Archive for February, 2006
February 28, 2006 at 10:04 am · Filed under Random Thoughts
Let me count the ways…going on 9 years now? You are my soul mate in clothing form and will have a place in my wardrobe for as long as your strings can hold that beauty together…and then for sometime after that. You are sophisticatedly black, I can take you anywhere, with colour shining in 5 subtle buttons. You are thin and sleek, yet surprisingly warm. Your kind is such an incredible kind of cardigan that four teenagers had to all buy you despite the fear of uniformity. From what I hear, your sisters are still equally cherished by their owners.
Of course no friend is without wounds. So I collect buttons and pins to patch yours up. You inspire the seamstress in me. Not to make substitutes but to mend your broken parts! There could never be a substitute for you oh the only prodigy of le chateau.
February 26, 2006 at 8:54 pm · Filed under I am feeling..., I'm a Nerd
Probably followed by another week of hell….then maybe one more.
I am dreading March and it’s only February but I have a history of dreading March.
It will all get done though, well the important part of “all” at least, I can finally smell it.
The great thing about times like these is that you finally remember all those passions and dreams and projects that get pushed to the back of your head when you actually do have time to work towards them. Now if I can remember to write them down this time…
Anyway, funny thing that I realized this week (well I had known about it for a while but thought it was hereditary until being clarified last weekend) - I totally break toilet seats. When I was a kid, I always sat on the toilet sideways. In both the ‘upstairs’ and ‘downstairs’ washrooms, the counter and sink were right next to the toilet. I would sit sideways so that I could conduct experiments with various bathroom products in the sink. Growing up, I didn’t lose the tendency to approach the bowl from an angle necessary for sideways sitting. My attack has always been one from the side with this final twisting motion to keep my legs at 12 o’clock. That added torque causes the seat’s bolt-and-nut assembly to loosen and eventually, the bolt-and-nut assembly’s plastic housing becomes worn and the seat can no longer be tightly bolted down.
This has happened to every toilet in places I have lived in for longer than six months. OK so that’s only 4 toilets but statistically, there is a high probability that if I don’t change my entrance, I’ll ruin more seats.
Don’t worry, it’s unlikely that I will break yours. The damage only occurs through repeated exposure.
February 22, 2006 at 12:27 pm · Filed under Reflection, Things Found Online
I was one of those kids who were always trying to break an arm or leg because it would be so cool to have a cast. I hovered around sick siblings so that I could catch the bug and stay home too. So today when the optometrist told me I have astigmatism my ears perked up. “Something wrong??…!?” It’s silly because it is not even severe to the extent that I need glasses. I am fine without them. I think that really, I was excited about acquiring a label, a classification, a new statistic to file myself under.
When I came to the lab, Tony had a link to his personal Interactive Johari Window and I was all over this idea. Please go to my Johari window (if you know me) and pick out a few words to describe me. I can’t get enough of these things!
February 21, 2006 at 7:19 pm · Filed under Random Thoughts
When I think about 1984isms, I’m not so much scared at the thought of being monitored. I am more scared that I find it hard to be scared of people watching me. It does not make me a good advocate for citizens’ privacy so I try to pay close attention to news items dealing with the use and abuse of personal information. I should be aware of some of the threats.
In my own life, there are only two places where I really think about people looking at my personal information: the bank and Safeway. I was just at both tonight. I can’t help but imagine a small number of people huddled over my records and laughing at me. Laughing at my bank balance. Laughing at the quantities of applesauce I consume.
February 21, 2006 at 6:42 am · Filed under Dreams
I was in Vancouver-Regina morph, leaving some place to walk a few blocks home. A man was walking on the other side of the street wearing a parka and playing a recorder. He was someone I had gone out with once before but I couldn’t be sure. I walked slowly, so slowly that I couldn’t walk straight. Couldn’t bring myself to walk up to him or even look over but I was not going to run away either. We both had to cut through the same park. He to a party in a greenhouse/tent, me towards home. Then my name was called and I knew it was him. I turned around and walked over, walked with him to the party. My face was burning. He was drunk and balding. He had something that he wanted to say to me but he wouldn’t/couldn’t. People were interrupting, distracting. I turned around to leave several times but stayed because I wanted to hear. Still, I had a surprisingly calm acceptance that I might not. Then I woke up without ever hearing, but still thinking that he might tell me something.
My dream itself is not that interesting. Waking up though, it took me some time to get back to my own reality. At 3:30am I was still in that space where your dreams and your conscious life are intertwined and you can’t quite distinguish one from the other. I had two things going on: I was wondering what he had to say and I couldn’t think of anything I would say to him (that was from dreamland) and, I had the most overwhelming sense of what am I doing with my life and why am I living it inside walls I have spent the past 25 years building (from reality).
It is 5:30, I could not fall back to sleep, and I am still obsessed with thought B. Thought A is there, but mostly as a reminder of how much time I invest in waiting for the approval of others. I wait and then I begin to accept that I might never receive. Everytime I accept, another brick is added to my wall. Of course it is fine to be peaceful with what life offers, but I think my peace has been through finding solitude and safety, not through accepting drama and pain.
The dream was a prelude to my day and today is going to be a day of deconstructing. Normally I spend a lot of time reflecting on how to make the space within my walls more pleasant. In other words, I consider what I can do with what I have. Today I’m going to consider what I could do beyond my self-imposed limits.
If I can stay awake. You’ll likely find me on the couch in x509 between 10am and noon.
February 20, 2006 at 10:54 pm · Filed under Thinking, Work
If your mother asks you “is your thesis done?”, simply start telling her about your thesis work. Watch her eyes glaze over. Continue this for 5-7 minutes or until she changes the subject. Repeat every 1-2 weeks as needed. This may or may not work with your supervisor.
February 17, 2006 at 7:25 am · Filed under Reflection
I have a tradition of buying flowers whenever I have people stay with me. I guess it only started in Vancouver, when I first came here I was amazed by all the wonderful flowers sold by the small grocery stores. All the colours just left on the sidewalk - not seen so much in Regina. Yesterday I bought irises and today they are reminding me that I forgot about my love of the flowers for sale. They have become part of the background. Note to self: notice colour today.
My mother and sister are visiting this weekend. Boy am I excited!! A little guilty too because I know I won’t get much work done. At least it encouraged a massive clean up / laundry session. That and I’ll be able to talk to them about the move over the weekend - I am sure they will have some words of wisdom for me.
February 13, 2006 at 1:36 pm · Filed under I am feeling...
It had never occured to me, until now, that someone could drink at work. I knew you could - but I couldn’t think of how someone would want to. This is likely due to the fact that for me, boozing is a highly social activity. I couldn’t imagine sitting at work, hiding my drunkeness and not having anybody to share my spirit with.
But today I am sitting at my desk and I am thinking, yes, I can see that there are some reasons why people might drink at work.
This is excruciating. I am getting nothing done here. I feel so motionless, so unable. I didn’t sleep enough last night and I can’t read papers unless I get my full 8 hours. I’m in the lab alone. My only distraction is the Internet and I am sorry Internet but I am getting so sick of you.
I wish that someone would come along and save me. Talk to me. Entertain me.
But I am here for a reason. That is to work on my thesis. Oh thesis how I loathe you you make me sit here in uncomfortable office chair with loud building hum and mocking blue skies outside and a table / desk that I am sure sucks the heat from my hands to use as energy for its self-dust-generation machine.
I think I might re-try working at home. There have been many failed attempts…but the amount of work I am not getting done here is getting ridiculous.
On another note…if anyone is interested in collaborating on some sort of online photo / story project please let me know.
February 12, 2006 at 12:20 pm · Filed under Music
Last night I came home and was trying to respond to some text that Jemma sent me earlier in the evening. Trying is the key word. I was using T9 text input and whenever I went to hit “next”, my thumb reflexively went for the “send” button. Strange - they are on opposite ends of the keypad, but at least it resulted in some funny texts.
Text 1: Dude
Text 2: Moss
Text 3: Ok sorry about that..tired and keep on hitting send by accident..was at this jazz concept earlier (…)
I can’t even remember what I was trying to type instead of Moss and I was at a jazz concert, not concept. Andrew scored some tickets to see the Hard Rubber Orchestra. I guess I shouldn’t say jazz concert though…it was more new music. They were really good, as was the Peggy Lee Band. I was thoroughly amazed by the sounds her cello could make. I was also grateful that she still “kept to a story”. Experimentalist are great, but when they give you nothing to interpret, nothing to relate to, listening can be tedious.
There are some other things that I want to write about, things related to my experience of music in general, but I’ll do that later.
February 11, 2006 at 4:22 pm · Filed under Random Thoughts
If I live in Kitsilano for another three months I shall never want children of my own. How have babies become fashion accessories? Can I get one in green? It is probably a good thing that I am leaving kinda soon.
I have not told my landlord yet. It is about time to, but I don’t remember how. Is a letter appropriate in that there is documentation of your decision? Or is it better to confront things face to face? It’s like breaking up but my breaking up tactics have usually involved me crying. I am honestly crying, but secretly I like how it takes the heat off of you just a little bit. I can’t cry to my landlord though, and he probably doesn’t care that much.
There are some things in Kits that I will miss dearly. The smell, the view, and my walk down W 6th past the community gardens and along the railroad tracks. Last night when Ali and I were walking to the movie, we spotted this:
…and it struck me. Again secretly, I am pretending that I have a secret admirer who created that has an ode to me. Call me delusional or conceited if you will, but a girl has to have her fantasies. No really - the face is unfortunately not quite as round as mine so I can’t take credit, but I love it.
February 11, 2006 at 10:17 am · Filed under Movies&Film
The movie this weekend was Transamerica.
There are a number of reasons to see this movie but if anything, see it for Felicity Huffman’s amazing performance considering she is a woman, playing a man who is really a woman. I was going to put man who wants to be a woman but after seeing the movie, transsexuality is a little more clear - distinguishable from say, a transvestite, and not being caused by any sorts of sexual motivations.
Seeing this movie revealed a very interesting thing to me - the extent that we empathize and begin to relate to characters we see in television programs and movies. Of course we do, we are empathizing, relating creatures and the industry uses that to their advantage. When we become attached to a character we are more likely to be attached to the movie or show. I’ve discussed this with friends in our conversations on Six Feet Under. We all felt that there was usually at least one character we could identify with. The rare moments of not having this relatedness were moments where we actually felt mad at the show.
The “test results” of my empathy came after the movie. Ali and I walked to Hell’s Kitchen for a drink and on the way I felt really awkward…like I was walking in a funny way to compensate for something. I told Ali, “you know…I think that after watching that movie, I feel like I am the man who is really a woman…like I have to forcibly act like a woman even though I am one”. Ali pointed out that my state was likely due to me understanding and feeling for the character, we talked about it some more and once we were at Hell’s Kitchen I was 100% woman again.
I was likely susceptible to going through that because it is easy for me to feel awkward with my body in some situations. Well, I am sure everyone has that to some extent. My awkwardness has usually been the result of my height. I’ve often felt like a giant, thinking that beautiful woman are small and delicate and that this is beyond who I can be. Thankfully, I am mostly over that : ) No more slouching so that I can be short too. Now I only slouch when I’m too lazy to hold myself up.
February 9, 2006 at 7:38 pm · Filed under Japan
So the haircut today wasn’t all that bad! I was somewhat at ease. It may have helped that I was the only client there.
Anyway, I finally have the address of where I will be staying in Japan. Now I am desperately trying to find a detailed map of the city so that I may determine where I will be in relation to…the rest of the world. I can’t find anything. I think it would help if I could write my address in Japanese but I’m not there yet.
In my search I found something pretty interesting. On the Starbucks Japan site, you can (and are later required to) search for store locations by train line or station!
February 9, 2006 at 8:14 am · Filed under I am feeling..., Site Specific
I’ve been thinking about the content of my website lately; thinking about its purpose, my goals and motivation, the benefits, etc. The theme of my thinking is generally:
why? overdone. redundant. who cares?
I feel somewhat negative about writing especially when I regurgitate a lot so I’m going to try avoiding that for the next little while…at least directly.
Yes kids, I’m gonna try to make this all about me.
As much as I can at least. My days have been super awesome so there isn’t much I can complain about. There was that alarm that went off at 6am this morning. It kept on going and going but I was already soaking in the tub so I couldn’t complain.
The head mop is getting chopped at 9am which means this will almost certainly be a good hair day…all I need to do is maintain my esteem for an hour and then I will be on the top of the world. I have this thing with going to salons and it is likely the subreason (the main reason being money) for why I wait so long between hair cuts. As soon as I walk into the place I immediately become self-aware and awkward. I feel like I’m surrounding by a club of fashionable beautiful people that are on top of everything and my only access to that club is by paying large sums of money to be a character in the periphery. Very negative, I know, but I’m working on it. Seriously though, I think I spend more time making myself up to get my hair cut than I do for the odd date here and there.
Speaking of date…I need to find one because it could make life just that much more interesting. That and I only have another month and a half before I check out of Vancouver so I need not to worry about implications of possible dates. Unfortunately, I think that I might not know how, or maybe I did at one point but I’ve forgotten. If you have any tips please let me know. For now I’ll just pretend that I’m beyond dating and that there are more important things in life. *closes eyes, tosses head, and tilts nose up in air*
February 6, 2006 at 10:41 pm · Filed under Computers
Sweet! So how do I set this up?
Actually…one thing with Google Talk that I find weird is its automatic insertion of people in your contact list that you communicate with some amount. Now the funny thing is, all the people that have been added to my Google Talk list are people who I would in fact enjoy having on my contact list.
So I’m wondering…does Google know who I like and don’t like?
The unfortunate thing about Google doing the adding is that it takes away from the joyful experience of seeing that somebody has added you to their contact list.
I don’t have much else to say. Things are going and coming. Today I tried to get into my apartment building with my FOB. It didn’t work. I also killed two spiders this morning. One was a little too juicy for me.
I am looking forward to a visit from my mom and sister in two weeks, as well as Kim’s visit in March. It’s all keeping me in good check with apartment cleanliness. Someday I’ll feel that it is clean enough for the public eye (yeah I’m a little neurotic about it) and I’ll have you all over for drinks…someday.
Google.
Two hundred years from now people or alien’s will study our history and determine the driving forces behind our advancements (or deteriorations) and they will find this word: Google.
Imagine calling your kid that.
February 3, 2006 at 5:03 pm · Filed under Movies&Film
I don’t know what’s funnier in this video: the tripping out soldiers or the tone of the voice over dude that demonstrates that they seriously thought LSD might improve performance.
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