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Burned Out not a Burnout

I might be bored. I might be lazy. I could be frustrated or befuddled. Mostly, I think I might be burned out (and so young; I know).

But I’m hoping in this case for the specific. I’m hoping I mean the status quo. I’m hoping, because homeostasis is boring although the animal’s body seems to like it. I’ve been hanging out a couple of new places… Builder. Monster. List. They’re not that fun… not as fun as Hostel. But Hostel is getting old. I’m young; I said so myself. It’s my imperative to have more ambition than resources. The only ones I need anyways are my wits (not wit — even though having Woody Allen and Winston Churchill in one’s back pocket can come in handy).

Here’s what I’m trying to say: I want to quit working here, at this place that I love, sooner rather than later. Simple enough.

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Womb with a View

Home. Returning home. I want to return home.

That was me, four days ago. I’m back. I’ve returned from returning. I got stuff. New undies (manties), some chocolate, some booze, some womper speakers. I got a new book about San Francisco and writing. I got a mind to do a lot of things. One of ’em is to write.

So here I am, writing the wannabe sublime. I wonder how many of my friends and family realize that a blog is not really a window to the subconscious? Glot. Glot glot. Editing is for sissies.

My feeling about the hostel has undergone a shift. I understand why those who live here, live here shortly. It’s a great place. But it’s a place where space has to be constantly claimed and carved out, where one’s status is never in comfortable stasis. Even more so than the ever-arriving travellers, I understand this: one is judged by one’s actions—in the past week. It is exactly the same as when I came here more than three months ago. It should perhaps at this point be pointed out that the point of moving here was to find a job and settle somewhere. I applied to SFSU back awhile ago, but never finished the application… so I never went. Now here I am, living in the city of San Francisco but not quite of it, living in a limbo world where I greet the world’s visitor’s who take in the place in larger doses than I’ve had since too long ago.

Returning home brought me back into a place where my mere presence is appreciated. Being here again is like emerging from the womb again, cold and blinking and more than a little confused. It’s a different view. It’s something I need to think about more.

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Aqua Teen Huhwhat Force

Everyone is telling me about it. The instantaneously infamous Boston Aqua Teen LED Bomb Scare of ’07. No, I haven’t heard about it before. Wow, no really. No, I haven’t been reading “the blogs”. I understand it’s all over the internet. Yes, it’s pretty funny. What you people don’t understand is that although I have a lot of online presence and know a lot about a lot, I am not all over the internets like flies on butter. This may seem an unlikely and unusual state of existence, especially for those that knew me in college. Things change.

Let me explain something: I’m a longtime fan. Aqua Teen is made from distilled awesome. It’s one of the most original, hilarious, and culturally ingenious shows in production today. It’s gets bonus points for confusing the hell out of anyone over a certain age. Then take Homeland Security, which is of course one of the greatest dumb factories in current times. The supercollider built to smash these two together may one day obliterate us all when Jerry Springer is nominated to the Supreme Court. It is, by all contemporary definitions, a super-meme.

I don’t care. I don’t care. Why don’t I care? Lots of good reasons. Although on the internet, I am not of it. In real life I am in fact possessor of a rather convoluted and novel social life. I have come to favor this over previous pastimes—i.e. this computer. And while I’ve neither the time nor impetus to describe the IRL world further, I do feel satisfied asserting it’s existence.

Keep me updated about this bizarre Boston business. I’ll give you that special feeling you get from telling someone who should already know (but doesn’t).

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Free Bike

The best things in life are free? I’d like to agree. Free: friends. Free: bike rides. Free: sore butts.

I rode around the entire northern side of San Francisco today. Don’t ask what inspired me, because inspiration can be depressing. It cleared my head of all that. The pain in my limbs, and in the sudden cramp attack deep in my torso while I watched the sunset on Baker Beach, that clutching muscle-demon I won’t soon forget, was enough to rid me of many woes. Has a way of focusing the mind. Makes me realize a few things…

I’ve been seeking people’s approval too much. Consequentially, my voice has been higher, my words often unnecessary, my intentions confusing even to myself. There’s a balance there (or there should be). You should seek my good graces and I’ll try to find yours too. If I need to get something done it doesn’t matter if I’m gonna be spending 6 hours holed up on my computer to do it—I’m getting it done. It doesn’t matter if I’m not the most social being in the universe if I’m still myself—that’s enough. It doesn’t matter if my blog posts sound like LiveJournal entries—that’s how people keep in touch with me nowadays anyway. I’m free to do any of these things. More free than I thought.

Free things have always been a big draw to me. I’ve never liked paying for things, cause ironically enough it seems to cheapen them. Tiny reminders is the way you keep yourself. Little bike, big town.

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The Nature of Frustration

It’s kind of a tangled ball of string that you have to pluck delicately painstakingly apart; a string that unravels your favorite shirt; a string that trips you in the dark; a string stretched taut between the limits of your patience; the same string scraped by the 10 year-old violinist torturing their parents; it’s a string that makes no sense; a string that defies the reality of the universe.

Much as I’d like to be speaking at length on the failures of string theory in the past 20 years—which I can’t—I’m not. I think instead another list is called for.

Callouts:

  • Planned Parenthood: If you’re gonna try to bill me for things that you said were free, have the balls to call me back. We can have a discussion like civilized people/organizations. Just because you misrepresented information and didn’t ever contact me after my appointment, like the bad one-night stand that I never had, doesn’t mean we can’t be civil. Step off.
  • CSUMB Administration & Records: Please mail my transcripts to me. Please do it now, not when you feel like it. This is important, cause otherwise I don’t go to SF State on the 24th. And you don’t get to continue not stepping off. Step off.
  • S.F.P.D. Meter Maid Task Force: You need to call me back too. And then we can discuss under what circumstances, exactly, free parking isn’t free. Steppoff.
  • My Computer: Houda, you heard me, that was totally uncalled for the other day. Getting unplugged and losing all my work was out of line. You made the list, nowsssstephoff.
  • Email Spammer Using my Domain: I’m just gonna tell you up front, and we’ll keep this simple: you need to DIE. Step off da face of da Urf.

OHthatFEELSgood—out, damned string.

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Balance

Things that are good:

  1. friends
  2. letters
  3. books
  4. food
  5. sex
  6. creativity
  7. maturity
  8. understanding

Things that are not as good (“are bad”):

  1. weather
  2. bills
  3. money
  4. “Breakin’” (1984)
  5. time management
  6. memory

Eight to six. Not bad.

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Flaming Chili Peppers with Sunglasses and Big Grins

That’s the pattern on them, anyways.

Cryptic messages are better. Better than just telling someone. If you just tell them, they’re all “why is this important? how does it affect me?” Now if you don’t tell them, then they’re all going to ask you, beg you to tell them. Cause obviously there’s a good reason you aren’t telling them.

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Cordless! ess-five-ten Logitech

I am so happy that my new keyboard works as intended. This is, like, the most awesome thing that has happened to me all hour. The keys pronounce a pleasant clicking sound with each nimble tap on their scissor-switched little square black forms. And while they are not as sensate-savvy as the infamous Model-M‘s, the relative mechanical feedback is quite satisfactory. Plus, I can appreciate the wrist-rest for what it is—a boon from heaven. Plus, plus, the weight’s a plus. All in all: A+.

 
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Bloody Racists

Damn racists at the blood donation clinic. Discriminating just cause I “turned three shades too white.”

I ain’t ready yet, apparently. I tried, I tried… As soon as they thought I started fainting the deal was off. But, see, that’s the whole point. It is my wholehearted desire to conquer one of my last two irrational fears: needles. I can handle pain. Apparently I can’t handle a rather small needle poking my digit-flesh. And the language of the forms. Oh God, the forms. They gave me extra water and pretzels and sent me packing. Another day, crossed-fingers.

Maybe I’ll go find a clown and scare him. Gotta conquer something.

Give blood
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Birthday Wishes

Starlight, star-bright, first star I see tonight, I wish I may I might… you know the rest.

I didn’t actually get that much for my birthday. Bought myself a wireless keyboard. Walked my dad through getting another year of Flickr (typed in the credit card myself.) What I got was um… kind of a uh… peace-a-mind. A resolve. Something I’ve wanted to do for at least a month now: write everyone in my life who deserves to be written. Oh, and there’s a big list to get to…

  • Aynne Valencia
  • Lynae Straw
  • Meredith Scheff
  • Jenna McKay
  • Donna Fitzgerald
  • Emily Wentz
  • Michael Bandli
  • Lauren Wolfer
  • Josh Nebgen
  • Petr & Zdenka
  • Allegra
  • Ryn
  • Jerome Gagnon-Voyer

And I think that’s it. I’d always like to add more. This year for my birthday I want something from myself [laughter]. I want myself to be the kind of person who fulfills that which I want from myself. This is all very deep, and very cathartic. And I’m glad I went outside with a tape recorder and acted all inspired and talked into it and then came back inside, feet freezing, and transcribed all of it. I might go outside more often.