Hum-drum-bum Listening: I am N-O-T-H-I-N, I am N-O-T-H-I-N...
Man, was this an exciting weekend. It was so packed full of fun that I couldn't stand it. It was like I was done with one thing and had just enough time to get to the next, kinda like on continuous moving party where I was along for the ride of my life. This was perhaps one of the best weekends of all time. Okay, okay, I'm lying. This weekend was actually pretty boring. When I say "pretty" boring, what I really mean was "hella" or "frikkin" or "crazy." I guess the whole "be careful what you ask for..." thing is pretty true. I asked for a pretty relaxing weekend and it was too relaxing. It was like I was a lump of jelly with no real purpose in life, not even a slice of bread to be spread upon.
Friday after work, I had no plans for the weekend. None, not even for that evening. When I got home, I started calling around asking what people were doing. Most people were busy or were doing things that I had no interest in doing. I was looking to play some billiards. No such luck. It's like whenever my friends get together for something, I'm busy and when I'm looking to get some people together, my friends are busy, or are too far out of town to do anything really on the fly. It's just the way things work.
So, after much chasing, I decided to give up on trying to find something really interesting to do. I ended up going with Carpenter to Swing City where the Toni Lynn Washington Band was playing. The funny thing about it was that earlier in the day, I had been talking to Cutesy Sister Number One about how Swing City sucked and why it sucked. I went into great detail about that and how the scene had grown uninteresting for me. It really is amazing how different Cutesy Sister Number One and I are and yet we're still friends. But, I ended up at Swing City. It was actually a decent night. I saw a bunch of people who I didn't normally get to see, including others that had dropped out of the scene. This included Tattoo Girl, Barbie and some other un-named folk. I had an extrordinarily good dance with Cutesy Sister Number One, and a couple others who I hadn't danced with in a while. I was teasted about being back out on the scene. I danced with this crazy cute girl from MIT. I only got her name. Maybe I'll find out more some other time. I think the most interesting point in the evening was at the very end. I guess there was this guy who was visiting from out of town and he came up to me, and told me that he really liked the style of my dancing. It was kind of a ego boost. I don't even remember the guy's name or where he was from. I knew that he was a legit dancer too, because I watched him dance a couple of songs. So, it's means something completely different coming from a newbie than it does coming from a seasoned veteran.
The next day, I was woken up by a call from The Violent One. Before I get into this, let me just tell you the The Violent One leaves the most long, confusing rambling messages ever in the world. I think I've clocked one at like a minute and fifteen seconds. It's insane. Anyways, she called me the night before asking if I wanted to hang out with her and the girl that she was hosting for the week and I told her that she'd have to call and wake me up an hour before she wanted me to meet them. So, she called me at like ten o'clock. I was like, I wanna go back to sleep, so she let me sleep a while longer and called me again at a quarter past eleven, I believe. By the time I was out of the house, it wasn five past twelve and I was supposed to meet the two of them at half past noon at the Otherside Cosmic Cafe on Newbury Street. Luckily I was only a few minutes late, but as it turns out that they were even later, which was fine. I just plopped down on a barstool and ordered a Raspberry Lime Rickey. Damn those are refreshing! Also as I was waiting, Carpenter called me up and asked me what I was doing. I told him and asked him if he wanted to join and he did.
When The Violent One and her friend arrived, we got a booth on the top floor. Something irked me about The Violent One and her friend that day. It seemed as if whenever The Violent One said her friend's name, she only said it in a whisper. It was weird. I don't know. It was as if her friend's name was a secret that needed to be kept among a smaller group of people, as if it were some sort of world crumbling secret. Strange... Anyways, we had chilled out for a bit and ordered by the time Carpenter had gotten there. I had an Otherside salad and a bowl of the Potato Corn Chowder. They rarely have the corn chowder action going on there, so when they have it, you've got to jump on it. It's much like the Gazpatcho. Mmmm... It's almost summer.... Gazpatcho time....
After a filling lunch, we walked around and went shopping for stuff that The Violent One's friend was looking for to take back to Japan with her. We went to Restoration Hardware, Crate and Barrel, and the Potterybarn. It was a full-fledged home furnishing spree. While walking from store to store, we took time to check out the protest march. I have to say that some of the people there were a bit freaky and some were very vanilla. I think the demographic was a bit heavy on the younger crunchier types though. There were some fantastic costumes and some really just ignorant people. I think the costumes that stuck with me the most was this string of arab women with their heads made out of paper mache who were carrying dead bodies and dead babies. It was mildly haunting. Not haunting enough to give me a real opinion over the war.
After walking around for a while, we got ice cream at JP Licks and then we all split up. I could feel a headache coming on, so when Carpenter dropped me off at my place, I layed down on the couch and took a nap. It didn't help all that much. It's a good thing that I had no plans that night because my head was hurting like a bitch. I don't know how else to describe it. I think it was also coupled with a bit of nausea. I don't really know if it was independent or if it was a byproduct of the headache though. So, I just stayed in that night. I flipped the stations on the TV and just chilled. To tell you the truth, the headache didn't go away until the next morning when I woke up. I don't know what that was all about.
Sunday, I went to dragon boat practice. When I got there, there weren't that many people runnin' around. There were maybe six of us, but slowly but surely more people showed up. By the time we finished stretching, we had a total of nineteen people. That's about how many people we usually have. Dulcimer showed up and I was rather overjoyed. She had dropped off of the face of the earth and has returned. Yay! She's one of my dragon boat partners in crime, not to mention a major crush. But alas, she has a man, and I am content to keep her as a friend. It was really nice to see her though. Paddleback showed up as well. I don't know why, but I was kind of surprised to see her too. During this practice, we had our lefts outnumbering our rights by a great deal. We didn't even have anyone good to do stroke on the right. We did some testing and stuff too. Then the usual dim sum and stuff followed. It was all pretty standard.
From four o'clock until dinner and then fro a bit after that, I napped. At eight thirty or so, I headed off to Medi Girl's b-day shindig at Johnny D's in Davis Square. I was there mostly for moral support. There was salsa music and dancing, and honestly I don't really dig either. There were a number of attractive women there, but even still it didn't make me feel like dancing. I just sort of hung out with Barbie and Carpenter and had a few beers. At half past eleven or so, I bummed a ride home from Carpenter, watched a show that I had recorded and went to sleep. And that was the extent of my weekend. Exciting, huh?
Today, I'm feeling a little drained. It was like the rest that I had this weekend was no good. I feel the cynicism and apathy growing in me. It's been growing for a while lately. I think it has to do with my dissatisfaction with my life despite all of the "stuff" that I do. I don't even quite know why I'm dissatisfied. I know that I am in a very fortunate life position at the moment. I have a stable job, a place to live without rent, home cooked meals, great friends, fun hobbies and so on and so forth. What is missing? What is missing? Can someone tell me what's missing so I can go out there and find it? Somebody? I find myself getting snippy with people and being apathetic about a great many things going on around me and in the world as a whole. Does something need to change? What needs to change? Is it because I'm below my monthly CD quota? *sigh* I wonder if it's because of....
Where Did Everyone Go? Listening:So long ago, I can't remember when, that's when they say I lost my only friend. They said she died easy of a broken heart disease...
Just as yesterday was a productive day, last night was a productive night. It went down a little like this. Right after work, I plopped down on my couch and napped for an hour or so. Upon waking up, I had a little dinner and watched the shows that I recorded this week. It really didn't take all that much time. As I was getting ice cream from my freezer, my grandmother hijacked the TV and turned it to CNN. Hijacked! By my own grandmother! She could have at least asked. Damn that CNN! Damn this war! I don't want to hear any more about it. I want complete media silence on the war. I don't care if they keep fighting, just shut up about it. Leave me in peace and quiet with my fictional story lines and cheesy deceit on reality TV game shows.
When I figured out that I had been hijacked (I only keep using that word, because I can't find a more suitable word), I ate my ice cream and retreated to my room. Now, my room was a mess. I do stress was. After last night, it's significantly cleaner. I wouldn't go as far as to say that my room was clean, but it is definitely less messy. I cleaned up a lot of the useless paper lying around and put away some stuff that should have been put away a long time ago. I had a box full of styrofoam popcorn in which a bunch of cafe press stuff had been shipped to me that I emptied out and shoved a bunch of CDs into it. That box helf seventy two or seventy three CDs. And that's half the size of my big box of CDs. I actually think that there's close to three hundred CDs in my big box o' CDs. I threw out a shitload of stuff. I can actually see the surface (or at least some of it) of the table next to my bed. It's a quality improvement.
By the time I had finished cleaning my room and decided that I wanted top veg out in front of the TV, my grandmother had decided to stop worrying about the war for the day and went to bed. So I flipped around for a while before I went to sleep.
So, an exciting evening, right? I thought so. I got something done.
Today I'm working until five o'clock for real, instead of just ending up leaving at five because I didn't start my blog until four. SCUBA is in class all day and someone needs to stick around in case the Client calls and asks us to bend over backwards and scratch our nuts with our tongues. Okay, I guess that was particularly icky, but I just wanted to shock you. But, yeah, that's why I'm still at work on a Friday at a quarter to five.
Another thing that happened to me today was that I reserved the Mezzanine at Limbo for a Dragon Boat fundraising party. I had thrown around that idea for a while, but nothing ever really happened. So, today druing our lunch, Hardcore and I went down there to sell it and it worked. The thing was that we need at least fifty people there who are each spending at least fifteen or twenty bucks a person on food and alcohol. That's about the cost of two drinks there. In addition to that money, we're gonna want people to donate some cash to the club. We were thinking somewhere between five and ten dollars, but if we ask for five and only fifty people show up, we've only made two hundred and fifty dollars. If we ask for eight dollars, we'll make four fundred. So I'm leaning towards the eight dollar suggested donation thing. And in case you're wondering, I won't make the same mistake twice. I'll have people at the top of the stairs of the Mezzanine collecting cash so that we don't get shafted. Hopefully the board of directors or the executive committee, or whatever you wanna call them, will approve all of this and we'll haev a swank little party. Yeah, baby!
Man, I have nothing, and I mean nothing, planned for this weekend. All I have to do is go and run dragon boat practice on Sunday. It should be an interesting time. We're going to be doing some testing. We're gonna find out objectively, how long people's strokes are and subjectively, how hard people can pull. It should be a good time. I'm looking forward to goading people into stretching farther and pulling harder.
Well, it is time to go. It's five to five and I have to do a couple of things before I bust on outta here. Hey, if anyone wants to do anything tonite, gimmie a call... If all else fails, I might just roam around the city.
A Productive Use Of Time Listening: This is your night, dancing free before the morning light...
For a significant potion of the day today, I was running without music. See, I was ripping some discs onto my computer. Well, I ripped three discs. I also made an MD with two Dave Matthews discs, two Hootie And The Blowfish discs, a John Mellencamp, and a Norah Jones disc. Amazing... Five an a half albums on one minidisc. How great is that?
Anyways, this day flew. I have no clue what happened all day. For the most part I just kept my head down and attempted to avoid any shrapnel flying as a result of my little complaint letter. Man, I wish things didn't have to be like they are. I wonder what I could do to make the situation better that I haven't already attempted. It's just a bad situation. I guess he wasn't that bad today. I wish he could answer a question directly. Annoying as hell.
Last night was pretty humdrum again. I ended up bringing some ice cream to Booch's where we talked and had tea. She updated me on her weekend and I updated her on mine. We both had pretty strange, fun and eventful weekends. She had to get some stuff done, so I kicked it out of there early, err... she kicked me out of there early.
From there, since I figured my grandparents were still watching CNN and I really didn't want to sit around while they watched CNN, I went to MIT to check out who was there. There were only a few dancers there that I knew and liked. I danced maybe three songs and that's it. I mostly hung out with Perv Girl and her boyfriend and another girl. Eh... It was alright. I also found out that two dancers just bought a condo four or five blocks away from me. That was nice to hear. I guess I'll know more people in the neighborhood now.
After a while, I got bored, went to a computer cluster and putzed around on the internet for a while. I read blogs, did research on my Dance Valley vacation in August, and read some e-mail. Pretty boring. When I got home at eleven, I watched the episode of 24 that I recorded and went to sleep. Pretty boring, no? Tonite doesn't look too much more promising. If you're bored, drop me a line. Maybe we can hang out or something. Or, if you don't have my phone number, chances are we aren't really friends and I don't think you could drag me out of the house.
Aggravating Day, Nice Lunch Listening: Put yo number on this paper, 'cause I would love to date ya'...
Last night, I went home, watched the DVD extras to the movie Scratch which my brother (presumably) got me for my birthday. I have to say that DJ QBert cracks me up. He is a funny dood. I think that ninety percent of all Philipino people that I meet are funny as hell. I mean are a complete riot. QBert is no different.
After a quick dinner, I headed out to dragon boat practice. Hulk picked me up so I wouldn't have to trek my ass to the T. It was a bonus.
At practice, I actually paddled. It was kind of refreshing. The weird thing was that when I was paddling on the right side, which is usually my more natural side, there was a muscle just above my elbow that started to really kick my arse. I don't know. It just hurt like a bitch. So, I switched to the left side and all was well. I'm wondering if it was the fact that we didn't have time to stretch or if I have some form of tendonitis. Either way it hurt a bunch.
Following practice, Hulk and I went to the Uno's in Porter Square to meet up with the fundraising committee. I think we're going to work on my "Dominatrix Dragonboater" T-shirt under the table. I really think that it'll sell. I'm going to get Zealot to draw the character for me. Back in high school, she used to be able to draw all of these great comic book characters. I'm hoping that she can draw something cool.
Also, along the fundraising front, I'm working on trying to get Limbo to let us use the upper mezzanine for a fundraising party. Shaft said that the way he got his room in the bar he had his birthday in was that he guaranteed the bar that they would have at least fifty paying drinkers there. I'm hoping that I can pull this off with Limbo. I think we could get upwards of seventy five people. I don't think that my fellow team mates belives so. They just need to get everyone that they know to be there. If everyone brings five friends and we collect five dollars apiece from them, we'll be doing awesome.
And that was my evening. This morning was a bit of a different vibe. When I got up a little early, I thought to myself, "Hey, everything is going to be cool today." No such luck. Mumbles' attitude has started to kick up again. Actually it has been kicking up for the past week and a half. I have been working with him to the best of my abilities for the last year and a half and it's like he won't even meet me half way. There was a point where I was saying to myself, "Wow, he's gotten a lot better!" But recent attitudes have led me to change that opinion. Today I had to write yet another complaint letter to SCUBA regarding his attitude. It actually took me most of the day and ended up being around six hundred words. As an English major, I mulled over the language that I used and made sure everything was concise and understandable. I did, however, also get a bit of help on the ending from The Violent One.
Alas, it's a quarter to five. I need to go home. Halfway to the weekend. I'll meet ya there. I'll be sprinting to the end. Funny, I have no plans. Maybe I'll find some tonite. Maybe I won't.
A Well-Deserved Rest Listening: I dig the black girls... oh so much more than the white girls. I was so pleased to learn that they're much smarter, yeah, give, give, give, give it to me harder...
After a long day at work, I did close to nothing last night. I did laundry, ate some dinner, watched some TV, crashed out on the couch and even did a little bit of reading. It was overall a relaxing night. There were some strange moments, like when The Violent One called me from the Ted William's Tunnel, because she could, but overall it was humdrum.
I realized this a while ago, but I thought that I would just share again. The media sucks. My grandparents are total war media junkies. My grandmother will watch CNN for hours at a time and will not change the channel. If I'm not watching CNN when she comes in the room, she changes it to CNN. Maybe if I didn't understand English so well and I only caught one out of five words, I would watch it over and over again so that I could get the entire meaning, but watching it at nauseum is getting to me. It could be noon or midnight and she would want to watch war footage.
It doesn't help that it's all propaganda. OH MY GOD! THERE WERE TWELVE PEOPLE WERE KILLED! You know what? That sucks. I don't want to hear about it a million times. I bet that the families don't even want to hear about it a million times. Sure, I want to know if someone died, but you don't really need to show me each and every face and tell me every name. I would simply like a scoreboard at the bottom of the screen like an NBA scoreboard. There would be three scores: US DEAD, THEM DEAD, INNOCENTS DEAD. That would be ideal. That way, I could just keep track of the score and that would be that. I would kick back with a beer and check out the score as I flip through to another program.
Let's be honest. It's all propaganda. They want to show us each and every face a hundred times to generate hatred among the American people against Iraqis as a whole. They don't really want us to believe that Iraqi people are good people. They want us to hate them so much that we all jump up and shout, "KILL 'EM ALL! KILL THE FUCKERS!" That's not so much gonna happen. Our people chose to die. They chose that lifestyle. They chose to live under the whim of potentially dumb people. I'm not trying to take anything away from their deaths. I'm trying to take away the legitimacy of putting their faces on television twenty times over the course of an hour. I know. I counted one hour when sitting in the TV room with my grandmother who really doesn't understand what's going on.
Enough about the media making me sick. Being informed is one thing, but using death as entertainment (unless you personally hate the specific person who is dead) is no good.
Tonite, I'm going to dragon boat practice. Yeah, I figure, what the hell.... I hope it's fun. I wonder if I'll be running the practice or if I will be paddling. I guess it doesn't really matter. I can't wait to get out on the water. Every day, as I cross over the Longfellow Bridge on the way to work, I look at the cove-like area near community boating. There's only a small sheet of ice on the water now. The large crust of ice on the main part of the river has all melted away. Just because it all melted away doesn't mean that the water is good for paddling yet. I'm gonna bet that if I stuck my hand in the water, it would fall off within three minutes.
*Sigh* Time to go home to take a nap before dinner and practice.
I Swear! I Was Joking! Listening: Would you please ignore that you found me on the floor trying on your camisole. Oh alcohol, would you please forgive me...
What a weekend! Sheesh! It took me, whipped me around, kicked my ass and then left me on the ground spent like you wouldn't believe. I am so exhausted right now and I have a million things to do. Well, I really don't have a million things to do. I have to get some sleep and I have to do laundry as well. Fuckin' A! But I digress... It's time to get the skinny on the weekend.
We could wear jeans to work on Friday. It was nice. I wore a pair of my baggy jeans (as opposed to my wikkid baggy raver jeans) and my eight dollar Filene's Basement Kenneth Cole shirt. The weather and the clothes made the day rather comfortable. I also felt I was stylin' a bit, so that added to the day. It's amazing how more comfortable clothes can make a day better.
After work and after I finished writing the last entry, I went home and crashed out for a couple of hours. I really needed the nap. I mean, I really needed the nap. I slept solidly until just after seven o'clock. I think I could have slept more, but alas, I had to be somewhere.
On the way to the T, I gave Rebound Girl a call. I still hadn't thanked her for the gift that she sent to me. Unfortunately, she wasn't home, so I left a message. As I passed through the Marriott in Kendall Square to buy a pack of gum, Rebound Girl ended up ringing me back. I sat in the Marriott and talked with her for about ten minutes before I told her that I had to get somewhere and that if I left the building, I would lose my cell signal. So, we said our goodbyes and I treked off downtown.
I actually thought that I was going to be really late. I was supposed to be at Maggiano's at eight o'clock and when I stepped out of the T, it was two past eight. At first I didn't have my bearings, so I went down the wrong street. It didn't take me too long to figure out that it was the wrong way. I found myself in front of Bonfire, which is Todd English's new steak house. It looked rather nice, but I would have to save that for another time.
Luckily, by the time I got to Maggiano's, I was only five or ten minutes late. I was somewhere around the fifth of seventeen to arrive. Some people were on some hardcore Asian Standard Time. The funny thing was that none of them were Asian. Anyways, this was where Cutesy Sister Number One and her pal from grad school's birthday dinner. The dynamic at the table was kind of interesting. I knew two other people there, neither of them really well, but I knew them nonetheless. The table was essentially split in half. One half were conversing amongst each other in the direction of Cutesy Sister Number One and the other in the direction of her friend, each were at respective heads of the table. There was such a clear division that there were about for or five people that I didn't even catch their names. However, one guy I did meet there used to dance at Atlantic Dance on Disney's Boardwalk Resort. He knew the girl that I had the biggest crush on, and consequentially informed me that she had just gotten engaged. Yeesh! I guess I should take that back. I barely knew the girl, but I did drool over her a bit.
After dinner, we headed off to Flash's Cocktails, which was a couple of blocks away. Cutesy Sister Number One wanted to go somewhere with dancing, and, clearly, Flash's was not the place, so we stuck around for one drink and then headed out. At that time, it was somewhere around the ballpark of eleven or half past eleven, so a large number of people bounced on home. When the smoke cleared, it was just Cutesy Sister Number One, one of her ex's from two years ago and myself. After all was said and done, we ended up at the Big Cheezy... err.. Easy. We drank some more there and danced some. It was kind of a wild time. Crazy stuff happened.
At two, when the club closed, we ended up trotting down to the South Street Diner for some greasy food and some frappes. I just had an extra thick strawberry frappe. Cutesy Sister Number One had some bacon and some cheese fries, and her ex had a burger and a chocolate frappe. On the way out of the diner, I ran into one of the sales girls from Ozone. It was a bit surprising. By the time we left it was at least three thirty. We caught separate cabs back home.
By the time I was home, I couldn't wait to hit the sheets. I just wanted to crash out. I caught my brother though. He wanted to see if I wanted to grab dim sum with him and his new girlfriend. I told him that I guessed so, but that he'd have to pull me out of bed.
The next morning, my eyes opened at around nine o'clock. It was strange. I wanted to go back to sleep and I even stayed in bed for another hour, but I never really got any quality sleep after I woke up. So, I get out of bed at ten and wash up before going to dim sum.
My brother's new girlfriend, who I'll call Slappy, was kind of quiet, much like his last girlfriend. She was tiny too. She ate close to nothing too. I've seen amoeba eat less. It was crazy. But she did seem to roll with my sense of humor. She said that I was "entertaining." Yeah, I get that a lot. The other funny thing about our meeting was that when she first saw my brother and I next to each other, she was like, "you two are so much alike!" I took offense to that. And after a few hours at dim sum, she was like, "I can't believe how different you two are." I found that amusing.
Following dim sum, I took them out to the Boston Harbor Hotel and the Joseph Moakley Court House to see the harbor and the skyline. It was cool. After that, I let them go and have their private time.
After I let them go, I had my only two true hours of rest and relaxation that weekend. I slept on the couch for a couple of hours before The Violent One picked me up for dinner. Pookz was in town from med school in Philly. There was a large party of us going to Vinnie Testa's for dinner. It was funny. It was exactly like Cutesy Sister Number One's birthday party. I barely talked to half of the table. I did, however have linguini in white clam sauce. I was looking forward to that. I really didn't talk to Pookz all that much, which was a travesty. He was really only in town for the weekend. I'm sure we'll chat some more next time he's in town.
Earlier in the week, I told my brother that I would take he and his girlfriend to Cuchi Cuchi for a drink. I thought they would really enjoy the drinks there. I know how my brother feels about alcohol. He drinks, but not that much. He doesn't really have the taste for it like I do. My brother had a Strawberry and Fresh Basil martini, I had a Caipiriniha and my brother's girlfriend had a Cuchi Julep. Man, my brother is a light weight, but his girlfriend is frikkin crazy insane lightweight. I was joking about getting his girlfriend drunk earlier in the week, but I really didn't mean it. This girl got completely trashed off of one drink. We're talking, loopy drunk. So much so that the room that she was in started to spin and she got all tired and stuff. Walking back to her hotel, as I was making fun of her, she proceeded to try to hit me and slap me. Now, this is my brother's new girlfriend. I can't retaliate until at least the six month mark, so I just sat there and made more fun of her. Yeah... that's the last time I ever take her drinking. Ridiculous.
Sunday morning, I said bye to my brother who was on his way back to Cornell and went to dragon boat practice. It was one of the more fun dragon boat practices yet. I got to be a bastard. It was amazing amounts of fun. Some people proclaimed that they could no longer feel their shoulder. I'm such an asshole.
After practice, I crashed out for an hour and then waited from The Violent One to come and pick me up. We were cruising over to Junior's place to pick up some stuff that he wanted to get rid of. He was giving away his futon, a coffee maker, an ironing board and iron to Ye-ah. I got a rice cooker and a minidisc organizer case. I also got a car minidisc changer for Shaft. It took forever to pick everything up and move it over to Ye-ah's place. I anticipated it taking maybe an hour. It took two.
By that time, I had to rush to eat dinner and then went off to meet Barbie for coffee at the Diesel. We did a lot of catching up. I'm now supposed to help her find some cool things to do that aren't swing dancing. Heheheh... I'm always looking to drab people down into things that I do. We're supposed to go clubbing soon. After coffee, we went to someone's house to watch the Oscars. I heckled like crazy. It was a lot of fun.
Anyways, I'm tired and I have to get out of here. I have laundry to do and such. I need a nap. Anyways, that was my weekend.
Presto Change-o Listening: We said goodbye to a dear old friend and we packed our bags and left feeling sad, it's the only way...
Junior And ZEN!!! Getting Smashed
So, today was Junior's last day at work. It kinda went by fast. We did coffee at half past nine for the last time. Junior, FOP and I all crammed into a photobooth and got our pictures taken. It was fun. His last lunch in Boston on the job was at Sebastian's. You can't beat their salads. It's strange. I know that he was a very self-motivated guy, but I would like to think that I had something to do with his success here at the Hall of Corporate Whoreship. He won the Above And Beyond Award. He ran the funds cleaner and faster than anyone else. He was liked by everyone. I dunno. He's like Uber-worker. Gonna miss going to lunch with him and just hearing the funny things that he has to say. I'm sure we'll keep in touch, if not consistently then sporadically. Hellz, if I need to stay with someone in tokyo, I couldn't think of a better person. He likes good food and like to have fun. Damn... Gonna miss the dood.
I'm still gonna see him again before he leaves. I'm taking a MD car stereo, a rice cooker and a MD storage unit off of his hands. Hopefully Ye-ah will take his futon off of his hands as well. I think SCUBA wants to get some people together for more drinks next week, but he's going to be in Vegas and at the Grand Canyon starting on Wednesday. Who knows how it will all work out...
Last night I went out for drinks with Junior, FOP and Covet. It was nice to go out for drinks with Covet. The dood is too frikkin funny. We went to the Elephant And Castle again. For hours, we chawed on salty foods and drank big glasses of beer. I, again, ordered the fish and chips. Yummy. I looooove the malt vinegar.
Tonite, I'm going out with Cutesy Sister Number One and a bunch of other people for dinner and drinking as a celebration for her birthday. I wonder where we're gonna end up. I hope it's not somewhere where the music will make me sour.
Anyways, it's time for me to go. This should prove to be a rather interesting weekend. I'm sure I'll have more to say on Monday.
IDGAF Listeing: *Sterile NPR News Voices... For the past seven and a half hours.*
Okay... I hate to break down and do it, but I think it has to be done. I hate it that everyone's talking about it like it's the only thing to talk about, but it has been the thing that I have been bombarded with for the past eighteen hours or so. The war. Some people are for it, and some are against it. I am neither. I find both arguements kind of compelling, but I don't give enough of a shit about it at the moment. I don't feel that this war with raise the quality of my life. I don't feel like my life is threatened at the moment. Well, I think the announcement of war has threatened my life, but that's all just retaliatory. It seems like everyone has an opinion, and I really don't. I'm not the provincial person that the idea of not having an opinion would make me out to be, but seriously... I've got my own shit to think about. This government doesn't work for me, nor will it ever. As long as I have my world in order, then well, we'll let the ignorant old money people pretend to play god. Call me selfish. Damn right. Everyone is and everyone should be. I guess that's what Bush is. A selfish bastard trying to make a name for himself, creeping out of the shadow of his failed father by attempting to control middle eastern oil and mispronouncing the word "nuclear." I don't give a fuck about it. When they start hurting my friends is when I will rise up. There's enough to worry about at home in our own country. Hell, there's enough to worry about in my own house. But enough of that. Everything is bullshit. Protesters who are wasting their breath and politicians wasting our money all need to go away. Haha... Cliche, but can't we all just get along? Apparently not.
I can't believe how much all of this media has controlled me. I was watching CNN with my grandparents last night before I went over to Booch's for tea, where we watched CNN. Following that, I came home and watched Bush on CNN saying that the war had begun. Soon after that I ended up watching my tape of Survivor and Angel. (Yeah, I already admitted I'm a nerd.) This morning, however, I came into work and logged into WBUR's website and had NPR streaming through my computer all day long. Funny, everyone gathered at my cube to hear Rumsfeld speak because they couldn't figure out how to do it on their own computer. Maybe I could do it because I am wikkid smaht. I never listen to NPR that much in a day though. It was really weird.
In other news, today, my group went out to lunch today for Junior's last lunch out with everyone. I'm assuming that we'll be having lunch tomorrow afternoon, but this one was on the company. We went to Bertucci's. It's amazing how some people will think that a rather mediocre place is the best place on earth. I'm not saying that I don't like Bertucci's, but what I am saying is that there are so many places that are just as cheap that have better food. I ate my food and was happy with it though. I managed to snake myself a roll before they were all devoured by my coworkers.
Tonite, we're going out drinking again. I called Little Sister up because she IMed me while I was at lunch and asked me if I wanted to go with her to throw rocks at the protesters. I ended up leaving a message asking her if she wanted to come out for drinks with us. Maybe she'll call. Who knows?
Time to go. Tomorrow we get to wear jeans in support of the war. I don't quite know how that works, but I'm accepting the privelage to wear jeans at work. Hah. Raver jeans or just baggies? I wore ravers last time. Maybe I'll just go for the baggies. Time to drink.
Gearing Up For Another Round Listening: Everyone's saying different things to me, different things to me...
Ring the bell! Round two begins. Another three day drinking binge. Yeesh! I'm gonna attempt to moderate a bit. Not gonna get plastered. It's Junior's last day on Friday, so we're, again, going to take him out. There's gonna be lunch tomorrow and then drinking after work. Who knows what kinds of chaos will ensue? I'm gonna bet that Junior is gonna be hung over and embarrassed on Friday though. Should be amusing.
Friday is Cutesy Sister Number One's birthday. Her friend from Brandeis has chosen to go to Maggiano's for dinner that night. Hmmm... It's a question of what to do... Last time I was there, there was a roach under my friend's salad. *sigh* What to do, what to do... I'll prolly go and will be very careful while eating and while ordering. Yeesh! I am looking forward to the party though. I'm assuming that it's gonna be insanely cheezy. So, I guess it'll be fun.
Saturday night, Pookz is coming back into town from med school in PA. I'm gonna grab dinner with him and the rest of the scooby gang (including The Violent One, Ye-ah, Glare, Totoro, OMG, Bombadier, Chocoholic et al.). I just kind of hope that Little won't be there. The Violent One thinks that I am letting her make my decisions for me as to where I want to be and who I want to hang out with. I disagree. I just know where I want to be and where I don't want to be. And when given a choice of sharing the company of Little and not sharing the company of Little, I will opt for the not. But I digress...
Also on Saturday night, I'm going to meet my brother's new girlfriend. It should be interesting. I think they're going to see Stomp that night and I'll probably meet them for drinks at Cuchi Cuchi. I'm kind of curious, because his girlfriend is younger than I am. I think it's weird because I never thought of my brother even dating someone my age, let alone someone younger or at all even. Weird...
On Sunday, I'll be going to dragon boat practice and will be meeting up with Barbie after dinner. It's so weird. She's been back in the counrty for a few months now and I have just been busy as hell, so busy that I couldn't schedule any time with her. Well, she's been busy too, so it's like we have the complete opposite schedule. It should be fun getting together with her again.
You ever just sit around at work and look at personal ads? Some of them are really funny. Really, they are. I have yet to respond to any of them though. There are a couple that I see though that really interest me, whether it's the pic or the list of artists that get them in "the mood," or their tagline. I've been considering replying. Maybe it's a pride issue that I haven't. I'm working myself up to it. I think... Maybe...
Anyways it's time to go. I get to go home and chill out some more. Maybe I'll read a little today. I have three books to read at the moment in addition to the book on the history of the DJ that I started reading nine months ago. It's that frikkin dense. Tonite I'll be drinking tea with Booch as the VCR tapes Survivor: Amazon and Angel. I'm a TV nerd. Stop making fun of me. It's not like I schedule my night around it. I schedule my VCR's life around it.
What To Do, What To Do... Listening: We miss you hissed the lovecats...
Not much to say today. Last night listened to Dubyah make a fool of himself spouting off about nookyulure weapons. Went to Ye-ah's place for a beer. Chilled out. Not much happened. My Tuesday night plans fell through, so I have to figure out if I'm gonna go to dragon boat practice or not. There's an extra one at the Y today. I dunno though. I'm feeling pretty lazy today. Maybe I'll just sit at home and eat ice cream. Maybe I'll go and wander around the city. Who knows? Maybe I'll just go take a nap. *sigh* Time to go home. Work tired me out today. It's hard damn work keeping phrases like, "What are you, incompetent?, "Jesszuz fuckin' christ, didn't I show this to you five minutes ago?" and "I know you're dumb, but I had no clue you were this dumb." bottled up inside all day. It takes a ton of effort. Maybe there'll be more to say tomorrow.
I Gots Ta Lay Off The Sauce Listening: If I could change the way I live my life today...
So, this weekend was rather entertaining. My coworkers and I didn't ebd up going to Mohegan Sun. We were supposed to ride down in SCUBA and FOP's cars and SCUBA's car decided to die on Thursday night, so instead we ended up drinking around Boston. We started at the Tam at around half past three. Two of my coworkers were trying to coerce Junior into going to Centerfold's. That would have been amusing. I would have laughed my ass off if they could have gotten him to go. He is the most straight-laced conservative Japanese boys I have ever met. Sometimes you see Japanese people in all funky clothes, right? Not this kid. He's like Mr. Kenneth Cole. But all of the attempts to get him there were thwarted. Let it be known that it really wasn't my idea (though most people will assume that it was). I just wasn't adverse to the idea and would have given Junior a big ol' stack of one dollar bills to have fun with just to see the look on his face.
After a few hours at the Tam and a few hundred attempts to get Junior to tip naked women with one dollar bills, we decided to leave there and go to the Elephant and Castle on the other side of Downtown Crossing. There, we dined on fish and chips and drank even more. Let me just tell you that these were some delicious fish and chips (complete with Malt Vinegar). I even think they were better than the ones I had at John Harvard's Brew House. They were truly yummy. I don't know if it was the fact that I was completely blasted, or whether they really were that damn good. I'll have to try that place again sometime.
By nine o'clock, we were all done drinking and ready to go home. Junior was blasted. He was amusing. Actually, I think SCUBA was the most sober person there. That's not saying much. So, I get a ride home. When I got home, I was supposed to call The Violent One, because she was supposed to give me a ride to Anti-Scott's place. She was having a St. Patrick's Day party type of a thing and I figured that since I wasn't in CT gambling away my cash, I would go over and chill. The bad thing was that The Violent One, for a half an hour wasn't picking up the phone. So, I got frustrated and decided to call Booch if she had heard from The Violent One. I don't know how I came up with that, but it made sense to me at the time. She told me that she hadn't heard from her, but since I had to give a set of CDs to her to borrow for the weekend and she had to give me my birthday gift and was planning on dropping by the party briefly, she decided that she would drive by, pick me up and take me to the shindig. It was a good plan.
So, as I was waiting for Booch, I was hanging out in the TV room with my grandparents who were waiting for my brother to get into town. Now, these folks may be old, but they can still sniff out alcohol like a pair of bloodhounds looking for an alcoholic owner. Since they smelled the alcohol, they decided to give me some shit about drinking too much. I wasn't having it though. I whipped out all of the "alcoholics in denial" lines that night. I can stop drinking whenever. I really don't drink that much. But the difference was that when I said all of these things I meant it. No, all kidding aside, I really don't drink as much as it seems. I think this past month was just an anomaly. I like my drinks and all, but I don't really see myself having a problem. I know when I've had enough.
Anyways, Booch picks me up. I give her CDs. She gives me my gift. It was Riesling Vinegar and White Truffle Oil. Yeah, baby! ZEN!!! owns White Truffle Oil. You know, between Booch, Glare, The Violent One and OMG, I have a full stocked kitchen without actually owning a kitchen through the last few years' birthday and holiday gifts. I've gotten oil and vinegar from Booch, a plethora of Crate And Barrel kitchen trinkets from Glare, a Tare Panda bowl and plate set from The Violent One and a nice set of wine glasses and glass trivets from OMG. Wow. I have a pimpin' non-kitchen. Hoefully I'll get to use some of this stuff when the grandparents go to California in May. I can't wait for that. Should be a good time.
Anyways, I get to the party and while I'm getting my first drink there, Booch gets a call from THE Hustler. He had been taking a test for the past thirty six (36) hours. Yes, he had been taking qualifier type exams for a full day and a half for his graduate program. Sheesh! I don't think I love anything enough to take a test on it for thirty six hours straight. Anyways, he was going to party with his classmates as a post-exam relief and wanted Booch to come along, so she did.
So, I continued to drink at the party. I didn't meet anyone of quality there. Everyone of quality there, I already knew. Ye-ah showed up as did The Violent One. At around two or so, I think The Violent One and I both got sick of the party and decided to bug out. Man, did I drink a lot that night. Beer, shots, punch, mojitos, you name it, I prolly drank it. When I got home, my brother was on his way to sleep. I started chatting it up with him anyways. Lots of random conversation. It was actually pretty damn funny as I remember it.
The next morning, I woke up at noon, cleaned up and went to the post office to pick up the tax stuff that my parents mailed out to me. On my way back, I got a meatball sub from Aram's Number Two House of Pizza, and chawed on it while I watched us get closer and closer to war. Carpenter called a few times, but we ket playing tag. First I was busy, then he was busy then I was busy again. At a quarter past three, the new refridgerator came. I have to say, my grandparents are wikkid weird. I was telling them everything tehy had to do and I was laying it all out for them, but they were all weird about everything. My grandmother was totally in the way of the people moving the fridges in and out. I kept telling her to leave everything alone and get the hell out of the way, but she wouldn't listen to me. I don't think they ever really listen to me.
After the whole refridgeratopr fiasco, I needed to get out of the house, so I went to the galleria. I walked around, checked e-mail at the Apple Store, bought some hair gel (I found it for $6 and it retails at the place where I get my hair cut for $16), read some magazines and just roamed around. On the way home, I called Hulk to see if he was planning on going to either of the two parties that dragon boaters were throwing that day. He said he was going to both, so I asked if I could get a ride. Yup... I'm the ride whore.
The first party was in Southie. We had a hard time getting there, because the directions that Hulk got from Mapquest sucked big donkey balls (must be bad end). It took us twice as long to get there as we had anticipated and we had to call the girl to get new directions. It was a pretty chill party. i think the most exciting (and perhaps the scariest) thing to happen that night was that these three girls decided to put on New Kids On The Block tapes and sing to them. Go figure. They were born in 1980 and 1981. I don't think you can have much taste if you were born then. It was actually very scary. I drank a couple of beers there. Nothing big. I was making a conscious effort not to drink a lot. I actually drank so slow that the beer was warm by the time I got to the bottom.
Hulk and I left that party at abour eleven forty or so. The place was dead anyway. People were leaving to go to a bar somewhere around the corner and the people weren't all that enthralling. The only attractive girl there that didn't seem attached to anyone or wasn't on my team was singing New Kids On The Block, so I had to leave her be. We rolled into Paddleback's Tropical Paradise Party somewhere around midnight. There were other dragon boaters there when we got there. Spoon, Hardcore and Hardcore's cousin were there. Let me just say that the music was thoroughly lame. Paddleback had nothing to do with it. I know. She has better tastes than that. It was like a Page Commons Room party. Lots of preppy white girls and guys dressed like idiots jumping up and down to even more idiotic music. *sigh* It doesn't mean I had a bad time. I had a great time chatting it up with my pals. It was just the fact that I went from New Kids On The Block to "Limbo Rock." That's like going from rock bottom to the ninth circle of hell.
There was a really nice upside to that party. Okay, Hardcore, excuse me if you actually read this, but your cousin is hot. She's a wikkid nice girl, intelligent, funny, and actually my typical "Hey, she's hot!" body and face type. Spoon was making fun of me saying that I don't date short Azn girls anymore. I tried to play it off in front of Hardcore's cousin. We kinda had a flirty thing going on, I though. We both thought the music was unfortunate and that her cousin was slightly odd. The one downside was that she is a sophomore at Wellesley. Yeesh! That wigged me out a bit. In don't know. It just seemed that we got along rather well and probably given the chance, I would see if she wanted to have dinner sometime. The likelihood of that ever happeneing is slim. I'm not going to say none, but it's definitely slim.
We called it a night just before two o'clock. Hardcore have me a lift back to my place. It was an overall pleasant evening of limited libations, interesting conversation and horrid music.
The next morning, I woke up, went to dragon boat practice, and had lunch with the gang at Pho Pasteur. OC Girl didn't want to go, because she just doesn't appreciate their food. I don't blame her. It's not the best food in the world, but I decided to go for the company. It didn't really matter all that much since I didn't have much of a conversation with anybody. It was like there were a million conversations going on and I couldn't focus in on any one of them.
Following lunch, I went home, showered and then met up with Carpenter just to chill out. We went CD shopping on Newbury Street. I ended up getting Massive Attack's Mezzanine, the Basement Jaxx's Red Alert single, and the new Lisa Stansfield Greatest Hits CD Biography, which came with a remix sampler CD. It was a quality purchase. After that was dinner, and then some TV watching before I went out to dessert with the brother, The Violent One, Carpenter, Booch, THE Hustler and Ye-ah. It was a nice evening.
Today has been stressful... A lot of shit hit the fan. I have been thinking about a lot of stuff today too. I have been able to remember a lot of my dreams lately too. I haven't written any of them down, so they haev faded, but I know when I wake up in the morning, I can remember them. I haven't consistently done that since I was in high school. Weird. I've just been thinking a lot. I'll expand on it tomorrow. It's half past five. I've been here way too long. Time to bug out.
$5 Pitchers of Pabst Will Be The End of Me Listening: I wrote a letter, she should have got it yesterday. That life could be better by being together is what I cannot explain to Jane.
I'm a liar. I'm a huge liar. I have no clue what happened on Survivor: Amazon last night. Not a single clue. Well, actually, I do have a clue, because I went to the CBS website today and read the synopsis of what happened. Quite a number of twists, no? But anyways, I wasn't at home last night until eleven o'clock. I was planning on being home at a reasonable hour and just chillin' out for the entirety of the evening, but instead I was drinking five dollar pitchers of Pabst Blue Ribbon with Nermal and Little Sister. I guess it would have been better than spending eight dollars a drink at a tapas (topless?) bar. You decide which one I really meant.
Anyways, what happened was that I was IMing Nermal at the end of my workday as I was getting all of my crap together. She had just finished a paper and was looking to drink a bit. I have to say that too used to get the urge to drink after writing a paper. Now I just get the urge to drink when I walk into work in the morning. But that doesn't happen every day, now does it. If only I had a bottle of Bailey's chilled in my desk drawer, I would have Bailey's and coffee every morning, I would be much more pleasant, they would think that I had a year round sunburn, and there would be twenty times as many transposed numbers. But I think it's all worth taking the edge off of me.
So, we were IMing and I was gonna suggest going to get a drink since I knew she had just finished a paper, but she beat me to the punch. She was like, "What are you doing after work?" I was like, "Well, nothing really, why? You wanna go grab a beer?" She was like, "Yah, I'll meet you at the Sidebar in twenty minutes." So I went to the Sidebar and grabbed a buck fifty Pabst pint and waited for her. Around a quarter past five she called and asked if I was waiting for her. I said, "Well... yah!" because she was supposed to be there a half hour early. She asked if I wanted to go over to the Beantown Pub, but since I had a beer that was three quarters full, she decided to come over. When she arrived, Little Sister was there with her. It was a pleasant surprise!
So, right off the bat, Nermal goes and gets a five dollar pitcher of Pabst. Little Sister has a small cold and doesn't drink much anyways, or so she says. Nermal drinks two cups, I drink two cups, and Little Sister drinks one cup. Keep in mind that Nermal is tiny. I was impressed that she could pack it in like she did. We went through three pitchers like that. I told myself I was going to be home by eight so that I could see Survivor: Amazon, but that didn't happen. I looked at the clock after several hilarious conversations where Nermal described a bartender from Meffahd (Medford) and it was almost eleven o'clock. Really funny. Little Sister and I made fun of Nermal while she was on the phone with her mother, when we thought it was her boyfriend. That was a scene too. I'm glad someone else besides me gets in on the whole "I love you" tease when someone's on the phone with their significant other.
Anyways, I got home at eleven o'clock after going into Suffolk Univeristy Law School to grab some of Nermal's stuff and to drop off some of Little Sister's. When I got home, my grandmother was still up. I was tipsy and ate some rice for dinner while watching an episode of Howard Stern where some lesbian porn star was going to go on a date with one of three contestants. It was amusing. That was followed up by one of my guilty pleasures shows, Boy Meets World with Fred Savage's little brother. I swear that show cracks me up.
Anyways, I went to sleep at half past midnight and woke up late for work today. Yah. That was smart. Real smart. I was almost an hour late. Good thing SCUBA was out. There was mad amounts of drama. Luckily, none of it circled around me. Tonite, we're taking Junior out on the town. My brother comes into town as well. Anti-Scott is having a party that I'll prolly go to. Who knows what time either... Tomorrow, the refridgerator gets delivered. There are also two parties that night as well. Should be a good time. *sigh* I hope I get some sleep soon.
Ice Cream Heals All Listening: Where do I begin to tell the story of how grand love can be?
Last night after crashing out on the couch, I met up with Booch to go over to The Violent One's place to eat some leftover ice cream. Mmmm... White Russian... So I went over to Booch's place at around half past seven and did some stuff on her computer for a bit. She wasn't feeling all that good, so I was trying to be as nice as possible. That doesn't mean that I'm normally mean, it just means I was being especially sensitive to what she needed. We left her place at around eight and she was totally distracted. She physically wasn't feeling well, mentally not feeling well, and was a general mess. Not like a mess as in one part of her shirt was untucked and one of her pant legs was tucked into her sock. She just looked like someone shot her dog with her watching while her head was in a press. But she did have the nifty shoes that we bought on Friday on.
She was so distracted that she wasn't quite paying attention to which way she was going, so we ended up going to Beacon Street on the round about route, through downtown. We got turned around a bit. She got frustrated. I feared for my life on many levels. eventually we got to Beacon Street and headed off to Washington Square. While we were parking, some schmuck decided that he couldn't get past us parking where we were, so, we had to move. Rat bastard!
When we got there, The Violent One was, of course, there and one of her friends from Aikido. We all sat around The Violent One's kitchen table chatting and eating White Russian ice cream from Ben & Jerry's. I think after the late night ice cream and chat session, Booch felt better. She was at least less stressed.
After Booch drove me home, I watched Angel which I had set the VCR for earlier in the evening. Damn that series is good. I used to hate it now I can't stop watching. Not much on tap for tonite. I'm kinda tired, so I'm gonna stay in to watch Survivor: Amazon. Tomorrow, I'll be at Mohegan Sun or Foxwoods. I WILL NOT bring my debit card.
Excuse me, Would You Like French Fries With That? Listening: Kindness falls like rain and washes me away...
Okay... Freedom fries? Gimmie a fuckin' break! They are french fries. FRENCH fries! Who is the idiot on Capital Hill who thought that one up? Actually I heard they did that somewhere south of the Mason Dixon Line first. Frikkin inbreds. Some two toothed rednecks were genius and decided Jaques Chirac was an idiot. I can understand that you may not like someone's political opinion. That's cool, but do you actually think that changing the name of a food will change anything? Do you think in Baghdad they now call New York Style Cheesecake "I Love Dictatorship" Cheesecake? I don't think so. Why do we have to look like complete idiots on the global scale? That's it. That's my spout for the day.
Food Whore. Listening: So return them to the sender and the note attached will read: "I love to hate you."
Yesterday, I took the day off of work as one of my flex time days. Since it was my birthday, I really wanted to do what I wanted to do, which was to head over to the Diesel Cafe in Davis Square, read some, write some, listen to some quality music, kick it into town to maybe meet Nermal for some lunch and then maybe go back and read and write some more, and then have my birthday dinner. Well, the birthday dinner happened. Here's what actually went down yesterday.
I got up at around ten o'clock and by the time I showered and such, it was ten thirty. I was supposed to call Nermal for lunch, but she was supposedly in class. At eleven, I call her cell and get her voicemail. Perhaps she was still in class. After having a cup of coffee, I took the grandparents to go and buy a refridgerator. I assumed that this would take like forty-five minutes, because we had already looked at all of the fridges and they decided which one they liked. That all went up in the air when the clerk told us that a Kenmore fridge was, in fact, manufactured by Fridgidaire (the brand with one of the worst dependibility and service records). Now we had to look at every refridgerator again and decide again. That took nearly two hours. After we decided, I went to the Apple Store to check my e-mail, send Ye-ah some directions to Les Zygomates and to answer some e-mails. While I was there, I also talked to the Mac people about the G4 Titanium Macs. That took me another hour, so really, I wasn't out of the galleria until about two o'clock.
From there, I headed downtown to pay my Sprint bill. I was hoping that the Sprint Girl would be there, but alas, no. I was kind of disappointed, because I told myself that if I saw her there this time, I would just suck it up and ask her out for dinner or something. That didn't happen. So, I paid my Sprint bill with some guy who wasn't quite fluent in English and then went to the Falafel King for lunch. Yummy, falafel.
After downing my delicious and inexpensive falafel sandwich, I headed over to Central Square to see if I could find a light bulb for my grandparents' dining room fixture. Sure enough, I found it and went on my merry way to MIT. Once again, I checked my e-mail and wrote about half of yesterday's post. I IMed with Nermal, who I found out forgot her cell at home and felt terrible. She wished me a happy birthday and told me that she was going to Miami next weekend to see her boyfriend. Yeah, that kind of scratched her name off of the potential list. Yeah, maybe I do give up a little too easy. But, do I really wanna be that guy who is "the other man?" I don't think so. As cute as this girl is, a guy's gotta have some standards or some morals... Well, no, I don't. But I think I'm at the, "it's never gonna happen anyways" phase of me thinking a girl is attractive.
I left the cluster at about half past four and gor back to my house at around five and waited around watching Tony Blair on MTV until Greaser came to pick up his equipment. That was at about a quarter to six. I got a call from Carpenter offering me a ride to the restaurant. I continued to watch TV until seven-thirty, when Carpenter came to pick me up.
In the car, he gave me a note that he kept forgetting to give me from Rebound Girl. It was sweet.
Dinner was really what I needed to lift my spirits. The day didn't even go as I planned. It was hardly a day off. It was more like time to just get shit done that I couldn't do during work. In attendance were: Bombadier, The Violent One, Booch, Glare, Carpenter, Junior, Emerill, FOP, and VWMod. It was a great time. Everyone there enjoyed their food. Here's what I had: Seared fois gras with smoked paprika and brandy, Braised lamb shank with polenta and for dessert, I had the Lemon and Huckleberry Tarte. Damn that stuff was yummy. Fois gras, lamb shank and lemony goodness. I couldn't lose. In addition, I had a couple of glasses of wine and coffee with a shot of Bailey's. Yum!
The great thing was that it seemed like all of my friends seemed to get along really well. There were conversations here and there. People were talking and getting to know each other. It was sweet. The one thing that irked me was that I didn't have that dinner so that people could pay for me. I just wanted to have good food with my friends. I inteded to pay my way and, you know, that would be that. But that didn't happen. People pitched in and paid for my eighty dollar meal. I'm really greatul, but it didn't need to be done.
Anyways, it's time for me to go. I have to get home to do laundry. After that, I don't know what I'm going to do.
Thank You, Mr. Murphy, But Really You Can Take Your Law And Shove It. Listening: Somebody, somebody, somebody, somebody, can andybody find me somebody to love?
Hmm... The weekend was rather interesting, stressful, great and suckey. Somehow I feel like it damaged me. I don't know if I can reflect all that I am feeling at this moment. I haven't had much time to rest or anything like that. My mind is continuously cranking. It hurts. It has been giving me a headache. It makes me want to go and punch something. It makes me want to go out and hug someone. It makes me want to crawl into bed and sleep. Enough of what's going on now, let's talk about the past.
Friday is when all of the hectic stuff started. After work, I rushed to Newbury Street to get a hair cut (again, from the cute chick with the dyed red hair), pay fo the Ben & Jerry's for the party and to meet Booch to go buy some raver attire. Rush rush rush. *sigh* Booch and I had a ball picking out clothes. It was amusing having her try on all of this crazy gear. She must have tried on ten tops and five pairs of pants. She found a funky pair of Diesel shoes to match. To see what she looked like, check out the "Frank" blog link or Booch's. I still couldn't for the life of me find a good pair of sneakers or a piggy bank. For dinner, we went to Men Tei just off of Newbury for some quality ramen. After having to use quarters to pay for the tip at dinner, we went to the garage and paid for parking in pennies. We fuckin' suck. I could tell that the guy was getting annoyed when I pulled out the change purse. Ghetto fabulous.
Following dinner, Booch and I kicked it over to Swing City to meet up with Greaser so that we could pick up the sound equipment for the following day. When we got to Swing City, the woman at the door told us that we had to leave our keys so that we could go in and look for Greaser. For fuck sake. This woman actually wanted us to do it. So we did. After looking around, we figured out that Greaser hadn't shown up yet. I called him, and he was enroute. So we waited and stuffed the system into Valdamar.
From there, we dropped it off at my place and went to go pick THE Hustler up before heading to Cuchi Cuchi for drinks. We wanted to meet The Violent One there, but she took off before we could get there. The funny thing was that I saw two other swing dancers at Cuchi Cuchi. Cutsey Sister Number One was one of them. She got completely trashed off of two and a half martinis. It was amusing. She was all over the guy she was with as well as all over me. I got a lil sugar out of it, so I found it amusing. Heh. The most sugar I've gotten in almost a year. I started out with a Cuchi Julep, which kicked ass and also had a Gin Gimlet. I can't believe how good their drinks were. I'm gonna have to go back. Though they were expensive, they were well worth their weight in gold. Booch, THE Hustler and I left at last call and I went to sleep at around one thirty.
The next morning, I woke up at around nine thirty. I wanted to sleep longer, but I couldn't get back to sleep. After I showered and drank some coffee, I watched some TV and chilled around a lot. When I expected The Violent One to call, Booch called. It turned out that THE Hustler had nothing to wear to the party and wanted to borrow some pants. So, Booch came over and took a pair of my UFOs.
Here's the beginning of the stress. See, Booch and her roomies aren't really working out. She asked me if I wanted to move in with her. We went to look at an apartment on Binney Street. I have been looking at the complex for a long long time. I have always wanted to live there and we saw an apartment that we really liked. So, she put down a hold so I could think about it... This part of the story is to be continued.
After Booch left, The Violent One called and we went to run errands. While we were at Star Market, PJ called up. He needed help with directions. We met up with PJ and drove his car to the VFW. Following that, since PJ's cousin wasn't available, he went on errands with The Violent One and I. We went to iParty and hunted for candy and such. Then we kicked it over to The Violent One's place so that she could change. I have to say that it took a long time for her to change. While she was getting ready, PJ and I had a long talk about life and such in The Violetn One's kitchen over glasses of water. It was cool. It still amazes me that after a four year hiatus, PJ and I still rock the friendship.
When The Violent One was ready, we were running late. We had to get back to my place, pick up the gear, buy pizza and I had to change. I changed in a flash and we were still running late. We didn't get to the VFW until a couple minutes past seven. Stuff didn't get set up until just past seven thirty. Holy shit was I stressed. On top of it, I was seriously thinking about moving in with Booch. It was weighing heavy on my mind. There was so much to think about and we only had three days to make a decision. It was killin me. Once everything got stet up, people started coming in. I have to say that there were a lot less people than I though were going to be there, or who said they were going to be there. There were a number of people who had some very valid excuses. They called to wish me a happy birthday and told me why they couldn't come. It's kind of hard being mad at people who have valid excuses why they couldn't show up. There were also a number of people who said they were going to come and just didn't show up. I guess I was a little cheesed about that. The great thing was that Shap Attack, Scoops, Carpenter and Kato all spun wonderful sets. I really think that Carpenter has an ear and if he had the equipment, he could probably be a good DJ.
I had such a good time bouncing around the party. I mean a really great time. My set left a lot to be desired, but oh well. What do you expect after months of not spinning a single tune? I think everyone who was there also had a good time. There were people smiling and dancing. Paddleback and her man showed up, Hulk, Hardcore, just a ton of people from all different parts of my life. It was really nice to see all of my pals getting along as well. There are a ton of pictures out there. PJ said he would burn all of the ones that he took onto a CD for me. I'm psyched.
Here are some of the highlights for me at the party: First of all, Booch all ravered out. Holy shit! It was fantastic. A conservative li'l girl with a extremely professional job who dresses in clean lines and upper-middle class status quo clothes in phatty raver pants, a top that said (quite loudly), "My boobs are poppin out at any second!" and a bright red wig? How much does that rule? A lot. PJ's duct tape arm band with glostix. Creative. He looked like a superhero. Maybe it was the glowing green ring as well. Getting spanked twenty-five times from one girl. Yeah... she used to throw fetish parties. I know she wouldn't do me wrong. Scoops whippin out the White Russian Ben & Jerry's. Candy necklaces. My groups of friends mish-mashing together into one big happy... mish-mash of friends.
After the party was over, we cleaned up, counted the cash, and packed it in. This is what I left with: a sound system, a ton of ice cream, cups, water, vinyl, a light, One hundred eighty one dollars, a ton of candy, someone's jacket in a bag, a car key, and much much more. It was ridiculous. From there, we headed to IHOP, where I ordeded a mushroom and green pepper omelet with a side of hash browns and bacon. What I got was a mushroom and green pepper omelet with hash browns and bacon on the inside. How odd is that? Yeesh! We had a fun time at the IHOP.
After IHOP, PJ left for Queens after we duct taped his driver side mirror. Someone fuct it up and now he has to get it fixed. I'm amazed that he drives as much as he does and plays foot ball as much as he does. It's like he sleeps less than I do. I was in bed at around three and was fast asleep before I could even tell the sheep to be ready to be counted.
The next morning, I got up at nine, showered the silver cement out of my hair, and headed off to Dragon Boat practice. I was in no real condition to paddle that day, which was good, because there was no room for me to paddle on the right side. I ded, however, end up coaching. It was my first time coaching all season. It felt nice and the people really responded to the commands I laid down. Shutterbug was back as was Nurse Windsurf. It was great having some of the old timers back. You can only take so much of the newbies and focusing in on them.
After practice, we went to P.F. Chang's for lunch. I was rather disappointed with their food and with their menu. Was not a big fan. I was also thinking hard about the Booch apartment. There was just so much to think about and consider. Could I change my lifestyle? Could I deal with only two hundred dollars of play money a month? Could I curb my spending? Would I be happier in my own place under those conditions? Do my grandparents need me there? Is this what I should be doing? Would I do if it were cheaper? This all came to the surface when I had tea with Booch later. We both expressed our hopes and doubts and the doubts seemed to win this little battle, at least for now. And there it was settled. I lost a fantastic (though pricey apartment) and potentially a really compatible cool roomie who would want to throw dinner parties with me. Maybe there'll be another time. I think I would lose out on something if I never roomed with Booch over the course of my life. I think she could add something to my life if we lived together. I'm not sure what it is, but I'm gonna guess it would be a lot of fun.
So, that was my weekend. It was full of stress, so much so that my neck is sore from the stress. The sorenes centered mostly along those muscles that lead from the back of your jaw along the sides of your throat. It hurt like a fucker. It's actually still kinda tense. Oh well...
Reflection Listening: Well, I will go in this way and I'll find my own way out. I won't tell you to stay...
I know that my twenty-fifth birthday is still three days away, the party, just over thirty six hours, and I still have many many years ahead of me, but as I was walking to work today, I was thinking about all of the absolutely amazing people I have met over the course of my first twenty five years. I'd like to take a moment to just give a few shoutouts to some of them with their actual names (though some of their names haven't crossed my lips for years). We'll start from the beginning:
Mr. Coons: Mr. Coons was my teacher for fifth and sixth grade. He kicked my arse. I was a slacker and have always been a slacker, but he really pushed me and failed to put up with any of my crap.
Brother Rich: He was my English Grammar teacher at Chaminade College Prep School in St. Louis. Though I didn'trespect his religious view, be introduced me to the commandments of the English language. He made me memorize passages from our grammar book verbatim. He also introduced me to the first Hemingway story that I ever read, A Day's Wait. He was the nazi of the English language and made me into the stickler that I am.
Joe Poole: Joe is the first intensely religious man that I ever really respected on a personal level. He was an ex-marine, and one of the security directors at Colby. He introduced me to some of the only gospel music that I dig (Kirk Franklin). He was a great ally to have. No nonsense and very well spoken.
Lee L'Heureux: When I met Lee, he was just some snot-nosed high school kid who wanted a show at my radio station. He played hip-hop. He was the anti-christ. He is the hardest working kid that I have ever met. Within his almost six years at the radio station, he created a nationally syndicated show (over the internet) broadcast from the radio station, became a major player in the hip-hop world, became station manager by his sophomore year at college, and has dealt with the FCC more than twice the amount than I did. He is more driven than anyone I have ever met. I see only great things from him.
Sgt. Chris Lewis: On my first programming meeting of the year I was the General Manager at WMHB, I saw this buy in full dress army uniform, beret and boots walk in and say, "I wanna play some techno." I was shocked. As an army staff sergeant posted in Maine from his last tour in... BOSNIA and was a part of DESERT STORM, Chris came in and taught me a million things about spinning records. Together we formed the Vinyl Empire on campus including Zach Gazza (Static), Rob Belcher (MC Sport), Coy Dailey (Mr. Dailey), Juanito Savaille (Jamal), and Lee L'Heureux. Now, he's over in the middle east doing his job trying to protect us, however the government sees fit. He is a brave, strong, smart man that I am happy to call my friend.
Jenny (Jim) Boylan: I don't know why, maybe it was his zaniness and his energy, but I found her really inspirational as a writer. She was an absurdist kind of a writer and I liked that. She brought humanity and realism to completely absurd situations. It was kind of cool having him as a workshop leader.
Charles Bassett: Bassett opened my eyes to more Hemingway and Fitzgerald than I could shake a stick at. I can't believe that I was lucky enough to have him for two classes in college. For a guy who just keeps on retiring and coming back, he has an amazing abount of energy and passion for the material he teaches. This white haired, red faced man who occasionally has spittle forming at the corners of his mouth would pace around the room, getting all up in your face about where Fitzgerald was born and then would drink a beer with you on your last day of class (provided it wasn't a light beer). If I were ever to become a teacher, I would want to be a nice cross between Bassett and Boylan. But as long as I remember college, I will never mind being called "Smedley."
Anyways, those are the majority of the people who I don't see much any more that I would easily call amazing people. The time I spent with each of these people really made me think and grow, no matter how young or old they were or no matter what position they held.
You know I just noticed that none of the people I mentioned were women. I find that kind of odd. I think a couple of my current friends who are women are completely amazing. I have such amazingly smart, interesting and warm women friends. I'm sure down the line when I'm forty or something and I don't see them as often they'll get a place in my "Amazing People" thoughts.
ZEN!!!stock Listening: Oh look what the cat's brought in...
So, I was just thinking... If I had the ability to put on a massive festival concert, this is what it would look like:
MAINSTAGE 10:30AM-12:30PM: Barenaked Ladies 12:30PM-2:30PM: The Corrs 2:30PM-4:30PM: Moby 4:30PM-6:30PM: Morcheeba 6:30PM-8:30PM: David Bowie 8:30PM-10:30PM: Dido 10:30PM-12:30AM: Faithless
SECOND STAGE 10:00AM-12:00PM: The Violent Femmes 12:00PM-2:00PM: Badly Drawn Boy 2:00PM-4:00PM: The Cure 4:00PM-6:00PM: Norah Jones 6:00PM-8:00PM: Nelly Furtado 8:00PM-10:00PM: Gorillaz 10:00PM-12:00AM: Basement Jaxx
THE RAVE TENT 10:00AM-12:00PM: Tiesto 12:00PM-2:00PM: Sister Bliss 2:00PM-4:00PM: DJ Colette 4:00PM-6:00PM: DJ Rap (spinning Drum & Bass) 6:00PM-8:00PM: Donald Glaude 8:00PM-10:00PM: Charles Feelgood 10:00PM-12:00AM: Carl Cox
So, there ya have it... That's my lineup. Someone call me when it all gets together.
Wutchoo Gonna Do About It? Listening: Juliet, the dice were loaded from the start...
I had a really intense dream last night. It wigged me out a bit. It started off that I was leaving for work. I got to the train station and I saw Scoob there. He comes up to me and tells me that this bootlegger cheated him. Now, for those of you who know me, know that I don't like it when people fuck with my friends. So, I start giving this guy shit. I get all up in his face and it comes to blows. A train rolls into the station and he retreats into the train. The door closes and I'm still on the platform. I'm so pissed that I go over to his table and flip it over and send all of his bootleg CDs flying. After that, Scoob and I get into the train and go home.
The next day, I get to work and get called into the boss' office. But it's not SCUBA or the three bosses above him, it's one of the guys that was on FOX's Married By America. It was the guy they referred to as a "used car salesman." That was weird. So the boss starts talking to me and asks me about the situation in the train station. I told him that the guy was messing with my friend and I felt like I had to stick up for him. Following that conversation, he hands me something (which I forget what it was, but evidently it wasn't important) and on top of it is a pink slip. I had been fired.
Once I realized what it was, I got fuming angry and demanded to know the reasons behind it. He told me that he didn't think that I belonged at the company and that I knew it. He said that I was only there for a paycheck and that I wasn't contributing to the company. I told him that it was bullshit and that I did a lot for the company. Honestly I don't know why I was arguing. I don't belong here. But, I do a lot for the company. He told me to honestly tell him that I wasn't just biding my time for something better to come along and that I wasn't just saving money so that I could go on the JET Program. I told him that I was planning nothing of the such. I got fired anyway.
After I got fired, I went back to my desk to collect my things. Everyone was watching me as I packed. I said aloud that I didn't know why I was being fired and that it was bullshit. I said aloud that I did plenty for the company. Then this one manager (we'll call her she-man) said, "Well, you don't exactly work very hard..." I was so pissed that I left. And, that is how the dream ended. It was weird.
So, that is my big story for the day. Tonite is dinner with Booch. Fun fun fun. Oh... I need to know... what's your favorite Ben & Jerry's flavour. Let me know by tomorrow. I need to figure out what I'm getting for my party. Leave the answer in the comments.
Dress Me Up In Vinyl Listening: Magic for me. Magic make no sound. It good for me. It good for me underground.
Last night, after I got out of work, I hurried home to go with my grandparents to the mall. You see, our refridgerator is broken and it is failing to cool about seventy-five percent of the area inside of it. I think one section of the freezer is working, but not working well enough to freeze ice. So, we're using that little compartment as our refridgerator. It sucks something fierce. I thik the fan is broken or something like that. Maybe it's a number of things. All I know is that they've had that refridgerator for as long as I have been alive, and probably longer. It's time to get a new one. Back then I wouldn't be surprised if the refridgeration aspect of the contraption wasn't provided by a trained monkey sitting in the back witha block of ice blowing air over it. Okay, I would be surprised, but that doesn't mean that I wouldn't find it amusing.
Anyways, we went to Best Buy and Sears. We were looking at 20.2 cubic foot refridgerators. Some were on sale for just under five bills. My grandparents wanted to buy one in Best Buy simply because there was next day delivery and that delivery was free. However the brand that they were looking at had the worst track record (according to Consumer Reports) and the worst repair service record as well. I convinced them that they wanted a fridge from Sears that cost about the same. The difference is that if we bought it then and there, we would have to pay fifty-five dollars for delivery and another ten for the removal of the old one. However rumor has it that they'll waive the delivery fee. So that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna wait it out until Sunday and if they aren't waiving the delivery fee, we're just gonna suck it up. Man, last week, when I noticed that ice wasn't freezing in the top freezer and I told them they should looking into getting a new fridge and they blew me off, the delivery was free. I honestly don't think they listen to a thing I say nor do they take me seriously. Oh well. What am I gonna do? I'm always gonna look like a kid to them.
After our excursion to the mall and after we ate some dinner, I retreated to my room and sorted out my vinyl. I had to decide what was coming with me on Saturday and what would be sitting at home, lonely with all of the other crappy vinyl that I got for free (ie. Will Smith's Miami, Enrique Iglasias' Bailamos & some Bis record.). So, I sat there and sorted. First the "possiblys" versus the "Umm... I think nots." Then the "I guess I'd rather nots" the "definitelys" and the "tough calls." Finally, I was down to my "definitelys" and my "sure why nots." when push came to shove I decided to bring about a third of my collection with me. That's one hundred pieces of vinyl. Some are packs of four pieces with twelve or sixteen mixes on them. Some are just single pieces with an A side and a B side. Some are single sided pieces.
After that I got a bit anal and decided to see exactly what I was bringing with me. Big surprise. Twenty of the one hundred records were either by Faithless or were connected for Faithless (ie Rollo is a part of Dusted and a part of Faithless, so Dusted counts as a Faithless disc). Damn do I love them. It took me quite some time.
I also cleaned a shitload of club postings out of one of my record boxes. I had enough to fill two ziplock freezer bags. The one quart kind. Back in college I used to post them up all over my walls like it was wall paper. At the beginning of every year, I had to run to the bookstore to buy more of that poster putty so I would have enough to put up all of my postings. I had some really pretty ones. I had one that was in the shape of a butterfly, one in the shape of an Incan sun. It was fantastic. I knew almost every DJ on each of the bills. It was realy soothing looking at all of the club art postcards. The creativity was unending on them. I spent a long time just sifting through them.
The rest of the night I talked on the phone to Ye-ah and The Violent One and cleaned my room a bit. I also read a bit more of Banana Yoshimoto's Lizard. It was generally a very laid back evening. It was as cold as nuthin, so I felt the need to stay inside. Tonite, hopefully I'll be kickin' it over to Special K's to knowck some of my rust off. Who knows how rusty I really am?
A Really Fantastic, Chill Weekend Listening: And when you go, you along. And when you stand, you stand alone.
I had a really great weekend these past couple of days. It was just really nice. It all started on Friday. Right after work, I ran home, grabbed my gear and headed off to Booch's place. She and THE Hustler were giving me a ride down to NYC for Shaft's birthday bash. We ended up sticking around THE Hustler's place while he quickly finished his taxes. While we were there, Booch introduced me to Joe Cartoon. I have to say that I laughed my ass off at the "Spanking The Monkey" cartoon. You'll have to watch it. I'll warn you... It's not really all that "workplace appropriate."
We got on the road by about a quarter past six or so and stopped off at a rest stop to get some grub. We all opted to go to Boston Market (which was
