So spent a good amount of time this Christmas season working, so I'm taking tonight to hang with my brother Al and his wife Calli for the first time in two years. Doesn't feel like it's been that long, but life's some shit sometimes. Like I told Al, "Life goes by when you're having fun...not seeing you probably has something to do with it."
Like old times, instantly.
More writing tomorrow.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
The Redemption of Today - A Poem
The sky came down and the Earth went falling
Down the abyss where cyclopses, walled in
Escaped with the darkest of souls in the depths of The Pit
Wound round the nine circles to battle mankind with
All of the hatred we had spouted, they had been saving
Winding our anger, a line for their angling
We were caught in the hook and the whole of us dangling
They pointed and laughed and in the great mangling
A bright young face stood and said with a scream,
Life doesn't just end with the death of a dream.
One day ends in horror, another in lies
And we just look up, shake it off, sigh,
Maybe this will be the sunrise where our nightmare sets
Where we are left alone to set right what's left.
But the days cascade and build from the next
And when we sweep aside life, our energy's spent
Avoiding the world we were once meant to conquer
We drudge to close doors and forget that what's offered
Is the promise inside of each of our striving
The guide of our minds is our soul that's deriving
The traumas and costs of our times into feeling
And how minds harness the meaning determines their ceilings.
Life doesn't just end with the death of a dream
There's more to a stitch than a rip in the seam
Backtrack and attach a new yarn to old thread
You'll never find a truth in a world of dead ends
When your ends are covered in the truth of the promise
That all of us are capable of pulling from in us
Our pasts into present, filtered by drive,
The wisdom we gather when we are alive
When we fall, and we rise, then we set like the sun,
We may hide from our gifts, but the light is still on.
Down the abyss where cyclopses, walled in
Escaped with the darkest of souls in the depths of The Pit
Wound round the nine circles to battle mankind with
All of the hatred we had spouted, they had been saving
Winding our anger, a line for their angling
We were caught in the hook and the whole of us dangling
They pointed and laughed and in the great mangling
A bright young face stood and said with a scream,
Life doesn't just end with the death of a dream.
One day ends in horror, another in lies
And we just look up, shake it off, sigh,
Maybe this will be the sunrise where our nightmare sets
Where we are left alone to set right what's left.
But the days cascade and build from the next
And when we sweep aside life, our energy's spent
Avoiding the world we were once meant to conquer
We drudge to close doors and forget that what's offered
Is the promise inside of each of our striving
The guide of our minds is our soul that's deriving
The traumas and costs of our times into feeling
And how minds harness the meaning determines their ceilings.
Life doesn't just end with the death of a dream
There's more to a stitch than a rip in the seam
Backtrack and attach a new yarn to old thread
You'll never find a truth in a world of dead ends
When your ends are covered in the truth of the promise
That all of us are capable of pulling from in us
Our pasts into present, filtered by drive,
The wisdom we gather when we are alive
When we fall, and we rise, then we set like the sun,
We may hide from our gifts, but the light is still on.
Winter Solstice Lunar Eclipse
Aligning in the air
Two circles
Crisp
Dark
Significance is supposed to hang
On the celestial bodies
At this moment of their dance.
They pull the tides
They light the sky
But that isn't enough
For those waiting for a harbinger
Or a boon
When our world blooms with life
With water, and with air
Everyday,
In a universe of dead rock, superhot hydrogen,
An unfathomable lack of density, the void of space, dark matter,
We dream for what?
What more can we dream for?
A lottery's lottery's lottery
Couldn't make the Earth.
The vanity of Man.
We would beg the sky to fall
So the world would own up to our call,
Bring order to our chaos,
End us.
Two circles
Crisp
Dark
Significance is supposed to hang
On the celestial bodies
At this moment of their dance.
They pull the tides
They light the sky
But that isn't enough
For those waiting for a harbinger
Or a boon
When our world blooms with life
With water, and with air
Everyday,
In a universe of dead rock, superhot hydrogen,
An unfathomable lack of density, the void of space, dark matter,
We dream for what?
What more can we dream for?
A lottery's lottery's lottery
Couldn't make the Earth.
The vanity of Man.
We would beg the sky to fall
So the world would own up to our call,
Bring order to our chaos,
End us.
Ch-Ch-Cha-Chaaaaanges.
Hey gang,
So, some of you kids know that I've started at the Roasting Plant, bagging coffee, selling coffee, not cutting my hair in far too long, etc.
Well, there's a couple of big changes that have occurred in the last three days.
I have officially resigned from Greenteagraffiti.com, the Asian Pop Culture site I started working on a year and half ago with my buddies AJ, Jonas, and others, and left on great terms, so that I can continue to pursue my writing endeavors while working my butt off in coffee.
Secondly, I will be joining the management staff at Naked Coffee. I'll continue roasting coffee and slinging joe, and I'll function as a "flex position" duty manager, essentially going between coffeehouses and committing various admin tasks on a routine, scheduled, disparate basis. I also get to talk in Manager meetings and do what I do best: say things that I know are absolute genius and full of import. Basically, because I won't be running a coffeehouse/restaurant, I get to treat manager meetings like a focused blog, bringing up ideas that I think are neat-o without the responsibility of implementing them. NOTE: That was a joke. NOTE ON THE NOTE: Mostly.
I think both changes improve the quality of life for all parties involved: the website deserves an Editor in Chief who can be as dedicated as possible, Naked management seems pretty excited about having me aboard, and I'm going to learn...well, a lot. I think. I don't know. I think listening. I'll be a better listener for sure. Or Kaylee and Inga will stab me. Necessity breeds obedience. I think that's how the saying goes.
So yeah, I'm gonna be writing, working a crap ton, making some money, and hopefully, hosting game nights on a regular basis.
To all you guys who haven't been seeing me, I've been super busy, but I'm thinking of all you guys! More transition is gonna happen these next four months, as responsibilities increase and writing output continues to grow, and I continue working on my physical capability, but it's all building for the better.
See ya on the Internets, kiddos!
So, some of you kids know that I've started at the Roasting Plant, bagging coffee, selling coffee, not cutting my hair in far too long, etc.
Well, there's a couple of big changes that have occurred in the last three days.
I have officially resigned from Greenteagraffiti.com, the Asian Pop Culture site I started working on a year and half ago with my buddies AJ, Jonas, and others, and left on great terms, so that I can continue to pursue my writing endeavors while working my butt off in coffee.
Secondly, I will be joining the management staff at Naked Coffee. I'll continue roasting coffee and slinging joe, and I'll function as a "flex position" duty manager, essentially going between coffeehouses and committing various admin tasks on a routine, scheduled, disparate basis. I also get to talk in Manager meetings and do what I do best: say things that I know are absolute genius and full of import. Basically, because I won't be running a coffeehouse/restaurant, I get to treat manager meetings like a focused blog, bringing up ideas that I think are neat-o without the responsibility of implementing them. NOTE: That was a joke. NOTE ON THE NOTE: Mostly.
I think both changes improve the quality of life for all parties involved: the website deserves an Editor in Chief who can be as dedicated as possible, Naked management seems pretty excited about having me aboard, and I'm going to learn...well, a lot. I think. I don't know. I think listening. I'll be a better listener for sure. Or Kaylee and Inga will stab me. Necessity breeds obedience. I think that's how the saying goes.
So yeah, I'm gonna be writing, working a crap ton, making some money, and hopefully, hosting game nights on a regular basis.
To all you guys who haven't been seeing me, I've been super busy, but I'm thinking of all you guys! More transition is gonna happen these next four months, as responsibilities increase and writing output continues to grow, and I continue working on my physical capability, but it's all building for the better.
See ya on the Internets, kiddos!
Monday, December 20, 2010
Not real updates
A bunch of stuff is happening in my life that is, for the most part, good, but I don't think I can talk about any of it right now.
So in the meantime, my five favorite things right at this moment, no particular order: Bella bru chocolate chip cookies; flaxseed oil chips from Trader Joe's; the scent of fresh roasted coffee; my current sleep-deprivation induced/enforced zen state; the sense of accomplishment done with a job well worn into the body that, although may cost me dearly when I open tomorrow, will still be worth it despite the aching sure to occur.
More thorough blogging, with updates that matter, when I figure out what there is and is not to say.
So in the meantime, my five favorite things right at this moment, no particular order: Bella bru chocolate chip cookies; flaxseed oil chips from Trader Joe's; the scent of fresh roasted coffee; my current sleep-deprivation induced/enforced zen state; the sense of accomplishment done with a job well worn into the body that, although may cost me dearly when I open tomorrow, will still be worth it despite the aching sure to occur.
More thorough blogging, with updates that matter, when I figure out what there is and is not to say.
Friday, December 17, 2010
Coffeehouse poems
Midtown - "On Falling"
I
There's nothing in the slack to endure, or hush, or control, stifle, restrain.
Just the energy of a wave breaking - it has already risen
Its own weight troughs it
The threshead flops
To a puddle
Flattens.
II
You can't spell flatten without latte
The foam is rich, ain't it?
And sweet
And short
And when its gone,
There's no hiding the bitterness
The bitterness that provides the energy
Your empty icing never could.
III
From heaven they fall, in December. The end,
And then January.
Thunder and Lightning
Strike the ground from Heaven
Recall the flightless angels
Reminds us that Hell is cold
And God speaks in sparks of heat
In the flashes of his Wrath.
Tupelo - "Inside a Puddle - an experiment in Haiku Catalexis"
Ripples roll and slide
Stillness encircles, collides
At tangents, our minds.
Action is willed forth
Moments bellow beyond us
Our lungs pull breath
Gravity surrounds.
Environment beyond us
Encircles, collides.
Action pulls breath.
Stillness rolls and slides, our minds
At tangents, ripple.
I
There's nothing in the slack to endure, or hush, or control, stifle, restrain.
Just the energy of a wave breaking - it has already risen
Its own weight troughs it
The threshead flops
To a puddle
Flattens.
II
You can't spell flatten without latte
The foam is rich, ain't it?
And sweet
And short
And when its gone,
There's no hiding the bitterness
The bitterness that provides the energy
Your empty icing never could.
III
From heaven they fall, in December. The end,
And then January.
Thunder and Lightning
Strike the ground from Heaven
Recall the flightless angels
Reminds us that Hell is cold
And God speaks in sparks of heat
In the flashes of his Wrath.
Tupelo - "Inside a Puddle - an experiment in Haiku Catalexis"
Ripples roll and slide
Stillness encircles, collides
At tangents, our minds.
Action is willed forth
Moments bellow beyond us
Our lungs pull breath
Gravity surrounds.
Environment beyond us
Encircles, collides.
Action pulls breath.
Stillness rolls and slides, our minds
At tangents, ripple.
We have re-launch!
Turns out, for some reason, that Midtown's Internet has been the reason my Blog was blocked from me.
At Tupelo, it works just fine. Hence this post.
This means, of course, that I'll be doing my blog at Tupelo...which means making sure I have my headphones on and am blocking out the world at all times...I just know practically everyone who hangs out here, and it's hard not to strike up conversation unless I'm obsessive about creating a personal bubble. Which I find kind of depressing.
But until Internet comes up at the place (AT&T failed AGAIN yesterday,) it's what I'll have to do. Such is the way of the world, working on not work at work.
So updates:
Been working nearly everyday the last two weeks, and I'm in for more work next week during the holidays. Naked Coffee doesn't close up shop during the holidays, because the demand is crazy high, and all of us are in to make a lot of money the week of Christmas. So I'm down. So, so down.
It's just a matter of pushing through it. I won't have had a weekend in a month when, two weeks from now, I should get New Year's Eve and New Years Day off. I mostly got it off for Murph's birthday. Assuming he's not going somewhere nuts for it, I can join him. It'll be his last birthday as a single man, so I figure we should drink to the occasion. Then again, drinking helps one get through any occasion with Murph.
Writing is steady despite the rushes. Found time to write some poetry. I mean, I'd like to write prose, but probably all the new hats I'm wearing at work, and the way I've been pushing myself physically, through work, workouts and running around on the various projects, facilitates to Poetry and writing of moments, phenomena, rather than prose, which demands characters that demand your attention and time. Characters need to develop a voice in your mind over time: poetry utilizes the fullness of your wisdom to respond to moments.
A lot of input equals a lot of verse. Not a lot of time.
I had a dream one day, and it was me literally creating a new dice game. This was before my latest Yahtzee triumph at the household, so I don't know where it came from. It involves betting on a leading player, somewhat of a dice pool game...I dunno. Still figuring it out. If I decide it's worth developing, I'll do something with it.
It's just so rare when I remember a dream, I feel that, since it was such a productive dream, I should do something with it.
Or maybe, it was representative of something else I should be doing. I'll psychoanalyze myself some other day though, I guess.
Yee-ya! The blog's back!
At Tupelo, it works just fine. Hence this post.
This means, of course, that I'll be doing my blog at Tupelo...which means making sure I have my headphones on and am blocking out the world at all times...I just know practically everyone who hangs out here, and it's hard not to strike up conversation unless I'm obsessive about creating a personal bubble. Which I find kind of depressing.
But until Internet comes up at the place (AT&T failed AGAIN yesterday,) it's what I'll have to do. Such is the way of the world, working on not work at work.
So updates:
Been working nearly everyday the last two weeks, and I'm in for more work next week during the holidays. Naked Coffee doesn't close up shop during the holidays, because the demand is crazy high, and all of us are in to make a lot of money the week of Christmas. So I'm down. So, so down.
It's just a matter of pushing through it. I won't have had a weekend in a month when, two weeks from now, I should get New Year's Eve and New Years Day off. I mostly got it off for Murph's birthday. Assuming he's not going somewhere nuts for it, I can join him. It'll be his last birthday as a single man, so I figure we should drink to the occasion. Then again, drinking helps one get through any occasion with Murph.
Writing is steady despite the rushes. Found time to write some poetry. I mean, I'd like to write prose, but probably all the new hats I'm wearing at work, and the way I've been pushing myself physically, through work, workouts and running around on the various projects, facilitates to Poetry and writing of moments, phenomena, rather than prose, which demands characters that demand your attention and time. Characters need to develop a voice in your mind over time: poetry utilizes the fullness of your wisdom to respond to moments.
A lot of input equals a lot of verse. Not a lot of time.
I had a dream one day, and it was me literally creating a new dice game. This was before my latest Yahtzee triumph at the household, so I don't know where it came from. It involves betting on a leading player, somewhat of a dice pool game...I dunno. Still figuring it out. If I decide it's worth developing, I'll do something with it.
It's just so rare when I remember a dream, I feel that, since it was such a productive dream, I should do something with it.
Or maybe, it was representative of something else I should be doing. I'll psychoanalyze myself some other day though, I guess.
Yee-ya! The blog's back!
Friday, December 10, 2010
Busy
Wow. Who thought running a softball team, picking up shifts, having three consistent writing projects and a promotion at my job would cut into so much of my time to...you know...live?
Quality of life will improve soon, I think. I hope. Anyways, short blog post, as I'm in the middle of a double. Just trying to keep my word!
Quality of life will improve soon, I think. I hope. Anyways, short blog post, as I'm in the middle of a double. Just trying to keep my word!
Thursday, December 9, 2010
LaRussa, Sparky, or Ozzie Guillen?
CP, fearless owner of the Naked Coffee industry, has entrusted me with the task of forging a men's softball team from the raw stuff of our joe slingin', lunch servin', music playin' roster.
We are to play the Naked Coffee women, who have already proclaimed their softball superiority. Sherry, team manager, and Inga, the Orphan Queen, have pronounced their victory more than a month in advance, providing in five minutes enough bulletin board rhetoric to last the five weeks it will take to reach that austere, mid-January day in Curtis Park, when and where the battle shall commence.
I have eight down, and feelers out for 10-12 more possibilities. First practice will be next week...and I think it's gonna be a good one.
Chris may have laid down the challenge, but it's the ladies that struck first blood with their words. My efforts are burgeoned by their chastisements, the sharpness of their wit has carved into my ego, and uprooted an ancient fossil of times long gone by, when the State Hornet softball team came back from over 10 runs down in two innings to beat ASI. This was the last time I played softball, as Cody Kitaura and I got the rally caps around and the hits kept coming.
I was 80 pounds larger then. And we didn't have nearly the sense of purpose that our men will have going into this game.
It is going to be a bonding experience for us, a testing ground, and most importantly, a lot of fun.
And we are going to compete.
So will it be Sparky Anderson, Ozzie Guillen, Tony LaRussa who shall be my managerial mentor? Maybe none of the above.
I always liked Vince Lombardi, with maybe a twinge of Mike Singletary thrown in. But I won't be dropping my pants any time soon.
It is time to prepare.
We are to play the Naked Coffee women, who have already proclaimed their softball superiority. Sherry, team manager, and Inga, the Orphan Queen, have pronounced their victory more than a month in advance, providing in five minutes enough bulletin board rhetoric to last the five weeks it will take to reach that austere, mid-January day in Curtis Park, when and where the battle shall commence.
I have eight down, and feelers out for 10-12 more possibilities. First practice will be next week...and I think it's gonna be a good one.
Chris may have laid down the challenge, but it's the ladies that struck first blood with their words. My efforts are burgeoned by their chastisements, the sharpness of their wit has carved into my ego, and uprooted an ancient fossil of times long gone by, when the State Hornet softball team came back from over 10 runs down in two innings to beat ASI. This was the last time I played softball, as Cody Kitaura and I got the rally caps around and the hits kept coming.
I was 80 pounds larger then. And we didn't have nearly the sense of purpose that our men will have going into this game.
It is going to be a bonding experience for us, a testing ground, and most importantly, a lot of fun.
And we are going to compete.
So will it be Sparky Anderson, Ozzie Guillen, Tony LaRussa who shall be my managerial mentor? Maybe none of the above.
I always liked Vince Lombardi, with maybe a twinge of Mike Singletary thrown in. But I won't be dropping my pants any time soon.
It is time to prepare.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Re: No-win battle
I think Schopenhauer said it:
The mature human mind knows everything. You can ask it any question, and it will give you the best answer possible. The mature human mind knows everything...it's just that it knows most things wrong.
I can safely say: I just knew wrong. But that's why you search for truth, and not let yourself remain confident in ignorance, put trust that, if you're proactive, you will come to truth, and common ground.
You just got to be willing to let go, unlearn, and relearn.
Good stuff.
The mature human mind knows everything. You can ask it any question, and it will give you the best answer possible. The mature human mind knows everything...it's just that it knows most things wrong.
I can safely say: I just knew wrong. But that's why you search for truth, and not let yourself remain confident in ignorance, put trust that, if you're proactive, you will come to truth, and common ground.
You just got to be willing to let go, unlearn, and relearn.
Good stuff.
Fighting a no-win battle
Sometimes, you just have to, because it's the right thing to do. Fight a battle where your efforts will not only lead to defeat, but a complete defeat, void of affecting the slightest amount of positive change.
You fight no-win battles only when something very important to you is at stake, the cause is undeniably just, and the possibility that, because of your actions, there is at least a chance that a seed will be spread in the minds of others that likely wouldn't have been there had you not acted.
When there can be no common ground, and the underground rises, the only thing you can do is confront the situation on the battle ground. Only, with those you care about, the results will never have a victor, there will never be a clear compromise, there will always be the memory of pain afterward, the hurt, and the conflict in some ways always a little unresolved, and that at best.
But some times there is no choice but to confront, to take a stand, to force an engagement of wills, because otherwise, there can be no truth, just vitriol, a lack of empathy, emotional reactions isolated from the world that rise to destroy the bonds we all share.
This is vague, but that is because I find that I very often, in many situations, don't take the stands I should; I only make the tough choice after physical threats come to me or my friends, and otherwise, I allow the tension to rise and rise until it boils over.
But this is a more proactive me. And perhaps, a more obnoxious, more invasive me. But some things are worth trying to save, even if the result means I die a little to others.
Life can't always be easy. Life can't always be free. We have to chain ourselves sometimes, to tether ourselves to those parts of the world we hold sacrosanct. But maybe conviction is a lie, regardless of its form, that nothing should be sacred, we should always float with the current of fate, to stay within our mot, our place in the flow.
Maybe I'm wrong.
But sometimes, it's worth making the effort to find out you're wrong, especially when you know you're right, especially when you know you're the only one who can.
Martyr complex. I don't know how self-serving this all is. But what can you do? I am meta-doubting, but I do not doubt the nature of the battle, nor where I stand inside of it.
Firmly in between two circles that have lost almost all their intersection,what was a venn diagram split out until there is just a tangential point, hypothetical as the meaning of a person's inherent value, to keep them together.
You fight no-win battles only when something very important to you is at stake, the cause is undeniably just, and the possibility that, because of your actions, there is at least a chance that a seed will be spread in the minds of others that likely wouldn't have been there had you not acted.
When there can be no common ground, and the underground rises, the only thing you can do is confront the situation on the battle ground. Only, with those you care about, the results will never have a victor, there will never be a clear compromise, there will always be the memory of pain afterward, the hurt, and the conflict in some ways always a little unresolved, and that at best.
But some times there is no choice but to confront, to take a stand, to force an engagement of wills, because otherwise, there can be no truth, just vitriol, a lack of empathy, emotional reactions isolated from the world that rise to destroy the bonds we all share.
This is vague, but that is because I find that I very often, in many situations, don't take the stands I should; I only make the tough choice after physical threats come to me or my friends, and otherwise, I allow the tension to rise and rise until it boils over.
But this is a more proactive me. And perhaps, a more obnoxious, more invasive me. But some things are worth trying to save, even if the result means I die a little to others.
Life can't always be easy. Life can't always be free. We have to chain ourselves sometimes, to tether ourselves to those parts of the world we hold sacrosanct. But maybe conviction is a lie, regardless of its form, that nothing should be sacred, we should always float with the current of fate, to stay within our mot, our place in the flow.
Maybe I'm wrong.
But sometimes, it's worth making the effort to find out you're wrong, especially when you know you're right, especially when you know you're the only one who can.
Martyr complex. I don't know how self-serving this all is. But what can you do? I am meta-doubting, but I do not doubt the nature of the battle, nor where I stand inside of it.
Firmly in between two circles that have lost almost all their intersection,what was a venn diagram split out until there is just a tangential point, hypothetical as the meaning of a person's inherent value, to keep them together.
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Wounds
Cancer will fester
Go into remission, then
Re-emerge stronger.
The worst wounds infect
Spread new wounds into the spaces
Where new cells should form.
The body and mind
Same organism, same waves,
More alike than not.
It is memory
That facilitates our growth
Under the lash of pain.
But hurt hides beneath
Our actions. It awakens,
Infects us with fear.
Past pain becomes a
Hereditary disease
Our future carries.
Go into remission, then
Re-emerge stronger.
The worst wounds infect
Spread new wounds into the spaces
Where new cells should form.
The body and mind
Same organism, same waves,
More alike than not.
It is memory
That facilitates our growth
Under the lash of pain.
But hurt hides beneath
Our actions. It awakens,
Infects us with fear.
Past pain becomes a
Hereditary disease
Our future carries.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Bagging, not Dissing, Coffee
It was kinda funny, being really, really bad at something again.
I mean, laughably funny.
I started my new position as a coffee bagger, wholesaler and drip coffee passer outter. So basically, most of the stuff at the job, I picked up on right away. But the actual process of bagging a 1lb bag of coffee, quickly and with some semblance of grace? It took a while to reach the former, and I still don't feel they come out looking that presentable.
In the past, I would have been angry with myself, gotten frustrated...but I just kept moving, amused and looking to find ways to do better, eventually asking Biaggio for some much needed help, and I got a process going now. I am confident I can make a 1 lb bag of coffee in two metal scoops, 15 times out of 16. Folding it? Getting there.
It's pretty awesome though. I feel like I get what I'm supposed to be doing, and I can see myself being fast enough to kill it in the next three weeks...you know, eventually. And the main thing I love...is the smell. Roasted coffee is just...I don't have a description. It's the most inviting environment. And the plant, on Mondays? Is mine. Biaggio has to tote himself up to Chico, CP's got roasting, paperwork, calls to take...I run the floor, grind the product, sling the joe, keep the space...
Being around fresh roasted coffee just feels right. that's really all there is to it.
I mean, laughably funny.
I started my new position as a coffee bagger, wholesaler and drip coffee passer outter. So basically, most of the stuff at the job, I picked up on right away. But the actual process of bagging a 1lb bag of coffee, quickly and with some semblance of grace? It took a while to reach the former, and I still don't feel they come out looking that presentable.
In the past, I would have been angry with myself, gotten frustrated...but I just kept moving, amused and looking to find ways to do better, eventually asking Biaggio for some much needed help, and I got a process going now. I am confident I can make a 1 lb bag of coffee in two metal scoops, 15 times out of 16. Folding it? Getting there.
It's pretty awesome though. I feel like I get what I'm supposed to be doing, and I can see myself being fast enough to kill it in the next three weeks...you know, eventually. And the main thing I love...is the smell. Roasted coffee is just...I don't have a description. It's the most inviting environment. And the plant, on Mondays? Is mine. Biaggio has to tote himself up to Chico, CP's got roasting, paperwork, calls to take...I run the floor, grind the product, sling the joe, keep the space...
Being around fresh roasted coffee just feels right. that's really all there is to it.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
A parable of parallels in more foreign English
My thoughts on accepting increased responsibilities with Naked Coffee:
Shingo Yamamoto.
Began Ninja Warrior as a Gas Station Attendant...is now a multiple-level manager under the same company. Consequent to his meteoric rise to gas pumpdom, homeboy esse vato had a heroic rise to mass pimpdom, becoming a Sasuke (In English we translate it as "Ninja Warrior") finalist and All-Star contestant.
More energy begets more energy, provided sleep, eating and exercise? Allows us to excel?
Biting off more than I can chew? Well, what's the harm in trying?
After all, it's worked for the last three decades of pro wrestling super faces, video game protagonists, and investment bankers.
In the words of Jeremy: What could possibly go wrong?
Shingo Yamamoto.
Began Ninja Warrior as a Gas Station Attendant...is now a multiple-level manager under the same company. Consequent to his meteoric rise to gas pumpdom, homeboy esse vato had a heroic rise to mass pimpdom, becoming a Sasuke (In English we translate it as "Ninja Warrior") finalist and All-Star contestant.
More energy begets more energy, provided sleep, eating and exercise? Allows us to excel?
Biting off more than I can chew? Well, what's the harm in trying?
After all, it's worked for the last three decades of pro wrestling super faces, video game protagonists, and investment bankers.
In the words of Jeremy: What could possibly go wrong?
Saturday, December 4, 2010
ProANTivity: Odysseus recaptures Ithaca and his Hearth
The ants came to the house five days ago.
I had memories of the time the Metaphortress was attacked, they kicked back into me, a bad dream clutching white knuckle on the steering wheel, driving me to instant madness...and this time, instant action.
So the soap and water treatment began. A relatively eco-friendly bug killer, and cheap: I cleared the kitchen in seconds. When Tanner got home, we tracked their entry point (a few crevices in his room) and cleared the kitchen of even the smallest crumb of food.
Three days later, they were back, and in a greater number than before. They didn't even seem to be searching for food, merely a warm place to stay. And, perhaps, build a hive. So I ran to the Alhambra Rite Aid, murder on the mind, nearly ran a stop sign or two in my haste, and bought the most invasive bug sprayer I could find.
It's Raid MAX, and it's motorized. A MOTORIZED NOZZLE. This stuff is murderous. So I lined our baseboards, sprayed inside the holes, in the holes between the cabinets and the washing machine, under and around the oven, the fridge, Tanner's baseboards...
That night. Today. No ants. Just the smell of "No Odor" Raid MAX, which is unsurprisingly, not odorless. It smells like skull and crossbones on a glass bottle.
So don't lick the floor near our baseboards for at least...12 months. That's how long the bottle claims the stuff kills roaches after first application.
The key is to be proactive with pests. Much as in other things in life.
I am hoping that this blog is that...the string of energy that eventually leads to my long term writing goals. Even if it's just the soap and water beginning before I bust out the death serum.
I had memories of the time the Metaphortress was attacked, they kicked back into me, a bad dream clutching white knuckle on the steering wheel, driving me to instant madness...and this time, instant action.
So the soap and water treatment began. A relatively eco-friendly bug killer, and cheap: I cleared the kitchen in seconds. When Tanner got home, we tracked their entry point (a few crevices in his room) and cleared the kitchen of even the smallest crumb of food.
Three days later, they were back, and in a greater number than before. They didn't even seem to be searching for food, merely a warm place to stay. And, perhaps, build a hive. So I ran to the Alhambra Rite Aid, murder on the mind, nearly ran a stop sign or two in my haste, and bought the most invasive bug sprayer I could find.
It's Raid MAX, and it's motorized. A MOTORIZED NOZZLE. This stuff is murderous. So I lined our baseboards, sprayed inside the holes, in the holes between the cabinets and the washing machine, under and around the oven, the fridge, Tanner's baseboards...
That night. Today. No ants. Just the smell of "No Odor" Raid MAX, which is unsurprisingly, not odorless. It smells like skull and crossbones on a glass bottle.
So don't lick the floor near our baseboards for at least...12 months. That's how long the bottle claims the stuff kills roaches after first application.
The key is to be proactive with pests. Much as in other things in life.
I am hoping that this blog is that...the string of energy that eventually leads to my long term writing goals. Even if it's just the soap and water beginning before I bust out the death serum.
Friday, December 3, 2010
KSSU Chronicles Part 1: LJ Rice
Part of this blog is going to get me going on an idea I've had for a long time...to make a real complete and captivating story in regards to the life and times of KSSU. I don't plan on this stuff to make it in, but I learned a lot from my experience at the radio station, which would be my first home at Sac State for the 9 semesters I was there. The first installment contains insights into my friendship with Jenkins Hall dormmate, long time buddy and co-host on the Beans and Rice Show, LJ. This is in no way a complete story, but more an excerpt of a section of our lives, and how I feel about them in my current mood. Currently, I am lacking sleep and need protein. Rawr.
It was, of course, LJ's idea to start Beans and Rice. Despite the fact that I, at the time, considered myself the superior mind of the two, because of my grades and ability to build on ideas, I would later reflect and realize that my Filipino friend's ideas were always bigger. Huge. Terrifying. I had always been incredibly risk averse with how I spent my time, while LJ was careless, frivolous: there wasn't a challenge LJ wouldn't take on head first, there wasn't a challenge I couldn't first talk myself out of.
As such, LJ had a penchant to fall flat on his face. With girls, with video games, with Hennessey and poker, while I was comfortable succeeding at those tasks in which I knew I excelled: logic puzzles, literary analysis, stats...you know, the nerdy stuff.
But LJ didn't let his studies consume him, if anything, he raged against the constraints and constantly saught out ways to exploit as much as he could from the coddling environment around a college to create options for "asymmetrical" paths of personal growth. He would learn lessons from experience from those failures, and when he did succeed, it was usually pretty damn glorious.
As an 18 year old high school grad, I didn't see the wisdom in biting off more than you could chew. I was blind by the fear of failure.
So at first, I told LJ it wasn't likely: these guys were music snobs, likely, and wouldn't let us into their cool club. LJ took me to the radio station, where I awaited the Core staff smugly, confident that they wouldn't have space for a new show two weeks into the semester.
The schedule was barely half full. We pretty much had our pick of the litter for a time slot. "Fair warning." They told us. "We have 3000 milliwatts of power to boost our signal."
LJ said, "Whoa. That's a lot."
I responded. "Dude. That's 3 watts of power."
"Is that a lot?"
"Let me put it in perspective." I paced, as I often did when I was being a condescending 18 year old English major brat. I paced an awful lot in those days. "You see that light bulb right there?"
"Yeah?"
"That's a sixty watt light bulb."
"Oh."
"That light bulb? It pushes twenty times more power than the signal."
"Oh."
"That means if the station's antenna was planted on my head, half the time, on a cloudless day, you could pick up its signal on my dick."
"That's gross! I'd never do that."
"But your mom would."
"Fuckyoufuckyoufuckyoufuckyou."
"I know! She did last night."
And we continued insulting each other back to the dorms...but not before stopping to agree to doing the show. Of course, hearing how dirty our mouths were, Caitlin Caso, Assistant Manager under David Wilbur, made sure to schedule us for an 8PM-10PM slot on Friday nights. No administrators would hang around after 5PM any day of the week, let alone a Friday night. KSSU was protected, and they got a 2 hour slot filled.
It was perfect. LJ would have the freedom to do whatever the heck is mind led him to, and I couldn't risk failing: I could say whatever I want and, even if we sucked, there was no failing...The Beans and Rice Show was gonna be the tree falling in the forest, and inside its hallowed out trunk, LJ and I would be having a verbal dance party.
But LJ...LJ always had big ideas. And I loved building on ideas.
So it started modestly, two kids saying things they probably shouldn't on the radio, prank calling dorm rooms, though mostly their friends, and remarking on people, politics and pop culture in the most irreverent, meaningless and hurtful ways possible. When that got old, which it did for LJ quite often, he'd leave the show for...what...10, 20 minutes at a time? until he pulled a girl or two from the Union into the show to get, for lack of a better term, harassed. Luckily, I helped these poor strangers pick on LJ, who always made himself an easy target for insult, so that we never got sued for him essentially trying to corner girls into giving him dates on the air.
It was funny. Sure. But you'd be surprised how many dates LJ got out of that...or that same balls out mentality in another sphere. He was willing to play a numbers game in those days: ask out damn near anyone, embarrassing himself to no end, yes, sometimes, but it's hard for a young girl to deny someone who's willing to throw themselves into total vulnerability just for the chance to buy them lunch. In that way, there were always girls for LJ, despite the fact that he was loud, and had a penchant for farting and burping...and they were never pretty. I remember clearly the day 500 people were eating in the Dining Commons when an LJ burp silenced all other noise, and 998 pairs of eyes glanced at him in shock, horror, and awe. He once farted in his dorm room and, 100 feet down the hall, I had to close my door and open my window.
On-air in the KSSU studio, his fart made me gag so bad I had to evacuate the building for five minutes. They really are the things of legend...I hope Kayla has a deadened nose, or has subdued his eating habits.
Yes, so lots of embarrassing stories about LJ aside,he was really willing to put himself out there...and it wasn't just admirable to the cowardly young me, but it was contagious.
In high school, I had remade myself into a very public figure. I had been a brooding child, but by 8th grade, I wanted everyone to know my name. I was sophomore class President at Oyster River, the ham at every prep rally there, and later, Folsom High School, where the Student Body made me their P.R.C. mid-way through my senior year. I cheered at every basketball game I could make, I hosted Karaoke Fridays (where, climbing off the stage, I famously mooned people. At least once a week,) and ran the pep rallies I had once run amuck. The Senior class even elected me Prom King, thus proving that Folsom, being of a Democratic state, had no clue as to how to contextualize the word "royalty" into a modern setting. Pomp, circumstance, and austerity are three words that have never adequately defined me...but bless em anyways.
In college, at Sac State, though, I had come in just wanting to find some good friends in the dorms and disappear from radar. LJ. Though. Was contagious.
It started with the "Rally to Raise Student Fees." It was a parody idea he had, which I vigorously expanded on. We had Zhuo and Ken dress up in Beans and Rice Street Team Jerseys (Which consisted of plain white Tees with duct tape letters spelling "Beans and Rice" on the front, and their radio handles on the back,) we had a sign up sheet, multiple rally-esque chants, and tag lines to get people to buy into the fact that Sac State would remain a crappy school unless we made students pay more so that: 1.) We could get more and better teachers, 2.) Make sure less people could afford it so we could have smaller class sizes and 3.) Because we might get a sweet swimming pool, and girls in bikinis are HAWT.
Who knew the administration was listening, and would develop the WREC (now WELL center) after I had graduated.
But yeah, obviously it was satire, and only three people signed up for the petition because they felt bad for us...of course, despite our lack of a signal, one of the signees managed to turn on KSSU by Lassen, where the antenna was, and heard his name broadcasted. He freaked out, came to the station, threatened to sue us on and off the air, and, in general, made for some CLASSIC radio..as well as a very worried and annoyed Caitlin Caso. I still remember the guy's name, but I omit it here so I won't be sued. I is po'.
But this turned out to be the gateway drug: LJ had a taste of accomplishment, so he wanted more. LJ found a way to record our shows, to do live broadcasts on the internet years before KSSU had the tools to do it for every show through some sort of freeware he found/maybe pirated, and somehow managed to get an on-phone interview with Import model and Playboy bunny Kaila Yu. Of course, as shock jocks, we DIDN'T ask about her boobs like everyone expected: we asked her questions that displayed her well rounded intellect and made us seem like pansies. Our friends and listeners (now many more than 3 watts worth internationally...maybe, like, 15) all made fun of us, said we'd lost our spine at the voice of a pretty girl...but always with us, it was about controversy, even if it was the controversy of a lack of controversy.
Of course, that's because under the subtext of controversy, it was always about us.
Luckily, it worked for us. Mostly. No one we knew in Jenkins Hall was quite as self-obsessed as we were. LJ on being a man, on getting girls, on doing whatever he wanted when he wanted and living his way, and me on holding myself as smart, friendly, smart, dependable, and smart. We were glad to enable each other, and pick on each others' insecurities enough in a harmless enough way that it made us look strong and self-assured. We enabled the most willful parts of us, which, always, are the most vulnerable parts.
It didn't always work, and couldn't have always worked in our favor. LJ would get burned by girls and fall into poor moods. I'd obsess about how other people viewed me, and kinda collapse. LJ became a hermit in his apartment for a while, after he had moved out of the dorms. I dropped out of school for a semester and infamously worked graveyard at a gas station for five months before crawling back to the ivory tower.
I think, in those absences, LJ and I truly found at rock bottom the ground from which we could build real people. LJ would separate himself from girls, for a time, and spend time with his Madden, Halo, and other decompressing activities where he could chill and reflect. I found out that there were people with way bigger problems than me, and most of them let their experiences turn them into total assholes on weekend nights when they were filled with liquor and looking for a fight. I, decisively, knew I didn't want to be a part of this world...which meant I had to, some extent, real take care of myself.
It wasn't JUST LJ and the radio show that led to the anagnorisis, but our constant desire to push each other, and ourselves through each other, was what allowed us to grow. And because he always had his avenues that I'd never cross, and myself ones he'd never ave an interest in, we continued to travel similar amplitudes on different wavelengths, and in the symmetry we built a strong friendship.
LJ, now, is engaged to a fantastic girl (HI KAYLA!) has a job where he works his butt off and makes damn good money, owns his own home, and frankly, is kicking ass. He got it, mainly, by always pushing forward, taking chances in seeking promotions, and, in general, biting off more than he could chew. As usual, I think I'm kicking ass in similar ways, but in totally different avenues. If I ever wanted the life he's got...the girl, the house, the career...I'd have a hella good blueprint to follow.
It was, of course, LJ's idea to start Beans and Rice. Despite the fact that I, at the time, considered myself the superior mind of the two, because of my grades and ability to build on ideas, I would later reflect and realize that my Filipino friend's ideas were always bigger. Huge. Terrifying. I had always been incredibly risk averse with how I spent my time, while LJ was careless, frivolous: there wasn't a challenge LJ wouldn't take on head first, there wasn't a challenge I couldn't first talk myself out of.
As such, LJ had a penchant to fall flat on his face. With girls, with video games, with Hennessey and poker, while I was comfortable succeeding at those tasks in which I knew I excelled: logic puzzles, literary analysis, stats...you know, the nerdy stuff.
But LJ didn't let his studies consume him, if anything, he raged against the constraints and constantly saught out ways to exploit as much as he could from the coddling environment around a college to create options for "asymmetrical" paths of personal growth. He would learn lessons from experience from those failures, and when he did succeed, it was usually pretty damn glorious.
As an 18 year old high school grad, I didn't see the wisdom in biting off more than you could chew. I was blind by the fear of failure.
So at first, I told LJ it wasn't likely: these guys were music snobs, likely, and wouldn't let us into their cool club. LJ took me to the radio station, where I awaited the Core staff smugly, confident that they wouldn't have space for a new show two weeks into the semester.
The schedule was barely half full. We pretty much had our pick of the litter for a time slot. "Fair warning." They told us. "We have 3000 milliwatts of power to boost our signal."
LJ said, "Whoa. That's a lot."
I responded. "Dude. That's 3 watts of power."
"Is that a lot?"
"Let me put it in perspective." I paced, as I often did when I was being a condescending 18 year old English major brat. I paced an awful lot in those days. "You see that light bulb right there?"
"Yeah?"
"That's a sixty watt light bulb."
"Oh."
"That light bulb? It pushes twenty times more power than the signal."
"Oh."
"That means if the station's antenna was planted on my head, half the time, on a cloudless day, you could pick up its signal on my dick."
"That's gross! I'd never do that."
"But your mom would."
"Fuckyoufuckyoufuckyoufuckyou."
"I know! She did last night."
And we continued insulting each other back to the dorms...but not before stopping to agree to doing the show. Of course, hearing how dirty our mouths were, Caitlin Caso, Assistant Manager under David Wilbur, made sure to schedule us for an 8PM-10PM slot on Friday nights. No administrators would hang around after 5PM any day of the week, let alone a Friday night. KSSU was protected, and they got a 2 hour slot filled.
It was perfect. LJ would have the freedom to do whatever the heck is mind led him to, and I couldn't risk failing: I could say whatever I want and, even if we sucked, there was no failing...The Beans and Rice Show was gonna be the tree falling in the forest, and inside its hallowed out trunk, LJ and I would be having a verbal dance party.
But LJ...LJ always had big ideas. And I loved building on ideas.
So it started modestly, two kids saying things they probably shouldn't on the radio, prank calling dorm rooms, though mostly their friends, and remarking on people, politics and pop culture in the most irreverent, meaningless and hurtful ways possible. When that got old, which it did for LJ quite often, he'd leave the show for...what...10, 20 minutes at a time? until he pulled a girl or two from the Union into the show to get, for lack of a better term, harassed. Luckily, I helped these poor strangers pick on LJ, who always made himself an easy target for insult, so that we never got sued for him essentially trying to corner girls into giving him dates on the air.
It was funny. Sure. But you'd be surprised how many dates LJ got out of that...or that same balls out mentality in another sphere. He was willing to play a numbers game in those days: ask out damn near anyone, embarrassing himself to no end, yes, sometimes, but it's hard for a young girl to deny someone who's willing to throw themselves into total vulnerability just for the chance to buy them lunch. In that way, there were always girls for LJ, despite the fact that he was loud, and had a penchant for farting and burping...and they were never pretty. I remember clearly the day 500 people were eating in the Dining Commons when an LJ burp silenced all other noise, and 998 pairs of eyes glanced at him in shock, horror, and awe. He once farted in his dorm room and, 100 feet down the hall, I had to close my door and open my window.
On-air in the KSSU studio, his fart made me gag so bad I had to evacuate the building for five minutes. They really are the things of legend...I hope Kayla has a deadened nose, or has subdued his eating habits.
Yes, so lots of embarrassing stories about LJ aside,he was really willing to put himself out there...and it wasn't just admirable to the cowardly young me, but it was contagious.
In high school, I had remade myself into a very public figure. I had been a brooding child, but by 8th grade, I wanted everyone to know my name. I was sophomore class President at Oyster River, the ham at every prep rally there, and later, Folsom High School, where the Student Body made me their P.R.C. mid-way through my senior year. I cheered at every basketball game I could make, I hosted Karaoke Fridays (where, climbing off the stage, I famously mooned people. At least once a week,) and ran the pep rallies I had once run amuck. The Senior class even elected me Prom King, thus proving that Folsom, being of a Democratic state, had no clue as to how to contextualize the word "royalty" into a modern setting. Pomp, circumstance, and austerity are three words that have never adequately defined me...but bless em anyways.
In college, at Sac State, though, I had come in just wanting to find some good friends in the dorms and disappear from radar. LJ. Though. Was contagious.
It started with the "Rally to Raise Student Fees." It was a parody idea he had, which I vigorously expanded on. We had Zhuo and Ken dress up in Beans and Rice Street Team Jerseys (Which consisted of plain white Tees with duct tape letters spelling "Beans and Rice" on the front, and their radio handles on the back,) we had a sign up sheet, multiple rally-esque chants, and tag lines to get people to buy into the fact that Sac State would remain a crappy school unless we made students pay more so that: 1.) We could get more and better teachers, 2.) Make sure less people could afford it so we could have smaller class sizes and 3.) Because we might get a sweet swimming pool, and girls in bikinis are HAWT.
Who knew the administration was listening, and would develop the WREC (now WELL center) after I had graduated.
But yeah, obviously it was satire, and only three people signed up for the petition because they felt bad for us...of course, despite our lack of a signal, one of the signees managed to turn on KSSU by Lassen, where the antenna was, and heard his name broadcasted. He freaked out, came to the station, threatened to sue us on and off the air, and, in general, made for some CLASSIC radio..as well as a very worried and annoyed Caitlin Caso. I still remember the guy's name, but I omit it here so I won't be sued. I is po'.
But this turned out to be the gateway drug: LJ had a taste of accomplishment, so he wanted more. LJ found a way to record our shows, to do live broadcasts on the internet years before KSSU had the tools to do it for every show through some sort of freeware he found/maybe pirated, and somehow managed to get an on-phone interview with Import model and Playboy bunny Kaila Yu. Of course, as shock jocks, we DIDN'T ask about her boobs like everyone expected: we asked her questions that displayed her well rounded intellect and made us seem like pansies. Our friends and listeners (now many more than 3 watts worth internationally...maybe, like, 15) all made fun of us, said we'd lost our spine at the voice of a pretty girl...but always with us, it was about controversy, even if it was the controversy of a lack of controversy.
Of course, that's because under the subtext of controversy, it was always about us.
Luckily, it worked for us. Mostly. No one we knew in Jenkins Hall was quite as self-obsessed as we were. LJ on being a man, on getting girls, on doing whatever he wanted when he wanted and living his way, and me on holding myself as smart, friendly, smart, dependable, and smart. We were glad to enable each other, and pick on each others' insecurities enough in a harmless enough way that it made us look strong and self-assured. We enabled the most willful parts of us, which, always, are the most vulnerable parts.
It didn't always work, and couldn't have always worked in our favor. LJ would get burned by girls and fall into poor moods. I'd obsess about how other people viewed me, and kinda collapse. LJ became a hermit in his apartment for a while, after he had moved out of the dorms. I dropped out of school for a semester and infamously worked graveyard at a gas station for five months before crawling back to the ivory tower.
I think, in those absences, LJ and I truly found at rock bottom the ground from which we could build real people. LJ would separate himself from girls, for a time, and spend time with his Madden, Halo, and other decompressing activities where he could chill and reflect. I found out that there were people with way bigger problems than me, and most of them let their experiences turn them into total assholes on weekend nights when they were filled with liquor and looking for a fight. I, decisively, knew I didn't want to be a part of this world...which meant I had to, some extent, real take care of myself.
It wasn't JUST LJ and the radio show that led to the anagnorisis, but our constant desire to push each other, and ourselves through each other, was what allowed us to grow. And because he always had his avenues that I'd never cross, and myself ones he'd never ave an interest in, we continued to travel similar amplitudes on different wavelengths, and in the symmetry we built a strong friendship.
LJ, now, is engaged to a fantastic girl (HI KAYLA!) has a job where he works his butt off and makes damn good money, owns his own home, and frankly, is kicking ass. He got it, mainly, by always pushing forward, taking chances in seeking promotions, and, in general, biting off more than he could chew. As usual, I think I'm kicking ass in similar ways, but in totally different avenues. If I ever wanted the life he's got...the girl, the house, the career...I'd have a hella good blueprint to follow.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Projects and Pastimes
Projects:
- Top secret project with my actress friend. Well, the secrets are top secret. We're doing a series of music videos. I won't get deeper into it than that.
- This blog. Besides my two followers and the hits transferred when I post about it on Facebook, this is (for now) also mostly a secret. But a productive one.
- The Novel. This is super secret at this point. A quick update: I really, really need to grapple the Point of View of my narrator character.
- Green Tea Graffiti: When I get stable internet, this will be easier to keep up with. For now, I've got an article on the way that should be dynamite.
I'm really happy with the progress I've made on each of these projects...minus GTG, which I need at home internet access to have 24 hour coverage. My phone can't really check my GTG email very well, so it's just so hard to keep up. Gonna need to get on that...
As for pastimes, I'm still engaging in a bit of good stuff I've always loved to do.
- The Fantasy Football team I update every week in Murph's league is 9-3, and leads the league in Fantasy points by 200. I write a weekly column where I predict (often errantly) the real life NFL winners. We also make fun of Steve, who, much to my chagrin, is coming back to take a playoff spot. He's got Peyton Hillis and Dwayne Bowe. He's scary now.
- I'm doing e-w again, my brother Nick's 3DW fed, in the vein of old school ECW. I handle a South Korean immigrant with a sordid past named Na Neun Park. It translates to "I am Park." Started off as a high concept character, but has become more relatable, and frankly, interesting in the cooperative narrative dynamic as he's integrated into the federation and its Cabal of misfits.
- We have new upstairs neighbors at the new place. We saw a moving van outside, and, though I was determined to get this blog post out, I gritted my teeth and completed my second favorite college-bred pastime, moving. My quarter Mexican self, along with Tanner, helped them lug their big furniture up the 16 steps and into their pad. They're four friends from Folsom who got tired of living in an overpriced apartment, which is probably what Folsom city planning wanted. People like us, mid to late-twenties fun-seeking working class kids have no place in that place without children and an Intel job. I know already they're cooler than us, so I'm glad we helped out: nice folk.
- Poker nights should be happening twice a month or so at my place now. It's gonna be baller status.
- Tomorrow I truly take initiative in my health...like, the overall health thing, where I actually look to build on my potential for physical activity, rather than cutting cutting cutting. This is where the real work comes in. This is my new pastime.
Should be exciting! For now, I have a venue to run. It'll be a HELL of a show: The Kelps, The Aberzombies and Exhale play. Definitely on the punk side of rock. The Kelps ROCKED it last week, as stated in this blog. Check it out, 8:30PM tonight on 11th and H! 5 dollar cover!
- Top secret project with my actress friend. Well, the secrets are top secret. We're doing a series of music videos. I won't get deeper into it than that.
- This blog. Besides my two followers and the hits transferred when I post about it on Facebook, this is (for now) also mostly a secret. But a productive one.
- The Novel. This is super secret at this point. A quick update: I really, really need to grapple the Point of View of my narrator character.
- Green Tea Graffiti: When I get stable internet, this will be easier to keep up with. For now, I've got an article on the way that should be dynamite.
I'm really happy with the progress I've made on each of these projects...minus GTG, which I need at home internet access to have 24 hour coverage. My phone can't really check my GTG email very well, so it's just so hard to keep up. Gonna need to get on that...
As for pastimes, I'm still engaging in a bit of good stuff I've always loved to do.
- The Fantasy Football team I update every week in Murph's league is 9-3, and leads the league in Fantasy points by 200. I write a weekly column where I predict (often errantly) the real life NFL winners. We also make fun of Steve, who, much to my chagrin, is coming back to take a playoff spot. He's got Peyton Hillis and Dwayne Bowe. He's scary now.
- I'm doing e-w again, my brother Nick's 3DW fed, in the vein of old school ECW. I handle a South Korean immigrant with a sordid past named Na Neun Park. It translates to "I am Park." Started off as a high concept character, but has become more relatable, and frankly, interesting in the cooperative narrative dynamic as he's integrated into the federation and its Cabal of misfits.
- We have new upstairs neighbors at the new place. We saw a moving van outside, and, though I was determined to get this blog post out, I gritted my teeth and completed my second favorite college-bred pastime, moving. My quarter Mexican self, along with Tanner, helped them lug their big furniture up the 16 steps and into their pad. They're four friends from Folsom who got tired of living in an overpriced apartment, which is probably what Folsom city planning wanted. People like us, mid to late-twenties fun-seeking working class kids have no place in that place without children and an Intel job. I know already they're cooler than us, so I'm glad we helped out: nice folk.
- Poker nights should be happening twice a month or so at my place now. It's gonna be baller status.
- Tomorrow I truly take initiative in my health...like, the overall health thing, where I actually look to build on my potential for physical activity, rather than cutting cutting cutting. This is where the real work comes in. This is my new pastime.
Should be exciting! For now, I have a venue to run. It'll be a HELL of a show: The Kelps, The Aberzombies and Exhale play. Definitely on the punk side of rock. The Kelps ROCKED it last week, as stated in this blog. Check it out, 8:30PM tonight on 11th and H! 5 dollar cover!
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
190
The last time I was under 190 pounds...it must have been the beginning of Senior year of High School. Even when I defied the Freshman 15 in college, and made it the Freshmen -30, I was still 201 before I broke my ankle. So it's weird, I'm lighter than I've been since I became a legal adult.
Yet I still feel there's so much shaping I need to do. That I could easily lose 25 pounds from my gut. If I just pushed myself a little harder in exercise. Gain a few pounds in muscle. Tone out at 175. That would be nice.
I could look a lot better still. A day at a time? Certainly. But I need to make a plan.
So let's go ahead and do that for my post today. I got, what, 30 minutes that this mediocre coffee at Peet's afforded me. You know you only get an hour, chain policy? Well, they're pretty high volume here...Folsom requires brand development and overkill on marketing to succeed, but there're so many soccer moms and working moms and working dads and soccer dads. These guys do at least 2200 on a Wednesday, if they're open for 15 hours...
But I digress. Plans!!! Okay, so here it is.
50 pushups, 80 jumping jacks, 100 crunches, 80 squats, 20 box jumps.and a mile. Three times a week.
Probably not in Mike's group...I need to prove to myself that I want to do this for me. Do it for a couple weeks, then I'll know I can incorporate into the group with an assured sense of accomplishment.
Weekly updates...workout Wednesdays?...on this blog. Busy day today on my day off, so maybe I'll have a more developed post later. Or I won't.
Yet I still feel there's so much shaping I need to do. That I could easily lose 25 pounds from my gut. If I just pushed myself a little harder in exercise. Gain a few pounds in muscle. Tone out at 175. That would be nice.
I could look a lot better still. A day at a time? Certainly. But I need to make a plan.
So let's go ahead and do that for my post today. I got, what, 30 minutes that this mediocre coffee at Peet's afforded me. You know you only get an hour, chain policy? Well, they're pretty high volume here...Folsom requires brand development and overkill on marketing to succeed, but there're so many soccer moms and working moms and working dads and soccer dads. These guys do at least 2200 on a Wednesday, if they're open for 15 hours...
But I digress. Plans!!! Okay, so here it is.
50 pushups, 80 jumping jacks, 100 crunches, 80 squats, 20 box jumps.and a mile. Three times a week.
Probably not in Mike's group...I need to prove to myself that I want to do this for me. Do it for a couple weeks, then I'll know I can incorporate into the group with an assured sense of accomplishment.
Weekly updates...workout Wednesdays?...on this blog. Busy day today on my day off, so maybe I'll have a more developed post later. Or I won't.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Energy Gained from Energy Spent
It fundamentally doesn't make sense. You would figure, the more energy you spend, the less you have to focus on other tasks. Well, I would figure, and did, when I was entering college.
I got into an argument with Ana, a friend who lived in the dorms and was studying Kinesiology, about the subject. I told her that systems wear down with usage, hence the term, wear and tear. She said, no, the human body is organic, and it becomes stronger with usage, provided you don't blow out the system. Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
The last year I have been testing her theory, and, provided I receive ample sleep and fuel, I've discovered for myself that she had been right those years ago.
It really started, as so much of my improvement has, with the website. When GTG was getting started, there was just so much to do. So many ideas to hash out, personnel decisions to make, layouts to comment on, events to plan and execute, content and content and content to slam into my head about all this Asian pop culture stuff I had very little background in at the time.
So I ran myself ragged. 90 hours a week between the site and the Coffee job, at the height of my obsession; 30 hours pulling shots and steaming milk, 60 hours talking with AJ and Sean at UC Davis, plotting with Jonas at the pad on La Riveria, clicking away on my desktop. Of course, that couldn't last forever, and I was blowing out...but I began to understand then the truth of hard work: the more you work, the more you want to work, and the easier each task becomes.
After management training, my world stopped for a bit, and I realized that there was a balance that needed to be reached. I was starting to resent working at the coffee shop, started thinking about escaping again, as I had every time I reached one of these crossroads where I felt external forces were holding me back. When Resident Services Coordinating started to sour, I escaped for grad school. When I worked straight through two weeks to qualify for bar and street marketing, I decided to go to apply to teach English in Korea.
But the colleges, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education, they were experienced in people like me: people who were trying to use their organizations to hide from life, rather than to embrace a new change. I wasn't going to expand my horizons, I went to find a hole to crawl into. Honestly, if I was accept to Amherst or Florida, if I had gone to Korea, I wouldn't have learned what Mark and Joe learned in college, I wouldn't have flourished and developed as a more full person, as AJ and Jeff have.
Again, it was about learning what it meant to take satisfaction in one's effort, rather than needing other peoples' praise to power my work.
So blowing out with GTG, it was necessary: I had to let myself unleash the power within me, expend all I had, and learn lessons.
And I did. I learned that, the best thing to do when you're down was exercise: exert yourself physically, ESPECIALLY when you feel spiritually blocked. If it was the website, I would go play basketball. If I felt lagged at work, I would scrub the floors with a scouring pad, a bottle of simple green and a towel. The extra effort, the accomplishment of doing more than I otherwise would, and, most importantly, getting lost in the simple action of being, was enough to rejuvenate my system. I would then make sure to sleep extra and eat more, take care of myself.
I also learned that when I did this more often than that...I was ignoring a need in myself. I wasn't asserting my will in the places it was important. Usually, it has been that I need more rejuvenation reassertments when I've been isolating myself for a period of time. When I recognize this is the case, I make sure to hang out with friends...luckily, I have good friends who put up with my sometimes negligence (thanks guys!)
Working on what needs to be done, and accomplishing those tasks, really does more for you to utilize your free time than it does drain you. When you feel you are doing a bad job at work, or with your friends, or anything you view as important, that negativity does more to inhibit you than spending that extra bit to get through a rough day...especially when, realizing you had to put in the extra work, you feel accomplished enough, and secure enough in your autonomy, to reward yourself with a good night's rest. When I used to beat myself up, and "give up," I wouldn't be able to sleep...I would spend more time dwelling than getting stuff done, or using the time I wasn't spending getting stuff done to decompress.
Autonomy is so, so, so, so, so, so important. So important. Underline it. Italicize it. Surrounded it in parenthesis, brackets, and asterisks...highlight it in yellow if you need to.
Autonomy.
It is the chief gift of hard work, the blessing of human's sometimes maddening nature and wiring. If there is something you expect yourself to do, REGARDLESS if anyone is holding you to it or not, do it. Make yourself do it.
You'll be better for it, I promise you. And so will I, once I get to the point where I feel that I need to do Mike's workout three times a day.
I don't feel that way yet...and it's just something I'm gonna have to get used to. Like coming into work on a clean slate every day. Like this blog, writing every day. Like my desire to make people smile, and think, and my passion for thinking my way through problems, my obsession with self-work.
I'll keep working on those things I need to do, until, some day, when it clicks, and I realize I need to do the workout every day, I'll have the support of my deeds, the history of my accomplishments embodied in me, to achieve that goal as well.
Self-confidence. It's a step by step process. Day by day. Always.
I got into an argument with Ana, a friend who lived in the dorms and was studying Kinesiology, about the subject. I told her that systems wear down with usage, hence the term, wear and tear. She said, no, the human body is organic, and it becomes stronger with usage, provided you don't blow out the system. Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
The last year I have been testing her theory, and, provided I receive ample sleep and fuel, I've discovered for myself that she had been right those years ago.
It really started, as so much of my improvement has, with the website. When GTG was getting started, there was just so much to do. So many ideas to hash out, personnel decisions to make, layouts to comment on, events to plan and execute, content and content and content to slam into my head about all this Asian pop culture stuff I had very little background in at the time.
So I ran myself ragged. 90 hours a week between the site and the Coffee job, at the height of my obsession; 30 hours pulling shots and steaming milk, 60 hours talking with AJ and Sean at UC Davis, plotting with Jonas at the pad on La Riveria, clicking away on my desktop. Of course, that couldn't last forever, and I was blowing out...but I began to understand then the truth of hard work: the more you work, the more you want to work, and the easier each task becomes.
After management training, my world stopped for a bit, and I realized that there was a balance that needed to be reached. I was starting to resent working at the coffee shop, started thinking about escaping again, as I had every time I reached one of these crossroads where I felt external forces were holding me back. When Resident Services Coordinating started to sour, I escaped for grad school. When I worked straight through two weeks to qualify for bar and street marketing, I decided to go to apply to teach English in Korea.
But the colleges, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education, they were experienced in people like me: people who were trying to use their organizations to hide from life, rather than to embrace a new change. I wasn't going to expand my horizons, I went to find a hole to crawl into. Honestly, if I was accept to Amherst or Florida, if I had gone to Korea, I wouldn't have learned what Mark and Joe learned in college, I wouldn't have flourished and developed as a more full person, as AJ and Jeff have.
Again, it was about learning what it meant to take satisfaction in one's effort, rather than needing other peoples' praise to power my work.
So blowing out with GTG, it was necessary: I had to let myself unleash the power within me, expend all I had, and learn lessons.
And I did. I learned that, the best thing to do when you're down was exercise: exert yourself physically, ESPECIALLY when you feel spiritually blocked. If it was the website, I would go play basketball. If I felt lagged at work, I would scrub the floors with a scouring pad, a bottle of simple green and a towel. The extra effort, the accomplishment of doing more than I otherwise would, and, most importantly, getting lost in the simple action of being, was enough to rejuvenate my system. I would then make sure to sleep extra and eat more, take care of myself.
I also learned that when I did this more often than that...I was ignoring a need in myself. I wasn't asserting my will in the places it was important. Usually, it has been that I need more rejuvenation reassertments when I've been isolating myself for a period of time. When I recognize this is the case, I make sure to hang out with friends...luckily, I have good friends who put up with my sometimes negligence (thanks guys!)
Working on what needs to be done, and accomplishing those tasks, really does more for you to utilize your free time than it does drain you. When you feel you are doing a bad job at work, or with your friends, or anything you view as important, that negativity does more to inhibit you than spending that extra bit to get through a rough day...especially when, realizing you had to put in the extra work, you feel accomplished enough, and secure enough in your autonomy, to reward yourself with a good night's rest. When I used to beat myself up, and "give up," I wouldn't be able to sleep...I would spend more time dwelling than getting stuff done, or using the time I wasn't spending getting stuff done to decompress.
Autonomy is so, so, so, so, so, so important. So important. Underline it. Italicize it. Surrounded it in parenthesis, brackets, and asterisks...highlight it in yellow if you need to.
Autonomy.
It is the chief gift of hard work, the blessing of human's sometimes maddening nature and wiring. If there is something you expect yourself to do, REGARDLESS if anyone is holding you to it or not, do it. Make yourself do it.
You'll be better for it, I promise you. And so will I, once I get to the point where I feel that I need to do Mike's workout three times a day.
I don't feel that way yet...and it's just something I'm gonna have to get used to. Like coming into work on a clean slate every day. Like this blog, writing every day. Like my desire to make people smile, and think, and my passion for thinking my way through problems, my obsession with self-work.
I'll keep working on those things I need to do, until, some day, when it clicks, and I realize I need to do the workout every day, I'll have the support of my deeds, the history of my accomplishments embodied in me, to achieve that goal as well.
Self-confidence. It's a step by step process. Day by day. Always.
Monday, November 29, 2010
The Pleasures so Few Understand; On speaking a foreign language in English
I've come to the realization, and am comfortable saying that there are some pleasures I hold that, although totally uninterpretable to most of my friends these days, are nonetheless entrenched aspects that have guided and continue to direct the growth of my personality.
Perfection. When you hear the word, what do you think about? What is the first image that flies across your mind? For some, it's the perfect body, with a favorite celebrity crush making a viewing. Maybe it's a Michael Jordan dunk for the Chicago sports fan, or Dwight Clark reeling in The Catch for those in the Bay Area. Maybe it's your childhood treehouse, and the view looking out into the wilderness of simpler times and impulses.
For me, there is only one answer: Toshiaki Kawada versus Misahiru Misawa, Tokyo Egg Dome, June 3rd, 1994 for the Triple Crown Title.
I see Kawada nailing a Yakuza kick out of no where, Misawa working on the leg, then the back, weakening Kawada's powerbomb. Misawa not being able to put away Kawada with Inoki's octopus lock, and being forced to unleash the Tiger Driver '91 from a wrestling hold warehouse hooked under lock and key for the final victory.
When I think really hard about it, and try to imagine someone NOT thinking this is the very image of all that is possible in the world, my head starts to hurt. What could possibly match its story? The telling, retelling of all their battles in every series of moves. The concessions to each others' that will that were only exerted by force in violent conflict, elbows and boots. What that ever existed was as elegantly crafted, and put under the pressure of live performance, and executed to the utmost of human potential? The in-match motifs, extemporaneously breathed into life, forming organic structures of emotion in the audience, suffering small tragedy's until the final denouement, when the man with the invinceable head was finally put down by the master tactician.
How many people to I know actually know the difference between a tactician and a technician in pro wrestling? A brawler and a striker? A hooker versus a grappler? A high impact offense versus a high flying one?
Wrestling is just the chief example, of course, of my many exclusive vocabularies. Quite often, I have awkward moments, especially when tired at work, or out with friends, where I made metaphors to concepts, events, etc. that no one around me gets. Especially when I'm tired, it's hard to properly contextualize an appropriate response, especially when I'm trying to clarify a point and reach for comparison to do so.
There's literary criticism, speed quantitative methods, Talking Heads song lyrics (or song lyrics in general,) early '90s country music, Korean Underground Hip Hop (I asked for that one,) coffee, management practices, even writing...it gets to a point where your help doesn't help: you want to explain something, but you start speaking in jargon other people don't have the background to follow.
When I'm awake, I guess, I'm okay at small chat. But when I'm tired? The first four things I think of seem to always relate to one of my narrow fringe interests.
I dunno. I'm probably just tired. In fact, I'm exhausted. Got four hours of sleep last night when I needed 10. Ack.
Better post tomorrow, I promise.
But seriously, Kawada/Misawa is the most perfect thing I've ever witnessed. Consolidate your image of my now, friend!
P.S. Number 2 is Oscar Wilde's behavior in court when he was tried and convicted for engaging in sexual acts with a male minor. If you can read any one thing in your life, when you're totally miserable and want to laugh AT the world rather than with it, read it sometime.
Perfection. When you hear the word, what do you think about? What is the first image that flies across your mind? For some, it's the perfect body, with a favorite celebrity crush making a viewing. Maybe it's a Michael Jordan dunk for the Chicago sports fan, or Dwight Clark reeling in The Catch for those in the Bay Area. Maybe it's your childhood treehouse, and the view looking out into the wilderness of simpler times and impulses.
For me, there is only one answer: Toshiaki Kawada versus Misahiru Misawa, Tokyo Egg Dome, June 3rd, 1994 for the Triple Crown Title.
I see Kawada nailing a Yakuza kick out of no where, Misawa working on the leg, then the back, weakening Kawada's powerbomb. Misawa not being able to put away Kawada with Inoki's octopus lock, and being forced to unleash the Tiger Driver '91 from a wrestling hold warehouse hooked under lock and key for the final victory.
When I think really hard about it, and try to imagine someone NOT thinking this is the very image of all that is possible in the world, my head starts to hurt. What could possibly match its story? The telling, retelling of all their battles in every series of moves. The concessions to each others' that will that were only exerted by force in violent conflict, elbows and boots. What that ever existed was as elegantly crafted, and put under the pressure of live performance, and executed to the utmost of human potential? The in-match motifs, extemporaneously breathed into life, forming organic structures of emotion in the audience, suffering small tragedy's until the final denouement, when the man with the invinceable head was finally put down by the master tactician.
How many people to I know actually know the difference between a tactician and a technician in pro wrestling? A brawler and a striker? A hooker versus a grappler? A high impact offense versus a high flying one?
Wrestling is just the chief example, of course, of my many exclusive vocabularies. Quite often, I have awkward moments, especially when tired at work, or out with friends, where I made metaphors to concepts, events, etc. that no one around me gets. Especially when I'm tired, it's hard to properly contextualize an appropriate response, especially when I'm trying to clarify a point and reach for comparison to do so.
There's literary criticism, speed quantitative methods, Talking Heads song lyrics (or song lyrics in general,) early '90s country music, Korean Underground Hip Hop (I asked for that one,) coffee, management practices, even writing...it gets to a point where your help doesn't help: you want to explain something, but you start speaking in jargon other people don't have the background to follow.
When I'm awake, I guess, I'm okay at small chat. But when I'm tired? The first four things I think of seem to always relate to one of my narrow fringe interests.
I dunno. I'm probably just tired. In fact, I'm exhausted. Got four hours of sleep last night when I needed 10. Ack.
Better post tomorrow, I promise.
But seriously, Kawada/Misawa is the most perfect thing I've ever witnessed. Consolidate your image of my now, friend!
P.S. Number 2 is Oscar Wilde's behavior in court when he was tried and convicted for engaging in sexual acts with a male minor. If you can read any one thing in your life, when you're totally miserable and want to laugh AT the world rather than with it, read it sometime.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Of Growth - An Introduction
I woke up today, in my own room, woke up at my on leisure, took a shower, started my laundry, cooked some rice, ate half the pot, came to the coffeehouse, checked my Fantasy Football team, listened to the Garion vol. 2 in my headphones and logged onto my Blog.
Lately, I've felt like I'm in control of my life. A fiction among many fiction: tomorrow, North Korea could go to war with the South, and two of my best friends in the world would be on the border of bloody, horrible conflict. The price of the rice I buy might go up, MC Meta and Nachal could be enlisted into the service, the dollar inflated and the cost of my coffee rise as a result, California's water shortage could lead to rations and the fact our drier requires three hours to undampen a full load would lead to shorter showers.
But yet, I feel like I am in control of my life. I have my health in line better than it has been my entire adult life, especially physical, but also mentally and socially. I don't NEED people like I used to in my youth. I'm don't just enjoy writing, better, I am content with the action of it.
So, I was bumping Epik High Vol. 4 Disc 2 track 15 ("Fly" Remix) and I thought to myself, when did it all click? When did life get so much better than it was, when a good day was a special event, when contentment was a sour word...to where my bad days now are events, and thoroughly good days are the norm?
The answer is, it didn't really click at all. It's been, and still is, a continuous series of transition periods and habit reformations over the last two years that have allowed everything to come into place.
It started by denying myself the negative habits that had been part and parcel of my self-destructive tendencies. Quitting soda and replacing it with unsweetened herbal ice tea really was the beginning of everything. I realized soda was only serving one positive purpose: it kept me awake when I was tired with a mild caffeine boost. Other than that, it packed on extra, useless calories, killed my metabolism, and made me feel bloated...
After two weeks of quitting, and feeling better about the whole deal, I remembered Doug Rice's words, that he used for sentences in a short story, but that I transposed into life:
Everything in your life should be doing more than one thing for you.
So I started cutting back. I quit fast food for a two month period. I quit alcohol for eight months. I disconnected myself from those things that enabled more bad behaviors than good behaviors. I had to strip myself to bare materials so I could build on a new foundation.
And quite often, their were slips. I would fall into terrible moods for no reason. I would strongly desire to be like a person in ways I couldn't yet be: strong like my friend Joe, as easy with life as Chieng, as dutiful as Ken, as motivated as Autumn, as passionate as Inga, as brilliant as Kalan, as honest and sweet as Mark and Sarah Lanning have been with each other...this was not jealousy, but rather, my recognition that I was falling short of a ceiling, a ceiling external to my self.
But I wasn't there yet. And, quite often, these are the bar-setters, ideals; to aim for one would be to turn my energy into disarray, to make my growth inorganic. And frankly, experience, and the comfort with oneself necessary to properly contextualize these experiences, was going to take time.
So everytime i got anxious, that I saw myself not where I wanted to be, I reminded myself of a poem I read for my Prosody Final Paper...
In life, we may fly on a plane, and travel 3,000 miles in six hours, but in reality...how many steps did we actually take? How much did we actually travel, the sounds of children, the peanuts, the lunch? Six hours of life is all we lived, even as the world passed by below us.
We are human, and life is lived one step at a time. Be patient. Growth happens one step at a time.
The last six months has really seen me building on a foundation Stan Harms, my Precalculus teacher at Folsom High who re-instilled confidence into my academic endeavors. He once pulled me aside after one class one day as I was walking out the door, after everyone had left for sixth period.
"Big Boy," he said, "The only thing that matters in life is accomplishments."
When I had figured out what habits I had been using to enable my self-destructive moods, I was able to not just complete tasks, but, I can say, for the first time in my life, garner a real sense of accomplishment in what I do.
Completing tasks and accomplishing them are two completely different things, and achieving is a third...that's the lesson I learned the hard way. Completion occurs when an action is ended and the job done. In college, I completed assignments, often with vigor, resolve, and a mania bred from an obsessive need, and in doing so, I didn't just complete tasks, I achieved.
But achievement is a third concept, apart from completion and accomplishment. Achievement is inherently an external fulfillment from completing a task.
Accomplishment, what I've found for myself now, is internal gratification from a completed task. It is the satisfaction with my own efforts, without feeling like achieved something FOR the world outside of my reality, and without the cold immorality of completing a task. I know the difference between completing a task that sucks my energy dry, achieving a success by throwing energy for some purpose that enables co-dependence as often as it produces growth, and accomplishing a personal project that produces growth and asserts my autonomy in my own life.
Writing is breath, Doug Rice once told me. Funny thing: I haven't wheezed all winter. It might be the weight loss that's curbed my seasonal asthma. Maybe I finally learned to write for myself. But I know my writing doesn't have the manic energy that powered my prose when I used my assignments to act as a weapon, attempting to coerce me into respecting my effort. I know I'm not chasing the Lacanian object, unachievable, but I know, with my bare materials, I can put in a new kind of energy into my work.
An energy of accomplishment. An energy that utilizes my energy in an efficient, honed, delicately balanced and crafted way.
A sustainable energy, for a sustainable Frank.
Lately, I've felt like I'm in control of my life. A fiction among many fiction: tomorrow, North Korea could go to war with the South, and two of my best friends in the world would be on the border of bloody, horrible conflict. The price of the rice I buy might go up, MC Meta and Nachal could be enlisted into the service, the dollar inflated and the cost of my coffee rise as a result, California's water shortage could lead to rations and the fact our drier requires three hours to undampen a full load would lead to shorter showers.
But yet, I feel like I am in control of my life. I have my health in line better than it has been my entire adult life, especially physical, but also mentally and socially. I don't NEED people like I used to in my youth. I'm don't just enjoy writing, better, I am content with the action of it.
So, I was bumping Epik High Vol. 4 Disc 2 track 15 ("Fly" Remix) and I thought to myself, when did it all click? When did life get so much better than it was, when a good day was a special event, when contentment was a sour word...to where my bad days now are events, and thoroughly good days are the norm?
The answer is, it didn't really click at all. It's been, and still is, a continuous series of transition periods and habit reformations over the last two years that have allowed everything to come into place.
It started by denying myself the negative habits that had been part and parcel of my self-destructive tendencies. Quitting soda and replacing it with unsweetened herbal ice tea really was the beginning of everything. I realized soda was only serving one positive purpose: it kept me awake when I was tired with a mild caffeine boost. Other than that, it packed on extra, useless calories, killed my metabolism, and made me feel bloated...
After two weeks of quitting, and feeling better about the whole deal, I remembered Doug Rice's words, that he used for sentences in a short story, but that I transposed into life:
Everything in your life should be doing more than one thing for you.
So I started cutting back. I quit fast food for a two month period. I quit alcohol for eight months. I disconnected myself from those things that enabled more bad behaviors than good behaviors. I had to strip myself to bare materials so I could build on a new foundation.
And quite often, their were slips. I would fall into terrible moods for no reason. I would strongly desire to be like a person in ways I couldn't yet be: strong like my friend Joe, as easy with life as Chieng, as dutiful as Ken, as motivated as Autumn, as passionate as Inga, as brilliant as Kalan, as honest and sweet as Mark and Sarah Lanning have been with each other...this was not jealousy, but rather, my recognition that I was falling short of a ceiling, a ceiling external to my self.
But I wasn't there yet. And, quite often, these are the bar-setters, ideals; to aim for one would be to turn my energy into disarray, to make my growth inorganic. And frankly, experience, and the comfort with oneself necessary to properly contextualize these experiences, was going to take time.
So everytime i got anxious, that I saw myself not where I wanted to be, I reminded myself of a poem I read for my Prosody Final Paper...
In life, we may fly on a plane, and travel 3,000 miles in six hours, but in reality...how many steps did we actually take? How much did we actually travel, the sounds of children, the peanuts, the lunch? Six hours of life is all we lived, even as the world passed by below us.
We are human, and life is lived one step at a time. Be patient. Growth happens one step at a time.
The last six months has really seen me building on a foundation Stan Harms, my Precalculus teacher at Folsom High who re-instilled confidence into my academic endeavors. He once pulled me aside after one class one day as I was walking out the door, after everyone had left for sixth period.
"Big Boy," he said, "The only thing that matters in life is accomplishments."
When I had figured out what habits I had been using to enable my self-destructive moods, I was able to not just complete tasks, but, I can say, for the first time in my life, garner a real sense of accomplishment in what I do.
Completing tasks and accomplishing them are two completely different things, and achieving is a third...that's the lesson I learned the hard way. Completion occurs when an action is ended and the job done. In college, I completed assignments, often with vigor, resolve, and a mania bred from an obsessive need, and in doing so, I didn't just complete tasks, I achieved.
But achievement is a third concept, apart from completion and accomplishment. Achievement is inherently an external fulfillment from completing a task.
Accomplishment, what I've found for myself now, is internal gratification from a completed task. It is the satisfaction with my own efforts, without feeling like achieved something FOR the world outside of my reality, and without the cold immorality of completing a task. I know the difference between completing a task that sucks my energy dry, achieving a success by throwing energy for some purpose that enables co-dependence as often as it produces growth, and accomplishing a personal project that produces growth and asserts my autonomy in my own life.
Writing is breath, Doug Rice once told me. Funny thing: I haven't wheezed all winter. It might be the weight loss that's curbed my seasonal asthma. Maybe I finally learned to write for myself. But I know my writing doesn't have the manic energy that powered my prose when I used my assignments to act as a weapon, attempting to coerce me into respecting my effort. I know I'm not chasing the Lacanian object, unachievable, but I know, with my bare materials, I can put in a new kind of energy into my work.
An energy of accomplishment. An energy that utilizes my energy in an efficient, honed, delicately balanced and crafted way.
A sustainable energy, for a sustainable Frank.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Origin Story of a Lucky coin
It's tough right now to stick to the daily post goal I set for myself: our router's down at the house, so I have to go to a coffee shop to make these things happen. But you just got to push through the difficulty, get a double hammerhead at Midtown (Thanks Gayle!) and take a corner of the couch for yourself. And the fact it's half off ain't a bad deal.
Don't worry, CP. After doing a cost analysis of a cup, a coffee and a double shot of espresso, you still make money on my staffed beverage.
Anyways, I got a silver dollar in my venue tip yesterday...an old school one. One of the burly brutes that could be used for pre-kickoff festivities in the NFL. After AJ offered me the silver dollar from the tip jar, I donated the rest of my tips to her cause, not just because I had gotten 55 the shift before, but because I figured the minimal sacrifice of 5 dollars was worth it to add some stank to the coin's karma.
This is a true prize, and organically dropped in my lap. Going to the bank and asking for it would cheapen the experience of getting one of these bad boys first hand...especially with how the night went...it had a hint of the whimsical that made my sleep deprived actions seem to carry the weight of my new prize.
When I'm not acting as a barista for Naked Coffee, I'm the "sound guy" at the venue. In reality, I work a modest, but effective board, work the door, manage the event venue space, and keep things in general orderly and clean. I'm a noise and space custodian: I make sure there's no feedback in the speakers or the crowd.
One of the things I make sure to do before every shift is research the bands. I check out the schedule, bust out my netbook (best 300 bucks I ever spent,) and start google searching for, most often, myspace pages. Of the three different bands that had been listed to play, only one of them has a website of any kind.
The Capp Street Girls. Okay. Rock and roll, loud, 80s rock and roll. Alright. And they're all middle aged dudes from SF. Okay.
Checking the comments to see if they promoted the show, I then find out their lead singer had died five days before. He was nicknamed "Air Time Richie."
Whoa. So I call Inga, let her know that, hey, if the show gets canceled, I know why, and I let her know I'll hit her up as the night progresses.
Camporia, a replacement duo, comes in an hour early at 7:30 for a sound check, and I'm like: alright, there's a show, but it's gonna be last second replacements with no website to promote. The headliner is gone. Expect the usual crowd of, I don't know, 10 people at most. Usually, these shows don't do well...we've only been a music space for a year, and it's usually 3 years before you get any kind of a steady crowd who will walk into your shows just to see what it is.
So I'm surprised to see an old guard of KSSU and the Shennanigoats' long time drummer Scott there as part of The Meantime, the one of three bands scheduled to play. I know they'll draw a crowd. Okay. 25 people or so: solid show for our intimate space.
But there were more. They came for Scott, they came to see Nick and Nick of Camporia play, they came for Andy, the guy who brought The Meantime together so he could his songs played with a full band for the first time ever, and they came for The Kelps.
If you ever, EVER, get a chance to see The Kelps, and you like loud punk styled rock, you must see them. They brought friends, they rocked the place out, and, from what had looked like a canceled night, we had the fullest show I've ever been a part of. And it was chill. I had one douchy moment from an otherwise amiable dude (he thought I dumped a half full beer...there might have been five drops of backwash left.) but the packed house was happy to move into the rows, drink coffee, or beer, and watch the show. The bass player for The Kelps had his amp go out, and Scott got him a replacement. They raked in a sweet door, and AJ got some good tips. I got to see Scott, and his old Shennanigoat bassist buddy, Jim, and really felt I ran the place comfortably all night...I found my zen. It might have been because I worked 10 hours, because I only ate one meal, because I spent my break blogging and thus reduced myself to a relative dream state...but it felt magical.
A horrifying situation for a family out in the bay led to a crazy, improbable night, blowing up a Downtown Venue in Sacramento.
And I got my lucky coin.
So if you see me flipping a silver dollar, and its girth and heft is such that there's a doppler effect in the pitch difference between the end of the coin facing you and the one facing me, you will know where he came from.
He? Yeah, of course he has a name. Air Time Richie.
Don't worry, CP. After doing a cost analysis of a cup, a coffee and a double shot of espresso, you still make money on my staffed beverage.
Anyways, I got a silver dollar in my venue tip yesterday...an old school one. One of the burly brutes that could be used for pre-kickoff festivities in the NFL. After AJ offered me the silver dollar from the tip jar, I donated the rest of my tips to her cause, not just because I had gotten 55 the shift before, but because I figured the minimal sacrifice of 5 dollars was worth it to add some stank to the coin's karma.
This is a true prize, and organically dropped in my lap. Going to the bank and asking for it would cheapen the experience of getting one of these bad boys first hand...especially with how the night went...it had a hint of the whimsical that made my sleep deprived actions seem to carry the weight of my new prize.
When I'm not acting as a barista for Naked Coffee, I'm the "sound guy" at the venue. In reality, I work a modest, but effective board, work the door, manage the event venue space, and keep things in general orderly and clean. I'm a noise and space custodian: I make sure there's no feedback in the speakers or the crowd.
One of the things I make sure to do before every shift is research the bands. I check out the schedule, bust out my netbook (best 300 bucks I ever spent,) and start google searching for, most often, myspace pages. Of the three different bands that had been listed to play, only one of them has a website of any kind.
The Capp Street Girls. Okay. Rock and roll, loud, 80s rock and roll. Alright. And they're all middle aged dudes from SF. Okay.
Checking the comments to see if they promoted the show, I then find out their lead singer had died five days before. He was nicknamed "Air Time Richie."
Whoa. So I call Inga, let her know that, hey, if the show gets canceled, I know why, and I let her know I'll hit her up as the night progresses.
Camporia, a replacement duo, comes in an hour early at 7:30 for a sound check, and I'm like: alright, there's a show, but it's gonna be last second replacements with no website to promote. The headliner is gone. Expect the usual crowd of, I don't know, 10 people at most. Usually, these shows don't do well...we've only been a music space for a year, and it's usually 3 years before you get any kind of a steady crowd who will walk into your shows just to see what it is.
So I'm surprised to see an old guard of KSSU and the Shennanigoats' long time drummer Scott there as part of The Meantime, the one of three bands scheduled to play. I know they'll draw a crowd. Okay. 25 people or so: solid show for our intimate space.
But there were more. They came for Scott, they came to see Nick and Nick of Camporia play, they came for Andy, the guy who brought The Meantime together so he could his songs played with a full band for the first time ever, and they came for The Kelps.
If you ever, EVER, get a chance to see The Kelps, and you like loud punk styled rock, you must see them. They brought friends, they rocked the place out, and, from what had looked like a canceled night, we had the fullest show I've ever been a part of. And it was chill. I had one douchy moment from an otherwise amiable dude (he thought I dumped a half full beer...there might have been five drops of backwash left.) but the packed house was happy to move into the rows, drink coffee, or beer, and watch the show. The bass player for The Kelps had his amp go out, and Scott got him a replacement. They raked in a sweet door, and AJ got some good tips. I got to see Scott, and his old Shennanigoat bassist buddy, Jim, and really felt I ran the place comfortably all night...I found my zen. It might have been because I worked 10 hours, because I only ate one meal, because I spent my break blogging and thus reduced myself to a relative dream state...but it felt magical.
A horrifying situation for a family out in the bay led to a crazy, improbable night, blowing up a Downtown Venue in Sacramento.
And I got my lucky coin.
So if you see me flipping a silver dollar, and its girth and heft is such that there's a doppler effect in the pitch difference between the end of the coin facing you and the one facing me, you will know where he came from.
He? Yeah, of course he has a name. Air Time Richie.
Friday, November 26, 2010
Done with a mid shift, two hour break before closing...
I said I would update daily, so I'm sticking to my guns, despite the fact I'm on break during my double.
I just wrote "so I'm stick to my guns" and just caught it, so that should tell you my current state of mind.
Anyways, my Thanksgiving was pretty fantastic, as you can see from my previous post. I felt really rejuvenated today, and I was really happy to share my joy with all the people pouring in from Black Friday. I talked about playing tackle with my nephew, reading Curious George to him, the good times, and I got to hear what other folks did.
All in all, I just took in over 55 bucks in tips. Pretty darn solid Black Friday to me: and I didn't even ave to stand in any lines.
Now I work a venue, where I get to take people's dough, check their IDs, work the soundboard and be the vertex of multiple lines...if the show's busy, which I hope it is.
Hope you guys didn't get lost in Wal-Mart, or wondered into an abandoned Montgomery Ward's...egh.
My own personal Hell is being trapped in Montgomery Ward's for eternity, forced to stare at blank walls, with no where to sit in the entire store, forever Sunday afternoon after 3 hours at Church.
I guess that would be an irony: in Hell, it's always Sunday. I'll do better with that when I get some rest...maybe Sunday?
More irony?
-Frank
I just wrote "so I'm stick to my guns" and just caught it, so that should tell you my current state of mind.
Anyways, my Thanksgiving was pretty fantastic, as you can see from my previous post. I felt really rejuvenated today, and I was really happy to share my joy with all the people pouring in from Black Friday. I talked about playing tackle with my nephew, reading Curious George to him, the good times, and I got to hear what other folks did.
All in all, I just took in over 55 bucks in tips. Pretty darn solid Black Friday to me: and I didn't even ave to stand in any lines.
Now I work a venue, where I get to take people's dough, check their IDs, work the soundboard and be the vertex of multiple lines...if the show's busy, which I hope it is.
Hope you guys didn't get lost in Wal-Mart, or wondered into an abandoned Montgomery Ward's...egh.
My own personal Hell is being trapped in Montgomery Ward's for eternity, forced to stare at blank walls, with no where to sit in the entire store, forever Sunday afternoon after 3 hours at Church.
I guess that would be an irony: in Hell, it's always Sunday. I'll do better with that when I get some rest...maybe Sunday?
More irony?
-Frank
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Thanksgiving
The world got simpler today, for a few hours, and I am thankful for it.
Love is a simple thing, really. All the justifications and ramifications of our actions, the trials of everyday and the coping mechanisms and the suspension of disbelief and the power of belief are all various dressings which are applied unconsciously, freely, when interacted with people connected by blood, and time, and kinship.
The amplitude involved in understanding each other completely within the well tread routine of facial expressions reaches an asymptote where all there is is comfort.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, often, our conversations day to day are highly skewed by our mood. But when you see people you know well that you haven't seen for quite a while...mood has less of an impact than the familiarity of past interactions, gives way to a sort of watermarked nostalgia embedded into the way we communicate with old friends.
Yesterday night, I hosted a poker game with some folks I hadn't seen for a month or more. Ken had helped me moved a month ago, the Kevins and Steve I last saw...a couple months ago? They met at my place for a poker game, along with Alex Davis and Tanner Bright, co-workers and the latter being my roommate, and everything just seemed to fall into sync.
Ken, Murph and I set the tone early with easy talk and jokes, and everyone was able to fall in line with the discussion and get lost in the easiness we took the barbs. Even with the newer faces, it all felt natural, and for a while I forgot everything else in the world. The only burden was whether to raise or call or fold, and it wasn't a very heavy one.
Tonight, Thanksgiving, started with reading to my nephew, asking him questions about is well-worn Curious George book, trading tutoring stories with Barbetta's teaching conundrums, helping Jennifer whenever I could and talking e-wrestling with my brother Nick. Even when politics and work and business came up, I felt so at ease...the conversation would go where I knew it would, with a few surprises where everyone had learned, deepened their knowledge sources, where time and experience had wizened with context their insights.
Then, reading Jeff Normann's latest works, my great friend appears to become as great of a writer. I feel his voice in his writing, more than it has ever come across before, and it all reminds me of our late night/early morning talking over coffee the day he left Sacramento on his last vacation from Korea. He was there beside me again, telling me his thoughts about the culture shock, his perspective on the connections between the world's of the east and west, their perilous sense of work ethic, self-destructive obedience, and there, there in his writing he was with me again...but deeper. He shows me his world without preaching, his images are stark and tangible...I breathe in his conversation and forget myself inside his prose, like I did with Patrick Rothfuss, and, occasionally, George R.R. Martin (usually during Tyrion and Dany's scenes.)
Interacting with those you know best is like re-reading your favorite book in that every time you come back to the work, your increased experience and breadth of understanding allows you to find new things in the people you know best...and appreciate them more. Even more so, because they too are learning, and your shared amplitude is so great, you can walk alongside their energy, run with them as they run with you, and realize in that movement that all those adornments we live for day to day are just dressing, icing: if you ever felt incomplete, or lost, these moments remind you of your velocity.
I am going somewhere. I am moving forward even as the seasons cycle as do my relationships. This is not John Barth's mobius strip...yes, there are loops on the roller coaster, but it is not an ouroboros: it's a Sonic the Hedgehog level, and these moments amongst our closest friends and family are the accelerator panels that scream us into a blue haze across the scape of our imagination, our imagination the filter of our future, for what we believe is the scope of our vision, our bubble, which expands quickest, and best, when shown a path by those closest to us, that have access to our hearts, to inspire the soul with the synapses' rhetoric: our neurological pathways are worn to folds over time, and it is these we are closest to that saunter the treads of our life's crossing.
I am blessed by my friends, my family, those who I am coming to know and those I have long known.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Love is a simple thing, really. All the justifications and ramifications of our actions, the trials of everyday and the coping mechanisms and the suspension of disbelief and the power of belief are all various dressings which are applied unconsciously, freely, when interacted with people connected by blood, and time, and kinship.
The amplitude involved in understanding each other completely within the well tread routine of facial expressions reaches an asymptote where all there is is comfort.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, often, our conversations day to day are highly skewed by our mood. But when you see people you know well that you haven't seen for quite a while...mood has less of an impact than the familiarity of past interactions, gives way to a sort of watermarked nostalgia embedded into the way we communicate with old friends.
Yesterday night, I hosted a poker game with some folks I hadn't seen for a month or more. Ken had helped me moved a month ago, the Kevins and Steve I last saw...a couple months ago? They met at my place for a poker game, along with Alex Davis and Tanner Bright, co-workers and the latter being my roommate, and everything just seemed to fall into sync.
Ken, Murph and I set the tone early with easy talk and jokes, and everyone was able to fall in line with the discussion and get lost in the easiness we took the barbs. Even with the newer faces, it all felt natural, and for a while I forgot everything else in the world. The only burden was whether to raise or call or fold, and it wasn't a very heavy one.
Tonight, Thanksgiving, started with reading to my nephew, asking him questions about is well-worn Curious George book, trading tutoring stories with Barbetta's teaching conundrums, helping Jennifer whenever I could and talking e-wrestling with my brother Nick. Even when politics and work and business came up, I felt so at ease...the conversation would go where I knew it would, with a few surprises where everyone had learned, deepened their knowledge sources, where time and experience had wizened with context their insights.
Then, reading Jeff Normann's latest works, my great friend appears to become as great of a writer. I feel his voice in his writing, more than it has ever come across before, and it all reminds me of our late night/early morning talking over coffee the day he left Sacramento on his last vacation from Korea. He was there beside me again, telling me his thoughts about the culture shock, his perspective on the connections between the world's of the east and west, their perilous sense of work ethic, self-destructive obedience, and there, there in his writing he was with me again...but deeper. He shows me his world without preaching, his images are stark and tangible...I breathe in his conversation and forget myself inside his prose, like I did with Patrick Rothfuss, and, occasionally, George R.R. Martin (usually during Tyrion and Dany's scenes.)
Interacting with those you know best is like re-reading your favorite book in that every time you come back to the work, your increased experience and breadth of understanding allows you to find new things in the people you know best...and appreciate them more. Even more so, because they too are learning, and your shared amplitude is so great, you can walk alongside their energy, run with them as they run with you, and realize in that movement that all those adornments we live for day to day are just dressing, icing: if you ever felt incomplete, or lost, these moments remind you of your velocity.
I am going somewhere. I am moving forward even as the seasons cycle as do my relationships. This is not John Barth's mobius strip...yes, there are loops on the roller coaster, but it is not an ouroboros: it's a Sonic the Hedgehog level, and these moments amongst our closest friends and family are the accelerator panels that scream us into a blue haze across the scape of our imagination, our imagination the filter of our future, for what we believe is the scope of our vision, our bubble, which expands quickest, and best, when shown a path by those closest to us, that have access to our hearts, to inspire the soul with the synapses' rhetoric: our neurological pathways are worn to folds over time, and it is these we are closest to that saunter the treads of our life's crossing.
I am blessed by my friends, my family, those who I am coming to know and those I have long known.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Tell me, what's the why and wherefore?
I don't know exactly how this blog is going to be formulated.
Will there be short stories? Sure, I'm hoping so.
Will there be random thoughts and musings about the world? It wouldn't be me if there weren't.
Will there be anecdotes, plots to change the world, updates about where my writing is going? Almost certainly.
Doesn't that mean I should create multiple blogs for my various interests? Perhaps, some day, I'll do that, but until then, this will be a one stop-shop for Frank Demola's various pursuits.
Since I have internet at my house now, the plan is to update at least once a day.
See you in cyberspace, folks.
Will there be short stories? Sure, I'm hoping so.
Will there be random thoughts and musings about the world? It wouldn't be me if there weren't.
Will there be anecdotes, plots to change the world, updates about where my writing is going? Almost certainly.
Doesn't that mean I should create multiple blogs for my various interests? Perhaps, some day, I'll do that, but until then, this will be a one stop-shop for Frank Demola's various pursuits.
Since I have internet at my house now, the plan is to update at least once a day.
See you in cyberspace, folks.
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