend to stay at CSUCI past the current semester.

2007-11-07T09:59:00.000-06:00

Today is the first time ever in my life that I have forgotten just precisely how old I am. It's either 32 or 33. Fuck. I don't feel like counting years right now, so I guess the real number remains safely anonymous.

Greencine

2007-03-01T11:58:00.000-06:00

I subscribe to GreenCine, a San Francisco-based DVD rental company.

They recently changed their front page layout, and had this ad up on their old layout, which is still up while they work out the rough edges of the new. I had to repost it here because it is awesome.

edit: dammit, I should have known better to direct link to an image. It's gone now.

Tha Police

2007-02-28T17:13:00.000-06:00

I thought I'd look up some info on the Police shows coming up.

Here's what I found were the only available tickets and prices on Ticketmaster right now:

And here's a snippet of what's available on ebay right about now:

Dear god. Why did I bother? I knew it was going to be fuck all, but I had no idea. Too bad.

2007-02-23T14:06:00.000-06:00

Since the begininng of this year, I have planned on leaving my current assignment with the temp agency I work for and spending some quality time comparing my options for grad school, internships, and more interesting part-time work. I intended to begin this in March. Well, March is now here, and I am beginning to feel some very definite pangs of anxiety at these prospects.

There are three disparate areas of study I have been considering for grad school. One is journalism. The second is public health. And the last is the book-binding arts. All three hold unique appeals and problems for me. The next six months will surely determine the path my life will take for the next decade or more.

Yes. Anxiety.

Monster Planet

2007-02-15T14:16:00.000-06:00

I've been reading Monster Planet, a novel that can be read online; it is the third book in a trilogy of post-apocalyptic zombie horror novels penned by fine, upstanding citizen author David Wellington. I am here to say most definitely, and without any doubt, that it fucking rocks. I highly suggest that one check it out if one is so inclined. I'm not really a fan of horror-ish literature, but I appreciate the zombie aesthetic, so to say, and the apocalypse is a favorite time of the year for me as well.

I would venture so far as to call the series intelligent zombie horror, but that would imply I have had some sort of exposure to zombie horror novels which fell on the stupid side of the scale as a basis for comparison, which I have not. That isn't to say poorly written zombie books don't exist, merely that I haven't read any. The series isn't some deep philosophical exploration of the nature of thought and existence (with zombies) or anything, but it does lovingly depict giant zombie-skeleton-spider bone creatures with deadly swinging bladed probosces eviscerating things right and left. Who can deny the vicariousness a zombie bone creature can bring to one's life? I, for one, certainly cannot.

The first two books, Monster Island and Monster Planet, are out in actual bound-paper-book form as well, with the third coming (hopefully) soon, if one prefers reading actual words printed on tree pulp instead of words on a monitor.

This has been a Public Service Announcement...with guitar.

2007-02-09T12:47:00.000-06:00

I have somehow assumed the mantle of some sort of novice software technician for a group of older women at this company I am temping for. These women are all around the age of 60 or so - I know this because they often speak in gregarious tones about the pitfalls that come with their age. This group of women, this cabal of the aged, if I may, have somehow anointed me their savior savant. I helped one of them do something at one point a couple of months ago, and the word must have spread or something, because now they ask me daily for assistance in performing various functions in the software we use here. In doing so, they have exposed themselves as being completely inept in their knowledge of Word and Excel and the like, and even in the most basic of Windows desktop manipulation.

I have had to assist them in such mundane tasks as adding columns to a table for them, saving a file not at the default location a program prompts one to save at, but in a different location; I have had to replace accidentally deleted desktop shortcuts for them - the list continues interminably.

I must sound like a complete dick for railing on them for this, but I am genuinely surprised - no, shocked, that high-level veteran workers in this company, people who have been doing their job for more than a decade in most cases, have absolutely no idea how to really use the software they go through the motions of using every single day. I can't understand how they get through their days without knowing how to move a file somewhere, or any number of, to me, very minor and simple tasks. I feel like I need to go talk to the management here and clue them in on this, maybe suggest they have everyone go through some mandatory software training or something.

Oh well. I just wanted to vent.

2007-02-09T11:47:00.000-06:00

I started reading Franz Herschel Milhouse Kafka's The Castle back in 2002. I read about two-thirds of the book before I somehow lost track of reading it and, for whatever mundane reason, as my time slipped away, I stopped reading it altogether. I went back to it a year or so later, starting over at the beginning, and again failed to finish reading it. I've done this now four or five times since, each read through failing to complete the novel.

For anyone familiar with the subject of this book, my failure to finish it is a delicious irony. Delicious. With a rich buttery saffron-mushroom sauce.

2007-01-23T12:24:00.000-06:00

I would prefer not to be here at work today, but instead to be at a location other than that which I am presently located. In addition, I would like to have a large meal consisting of moist pancakes covered in warm maple syrup and bacon strips hand-grilled by a band of travelling gypsies.

2007-01-15T14:34:00.000-06:00

We decided to buy a TiVo box over the weekend. Why did I just write it like that, with their silly trademarked upper case TV letters and lowercase all other letters? Because I am television's bitch, that's why.

Anyways, it won't arrive until this weekend or something, but damn, this is weird, spending money on a device to watch television. However, it's more of a means for us to evade advertising than anything else. See, I watched very little television for several years when I lived in Santa Cruz, and none at all for a couple of years afterwards. It wasn't until after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans that Mara and I realized that having cable is an almost neccessary vector for getting prompt information about current events. So we signed up for cable. And while we've been thankful for the new avenue of information available to us, rediscovering television commercials has been akin to getting kerosene dumped on your head and set aflame while trying to watch a show. Ugh, advertising.

So in the hopes of abolishing television commercials forever, we bought their damned service. Suckers.

2006-12-15T12:47:00.000-06:00

I spent $40 on a belt this week.

The last time I bought a belt was over 10 years ago. On that occasion, I had bought that belt as a neccessity, to extend the usefulness of an ill-fitting pair of pants. This time, I bought it more as a fashion accessory than anything else. I feel so decadent.

It's a pretty cool belt. It's the kind of belt that would elicit a statement like "hey, that's a pretty cool belt" if one were to see it.

Stephens, 1912 - 2006

2006-12-14T12:18:00.000-06:00

Mara's granddad, the respectable W.C. Stephens died last week. He was an imposing man. He also lived one hell of a long life - he was 94. I can only hope to be so lucky as to live to 94.

Here's a pic of him when we went to visit back in May. He's the spry chap with the cane.

how did i mess this up

2006-12-14T12:13:00.000-06:00

You see, Mara's birthday falls on a particular date in the month of December. This year, I made the error of thinking and planning that this date was actually 2 days later than the real, down home, true date. Thusly, I had no cake ready, only one of several gifts purchased, and a gigantic and overriding sense of utter criminal stupidity. I fucking fucked up.

2006-12-08T12:34:00.000-06:00

oh god I just farted quite loudly sitting here in my cubicle. Surely it was heard by the surrounding denizens in the immediate area around my cubicle. oh horrible awful day getting worse minute by minute.

2006-11-17T13:01:00.000-06:00

This is pretty cool. Some place called Cornell University devised a robot that is capable of becoming self-aware. What if, say, my car became self-aware one morning on the way to work, and decided it didn't want to transport me to work after all, but instead drive to the beach and sit around looking out across the ocean all morning? Now that would be the perfect excuse for missing a day of work - "I'm sorry I wasn't here yesterday, but my car became self-aware and it took me to the beach instead!" This can also work for washing the dishes..."I'm sorry, but the scouring pad became self-aware last night! It demanded I just set it on the windowsill! I was held fast in its thrall!"

This robot can apparently also adapt to overcome "injury" (though I would call that mechanical failure). It looks kind of creepy, in a robo-punky Silent Hill kind of way. I can imagine a horde of these slowly tapping their metallic appendages along a dimly lit hallway on their way to subjugate me.

2006-11-13T23:07:00.000-06:00

I bought a new shirt, and it arrived in the mail today. I absolutely love getting packages in the mail. I buy stuff every so often online or through mail order just so I can get all excited when the package arrives. There is just something magical about a mystery package from faraway meant just for you.

2006-11-11T12:18:00.000-06:00

Clearly I spoke too soon with the "it's hot" complaining earlier. It has been freezing here since Thursday.

My newfound fellow employees are a little...off. They go about their everyday business, smiling, speaking to one another; but I see it. They believe they have buried the crazy deep inside, but it is in fact right there for me to see. I need only to look into their eyes. I swear, they pull out their crazy eyes when they talk to me.

2006-11-07T17:37:00.000-06:00

Man, has it been hot here lately. Goleta usually is around 70º F about now, but it's been nearly 90º for the last few days. It feels like summertime, but summertime weather in Goleta of this type usually only lasts for about a month or so tops before it reverts back to the hated cloudy, dingy 65º F weather we are always stuck with here.

I am sweating, and I like it.

2006-10-18T02:41:00.000-05:00

I am ga-ga for Project Runway. I freely admit this as the first of twelve steps to come. And I want Jeffrey to win. Go Jeffrey!

edit after show:

And...Jeffrey wins! Kick-ass.

In other news, tonight I had my first Salty Dog. It was more sour than salty, however.

cookies cookies

2006-10-18T02:27:00.000-05:00

I made cookies yesterday. I made them with the will and cadence of an expert in the culinary arts! I made them with flour, and butter, and lots of sugar. I made them...with love.

2006-10-04T01:59:00.000-05:00

After eyeing an unused half-bag of marshmallows left over from our recent camping trip, I decided to put them to good use. Mara mentioned Rice Krispies Treats earlier for some reason, and so it was decided.

To make these things, you need to melt butter and marshmallows, then mix them in with the cereal, and finally spoon the resultant goop into a pan to cool. It was surprisingly easy, but after stuffing my face with them for the rest of the afternoon, I never want to eat them again. Clearly a very easy treat to get sick of very quickly.

2006-10-01T14:19:00.000-05:00

Today marks the first day of rain of the season, which is fitting, as it is also the first day of October. I woke up and was greeted by an opaque, moist bathroom window. While I appreciate the beauty of dusky, dark rainy days such as today, I silently grieve the end of summer.

2006-08-14T15:23:00.000-05:00

A few nights ago I was up late, oh about 1 AM or so, and I went into the bathroom. Now, the bathroom has a window facing out the front of our apartment, looking out on a tall tree and, to its right, a concrete brick enclosure housing two trash dumpsters. Wonderful view, I know. While in the bathroom brushing my teeth, I heard some footsteps and a rustling sound coming from outside the window. I figured it was some late-night reveler returning home after a night out on the town, or some such thing. I thought nothing of it, and put it out of mind.

The rustling and steps came again, more concerted and determined this time. I narrowed my eyes and looked out the window. I could not see much of anything, as it was very dark outside and quite bright in the bathroom. I turned off the bathroom light and peered out. I saw nothing; yet the sounds continued. Adding to the rustling was now a distinctively animal sound - a trilling kind of speech. It lilted up and down, filling the courtyard with the sounds of the rainforest.

Aha, I thought, it must be raccoons or opossums, or some other local wildlife that comes out at night and tries to get into the foul-smelling trash. The noise continued, and I began to get annoyed. Ah yes: annoyance - the plum of my misery. It demands my immediate attention; I must follow it through without any regard for outcome. Caught in its throes, I grabbed my heavy black aluminum Mag Lite flashlight, a device which provided me with both light and weaponry, and decided to venture out to deal with the noisemakers.

The dumpster area seemed empty when I approached. I shone the flashlight around the brick square and found nothing. Crouching downwards and looking under the dumpster, I swept the darkness with the flashlight, and found myself face to face with a furry heathen of questionable intentions. It stopped its deviant machinations and looked up at me as I directed the beam of light at it. The animal's lanky paws, which it was twiddling nervously like a villain in a top hat, ended in sharp and very mean looking claws.

At this moment in time, my motions began to slow down, and I knew what to do. I had to defend my mate and my hive. I stood up, closed my eyes, and began to perform...the Dance. The Dance is a preternatural rhythmic beating and stomping of the feet and flailing about of the arms designed to startle and frighten away small children and animals. It has more success with the animals than the small children, though. I once attempted it on a child who was sitting outside on the sidewalk with a hatchet, striking the hatchet repeatedly on a section of steel pipe, making a most annoying loud clangy sound. It merely looked up me in a surprised manner and continued its hammering away. Never mind how a child got hold of a hatchet, but that is for another story. This raccoon responded to the Dance by immediately scampering out from beneath the dumpster and running into the bushes.

I was not content with this minor victory, though. Directing the flashlight into the underbrush, I saw the two bright beady reflections of its eyes looking out at me. I was not fooled this night - this animal most certainly had every intention of returning to the scene of the crime as soon as I left it alone. This in mind, I approached the bush in which it was hiding and stomped my feet again, this time adding to my dance the exclamation of "Get!" punctuated with each foot stomp. Above me, a light switched on in a window. Clearly my crusade was disturbing the evening peace. I stomped and "Get!"-ted one more time and finally caused the furry creature to dash out from leafy hiding place and tear away across the grass. Satisfied in my triumph, I walked back to my apartment.

While passing beneath the tree, I once more heard that animal trilling noise. A quick inspection of my surroundings revealed no sign of any wildlife. Then the trill, again. Hmm. Clearly I was being mocked. I went to my front door and turned around. The tree. Raccoons. In the tree. The one I was just standing under. I slowly craned my neck upwards to the night sky and saw them. One. Two. Three? Four? Five! Five raccoons were perched among the branches of this tree, trilling in unison, with their bright beady reflective eyes trained on me. It was like Planet of the Apes, only I was a man, and the raccoons the apes, and the tree, the Statue of Liberty, or something.

2006-08-10T11:26:00.000-05:00

It is amazing how quickly the weather changes here, a scant quarter mile or so from the Pacific Ocean. I left to run a few errands yesterday, and returned home about an hour later only to find a huge, seething cloud hovering over Isla Vista when I exited the freeway at the top of the hill. My first thought was - fire! my apartment! until I rolled my car window down and peered out catiously, nose first, seeking out the harsh aroma of burning, destructive smoke, but finding only a delicate mist. The lingering smoky behemoth was nothing more than a super-fast marine layer that clearly took my jaunt into town as an opportunity to form and loom over my home, acting as a beacon of sorts for my return.

2006-08-05T15:07:00.000-05:00

Netflix delivered Kingdom of Heaven yesterday, and we watched it last night. I had wanted to see it when it came out last year, but it somehow slipped out of the theaters before I had to opportunity to catch it. What a film. It is a beautiful, incredible, epic film. One of the best films I have seen in the last five years. There is a director's cut that came out not too long ago also. Neither Netflix nor Greencine had it available for rent, so I settled for the theatrical version, which was impressive in its own right, but from what I have read on the internets, the director's cut is even better.

I also found that the film fared very poorly in North America, but substantially better in Europe and the Middle East, with its best showing in, of all places, Egypt. It's not a film about adventure or love or anything like that at its core, but rather a study of a clash of religions in one of the most violent times in history. I think I'm going to purchase the extended DVD, which is a rare decision considering the paucity of available cash in my life right now.

I'm seeing things dancing at 4 am

2006-07-10T05:45:00.000-05:00

Man, I just can't fall asleep tonight. It's going on 4 AM and here I am, washing dishes and flossing and taking trash out and performing all sorts of pointless domestic activities. I happened to stumble on this story a bit ago, about how Magic Mountain may be closing. That's so sad. I went there often as a young lad, and I even worked there yonder about nine years ago before I went away to attend university. I remember selling tickets to seriously big-time actor Pete Postlethwaite, waving Ben Stiller through the parking lanes, and watching Hulk Hogan carouse through the front gates with his entourage, and then bragging about these chance encounters to whomever would listen...until someone who shall remain nameless shamed me into disowning my grand experiences. But it was Pete Postlethwaite! How could you not scream the details of that chance encounter to the heavens?! Our meeting will be sung about in times of yore. In the future, you know, with lasers and shit.

Tyrebious Reaber, I gently pour a container of fizzy malt liquor to remember you by and stuff onto the steaming black tarmac. Floyd, the exceedingly introverted guy with big thick glasses. I nicknamed him The Cobra in a clumsy, backfiring attempt at empowerment. Instead, he would arch his brow at me and ask me why I was drinking his Coke.

2006-06-27T16:19:00.000-05:00

Recently, I saw a man in the audience of a movie theater. A very tall person took a seat directly in front of the man. He affected a stern, pensive countenance when he realized the tall person was substantially obscuring his view of the film, which was soon to begin. The film started, and I saw the man and his companion leave their seats for a less obstructed vantage point in the theater. His sullenness seemed only to increase with this turn of events. I watched the man as he squeezed his cup of soda until it burst, then cast the icy remnants onto the back of the seat and floor at his feet. He then stood up and walked out of the theater. A few minutes later, his companion followed him.

Commerce

2006-06-24T11:39:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I was, for the first time ever in my sordid life, forced to replace an entire set of tires for my automobile. Its cost: $268.00.

But the human cost was far more. The establishment I conscripted to raise the countenance of mine car was so bustling, so bursting at the seams with human activity of all kinds, that I was forced to take shelter at a nearby strip mall. The environs of said strip mall contained all manner of traps - movie theaters, bookstores, coffee shops...I could only hang my head in shame and shamble forth. For an hour in the multiple of three was my time frittered away staring down the maw of this raw, unfettered free market.

In hindsight, it could have been much worse. I came away from the experience with my wallet depleted only from tire necessity, and nothing more. I did find an interesting history book on the sovereign nation of faraway France that I felt very compelled to purchase, if only for my extreme ignorance of the history of all things French, other than that there was some kind of Revolution, and wine, and The 400 Blows.

2006-06-09T23:10:00.000-05:00

Taking naps at the movie theater seems to be my new raison d'etre. I used to only do this during the occasional extreme late night movie outing. I remember falling asleep at a late showing of Hellboy, but nothing really much else until very recently. I missed 20 minutes of the Da Vinci Code (can you blame me?) and I just missed a chunk of The Break-Up earlier today due to another unannounced stealth nap attack. Neither was a late-night showing, though. I think my body just decided it needed rest, and the present was as good a time as any.

Woe is Deming

2006-06-04T20:09:00.000-05:00

I could not resist the urge to write a review of the monument to post-modernity known as the Grand Motor Inn of Deming, New Mexico. Pity I didn't take a single picture of the Inn itself. It is known to locals and those who frequent it as The Grand, which is much more grandiloquent sounding than it deserves to be.

Bugs.

2006-06-04T07:03:00.000-05:00

I report in to share that we appear to be under siege by members of the underground terrorist cell animalia arthropoda. You see, the temperature has suddenly shot up from being a consistent 65 degrees to a steamy 85 even at midnight.

And then the bugs came.

The first sign of the beast manifests itself as a multitude of tiny gnats frolicking in the moist bathroom sink-bowl. The second is a swarming of at least three different species of winged devils around any indoor light source. I counted the selfsame bathroom sink-gnats, a moth-like gnat of a more robust body (and a deep brown when all smashed up on a scrap of tissue, which is my preferred form of this beast), and what may or not be a distant cousin of the mosquito, which seems to suffer from dwarfism or some such malady.

This all came to a head about 45 minutes ago, when I was laying comfortably asleep in bed. I felt a pleasant tickling sensation along my thigh, as if a lover were tracing an unseen finger gently along my skin in the dark. Also, if this lover had eighty-six fingers, all 3 millimeters in thickness and covered with a fine hair-like covering. I reached my hand out in the night and rubbed my thigh...and something was there. I promptly elicited a sound unlike any loosed upon this earth since the long-ago days of the vikings, who I've heard lived in an exceedingly cold place and bore hammers of elkskin and møøse. Also, they had beards and bought bacon in bulk at Costco.

I leapt from the bed with an animal grace - if the animal were a duck-billed platypus. I turned on every light in the bedroom, and in spite of my bedmates protracted cries of mercy to spare her 4 AM eyes from my floodlight fury, I found a bug-creature in my bed. She killed it for me, because, really, I'm not touching those creepy bug-things, even if I had one of those cold-Viking møøse-hammers. Yuck.

And then to top it off, I walk out to the kitchen - keep in mind this is not a long walk in our 450 square foot closet-apartment - and I nearly step on a spider the size of a quarter. A freakin' quarter.

So yeah, now I'm wide awake and not going back to my bug-infested bed anytime soon.

Apocalypse Ir-rationale

2006-06-02T16:52:00.000-05:00

One of the most content and stress-free times in my life was the two years I spent living in Santa Cruz while attending university. After hours of deliberation and mindless waving of divining rods, I have concluded that the reason for that was the infrequency of which I drove a car during that time. That town had buses that could take you anywhere.

I do not enjoy driving. I do not even enjoy coming along as a passenger while someone else is driving. My fervent wish is for each and every automobile in this world to simultaneously combust in a giant worldwide chain of de facto destruction. The only thing wrong with this scenario is that it nullifies the possibiity of a future where gangs of post-apocalyptic leather-clad humanfolk roam the deserts of the world in souped-up Dodge Chargers in a battle for control of the world's sparse remaining resources.

driving

2006-05-31T02:56:00.000-05:00

Drove with lovely Miss M to Tucson and then on to Deming, New Mexico over the weekend. The trip was a Visite Finale to see M's ailing grandfather for what may possibly be one last time. At 94 years, every minute seems like it is on borrowed time.

We left Santa Barbara at around 11 AM Friday, and arrived in Phoenix around midnight that evening. 13 hours on the road, and we still had further to travel. The drive back was nearly as grueling - the clincher is getting around the I-10 linchpin in San Bernardino without getting mired in traffic. The trouble is, there's only one real route through to Arizona, and it's through there. Everyone must take it; I see mothers and puppies alike packed tightly into dull colored, bug-spattered compact cars.

While on holiday in the decadent town of Deming, I was able to imbibe the marvelous variety of Coca-Cola that is made not with corn syrup, but with real cane sugar. On that day, I ascended to gates hewn of pearl thrown wide open for me.

These pictures are an accurate view of the weekend from my perspective.

2006-05-23T06:18:00.000-05:00

Yeah, so it's 4 AM. So what in tarnation am I doing awake and in front of the computer? Welcome to the world of Zyrtec-D. When these late-onset seasonal allergies (that's what I'll call them, because it makes me sound like a doctor, it does) began a couple of years back, my crack squad of attack allergists cycled through prescriptions of every available allergy drug in the Western world, and even some from beyond (black centipede meat I am looking at you).

Zyrtec-D is the big failure. I have a metric ton of it sitting around unused, as I wound up taking it for about 6 months before giving up. It gave me insomnia and a host of other nasty side effects, and it raised my blood pressure, too. You see, the "D" in Zyrtec-D stands for, I am told, Decongestant, however it may as well be a totem of the Darkest evil which lurks in the hearts of humankind for all its Dicking around it did with my health. I only tolerated it for as long as I did because, out of all the allergy drugs I had taken, it was the only one to put even a slight dent in my prime symptom of discord - the nasty post-nasal accoutrements I had to put up with daily. If you happened to find yourself in the same room as I in the last two years, the frequency with which I have had to cough and grind my throat in a most guttural attempt to clear it is likely enough to send you out the window onto the waiting asphalt below.

I now pay the price of my foolishness as I try to cajole myself back to sleep.

Water

2006-05-18T14:05:00.000-05:00

Each time I flush a toilet I fear that my callous action has brought our society one step closer to a post-apocaytic future in which water is the rarest commodity and gangs of heavily-armed, leather-clad thugs battle one another for control of the world's remaining resources.

2005-08-16T14:32:00.000-05:00

It has been quite a while since I updated and posted anything new here. However, I refuse to allow this update to be the "it has been a while since I updated" update.

Sometimes.

2005-02-15T13:07:00.000-06:00

Sometimes, I dream of a faraway world in which I am not assigned a document to edit on the very same day which it must unequivocally be mailed out.

Sometimes, the documents speak to me, but in Latin, and in a woman's voice.

Fault

2004-11-03T16:46:00.000-06:00

November 3, 2004...words fail me.

SKRUDGE

2004-10-06T15:16:00.000-05:00

Me: So what does MRP stand for in the context of CRWQCB-LAR MRP# ?

Him: I dunno.

Me: Okay, I'll look around and see what I can...skrudge up.

...

I made a new word.

Elvis, in itself, is a reward.

2004-10-06T12:23:00.000-05:00

Alright, now.

Hold on...

Almost there...

Now!

Here at work, in the illustrious field of environmental management, the reports I edit must eventually wend their meandering ways over the yellow brick road of no return and wind up in the hands of a variety of city, county, and state agencies.

Someone is needed to bring together the disparate elements of...photocopier, mailing envelope, and UPS.

This someone is our new clerk. I shall call him Theobold.

Theobold is a feisty young man, he looks to be of the age of 22 or so. Mr. T has recently graduated from college and this is his first job, post-education. I feel bad for Theobold. He is obviously a smart cookie, capable of much more than what he does here - this much I have gleaned from our perfunctory exchanges.

Because he is relatively new in his charges here at work, it is up to the editors present, myself included, to perform a bit of looking-over on much everything he does. This has become quickly annoying, as he is a sharp enough youngster to not particularly need such supervision. I also tend to empathize with him because, when I first began my employ here, I had to endure much of the same close observation, something I resented with clenched teeth and fiery tongue.

So we arrive at the current juncture. Theobold drops off a never ending stream of completed reports, I look them over for accuracy, and return them to him. In order to lighten the tedium of this process, it occured to me that it would be highly amusing (for me, at least) to place congratulatory self-esteem boosting stickers and messages on said documents before I return them to our man Theobold. I bought a variety of stickers yesterday, and waited breathlessly today for my first opportunity to lay one on Mr. T.

My creation elicited a joyous "Oh, g...geez!" when I presented it to him.

My work here is done.

2004-09-07T18:11:00.000-05:00

The following is an image I scrawled on an agenda sheet while drooling into oblivion during the two-day company meeting I had to endure last week. Yes, two days of unceasing, perpetual debate over the color of pens, or the proper size of a divit. Can you spot the point at which I reached an unholy apex of acronym overload? I knew you could.

2004-09-03T18:51:00.000-05:00

I was editing the company newsletter today, and there was a piece written by one of the field technicians that was written so awkwardly that I had to rewrite huge chunks of it...to my own liking, of course, meaning I turned pieces of it into baroque master-passages of ungainly literati.

* * * * *

Once the impacted soil had been defined, several groundwater monitoring wells had been installed, and the data began to pile up, the pieces to the puzzle began to unfold like the giant petals of some monstrous, yet ineffably shy blossom. However, no matter which way they were turned, the pieces just didn’t seem to fit. Why were higher concentrations of hydrocarbons measured in the upgradient wells than in the wells immediately adjacent to the identified source? I pulled my feet away from the dark wood of my desktop and swung myself over to the file cabinet, manically sifting for the answers to…something. Anything.

There was a knock on my office door. It was Deidre, my secretary.

"There's some guy here, boss," she said in between smacks of chewing gum.

"He says he's an old friend. A Mister Rogers."

I looked up. Reaching into my coat, I fingered the cold barrel of my gun. Still there. Mister Rogers ain't here to be my neighbor, that's for sure. He's here for the scoop on the dissolved-phase hydrocarbon plume.

"Let Mister Rogers on in, Deidre."

I tensed myself for the bastard's entrance. Nobody screws me over at my own game...no matter how much he wants to be my neighbor. I'll show him how we do things here in Ven-tura.

* * * * *

My Body Is Exploding

2004-08-25T23:17:00.000-05:00

Well, so I turned 30 in June, and I figured it was nigh time that I went to the doctor and got myself inspected and stamped with a freshness date. So I show up, strip, get random gaping needles jammed into various body parts, cough while the doctor is strategically cradling my tender manhood, and then throw my clothes back on and head home.

It turns out that I have elephantiasis of the ego. No, wait...I have extremely high cholesterol levels. Not the elephant thing. Also, I am dying, slowly. Apparently one's body begins to slowly decay when one reaches the respectable age of thirty, forever turning its back on the majestic fruits of young manhood and sprinting at full speed towards wrinkled, diabetic prune. If only somebody had told me this sooner, I might not have wallowed in the sordid debauchery I so eagerly embraced when I turned 29. Twenty-nine is a good year! I shall forevermore respond to any question about either the condition of my scrotum or my age by ejaculating twenty-nine at top volume, after which I slowly lower my gaze to the ground beneath my shoes and begin to sob uncontrollably.

Last night, in a calculated and methodical fashion

2004-08-05T10:47:00.000-05:00

I dreamt that John Kerry and Ted Kennedy were brothers, and Ted Kennedy's maiden name was Ted Kerry. And this was a big secret that nobody was supposed to know.

Also, there was a man in my dream who was missing his right hand, and in its stead, nailed into the stump, was a small stool that doubled as a prosthetic hand. When this man needed a rest, he would simply swing his prosthetic stool underneath him onto the ground and have a seat. He had a whole set of different stools he used interchangeably, from shiny black metal stools to ones with urbane walnut legs and elaborate latticeworks.

That is a kickass idea. I'm going to patent it right now.

Lovely rigormortis.

2004-07-26T21:45:00.000-05:00

Indonesia is that rarest of treats - a country so ripe with culture and a storied past that one can easily pluck any number of its lovely fruits, and, biting gently into its soft flesh, send rivulets of sweet nectar down one's chin...a miniature, luscious cascade that ultimately collects in a damp, sticky mess on the front of your shirt.

One day in the near future I will find myself delicately climbing out of my own private submersible, placing my soft black beret over my heart, and placing my pasty white American feet, tender with disuse, onto the moist green soil of Mother Indonesia. I do this for love...love and adventure.

In an attempt to endear me to the nuances of Indonesian culture, lovely Miss M., the woman who I follow to the byways of Indonesia directed me to a website overflowing with pictures of the marvelous seascapes, lush forests, and busy cities of proud Indonesia.

What she did not foresee was the existence of this particular photo, which I showcase below.

That is the facade of a police station in Bintan, on the island of Riau.

In case you missed that, allow me to provide a closer shot of a certain detail in front of that police station.

Indeed.

I will never leave Indonesia alive.

Confirmation.

2004-07-21T17:23:00.000-05:00

There are some things in this world that just make everything seem...all right.

Subtlety.

2004-07-20T13:13:00.000-05:00

I am endlessly amused by the recurring ad my blog page here seems to have spawned. A bit of exposition - Google's ad service scans the content of a particular web page, then displays an advertisement with links it deems relevant to the content of said page.

Here is the ad I've been getting:

Nice.

Dinosaur apathy

2004-07-16T14:46:00.000-05:00

I am beginning the long walk down the sad, sad path of utter apathy for the work I am doing here at my place of employ. You see, I quickly become bored when I master a new challenge. When I am in total control of things, and I know everything I need to know in order to accomplish my job, boredom sets in. Boredom and routine. Every day, read through documents, edit mechanical and grammatical errors. Same subject. Groundwater remediation. Environmental cleanup. California Regional Water Quality Control Board. City of Ventura. City of Los Angeles. City of Santa Barbara.

Sometimes, to break the monotony, I like to emit a low, guttural growl from deep within my throat, which I slowly increase in volume until one of the other editors in the room hears...something, something they can't quite put their finger on, but deep in their trembling, comma-splicing bowels, they know something is out there, and they begin to feel the first burgeoning twinges of fear. They sometimes peer around, searching out the source of the sound - but they cannot, as I am too quick for them. I vary the pitch slightly, and they ask me "if I hear that". Of course, I deny hearing anything, and at this point I stop my neanderthaly antics.

Other times, like today, I don't feel much like antagonizing my coworkers, so instead I marvel inwardly at the prospect of, for example, resurrected dinosaurs with super-strength, enhanced intellect, and the ability to wield heavy firearms. Like in this artist's rendition I created today instead of editing this groundwater remediation progress report -

In the future, all our wars can be fought using dinosaurs, until of course, cliches begin to set in and they turn on their masters, enslaving the selfsame beings which set them free from their millenia-old extinctions.

upcoming shows, label stuff

2004-07-12T13:34:00.000-05:00

It seems Rilo Kiley has left Saddle Creek Records and has started a new record label, brute/beaute.

They are playing a show in Hollywood in a week or two, and I think we're going to go. At least it's not at the Glass House, which was quite possibly the worst venue I have ever had the displeasure of visiting. No bar, no cameras, meh. I don't really care about the cameras, honestly, it can be very annoying to have to struggle to see a band when all the 15-year old girls are jumping up and down in the front with their cell phone cameras in the air. The absence of alcohol, however, is unpardonable.

mid-yawn

2004-07-11T21:49:00.000-05:00

Patrick the compulsive urinating cat sums up how I spent today rather nicely.

Preach on, brother Patrick.

2004-07-10T14:00:00.000-05:00

They say I am

Wackiness: 82/100
Rationality: 62/100
Constructiveness: 50/100
Leadership: 84/100

You are a WRDL--Wacky Rational Destructive Leader. This makes you an enemy of the state. You are charismatic and winning and a very dangerous enemy. You favor justice over compassion, and would almost rather see your opponent fail than you succeed.

You impact the lives of those around you more than any other personality. People remember your name and respect you. You are a tremendous amount of fun to be around and astonishing to watch. You are generally abstinent in your habits, and you like things tidy and ordered.

When picking teams, it is smartest for others to pick yours.

I am an outsider, a maverick out to destroy all and win over all the ladiez when the destruction is done.

I am OCD Vin Diesel.

2004-07-07T03:44:00.000-05:00

How did I wind up being stuck washing dishes and taking out the trash at 2 AM? I believe it was because I fell asleep for several hours after eating earlier. Something in my din-din demanded I lay my body, obstreperous as always, down for some rest quite immediately.

I woke up this morning (er...yesterday morning) to a pair of marvelous surprises left by my newly adopted (he's community property...or something) cat. Said feline demon sated his vile, philanderous needs by peeing in the corner of the bathroom, in front of the shower, coincidentally, it seems, right on the selfsame mini-towel I step on to absorb my wet feet when I step out of the shower. The cat may almost have been successful in catching me in the pitiless grasp of this malevolent, gleeful trap had I not become especially attuned to the very particular stink of cat pee from an earlier mishap of his. More surprisingly, he left three well-formed cat turds on the carpet under the dining room table. Now for some much-needed exposition. We moved the litter box out to the balcony a couple of weeks ago in order to try and combat certain problems, and have been trying to train him to utilize the kitty facilities outdoors, as the apartment is rather small and the only place we really have to put the litter pan indoors is in the bathroom. Also, he leaves little poo stains on the carpet because he can't seem to do his business without being fairly messy in the process. The move to the balcony is intended to remedy these issues. I let him out there as often as I can so he can take advantage of the litter box, but most of the time he just chases little moths or stares at the trees while outside, as if they are somehow mocking him in their tenebrous posturing.

Moving on.

I was bored earlier today, and so I thought it would be fun (read: relieve my boredom) to remove the hair from my manly chest. Now, my chest is not especially hairy - I have enough hair on it to lean towards the masculine rather than the feminine, but I'm certainly no Baldwin. So I went snooping through M.'s woman-products in her womanly stash below the sink (all women inevitably have a stash of hair-removal products under the sink in the bathroom...go figure) and I successfully found a mysterious, not wholly reassuringly pink bottle labeled....Nair.

I mulled the use of this Nair over and over in my head for about 3.25792 nanoseconds, when I came across a warning of sorts, in eye-catching bold print on the back of the bottle:

WARNING! IRRITATION OR ALLERGIC REACTION MAY OCCUR!
ALSO, MEN - YOU RUN THE RISK OF LOSING YOUR WILLY IN A SEA OF SWOLLEN PAIN AND SOMETIMES PLEASANT AGONY IF YOU PUT THIS NEAR YOUR THINGY.

This gave me pause. I inspected the product more closely, and saw that one of the chief ingredients in this beef stroganoff of noxiousness is urea. For the uninitiated, urea is the chief nitrogenous waste of mammals.

So...people rub animal waste on their bodies to remove unwanted hair. If I had known this earlier today, I would have gleefully rolled around in the free and natural depilatory the cat left for me.

On that note, I go to my much-needed rest.

2004-07-06T21:34:00.000-05:00

I sit here savoring a crisp glass of riesling whilst waiting for my dinner to cook. While at work today, over the eight-hour span of time I was present, I estimate I probably did only about three hours of actual work. It's true what the sages of Initech say - a man will only work just hard enough to keep from getting fired.

2004-06-25T14:20:00.000-05:00

Since I have been suffering from some particularly nasty flu-like/allergy-like [?] symptoms for the last six weeks, I finally gave in and went to see a doctor. My doctor is a short Asian man, probably around 35 years old. He's a pleasant enough fellow, in spite of the fact that that he once gave me a rectal exam. He has an odd quirk - whenever I am speaking to him, he constantly nods his head up and down, intoning "Uh huh...uh huh...", as if he feels I need some kind of constant affirmation of his attention. However, unlike some other doctors I have dealt with, this gentleman actually tells me about things when something has gone wrong in my body. He went into an impromptu biology lesson yesterday, extolling the virtues of my sinuses, all the while gesturing to a detailed chart, similar to the image below. Turns out the cause of my prolonged torment is a stouthearted sinus infection.

SOME OTHER GUY'S SINUSES

I am now on a strict regiment of powerful, bacteria-destroying antibiotics. I hope these magic pills help, because i am in misery.

Furni

2004-06-25T14:01:00.000-05:00

A while back, I saw an incredible Danish Modern dining set at at antique store downtown.

When the chairs are pushed in, it looks like this:

Did a bit of inquiring, and the designer is a Hans Olsen. Not much information on him is available. Too bad the set sold already. It would have looked perfect in our new dining room.

Tales of the Wind

2004-06-16T17:57:00.000-05:00

Today, I held my windpipe between my thumb and forefinger, and squeezed. It gave, cracking audibly and collapsing inwards a bit. The incident was quite disturbing. Ever since I quit smoking, I've been living in a delicate, whimsical fear that I'm going to be left with throat cancer or some evil variant of it as a result of my smoke-filled years. Having a windpipe that cracks inward does little to ameliorate my fears.

My problem

2004-03-17T16:40:00.000-06:00

I am very busy here, today at work.

A coworker thanked me for giving him some help with something, and in response I said, "Your problem!"

I think I couldn't figure out whether I wanted to say 'you're welcome' or 'no problem'.

He just kind of peered at me with suspicious eyes for a moment, then walked away.

Passion

2003-10-11T17:03:00.000-05:00

I got a bit of junk email recently that implored me to 'open her floodgates of passion'.

It made me laugh.

2003-10-04T14:35:00.000-05:00

Busy week. New job. Still have a nasty cold.

Tonight I'm going to see Lost In Translation again with a group of student-friends of Mara's. Dinner will likely follow the film.

I played 2 hours worth of Indonesian Scrabble Wednesday night with Mara, before we had to place the game on hold because it was taking far too long. The letter frequency in Indonesian is obviously different than English; the letter 'k' is one of the most common letters, but Scrabble only has one k, but twelve 'e's, which are nowhere near as common in Indonesian as in English. So you're screwed from the start, unless you do some footwork and have extra tiles.

I ate at a Vietnamese restaurant last night in Oxnard called "Pho Saigon". My first time eating Vietnamese. It was filling, but I didn't care for the fish-sauce it all seemed to taste and smell like. It permeated everything.

Ziggy played guitar

2003-09-28T18:18:00.000-05:00

Bought tickets to see David Bowie at the Shrine Auditorium this morning, $54 each.

I hope the seats aren't too bad - I can't really afford to pay upwards of several hundred dollars for the good seats.

coffee

2003-09-27T16:27:00.000-05:00

I have had enough of Internet Explorer. I am downloading the newest Netscape browser instead.

Last night I dreamt that I was throwing midgets around by their legs. Swinging them around, gaining speed, and letting them go, flying over the tops of the tall weeds in a large green and tan field. It was a beautiful day. And then I awoke to a dingy gray Ventura sky.

I brought my coffee maker out of retirement this morning and brewed myself some coffee. First, I had to clean it off, as it was covered by two years of dust and goo. I wiped the outside clean, and then proceeded to clean out the water reservoir, inspecting it closely with a flashlight and by probing it with my fingertips. No spiders had taken up residence in its innards, it seems. Then I disassembled it and used soap and water to wash each part separately. I then washed the espresso decanter, and then the 10 cup carafe. After all this, I had to scrub clean the copper filter, rinsing it for several minutes so as to not leave any odd musty taste in the machine. I then reassembled the machine, filled it up with both freshly ground coffee and ice cold purified water, and began to brew my much-delayed elixir. I had to search high and low for my sugar, as I had relegated it to an obscure location in my kitchen ever since accidentally spilling some couscous into the sugar box. That was bad, as I was spitting up couscous every time I made tea.

I don't fuck around when it comes to my coffee.

time *and* space?