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Wednesday, July 31, 2002
'an empty shell seems so easy to crack
got all these questions, don't know who i could even ask so i'll just lie alone and wait for the dream where i'm not ugly and you're looking at me and i stay in bed, oh, in a little while i'll see you if just once i could feel love stare back at me but i walked the line when you held me in that night i walked the line when you held my hand that night i walked the line when you held me close that night i paid the price, never held you in real life' - pearl jam i'm feeling musical this week. obviously. Tuesday, July 30, 2002
you know, i'd make this a weekly feature if i were going to be in town for longer than a month...
without further ado, here's the latest atrocity i've stumbled across while reading random blogs. careful, it's full of profundities like "she has some attitude, but what sorority girl doesn't". erm... pot, kettle? for some reason i'm picturing that scene from 'trainspotting' where begbie rolls the knife between his hands, slaps it down on the table, gets up to leave, and says 'okee!' in that odd maniacal tone of his. can i throw a virtual glass at this chick's face?? feeling snarky today. sorry. well, sort of. [wink] Monday, July 29, 2002
oh yeah, i forgot about this rather frightening sight that crossed my path this morning (my belief is that it was headed to the hospital). mind you, the truck i saw was not one of the ones pictured on that site, but one strikingly similar to it - with many pictures of dead babies and slogans proclaiming that abortion is murder and god will strike down those who perform them, etc. ad nauseum. the kickers, though, were the two huge american flags hanging off the front end of the truck off of some type of overhang, positioned so that you can't miss them even if you try. hmmm... so apparently any good american will support the pro-life cause?
i don't take issue with the basic viewpoint, since i happen to share it - i am a bad democrat, because i'm a pro-lifer. it's the one tenet of catholicism i support with any conviction, although i don't go out marching or crusading or anything extreme like that. more likely, if you ask me about it, i'll tell you why i feel the way i do, we'll probably argue for a few minutes, and then life will go on. what i do take issue with is the way this brand of pro-lifer forces their views on anyone with two ears - 'our way is the only way, you have to listen, we'll shove this down your throat and you're going straight to hell if you think otherwise', etc. etc. this is the kind of person the media has branded the fanatic anti-abortionist, and the hundreds of us quiet pro-lifers out there get lumped in with the wackos. sheesh. i guess you could turn it around the other way, too, since i figure there are hundreds of pro-choicers out there who also feel annoyed that they get lumped in with the fanatics. however, you won't catch the media calling them 'anti-lifers', will you? sorry to go off on a tangent there. just when i think i've seen it all, somehow the world finds a way to prove me wrong. now, back to work...
happiness: the court thing has been resolved; all i have to do is pay a measly $30 fine. watch, now the woman will sue, just because she can...
i'm still an idiot, but in a completely different way. 'this is our last goodbye i hate to feel the love between us die but it's over just hear this and then i'll go you gave me more to live for more than you'll ever know this is our last embrace must i dream and always see your face why can't we overcome this wall well, maybe it's just because i didn't know you at all kiss me, please kiss me but kiss me out of desire, babe, and not consolation you know it makes me so angry 'cause i know that in time i'll only make you cry, this is our last goodbye did you say "no, this can't happen to me," and did you rush to the phone to call was there a voice unkind in the back of your mind saying maybe you didn't know him at all you didn't know him at all, oh, you didn't know well, the bells out in the church tower chime burning clues into this heart of mine thinking so hard on her soft eyes and the memories offer signs that it's over... it's over' forgive me. i'm completely out of it [grin] Thursday, July 25, 2002
three completely unrelated things:
1) i find it scary that i can get completely transfixed by the fact that the wall of my living room is made up of moving particles. 2) i find it scary also that i keep getting annoyed and angry at things that are beyond my control, and that lately i've been blowing things way out of proportion. at least that's my take on it. i don't know, i feel things sort of sliding beyond my grasp in a way, and the fact that i can't quite put a finger on it causes me consternation and my mind goes off and creates all these wild and in all probability very unlikely and false scenarios. in sum, i'm retarded. 3) indicator that this court thing could be a giant headache: the friendly state trooper told me at the time of the accident to call the local district court to get a continuance, saying that he had no hand in the situation whatsoever. which is why i was somewhat surprised when i called the court today to get said continuance, and they told me i had to straighten it out with the trooper first and he would report the continuance to them. i don't think this bodes too well for me. i suppose we'll find out tomorrow... sigh. Wednesday, July 24, 2002
like, omg!
i'm sorry, you can't tell me that they're not all alike, with the exceptions of lexye, melissa [not mel-melissa - i mean coworker melissa], and shelley. see, i can be a hypocrite too! so... today. today was a challenging day - i learned full well how life can go from great! to shit! and back again! in a mere few hours. the day started off well - i had pop tarts for breakfast, i was toolin' along in a great bus, when for some reason an evil confluence of forces made it so that i ended up rear-ending a [mean, somewhat bitchy, caffeinated, in-a-big-hurry] woman with my bus today. she was fine, i was fine, damage was minimal, but i felt like such a giant ass. giant giant giant ass. well, at least now i can say i know what it feels like to smoosh into a car, even though it was without malicious intent. stupid soft brakes! the best thing about this is that i have a court date for it in september - when i'll be long gone. nine-month-continuance, here i come! happily, things got better after that, and speaking of being long gone, i finally have my plane ticket to russia! thanks to a good confluence of forces, i was able to get a steal of a deal. i'm leaving on august 27 and arriving in petersburg on august 28. finally, it looks like things are falling into place a little bit more. 'of a sound of light melody/is the soul to love' - moby Sunday, July 21, 2002
good god. some people need a life.
of course, some people also need a reality check... opening weekend went without any major disasters, thankfully - last night's champagne was well-deserved, IMO. hooray! Wednesday, July 17, 2002
more of the great outdoors... as hot as it was, emory and i saw it perfectly sane to go hiking this afternoon at mint springs. the ascent was steep, the descent was ankle-turning hell, but in between were some fantastic views and many a raspberry bush. oh, and did i mention ticks? gotta love 'em! the trails were easy, and the roundtrip took no more than 90 minutes - a hike i wouldn't mind doing in the fall, were i to be around.
but, on to today's big news (heh): whilst rummaging around my tape box, i stumbled upon my long-lost copy of this masterpiece. you bet your sweet sexy ass i took it right out to my car for a spin. man, tongue-in-cheek cock rock never sounded so good! Tuesday, July 16, 2002
ah-hah! i have overcome the problem! rejoicing abounds! my idle hands are amused once more!
so, if tonight's tech goes as badly as last night's did... friday could be an amusing night. by 'amusing' i probably mean 'awful', but if all else fails, at least i have a partner in consuming zebra cakes. hee! in case you want in on the craziness, check out the schedule for showtimes. look for 'kiss me nate', and pick your poison. you've been warned... Sunday, July 14, 2002
my god.
to revisit the age-old question from 'crime & punishment': is it a sin to kill someone if they have no redeeming value and will not be missed by anyone whatsoever? i fail to comprehend how one person can so lack brain cells. i'm past the point of patience; it's fucking war from here on out. all three of you who might read this regularly [and i'm prolly overestimating that by two people] know to whom i refer - i don't pray often, but lord, give me strength. aaaaaaugh. speaking of being past patience, blogger's decided it won't load my template. being the stubborn one i am, i'm not going to change it, so it could be a while before this post ever shows up. fuckers. Friday, July 12, 2002
ahhh... a sublime day. i got to sleep in heinously late, i showered with a fresh-out-of-the-box bar of soap, i had a relatively good day at work [well, as good as one can have on the miserable sack of crap and squeaking axles that calls itself unit 34], dinner was simple yet luxurious, the weather was amazing - no warmer than 75 degrees all day and it's actually a bit cold now! - i saw "amelie" again, and i've just finished some ben & jerry's nutty waffle cone ice cream. oh, and this is probably only funny to me, but i had the pleasure of seeing olev drunk at harris teeter and buying [surprise!] more beer. on days like this, it's marvelous to be alive. Wednesday, July 10, 2002
part two:
what else is wrong? entitlement, racism, and education. melissa made a strong impression on me with her point that everyone thinks they're entitled to something - be it a lawsuit, a hot meal in three minutes, the right not to have their kids be forced to utter the word 'god' in school, what have you - and nine times out of ten, this is not the case. the more i think about it, the more it makes sense. for some reason, we've been raising ourselves to think that we deserve everything that we want. in my mind, 'no' is the most underused word in our lexicon today. example: little timmy's screaming at the grocery store because he wants a toy, but instead of saying 'no' and moving on, mom gets him the toy to shut him up because she doesn't want to create a scene. jesus, if people only realized that a few minutes of embarrassment could save years of stupidity and pain later on in life. if this continues, timmy's going to grow up and think that every time something doesn't go to his satisfaction, he can just whine and wheedle his way into getting what he wants, instead of sucking it up and finding either a way to deal, or another way of obtaining that which he desires. but no, he'll turn into the psychotic woman with whom i recently shared space at a waffle house who was so miffed at having to wait more than 10 minutes for service when it was horribly busy and the understaffed help was already busting their asses to get everyone served that she saw fit to scream at both the cooks and the managers that she was going to do some serious damage if she didn'tget served right away. she caused such an uncomfortable scene that half the place cleared out by the time she threatened to physically hurt the manager. my god. would it kill anyone to wait a little bit, have a little bit of empathy, find something else to do to pass the time? i don't understand where people get off thinking that the world owes them something. no no no. you owe it to the people that raised you and presumably taught you how to get by to do something for someone else at some point in your life. racism and education: i still fail to understand how it is that assholes get away with judging, discriminating, and making policy on the basis of skin color or ethnic origin. i realize that this has been going on for as long as people figured out that they didn't look the same, but i cannot fathom why we continue to perpetuate it, in both our daily social and educational systems. this is a huge, sore issue for me and i've ranted this particular rant many times before, so i'll try to condense it a little. last month i was reading a book called 'the bell curve debate' that was basically a collection of criticisms of the book by the same name, 'the bell curve', whose basic contention is that intelligence can be distributed on a bell-shaped curve, with the polar extremes of intelligence (stupid and genius at either end) dwarfed by the average middle, or the bell itself. according to this book, blacks' genetic inferiority explained why their intelligence was so much lower than whites'; basically, blacks are born dumb and can't ever hope to escape that label because they're evolving at such a slower rate than their vastly more intelligent white counterparts. [never mind that the criteria and datacollection for these statements were often arbitrary and misleading] don't know about you, but this is one of the more audacious things i've ever heard anyone of claimed intelligence say, and i couldn't finish the book because i simply couldn't read any more about why all this is inaccurate [it didn't take much to convince me anyways]. it's shit like this that makes me sick - why, why, why is it ok to perpetuate this kind of thinking? whatever happened to 'all men are created equal' and america, the land of equal opportunity? are white people so desperate to get ahead that they've forgotten these now seemingly trite expressions in which our founders believed? that's said tongue in cheek, of course, since this country was founded at the hands of white aristocrats and has been run by them ever since. ok, so if someone's a little slower than another person - then give them the extra time they need tocatch on. divert funds from military projects to our educational system to pay for the extra teachers and time this is going to take. the sooner in a child's educational life we start evening out the playing field, the easier it might be for the disadvantaged and discriminated-against to catch up. i realize that where you're born so often dictates how much you learn and where you end up, but istill think that's crap. everyone who wants to progress should have a chance to, regardless of who they are or where they came from. i realize that that sort of strayed away from my original point as to what's wrong with this country, but i do still strongly feel that our kids are being brought up to believe in all the wrong things - instant gratification, entitlement, pop stars, and money over matter. it saddens me to learn that many adults can't locate all 50 states on the map, don't know where estonia and malaysia are, can't nametheir state senators, and know more about the cast of 'survivor' than the current president and cabinet. what kind of example does that set, when pop culture takes precedence over education about our nation, our history, and the world around us? we're so caught up in faceless communication and consumerism and boasting about our problems and looking our best that we've forgotten how tobe civil, and patient, and empathic, and open, and true to ourselves and each other. america is one big fake delusion, and i'm tired of it. and yes, i am doing something about it - i'm living in russia for a year. some call me crazy for wanting to go someplace where democracy's in its sometimes shaky infancy, where the media and speech are explicitly controlled by big business, and the quality of life isn't quite up to par with that of the west. i contend that it would do me good to spend time in a place where [to me] people aren't so concerned with trite, everyday details, there's a tangible, admirable national spirit that doesn't drive people into the ground on a daily basis, and life may be 'simpler' in a grand sense - so what? maybe simplicity is what i'm after, and i don't think that's a bad thing. just because it's different over there doesn't mean it's bad. increasingly i feel that i can no longer live in american society without wanting to harm someone on a daily basis - my place may not be in russia, but i've got to start somewhere other than here. whew. conclude rant here.
"feel no shame for what you are" - jeff buckley
so. here it is, in its uncensored glory. The Rant (tm), part 1. let me start by saying this: i like democracy. i love the idea of free speech, even if it isn't always evenly applied to everyone. i am amused by our often bumbling and corrupt political and electoral systems. i am also amused by fluctuating gas prices, foreign policy, and our tireless ability to complain about things without actually wanting to help change that which we don't like. that said, though, i've been having this creeping feeling, much more strongly since [oh no, here it is!] september 11, that there are so many more things wrong than right with america. in fact, i'm almost ashamed to profess my country of origin when i go abroad. why? let's see: my biggest beef right now: hasty patriotism. droves of people either bought american flags for their houses, cars, pets' collars, lawnmowers, backpacks, you name it, or rushed out to sign up for the army as soon as it was tragically brought to our immediate attention that we were caught dead asleep at the international wheel. all of a sudden, everyone loves the country, the government and the president can do no wrong, and gosh darn if they're gonna keep us down and prevent us from living our lives. we want the rights to barbecue, to see airshows, to bring pocket knives on planes, and even more than before, discriminate against and/or immediately penalize anyone who either looks foreign or suspicious. i'm sorry, but this posturing makes me ill. being victims of a terrorist attack has not drawn this country any closer together, in my opinion. we're going on with our 'normal' lives, but in all the wrong ways: we're still rude, boorish, inanely opinionated, stupid, imperialistic, and we still have this false sense of security that a) they'll never do this to us again and b) well, in case they do, the government will surely be there to protect us. nope. we got caught with our pants down, dropped way around our ankles, and we'd be deluded and plain fucking stupid to think that we've got anything covered. i don't know how i feel about the media telling us that we can't handle bioterrorist attacks, or warning us about possible dirty bombs, or that the government knew about the 11th beforehand - i don't know how much i trust the media for much other than sports reporting and ann landers - but if half of what they say is true, we're completely taking away the wrong lessons from this. september 11 was an attack on our way of life as a people, and it was precisely the kick in the ass this country needed. please note, in no way am i condoning the attacks at all - to make a long story short, i've felt that america needed something like this for a long time coming, but i truly, deeply wish it could have happened some other way, as in a renaissance-like cultural rebirth. however, i can't change the past, and it seems to me that we're getting up and running in the wrong direction. instead of looking at ourselves and asking, 'you know, maybe they did have a point and we should step back and see if there's a couple of things we could do differently', we've stomped our feet into the ground and whined that they shouldn't try to preach to us about our way of life because we're america and no one beats us, much less tells us the ugly truth. however, to me the problem is that the two ways of living are so fundamentally different that it seems impossible for the two to coexist - we just turn our backs and ignore them because they live in the desert, while they have no choice but to resort to violence because we won't listen to them otherwise (it's a never-ending circle of stupidity). i fail to see the harm in just listening for once - you don't have to agree with everything, but it wouldn't kill anyone to just listen.
rick's hair is now straw white. not blond, but white. as chris put it, he looks like johnny quest. um... way to go?
so, films: "sum of all fears" first. sometimes intense, mostly well-written; i highly enjoyed seeing baltimore get blown to bits [not because i dislike the town - i'm fond of baltimore, but for some reason seeing a place close to home become smithereens was funny] and ben affleck wasn't too bad as jack ryan, but the ending - ack, way way way too neat for my tastes. i don't know how much i can praise a film where all the bad guys get [predictably] taken care of and the hero and his love interest of less than a week are engaged by credits time. better was "ocean's eleven", which i just now saw. i must say, steven soderbergh is quickly becoming one of my favorite directors; this one was clever, engaging, amusing, and, dare i say, stylish. it was the exact film that 1999's "rounders" wants to be, even though "rounders" didn't know that at that particular point in time. it's kind of like "rounders" meets "snatch", except you can understand everything that's being said. heh. happy thing: "amelie" is playing at the $2 theater downtown. yay! Monday, July 08, 2002
so, last week i got my hair cut, starred in my own private version of 'sliding doors', and was an unfortunate bystander to celine dion [who's a canadian, for those not in the know] singing 'god bless america' over nyc's fireworks on the 4th. anyone else see anything slightly wrong with that?
more's coming later; except for that accountant rant, which has sort of been turned into the Next Big Rant. soooon. until then, read this and this, because i said so. =) this isn't to say that i swear by the washington post, but it is the major newspaper that i read daily and seven and a quarter times out of ten, it prints stuff i agree with. the above are two excellent examples. anyways, off to celebrate kim's 21st. w00t! Tuesday, July 02, 2002
the link i tried to post below got fucked up, so i deleted it. instead, try this.
the rant about this is coming soon, too. by 'soon' i probably mean early next week, so don't hold your breath.
"there's no leaving here/ask, i'm an ear" - pearl jam
so... so. i write this entry in physical pain, as today i've bruised my bum and managed to fry my skin to an appropriate shade of crimson. anyways, my weekend with melissa was sunday: laaaaazy day of sleeeeeeep. monday: leave baltimore early in the morning and go trail riding with emily. here's where i got the sunburn and sore bum, since i was riding a generously sized morgan mare [she's the double-wide in this trailer park of equine flesh] at speeds no faster than a bouncy trot. in a tank top, with no sunscreen on and a heat index in the triple digits. i'm smart, no? that accountant rant is forthcoming, but my broiled skin and i need some sleep. perhaps tomorrow. oh, and i got friday off. w00t! |
