Being a university student, stuck like a pig in cement mistaken for mud, in the make-believe world of ‘enlightened’ academia and those oh-so-familiar discussions of globalization, the topic of America: “international police” inevitably pops up. Most of us don’t seem to have any strong feelings either way, but there’s always those stereotypical guys and gals preaching about how much we should revile them for their foreign policies, greedy corporations, arrogance, fat-asses, and anything in between. Of course there are plenty of great things Americans do, positive things internationally, cool inventions and innovations we all use today.
But I could never go to America. Whether on an flight switchover or driving through, life isn’t long enough for those two hour checkins even without the anal cavity searches. I can’t be bored. I have no ability to deal with it.
It’s why I can’t bring myself to care about religious services and all those other associated social events. Sitting cross-legged on a mat someplace listening to someone less interesting than a stamp prattle on for hours about how everyone should live for everyone else, I’d feel pieces of my sanity start to shed one by one until the trickle turns into a monsoon and I’m debating how quickly faking death will get me on the first stretcher out of there. Don’t get me started on the mindless chanting. Besides that though, I’m pretty content with being labelled Hindu; we have some pretty cool stories (with monkeys!), great art, architecture, and festivals where people walk on hot coals and dance around with sharp metal needles and stuff rammed through their skins.
Give me 15 minutes of walking as an alternative to waiting in a long line and i’ll sprint. Give me a car that’s not really practical, not really safe, with an engine that sings and fizzles and crackles and made by someone who isn’t an accountant. Give me sex that’s wild, dirty, nasty like it’s the last time you may ever have it. Give me color, noise, sound and fury, even when it’s not ‘efficient’ or just plain scary. Flawed is interesting, imaginative is interesting, so is difference and passion.
When people used to tackle me about my habit of falling asleep during class or maybe while they were talking (in one embarrassing case), There was a time when I would apologetically explain that I probably suffered from some kind of Attention Deficit Disorder that I just couldn’t help. But you live and you learn when shit happens. And maybe the most important thing is that even if you live to be 195, life will always be too short. So fuck that ADD shit, I don’t need to apologize being bored by the boring by saying it’s my fault.
It’s like in Jeet Kune Do, the martial art that is much more than just fighting: take only from life the important things, and remember the rest like you remember the last time you used the
toilet.
*flush*
Thinking out loud //
I’m not huge on the flowers, the diamonds, the candlelight dinners, and whatever other rituals the day may stand for. But then how many guys really are? i might be crazy, but Romance should be fun for both I think. And if it’s work, well, then it’s .. work. No one likes work. Single, dating, married, whatever, Just enjoy the day.
Me? Well I’ve got an exam tomorrow at 9am, and because it’s downtown that means I’ll be waking up at 6 – the crappy timing of life is gonna make it hard to take my own advice.
Anyways, there’s a song I just wanted to share. The jazz song ‘My Funny Valentine’ has been covered by a few people over the years. The first time I heard it was in the show ‘Cowboy Bebop’ (man I loved that series). I’m not really a big jazz head or anything, but since then I’ve heard the much longer and more complex version by Miles Davis, but my absolute favorite version is a short and sweet vocal version by Chet Baker.
I don’t really have or listen to much jazz, but this is one of my favorite songs ever. He exudes a certain special kind of humanity that’s not just simply poignant to me, It’s the kind of something I’ve honestly been jealous of. I think it’d be pretty awesome to feel that way about someone – so enjoy the day if you do.
Download:
My Funny Valentine by Chet Baker
Thinking out loud //
In maybe typical male(child?)-hetero form, the shopping experience is one that always ends up pissing me off. Shopping for clothes is always a tightrope act, straddling an imaginary rope of dental floss over a crowd of plaid, flannel and super metro leeches, all vying for your attention whilst aching for you to at least let your wallet drop. You’d think buying nerd stuff, keyboards or furniture would be a lot easier – you spend hours in the halogen and liquid crystal glow of the internet, make a decision and then pick it up right?
What may not be surprising for anyone who knows me in real life™ is that I have the shittiest luck with both. With clothes I find out how whorrific or misshapen something really looks on me long after I’ve bought it. More commonly, my body shape keeps changing (improving hopefully) to being ever fitter but ever different. I’ve got a closet (well, a big stuffed box now) full of clothes in L, XL that fit me like a tablecloth.
To carry the eccentricity forwards, given shelves and rows of non clothing items, I can usually be counted on to pick out the one thing that’s either horrible at what it needs to do or is defective. I’m the canary in the Best-Buy mine then.
On my to-do list, I’ve got a desk lamp to return to ikea because I stupidly thought nondirectional mood lighting would work better than a tilting work lamp. Instead it shines directly in my eyes and not on my papers.
Damn you GRÖNÖ lamp, or whatever the fuck you’re supposed to be called.
The next chore is my fancy new wireless apple keyboard. This one is especially embarrassing:
When it first came out the idea of full sized laptop keys really appealed to me so I bought the normal wired one which worked fine except I found that having it wired really limited me, so I ended up having to sell it (losing 10$ in the process), and like a good lil’ Apple whore, going back and buying the wireless one. Now I’ve got it and it’s pretty hot and all (the batteries make it a little off balance to me), but every-time I press the space bar now it squeaks like an mouse. squeak squeak squeak Every mother-fucking time I finish a word. squeak I’m not being anal, it’s pretty obvious. And it’s yet another errand (and the burning of expensive fuel) I have on my conscience.
—————
As an aside (as if my writing is even half decently concise), I’ve been riding my bicycle to school a lot and despite it being salvage shoddily brought back to life, it’s a lot of fun going really fast and leaning over into turns. I miss how when I did motorcycle training, gas was almost like a limitless and expendable resource – forget keeping the revs low, motorcycles seem to always blast by at 14k RPM and climbing. Even when driven non-annoyingly, motorcycles really do call to me. Sadly, the sweat-inducing leathery gear doesn’t, but it’s still not putting me off.
Especially lately, reading about how Hiromi’s ditched her car for a bike and the adventures following.. screw the soliloquy – I wanna bike again!
Thinking out loud // [2]
It’s been almost two months since I graduated, and three since the last days of class. You might just so casually and reflexively ask, what have you been up to or busy with?
Prior to writing this was a quick, two minute, ‘conversation’ with a friend(*) that ended because of her summer school final exams being two weeks away. After which, I couldn’t say I came to some sort of realization because it’s been gnawing at my ankles since that last day of class: That I haven’t done a single thing.
Someone will interject with platitudes, which may actually be the whole point of keeping a blog, but I think not just writing (or drawing, or sketching, or making) something, but releasing it outside of your control or oversight is what makes it more real and tangible, somehow.
Between working at and quitting a crappy waitering job, losing my self in physical exhaustion (working out) and some half hearted attempts at continuing education it’s really been a life of white noise. I’ve been standing still where everyone else moves forwards. But I don’t want to live things or end things sour – like writing this first post, the first step is always the hardest and heaviest. I’ll just have to lift my head up, grit my teeth into a smile facsimile and just take it.
And maybe, suddenly, when I’m all done, everything will just flood right out.
* Not really a friend, I think.
Thinking out loud //
Gone through essays, exams and all undergrad good stuff and now I’m slightly free. I’m working more hours in the same crummy restaurant as before, but the theory is that I should be job hunting on my days off. All the popular job sites that everyone else seems to recommend are useless for me because they don’t have categories for Urban Planning or Design. Niche I know, but it’s what I think I want to do.
I’ve been gone for a long time, and the rust in my brain is crusting off and pumping into my fingers to help me type this out like old times. I wonder who reads this still, if anyone. My China peoples? An online friend in SG? And anyone from everywhere else, that made this thing worth reading are long gone I’m sure.
Not a bad thing though, it’s like a blank slate. One I can write the naughty good stuff on maybe.
Anyways, just for shits and giggles here’s an optical illusion to fuck with your mind in a similar way to how I soon hope too.
(Eye fucked yet? This isn’t an animated gif or anything either.)
Thinking out loud // [1]
