SD in Search of Self
Ten Days of Fun
We all grew up in the same orphanage!
During this hiatus, I wrote extensively in two notebooks, one of which was a daily journal of events (normal text), the other of which was a vent for thoughts and random stuff (different font). I also had a third notebook for pen and scratchwork. All of it's dated, though, so you'll figure it out.
Just a disclaimer type thing: If you don't like walls of text, don't read. If you don't like whining, don't read. If you don't like repetition, don't read. If you don't like politically incorrect jokes, don't read. If you don't like selfish obsession, don't read. If you don't like ranting, don't read. If you don't like substanceless material, don't read. If you don't like swearing, don't read. If you don't like to be depressed, don't read. If you don't like poorly written bitching, don't read. If you don't like reading this paragraph, don't read.
And if you don't want to find out about my life, DEFINITELY don't read.
Monday - June 26
Terrible... Spent the morning from eight to ten-thirty continuing to clean out stuff from last night... My contact lens was messed up when I woke up, and I was in pain for the first fifteen minutes of my morning. The construction workers arrived at ten. Everything is now downstairs; kitchen is thoroughly out of play for three weeks...
I napped downstairs 'til 1p.m., during which time my mom was out shopping. At 1:00, my sister and I walked over to DiCaprie's to have lunch. Good stuff. Not wishing to return to noisy construction and no internet access, we walked down to Kmart, where we tried the demo for Super Mario Bros. DS - It looks incredible. Then we visited CVS and Blockbuster and came out at the plaza, still hoping to kill time. We got drinks at CVS: I got "pomegranate green tea," which was actually really good. We sat on some rocks in to drink and finally went home.
With precious little to do at home, we convinced my mom to slice watermelon, then to take us to the library. I picked out Othello and a few others, most of which I probably won't read. Didn't have dinner.
I'm definitely interested in applying for a job at Blockbuster's. Must find Internet connection tomorrow at Robert's or Albert's.
Tuesday - June 27
Morning - parents were both out. Played an hour of piano before going to Luba's with my sister. I came home and killed time, calling Robert and Albert to secure an afternoon hangout location.
My sister came home from her piano lesson, and at 1:00p.m., we went out to T.C. Lando's for lunch. Harsha Krovi was there, and I spoke a bit with him. I ordered a "Western Steak Sub." The familiar atmosphere there and at DiCaprie's is great. My sister and I went to sit on some rocks in the plaza or lunch, and I spilled sandwich all over myself. That sub is messy.
Stayed at home and played on the Genesis for a few hours, 'til at last my mom came home and took me to Albert's, where I stayed a couple of hours playing MS Hearts and watching part of Season 4 of 24. Relaxing, Asian brotha goodness.
Came home and had baozi (larger dumplings, I guess) for dinner. After dinner, my dad took me and my sister to the library, where I tried to apply to Blockbuster and realized that they only hire 18-ups.
Tomorrow: Emerson, mow lawn, Robert's.
The improvement of life and the quality thereof has also raised the bar on the standard of living. for the first time in my life, I want to be able to drive. The immobility of the vast majority of my friends in this day and age is finally pressing me to want to get around town freely. The thought of desire itself terrifies me... but the desire is absolutely there. God help me.
Wednesday - June 28
I don't know how long I'll last, unable to communicate with my friends on the internet.
Emerson volunteering in the morning with my mom. We arrived late due to her decision to go to the dump, but we got out equally late.
At home, we had lunch, and I tried to mow the lawn, but it rained all morning, so my efforts were to no avail. I came in, called Robert.
At 3:40p.m., my mom agreed to take me. I drove her minivan to Robert's feeling decently comfortable. It was good, not because I like driving, but because I was driving to my friend's house.
Played SSBM and Fire Emblem at Robert's house, 'til around 6:40. It was hardly terribly original, but it was a beautiful breath of fresh air and a chance to talk - which we really hadn't had for the last two weeks.
Evening, my dad turned on the TV, and I was subjected to two hours of "America's Got Talent" while reading Replay by Sharon Creech. I probably became 30% stupider.
My sister managed to fry the good computer by watching anime and having it overheat/short-circuit during the construction.
Living at home is sort of like living at camp, except that I don't do anything, and my parents and sister surround me rather than friends, and I know that there is no visible home to which I shall return. Shortly, it sucks. Inability to communicate, to watch anime, to write on a damn keyboard is getting to me.
In vague effort to save my soul, I will spew out some of the deep, psychological issues that enthrall me of late.
This morning, at the hospital, I saw a very determined, frail woman, cast in patients' gown, walking her IV pole and Alaris pump. She was not over thirty, not ugly, but she paced the ward seeming remarkably lost. As I waited, my partner, a middle-aged man, greeted her a few times. Her replies, vague and noncommittal, proved her a still interactive character - very curious in appearance - child-like.
Throughout the morning, I was well aware that my afternoon would include mowing the lawn. Pendant tout le matin, je savais bien que mon apres-midi comprendrait tondre la pelouse. What got me was the rain. Every job I encountered involved a person's nervous small-talk - for after all, it's simply done in hospitals - of the weather. Over and over, innocent talk mocked my efforts of the rest of my day... clearly I did not mow the lawn today.
I drove again today, controlled a rickety, incohesive '97 Nissan Quest minivan down the winding path to Robert's house. My masculine presence absolutely dominated the roads; I am of the shocking 3% of America's drivers that considers itself below average (source: Dave Barry). In any case, driving continues to be idle and unamusing, but the ability to do so becomes oh so intoxicating. It can be done; it will be done. It will be I who has the power, my melodramatic mind wants to think. Gotta love melodrama.
This evening, I watched "America's Got Talent." I will withhold judgment of the show except to admire its appeal to the mindset of America: "Give Us Something Stupid!" I shuddered as my IQ slipped from listening to a black woman and a born'n'bred American male chatter. But there's something powerfully, retardedly addictive about the hip-hop magician, the huge gay "Russian," the unattractive white stripper, the British Piers's commentary.
On a slightly higher rung on the intellectual ladder - next to the Pokemon anime - was the book I read a few days ago. Easy to read, somewhat amusing books lend themselves so much better to reading than... say, A Farewell to Arms and Othello. (On a sidenote, Othello's good but classically Shakespearean in the nigh-painfully explicit verbalization of Iago's full villainy, intent, motivation. The enormously poetic innuendo, however, highlights the theme of sexual jealousy flawlessly, making Othello thusfar quite solid.) This book - the one about I am writing primarily - was The Boy Next Door, by Meg Cabot, the girl who wrote The Princess Diaries. It is a neo-innovative novel of semi-epistolary form - Cabot tells the story through e-mails entirely. The basic tale is of a typical drama-filled office romance, the female lead of which is a gossip columnist. The book is witty, likeable, charismatic, using coincidence and dramatic irony almost compulsively, to great effect. Reading requires a bit of suspension of disbelief on the legitimacy of the e-mails - to say nothing of the plot itself. Almost all characters type flawlessly and coherently with minimal emoticons (though to be fair, they are journalists for the most part), and they tend to write as they would speak. Cabot effectively evokes her characters' personalities through e-mail, but I cannot help but wonder whether the characters actually type like this. After all, with the rise of IM, the furtive workplace e-mailing seems just a bit off. (The sequel, which I haven't read, apparently includes IM conversations.) Characters pour out their souls, their Dear Diary material, into e-mails, inducing a touch of skepticism. But the detraction is minimal. An easy read and a warm feeling solidify great low-class entertainment.
I wonder how long the outpourings will last. I know that soon I'll become jaded, reserved about what I write, and the deluge of words will become a choking, feeble stream. For now though, I gush all the superfluous verbiage in the world.
How I miss thee so...
Thursday, June 29
Today wast he first day of the week on which I did not leave the house at all. I started the day by mowing the lawn. My mom interrupted me and took me to the dump, but I returned in half an hour and resumed and nearly finished... before the lawnmower died. Giving up, I went back inside, and the Asians left.
Home was a pathetic procession of reading: I read through Meg Cabot's Boy Meets Girl and a terrible book called Girl, 15, Charming but Insane. My mom being out all day, these and single-player Smash Bros. alone entertained me 'til 9p.m., whence I struggled for forty-five minutes with the G minor Ballade.
Life: My sister spent most of the last two or three days watching Azumanga Daioh, and she has nearly finished. My dad offered to take us to a movie, but I declined, telling him that a movie in Vermont would be preferable. My sole comfort in going to Vermont is that staying at the hotel cannot possibly be worse than being at home, cramped downstairs, devoid of communication, anime, friends.
That's the theory, anyway.
It's getting to me already - This morning, I dreamt that a large cockroach, remarkably similar to the one in Men in Black, was chasing me around a building, aided by Mike Lomakin, Adam Johnson, and Zack Goldman. I woke up at 9:20a.m.... ten plus hours of sleep.
Who the hell wants to be awake and rested with boredom assailing him viciously...?
Savage, malevolent, over-the-top bitching... God... help... me...
Interesting food for thought. If I were any more abstract or nature-oriented in my writing on this hiatus, I would be writing Walden. The Psych packet begins to look unsettlingly symptomatically upon me... Sublimation, Compensation, Reaction Formation, Intellectualization...
What the hell.
Friday, June 30
Emerson: arrived twenty minutes late due to traffic and got dragged from transport work to "transfusion room," filled with hideous people and hugely overtalkative people. The most obnoxious person, however, had a cool mobile device that I got to ride.
Came home, wasted time doing absolutely nothing. My dad was home early, and we shifted stuff in the downstairs bedroom. Then packing for Vermont.
Three hour car ride, 7:15p.m. to 10:00. The suite, rooms 225 and 227, is really nice. My sister and I don't have to share a bed, and there's a TV to which I set up the Gamecube for a few rounds of SSBM.
I'll just ignore the fact that I forgot a toothbrush and clean clothes.
report card came in the mail just before departure. Talk about brightening spirits...
In order: Fourth Term, Final Exam, Year Grade
English - B+, A, B+
Steege - A, AP, A-
AP Chem - A, AP, A
French - A, A-, A-
Calculus - A-, AP, A
Economics - A-, A+, A
GPA: 4.56 for the year, 4.42 overall. C'est la fin...
An obnoxious woman insisted on commenting on every topic available and, when she exhausted those, some unavailable topics, too. But she did have quite a cool mode of transportation. I guess God is unfair like that. Give the badass equipment to the scummy white trash.
The hotel is... a suite. My sister's intrinsic dislike of elevators found no complaint here. Living space provides me with a bed larger than my own. Cleanliness, air conditioning, favorable writing locations caress me. An uncrowded nightstand affords manageable storage for contact lenses, gaming devices, and notebooks. The contrast to the cluttered work in progress known as "home" cannot be greater.
But I'd still rather be in touch with my friends. It's past midnight, and the only reasons to be up at this hour are games, anime, and chat. None of the above apply; instead, I idly finish Othello in bed. God help me...
Saturday - July 1
Stayed at the hotel, for which I am grateful. The lobby has wireless internet; I managed to access it for a few minutes.
Finished Othello and began Long Live the King. TV-wise, I watched all of TErminator 2 in the afternoon and watched random crap at night.
Talk about a picturesque setting... Through closed windows, I can see rain descending, and I hear a burbling sound of the rain striking the pavement. Were I any further lost, I would be composing poetry. I view behind the curtain of rain is shockingly pastoral - a spectrum of green forest covers an overwhelming mountain, and at the foot, an unarbored yellow-green hill bears a dirt footpath.
I tried to access the internet today. My dad offered me his laptop and told me there was wireless downstairs in the lobby. I probably skipped down the stairs through the pleasant jazz on the speakers and situated myself in a criminally comfortable chaise. Mere seconds of adjustment and attempt, however, made clear the hopelessness of the effort. Instead, I spent my time playing Hearts with little enthusiasm: but at least Kaiba did not shoot multiple times.
3:04p.m. - My sister is tapping happily away, connected to the internet. Little Miss Technology, she is... unlearned in the ways of 24, Scott Chen Time, clutch report cards...
Finished Othello in the early morning hours today. Good stuff. Delivered the Shakespearean juxtaposition of words that I adore, obscured meaning such that I spent eighty per cent of the time deciphering footnotes, exaggerated just a lil' too much. Ah, well.
Sunday - July 2
Another... bad day... had to go swimming for around half an hour, played in the gym/workout center for hal an hour.
Back in, I went down to the lobby and wrote. My sister drained the laptop battery, which was really irritating... so I went outside to continue writing. Then dinner, and my dad made us go outside to play "volleyball." It last for half an hour and... well, sucked.
At 8p.m., I returned to watching TV - Ten Things I hate About You. The movie was better than the play...
After discovering that I can, in fact, fleetingly use the internet, my conscience insists that I continue my fanfic.
You wake up, hung over as all hell. You shake your head, vibrating your rubbery body, causing you to emit a very unmanly noise. You straigthen the limp noodle that is your body and gaze hazily at yourself. Green greets your vision, an unsightly grassy color. You blink a few times, trying to clear the haze from your sensors, but the tint persists. With tremendous energy, you lift your hands. Your arms seem to be considerably shorter than your snout and, to your horror, lesser in girth than Marlon Brando. Vision swimming, eyes barely focused, you suck in your beer belly to peer at your toes. Huge red sneakers, Nintendo-licensed, cover your feet. And you scream, for you know that whomever you are - and your high-pitched squeal assures you of the fact - You Are Not Donkey Kong.
With agility unbecoming of an alcohol-laden body, you run around in undignified circles, shrieking cries of agony. You lose all track of setting, your eyes closed to stop a stream of tears, but you recall your purposes. But... which to pursue?
Don't I feel like Mr. Cultural Elitist... sitting, writing nonsensically and verbosely in a dimmed cafe-liked area on a sofa, listening to slowly meandering, streaming jazz music. My sister just went upstairs, having exhausted the battery power of the laptop, leaving me entirely dry. The receptionist doubtlessly thinks that I am a desperate pathetic addict, as I sit alone in the lobby's lounge, and he is absolutely right. One does not simply shed dependence on the internet - and that is all that this one can say for now. I have the vague hope that if I write enough, I can let the writing consume me and convince me that I am an artist. I am so far gone.
Indistinctly, a clock continues to tick down the number of days until I regain full internet access. Every time I bring the clock to the forefront of my mind, I remember with considerable tragedy that there is no definite date on which I can ensure a return. Cliche tells me that we as humans fear the unknown above all else..
Fuck the cliche.
All right, I'm bored. Here we go: a quick review of the sequel to They Boy Next Door, Boy Meets Girl. The story introduces a new female protagonist, an idealistic Kentucky-born journalist, working in New York. The male lead is a good-looking, unprejudiced lawyer. Think Emma's Mr. Knightley. He is the ideal man. Plot-wise, Boy Meets Girl is far from dramatic: Knightley instantly falls for the girl, but the girl, while attracted to Knightley, detests that practices of law firm men. She eventually breaks the prejudice, and the ultraliberal couple lives happily ever after.
Much more discussion-worthy is the pseudo-epistolary form o Boy Meets Girl. E-mail remains a significant means of communication from the prequel, but Boy Meets Girl uses posters, phone messages, diaries, and other forms of communication to relate events. The only missing device is an objective third-person narrative.
I suppose that adding these alternate memos is a double-edged sword. The benefits are clear, of course. Different forms mean diversity, a positive trait. IM conversations and phone calls make deciphering events far less frustrating. The "train of thought" style fits much better with the diaries than with e-mails: Certain written thoughts are best kept to oneself, I've found.
On the other hand, the diversity rather abstractly detracts from the purity of the book. The Boy Next Door's e-mail exclusiveness was at times unconvincing, but it was solid and reliable. In addition, Boy Meets Girl loses some of its memetic elements with its direct transcriptions. While interpreting e-mails is difficult at times, the guessing and uncertainty of situations through the eyes of others were definitely endearing.
In any case, as a standalone book, Boy Meets Girl is an easy-to-read modern romance that delivers smirk-worthy irony and innuendo: Cheap thrills. As literature and a sequel... actually, who the hell cares about literature? It's good as is.
How the hell am I ever gonna type all this up?... God help me...
Monday - July 3
Early morning 24 - Season 2, right after the nuke blows up. Episode 16. Fascinating... Today is Monday.
Sleep. Woke up at 11a.m. and had breakfast, watched TV. My dad forced my sister and me to go swimming for twenty minutes. We went in the warm pool for a bit - it was actually pretty nice - and played around in the gym for half an hour. Then a late lunch.
More TV. After convincing my sister to give me some privacy, I watched for an hour or so, 'til I had to go play frisbee with the Asians. Came back to dinner, after which I used the laptop for an hour and forty-five minutes.
GameFAQs contest started, as well. Zelda took 89.97% of the vote on Civilization with 100K votes by itself; MMX crushed Suikoden with 72% of the vote.
Ah, the television. Soul-sucking, brain-burning, ever-present "entertainment." It has striven for the past three days to squeeze all of the life-force from me. I mock its futile efforts; I am so far ahead of the game it's not even funny. That's what I tell myself, and I believe.
Terminator 2 is amazing. Looking back on it, I can see how it helped to define my '90s childhood. Ah-nold is the very image of badass, just as he was when I was ten. Every line of dialogue was a laugh out loud, a chuckle, a pump of the arm, a mental high-five. John Connor, at age twelve, was long-haired and sexy a decade before "metro" gained popularity of any sort. The T-1000 "liquid metal" was the menacing immortal before any "liquid snake" or agent of The Matrix - which, upon further consideration, was a perfect transition from the '90s to the twenty-first century. Gotta rewatch that.
I saw Proscenium Circus's rendition of Ten Things I Hate About You back in the fall of '04 to see Jiang, and I liked it decently. Yesterday, I saw the "original" version, the movie. (On a Shakespearean note, both movie and play - which was very true to the movie - were better than their source material, Taming of the Shrew, just as Christie's Curtain vastly surpassed Othello.) In any case, the movie has a retarded charm common to all teen romances. In a heavily cliqued high school, boys with ulterior motive pay off an English chap to date an awkward lady. Brit and bitch fall for one another; drama ensues, culminating at prom. Silly, witty, touching... revolting to mind, attractive to heart.
Rush Hour 2 is another thoroughly necessary classic. Jackie Chan pulls Chris Tucker into a complex, entirely unremarkable plot involving an Asian guy who can actually speak English (obviously the villain). Cutscenes and hilarity ensue. I haven't much else to say. Give me American humor over Men in Tights or Monty Python any day.
I almost learned to throw a frisbee today. I was lost; for a while, I vowed to master the sinful art of jockery. fortunately, I quit the activity and went back inside to whine on the internet. As words flow from the proverbial pen (it's actually a pencil !!), the prospect of typing said words becomes progressively more daunting.
Anyway, one more movie: Not Another Teen Movie, which, as its title suggests, is a teen romance. Actually, this film does manage to breathe originality into the easily worn-out genre. The movie exaggerates or reverses every single cliche, parodying itself into obscurity, much as Terminator 3 does. Its two most notable satirees are She's All That and the aforementioned Ten Things. the script pays delicious tribute to the cookie-cutter stories; it begins with the "dorky girl" masturbating to She's All That, and it includes a poem called "Ten Things I Love About..." er, whomever the subject was. Not Another Teen Movie is much straightout funnier than the two source movies. Most endearing, of course, is that the movie preserves the basic plot: As the black guy (TM) prophesies at the very beginning, the main character stud "loses the bet but, in the process, learns a very valuable lesson and winds up winning much more."
Aside from movies, I just watch whatever looks most sexually appealing, which often is That '70s Show. If only it were more frequent...
And now, a quote from Long Live the King -
"She was a gagged New Yorker, silenced by caution and curiosity, watching a black con-man street conjurer, fooling everyone on his cardboard-box stage, and collecting all bets eventually. Because the secret ace of spades was his, and his accomplices were there to enforce it, George was the sucker who was betting, Kitchener was the black street conjurer, and the press were the lurking enforcers; their duty as street jackals was to ensure there were no winners, only losers and victims" (John Rowe, 131).
Rowe is an Aussie; he uses very lax grammar, and his evocation of emotion is oftentimes weak. While I find most of his prose and poetic language in Long Live the King rather mediocre, he does have his moments, and... this is one of them. The passage isn't perfectly written, and it makes little sense in context, but I love the metaphor just because.
Tuesday, July 4
America Turns 230.
Got out of bed post-11a.m. for brunch and watched The Whole Nine Yards.
As soon as the movie finished, we went to "the beach," meaning wasting half an hour looking for a lake. At the lake, my sister and I kayaked for an hour... which sucked. We came home and went to the pool and to the gym.
Upon return, I watched many episodes of Seinfeld and That '70s Show. I also indulged in two hours of House M.D. Midnight hours was O Brother, Where Art Thou?
God help me, because I might be enjoying what I am watching now.
The Whole Nine Yards kicked ass, entirely. Matthew Perry played superspas dentist "Oz," a man with a several-year-old hatred of life. Bruce Willis, contract killer "Jimmy the Tulip," moves in next door to Oz's house in Canada to hide from a former companion in the Mafia. A simple tale of love and killing unravels. Perry's obsessive stutter and twitch contrasts fantastically with Willis's unbreakable cool. This is fucking Chandler Bing, playing side-by-side with a movie God. Ace-grade.
Willis is easily the star. His "rugged good looks" hint at both Jack Bauer and Bob Donaldson. A beautiful drawl combines with poignant elegance to create a man whose every line is an instant classic. Imagine Donaldson saying, "You had sexual Congress with my wife?" in a semi-hysterical voice, and you might have an abstract idea of the objective of my adulation, the apple of my eye.
The brilliance of the filming is the way that the scene transitions are so damn well situated.
Willis: You know, I'm glad I had the chance to get to know ya.
Oz: You know what? Me too.
(Both grin, slightly awkward pause.)
Willis: You can go now.
Oz (quickly): Okay.
(runs, scene cuts immediately)
Wednesday - July 5
Woke up; my mom received a phone call in my room about the construction and delay. Parents called up a guy to fix the phones but were unsuccessful.
Finished reading Every Boy's Got One, by Meg Cabot, throughout the early afternoon. Then the Asians brought me out to shop for groceries. I rented Office Space and National Treasure and bought Zone of the Enders 2.
Came home, did laundry, used computer for a bit. Checked the GameFAQs contest - 3/3, Metroid over Kirby.
My dad's friend Matt and his family came to stay. We had barbecue ribs, salad, blueberry pie, cherry chocolate chip ice cream. It was stuffing in a very good way... though they did occupy the two beds and force me to sleep on the couch with my sister.
After dinner, at 9:30p.m., everyone except for my father and me went to the pool. Meanwhile, I watched Office Space. I can see why it's "classic."
I have not been overly sympathetic to my parents lately, except when they engage in yelling at my sister, who is amazingly enough, less civil than the Asians.
At ten thirty, as I was dozing deeply and desperately, the phone rang in my room. It was a sound spawned by Satan, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. None of the three other phones in my suite works, so my parents forward all calls to my bedroom. My mom picked up and talked. From the end of the conversation I heard, the people over in Home Depot lied about the speed with which they would deliver the kitchen's countertop. Apparently, the countertop is not arriving this week but... two weeks later. My mom was nearly crying on the phone, laughing in a terrible high pitch, accent and grammar painfully, repulsively Chinese. The call lasted ten minutes, and it trapped me in bed, listening to it, with my sister's complaints, thinking not of her mom's shattered dream but of the inevitable ensuing lecture. My mom stormed from the room when the call ended.
Then the phone rang again, and when my mom picked it up, it continued to ring, unaware that its handpiece was off the hook. Message missed. My dad called up the hotel maintenance, which claimed that nothing visible was wrong.
The Asians slightly diminished my empathy for them by taking out much of their frustration on me. But hey, I'm a forgiving guy..
Thursday - July 6
Woke up to a nightmare that everyone else was already awake. I intended to get up at 8a.m.; in my dream I got up at 7:24 and everyone was having breakfast, laughing at me. Not exactly great.
Had breakfast, which included a Pop Tart, and went to the pool and gym with Matt. Came back before the others, watched TV - Kathy Griffin, comedian. Then I had to go on a walk for forty minutes. Came back and had lunch.
After lunch: Several hours of TV, 'til finally Matt's family left at 6:00p.m. Then I had to go play frisbee/"volleyball" for another forty minutes and returned to dinner.
Post-dinner: had a haircut. Watched a bit of National Treasure, went downstairs during the rest of it to use the internet.
Came back, watched The Mummy - funniest movie ever, both intentionally and unintentionally - and finally to bed. Habib Marwan Is The Mummy.
Life's a bitch when you don't even have time to describe a nightmare... fucking TV...
My mom is so incredibly racist..
Friday - July 7
Came back from the hotel in Vermont - checkout was noon, but I had to stay in the pool area 'til 10:30p.m. because my sister insisted on "swimming." To be fair, the sun was ruthless; were I white, I would've called the vicious sol-rays "a beautiful day," and I would've leapt into the heated outdoor pool with savage pleasure.
Came home and was excruciatingly dizzy on the ride. My sister was a total bitch all afternoon. The PS2 also doesn't work, so I can't play ZOE2... I watched an episode of House and then had dinner. Then I watched an episode of Last Exile, which was thoroughly incomprehensible to my wasted mind. Two episodes of House later, I took to my room. My dad came home - he'd been at work - and yelled a little. As I was showering at midnight, my mom woke up and bitched a ton before going back to sleep.
Internet still down, and Life Care work tomorrow. I really, really don't want to do this. Living this life is really sucking too much. One month ago, I was having the best days of my life. What the fuck happened?
Four shot club, 7/7/06.
Writing past midnight. I discovered today that eating meals is a good thing; that it is physically possible - if terribly tiring - to watch more than one episode of House a day without commercials; and that I am thoroughly incapable of understanding any sort of fiction that revolves around war in media res - Final Fantasy IV, and more relevantly, Last Exile.
In addition, I realized anew - it always feels like a revelation each time - that my formidable bitching skills are totally genetic. Nope! Apparently a coveted skill that I'd believed I'd developed actually came straight from my mom. How disillusioning: family traits hardly make exciting talents.
As expected, I'm really beginning to slack on writing daily. With no internet whatsoever nowadays, I really cannot see the end to the daily journal rants. Deliver me... Without even the persistent assault of daytime television, I am fast running out of different ways to express my frustration.
Speaking of which, I guess there is a reason for which certain "thriller" books are not true "literature." While listening to Dan Brown's Digital Fortress, I enjoyed a well-paced, well-devised plot... but Brown's prose and style left me... dry, a sea turtle in Vermont.
Also, I gained a pound or so on my escapade; I thought it of great importance, since it pertains directly to me.
Random Stuff
Note: I am not destined to a life of mediocrity. I chose it.
You know the mark of a luxury suite?
Analytical Essay Outline - Note that were I writing an actual paper, my thesis would probably be the opposite of what it is here. Fuck that!
Society likes nothing more than a martyr. Sacrificing oneself or dying in the name of one's cause, if the judging eyes support said cause, automatically ensures one a place in others' hearts. Death, by choice or by foreign hand, still sucks, because it terminates potential usefulness, seeking to influence others. Suicide and stupidity become admirable mindsets as a result of the associated glory.
Body Paragraph 1 - Suicide - Islamic terrorists, Jesus, Japanese kamikazes
Body Paragraph 2 - Stupidity - JFK, Joan of Arc, The Alamo
Conclusion: Jesus saves... French pride... Remember the Alamo... I cannot deny the power of a martyr to unit people, to strengthen national spirit. But let's be serious. Dying sucks, and you shouldn't do it. Anyone who disagrees, in the words of Simon from Lord of the Flies, "dead wrong, bitch!"
And now... "Two Dreams."
I drank Coke at 9p.m. Bad idea... couldn't sleep 'til 2a.m. and woke at 10a.m. Bad idea, folks...
The first: Prom, with Robert. Both of us were dateless and off of the dance floor. It seemed like there was a lot of space, so perhaps the tables were a bit spread out. I spoke to no one, and I had no plans for post-prom. I didn't recognize anyone - after all, the seniors are gone, and that was the majority of my "crowd" last time. The prom was pretty unremarkable; I strode around for most of it doing nothing. As it ended, we poured into a hallway - not as grandiose as Park Plaza but much more scholarly. Everyone moved generally in some direction. I scaled very jagged, wide, expansive stairs with steps resembling the spiral staircase at school, but not circular. I walked into rooms that looked like - in hindsight - AP test rooms, though at the time, I thought they were weirdo SAT rooms. I wandered in and out of several; everywhere I looked, I was at the heart of the alphabet: I passed Robert, o whom I demanded the plans for Sunday - for it was the day after prom - and he said, "I dunno. Play Starcraft and sleep 'til 12." I saw Pat Morris, who said my name in the condescending jock way and high-fived me for the first time in years, dropping one of his crutches. I saw Brian Kwak, who gave me the finger and a "Fuck you." Lastly, I walked ot the proctor. I gave my last name, and he told me that seats were not in alphabetical order. On paper, he directed me next to Alice Yang, and suddenly Robert materialized. The proctor grinned as he pointed at the seating arrangement. "Try to finish quickly; every time you lift your head you'll be peeking at the other's sheet." As I moved to the tables, I saw two thoroughly unoccupied tables, adjacent to one another, and turned to ask if Robert and I could occupy those. Then I started to wonder what demonic test took place right after prom. Not AP, not SAT... I took all of those much earlier... what the fuck?
I transitioned into the second: I was viewing myself from third person. I was tipsy turvy, extremely nervous, and I grinned awkwardly as I spoke. I was Jerry Seinfeld, and I was saying, "Boy, do I have a full bladder!"
... I woke up and went to the bathroom.
... And that's all she wrote.
List of What I Watched
- Men in Tights - British humor, Robin Hood. Fuck that.
- E: 100 Funniest Movies - The presentation sucked. Fuck that.
- Janet Dickinson's Modeling Agency - Had some hot people. Had a lot of not hot people. Fuck that.
- Arthur - Classic stuff; I think I've seen every episode, though. Fuck that.
- Drew Carey Show - Fairly funny, especially Ryan Stiles; not top of the line. Fuck that.
- Will and Grace - Gay guy, straight girl livin' together. How exciting. How womanly. Fuck that.
- Everybody Loves Raymond - Every scene with the father sucked. Fuck that.
- Design on a Dime - A remodeling show. Fuck that.
- Designing for the Sexes - Another remodeling show to which my mom subjected me. Fuck that.
- Sex and the City - Giggling white girls? Fuck that.
- Ten Things I Hate About You - Teen romance. Fuck that.
- Not Another Teen Movie - More teen romance that claims it isn't. Fuck that.
- Remember the Titans - Black Guys, White Guys on a football team. Racial disharmony, '60s style. Fuck that.
- Gilmore Girls - Sexy girls with a single mom and very serious business. Fuck that.
- E: 100 Most Wanted Bodies - Repetitive, often unattractive, sometimes male. Fuck that.
- Kathy Griffin - My Life on the D-list - Comedian's "reality-TV"-style show. Pretty funny but just a tad too much Kathy Griffin. Fuck that.
- O Brother, Where Art Thou? - Comedy based off the Odyssey? Sounds good. Set in Gilded Age South? Fuck that.
- The Waterboy - I tried to like it; I really did. But it wasn't funny or tasteful. Fuck that.
And now, stuff to which I will not say, "Fuck that."
- Office Space - I can see why everyone says it's a classic. Bill is the fucking man. ... Yeah.
- That '70s Show - High school drama. Serious Business. Funny most of the time, too, so I'll take it.
- National Treasure - It stars Nicholas Cage as Robert Langdon. Instant win? I think so.
- Seinfeld - Best sitcom ever? I think so!
- The Whole Nine Yards - Chandler Bing, dentist, meets Bruce Willis, serial killer. HOT.
- Late Night Show with David Letterman - It has a six-word title and makes fun of Al Gore. Give me.
- Family Guy - ... Yeah.
- The Mummy - Perhaps the most intentionally and unintentionally funny movie of all time, featuring Habib Fucking Marwan.
- Rush Hour 2 - American Comedy at its racially finest.
- Terminator 2 - '90s Sci-Fi. Serious Business.
- House M.D. - A somewhat repetitive but always entertaining drama series.
- 24 - Couldn't leave it out.
Saturday - July 8
Woke up and played piano for a bit. My fingers are totally immobile now; the dancing on the Ballade sounds hollow and weak. I spent a solid half an hour working with my father and actually restored the internet connection (!). As I typed up my piano program for Life Care Center, said center called me and told me that it could not accept my playing today because it was under construction. Were I a silly whore, I would call it "irony," but the fact of the matter is that it is not irony but fate.
Internet abuse: Why not? I restarted all the downloads, checked all the necessary sites. In the GameFAQs "Best Series Ever" contest, Castlevania beat Halo with eleven thousand votes. My perfect bracket shatters and loses three points; my faith in the contest shoots up twenty. Hopefully Harvest Moon shows up Kingdom Hearts a lil' now.
Housework. With the kitchen counterless but semi-inhabitable, I carried stuff from downstairs upstairs and cleaned out the stuff under the porch... well, some of the scrapwood and old bikes, at least. Gouged myself with watermelon upon return.
For the record, this took five hours to type in full.
It's good to be back. I have found myself.
SD
July 9, '06
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