Today's only real low point was the arrival of a letter containing my rejection for the job I interviewed at, twice, and well. Since it's been weeks of silence on their end, the rejection was presumed; I guess it was nice to know I wasn't just forgotten.
So my current plan in life is to continue looking for gainful employment here--maybe temp work, which I know absolutely nothing about--and plan to move to the Bay Area in December or January if I find nothing suitable in Seattle. I will continue looking both places until then.
Anyway, since the job hunt is my least favorite topic of conversation lately, I'll move on.
I've been watching several speeches from the Democratic National Convention, like many bloggers. And of course I was impressed by Barack Obama's speech and, when that man runs for president in 15 years, I'll gleefully vote for him. Teresa Heinz-Kerry was also nice; I know she gets a lot of flack for... whatever the non-Stepford political wives get flack for, like speaking French or whatever, but I liked her. She seems thoughtful and intelligent, as well as possessing a unique perspective, which strikes me as a good thing to influence a president.
But despite all of this, I still find it hard to honestly *like* John Kerry. I mean, I'll vote for him, and on paper, he's got enough going for him that I don't hate myself for saying so, but I watch him and I just don't especially like him. Can't explain it. He just doesn't inspire a lot of enthusiasm. I just hope that won't be his downfall.
Yeeep. So, politics on my mind, as usual. Go Dems. It's like sports, but not as boring.
Today was a good day, which I needed. This week has been depressing and confusing, but I can't really go into it except for the fucking job hunt blah. So suffice it to say some shit went down that wasn't about me, but affects me.
Last night was fun, too. Kevin and I had dinner with his sister and her fiance, who are just about to move to Portland. They're good people. And today my mom came up and I cooked a bunch of food that was good. I made some roasted red pepper sauce and baked it with some penne and zucchini; I made some tofu salad that is good on sandwiches. I was going to make some superchocolatevegancookies, but I didn't want to abuse the oven on such a hot day. After we ate, mom and I went to the mall so mom could get some hot-weather clothes at Lane Bryant to wear while she's in Nebraska, visiting friends, then we got Ben & Jerry's Half Baked frozen yogurt and a DVD from the fourth season of "Sex and the City" to trash out on the futon in the nice, cool basement. Then we went and got Chinese food, which was yummy and filling.
I have so much already-made food now, I can eat happily for days. Leftover pasta, tofu salad, garlic spinach, rice, and mu shu with pressed tofu... *dies*
Also! We have met Steph's fiance, Steve. Whose unit also happens to be transferring to Fort Lewis (near Olympia) next year. They'll possibly have, like, a normal relationship for the first time ever.
Still listening to Kerry's speech. It's on PBS on the TV behind me. He's babbling about some stuff. You'd think I don't care, the way I talk. I swear I've heard this all before, it's such a blur. He's disappointing as an orator, but better than Bush.
Anyone seriously in the running is better than Bush.
And that anyone is Kerry.
Thursday, July 29, 2004
Saturday, July 24, 2004
This is completely insane. Since the government approved this drug once, and they can never be wrong, the companies that produce the drug are officially beyond reproach. Just, I, what the fuck? (Hit up bugmenot.com for a login if you don't already have one.)
Yeah, I'm posting just for that. I spent the day up at Lauren's grandparents' house on Camano Island, which was wonderful in all ways. Good folks, good food, good fun. I "attempted" waterskiing, which was a majestic failure, but hey, at least I tried. And at least I didn't get partway up, only to fall badly and swallow a mouthful of saltwater, ick. Other than that, the day was a smashing success.
Yeah, I'm posting just for that. I spent the day up at Lauren's grandparents' house on Camano Island, which was wonderful in all ways. Good folks, good food, good fun. I "attempted" waterskiing, which was a majestic failure, but hey, at least I tried. And at least I didn't get partway up, only to fall badly and swallow a mouthful of saltwater, ick. Other than that, the day was a smashing success.
Friday, July 23, 2004
Silence Speaks
When it's quiet, I imagine all the things that the silence is trying to tell me.
I imagine that my phone is ringing, only I can't hear it.
I imagine that the next e-mail I receive won't be from a mailing list.
I imagine that the distant slam of a mailbox will bring something other than a credit card offer.
I imagine that the sound of car tires on gravel is someone I want to see.
I drown out the silence with news radio and mp3s, running water and the clatter of dishes against a soapy sponge. I awake at the same time and go to bed at the same time, filling the interim space with all this listening to no avail.
As the sun comes up each day, I imagine my hopeful chances evaporating with the heat. I see my yard go to waste and housemates come and go. Plastic fan blades continue to spin, providing minimal relief.
I make lists of things I should be doing, but none of them seems important enough to actually do.
I gotta get out of this.
I imagine that my phone is ringing, only I can't hear it.
I imagine that the next e-mail I receive won't be from a mailing list.
I imagine that the distant slam of a mailbox will bring something other than a credit card offer.
I imagine that the sound of car tires on gravel is someone I want to see.
I drown out the silence with news radio and mp3s, running water and the clatter of dishes against a soapy sponge. I awake at the same time and go to bed at the same time, filling the interim space with all this listening to no avail.
As the sun comes up each day, I imagine my hopeful chances evaporating with the heat. I see my yard go to waste and housemates come and go. Plastic fan blades continue to spin, providing minimal relief.
I make lists of things I should be doing, but none of them seems important enough to actually do.
I gotta get out of this.
Wednesday, July 21, 2004
If Experience Is Required, It's Not Entry Level
Many classified ad writers seem to fall into this trap. They mean to say they are looking for a relatively inexperienced worker--probably so they can justify paying them dirt--but they call it "entry level." And, within mere sentences, contradict themselves by requesting that applicants have under their belt at least a year of related experience in addition to that oh-so-useful college degree.
If you need experience IN ADDITION TO college... IT'S NOT ENTRY LEVEL.
In other pointless rants, the LA Times crossword last week had the clue, "Apple portable computer," five letters. No, not an iBook! Through cheating, I learned they meant the Emate, which, according to my friend Rob, is something related to the Newton that had a little fold-out keyboard and was similar to a PDA for educational purposes, or something. At any rate--that was a bad clue! I was very mad about this clue! I wanted to yell at the people who wrote the puzzle! Because I am just that bored and frustrated!
So I still haven't heard from the people I interviewed with over a week ago, and people are telling me I should call and have a little speech like, "Uhhmmm, yeah, so what's up with the job? I still totally want it. Oh, right, here's where I kiss ass, awkward-professional-style, and say if you have any additional questions that can help you make the decision, let 'em rip! I can take it."
The thought of making this call--not to mention the question of which interviewer to direct my call to--makes me want to puke. I already sent a damn thank-you card reiterating that I really want the damn job. It was pretty. I used a nice pen.
What I really want, though, is to stop looking at job ads. Because they are depressing.
The other day, it occurred to me that I might want to go to school to become a dietician--I have no idea what kind of schooling this entails--because it might be fun. I've been unemployed a month and already I've sunk this low.
Dietician. What in the holy fuck?
That sounds almost as bad as the Kids in the Hall Hecubis sketch where Dave Foley doses Kevin McDonald with sodium pentathol to put him in a "trance" and discovers that he fantasizes about being a dentist. "'Cause they've got it all figured out, man!"
I've gone too far, and for too little.
On the sort-of-amusing side of life, Kevin got some nice clothes to wear to his sister's wedding, and actually contemplated wearing a tie. You have no idea how much that would amuse and please me.
Something has to.
Emate. What the fuck.
If you need experience IN ADDITION TO college... IT'S NOT ENTRY LEVEL.
In other pointless rants, the LA Times crossword last week had the clue, "Apple portable computer," five letters. No, not an iBook! Through cheating, I learned they meant the Emate, which, according to my friend Rob, is something related to the Newton that had a little fold-out keyboard and was similar to a PDA for educational purposes, or something. At any rate--that was a bad clue! I was very mad about this clue! I wanted to yell at the people who wrote the puzzle! Because I am just that bored and frustrated!
So I still haven't heard from the people I interviewed with over a week ago, and people are telling me I should call and have a little speech like, "Uhhmmm, yeah, so what's up with the job? I still totally want it. Oh, right, here's where I kiss ass, awkward-professional-style, and say if you have any additional questions that can help you make the decision, let 'em rip! I can take it."
The thought of making this call--not to mention the question of which interviewer to direct my call to--makes me want to puke. I already sent a damn thank-you card reiterating that I really want the damn job. It was pretty. I used a nice pen.
What I really want, though, is to stop looking at job ads. Because they are depressing.
The other day, it occurred to me that I might want to go to school to become a dietician--I have no idea what kind of schooling this entails--because it might be fun. I've been unemployed a month and already I've sunk this low.
Dietician. What in the holy fuck?
That sounds almost as bad as the Kids in the Hall Hecubis sketch where Dave Foley doses Kevin McDonald with sodium pentathol to put him in a "trance" and discovers that he fantasizes about being a dentist. "'Cause they've got it all figured out, man!"
I've gone too far, and for too little.
On the sort-of-amusing side of life, Kevin got some nice clothes to wear to his sister's wedding, and actually contemplated wearing a tie. You have no idea how much that would amuse and please me.
Something has to.
Emate. What the fuck.
Thursday, July 15, 2004
Nothing New
I didn't want to write until I had something to say, and I don't have anything to say, but I feel like I need to write. Except every time I get to this point, the words don't come. They're all in my head at random times and don't come out right. I've always had this problem. It's always bothered me.
Everything is in flux, and I mean everything. And it's not like I'm a caterpillar trying to become a butterfly. There's no proscribed course of change, I can't go make a cocoon and become something else, something with a specific purpose. I can't go through college and come out employed. I have to stalk my future. Purpose doesn't fall into my lap.
My second interview went very well, by the way, but I won't hear until at least tomorrow, I guess. The more time goes by between the interview and the notification, the less confident I am.
So I'm biding my time, rifling through job boards across the Internet, looking for something else even remotely worthy of notice and finding not a whole hell of a lot. I mean, I know I've only been at this a short while and really, I might be in for the long haul when it comes to finding gainful employment, but I'm really bad at that. I got fucking depressed about being unemployed from day one. And the more I look, the gloomier I feel. I guess that's normal. That it's normal is no comfort, though.
I'm reading and watching documentaries and getting really fucking angry. If I can't find a job and I can't spend all my time doing the dishes, well, I might as well get hyped up about politics. What good it's going to do me, I don't know, but it's something to focus the mind. Last night I watched The Weather Underground, which was pretty fascinating. It really brought out the cognitive dissonance I feel about radical leftist movements--I totally sympathize with their goals and philosophies, in a lot of ways, but the methods can be extreme (the Weathermen, for example, bombed a bunch of buildings during the Vietnam War) and even the philosophy can be too extreme for me. It's just hard to know where to get a foothold on the issues. But they talked about wanting to be a part of the revolution, of giving up comfort for the sake of the cause, and--yeah. I get that. I haven't done it... haven't felt it's necessary yet. What would make it necessary, anyway? Where's that line? And at the same time, it makes me question my long-standing plan to move to Canada if things get any worse--what good is running away? Do I have any resolve, about anything?
Anyway. Rachel was up last weekend, which was lovely. Her new place is damn near walking distance from here, even, and I'm hoping we'll be able to get in some good hanging out time. We have pretty similar music and movie tastes, so if nothing else, I am hoping we can get out and do that sort of thing on a regular basis. I helped her shop for decor and met the new boy, who was pretty cool. She also tells me that our third best friend from 8th grade, Sasha, will be coming to check out the UW Law School next month, so we'll all get to see each other for the first time in, I think, seven or eight years. How serendipitous if we all ended up in Seattle as adults after being quite suddenly separated after 8th grade?
Well, I must enjoy one last DVD before they all go back and I try to get Dead Like Me, which was out on $2 Tuesday, drat! (The woman working that day revealed that it embarrassed her that some people called it Tightwad Tuesday, a nickname that honestly never occurred to me.) And here is a comic (of sorts) sent to me by Chris that you should all enjoy.
Everything is in flux, and I mean everything. And it's not like I'm a caterpillar trying to become a butterfly. There's no proscribed course of change, I can't go make a cocoon and become something else, something with a specific purpose. I can't go through college and come out employed. I have to stalk my future. Purpose doesn't fall into my lap.
My second interview went very well, by the way, but I won't hear until at least tomorrow, I guess. The more time goes by between the interview and the notification, the less confident I am.
So I'm biding my time, rifling through job boards across the Internet, looking for something else even remotely worthy of notice and finding not a whole hell of a lot. I mean, I know I've only been at this a short while and really, I might be in for the long haul when it comes to finding gainful employment, but I'm really bad at that. I got fucking depressed about being unemployed from day one. And the more I look, the gloomier I feel. I guess that's normal. That it's normal is no comfort, though.
I'm reading and watching documentaries and getting really fucking angry. If I can't find a job and I can't spend all my time doing the dishes, well, I might as well get hyped up about politics. What good it's going to do me, I don't know, but it's something to focus the mind. Last night I watched The Weather Underground, which was pretty fascinating. It really brought out the cognitive dissonance I feel about radical leftist movements--I totally sympathize with their goals and philosophies, in a lot of ways, but the methods can be extreme (the Weathermen, for example, bombed a bunch of buildings during the Vietnam War) and even the philosophy can be too extreme for me. It's just hard to know where to get a foothold on the issues. But they talked about wanting to be a part of the revolution, of giving up comfort for the sake of the cause, and--yeah. I get that. I haven't done it... haven't felt it's necessary yet. What would make it necessary, anyway? Where's that line? And at the same time, it makes me question my long-standing plan to move to Canada if things get any worse--what good is running away? Do I have any resolve, about anything?
Anyway. Rachel was up last weekend, which was lovely. Her new place is damn near walking distance from here, even, and I'm hoping we'll be able to get in some good hanging out time. We have pretty similar music and movie tastes, so if nothing else, I am hoping we can get out and do that sort of thing on a regular basis. I helped her shop for decor and met the new boy, who was pretty cool. She also tells me that our third best friend from 8th grade, Sasha, will be coming to check out the UW Law School next month, so we'll all get to see each other for the first time in, I think, seven or eight years. How serendipitous if we all ended up in Seattle as adults after being quite suddenly separated after 8th grade?
Well, I must enjoy one last DVD before they all go back and I try to get Dead Like Me, which was out on $2 Tuesday, drat! (The woman working that day revealed that it embarrassed her that some people called it Tightwad Tuesday, a nickname that honestly never occurred to me.) And here is a comic (of sorts) sent to me by Chris that you should all enjoy.
Friday, July 09, 2004
Well, That Wasn't So Hard
I had my first post-college, real-job interview. It was relatively painless, and I scored a second interview on Monday. So, here's hoping. It sounds like a good fit for my skills and goals, and the company has good benefits and a decently casual atmosphere. Oh, and it's in Seattle.
I want it. Not more than anything; it's not a dream job or anything, just a good match. And if it's not, it's not. A job isn't marriage, you don't say 'til death do us part.
Tonight we're celebrating Lauren's birthday at Araya's, everyone's favorite vegan Thai restaurant of joy and love. Tomorrow I have at least one social engagement, and my mom's bringing a set of plastic yard furniture up in the morning. Yay for outdoor dining!
That's about all from me today. Wish me luck.
I want it. Not more than anything; it's not a dream job or anything, just a good match. And if it's not, it's not. A job isn't marriage, you don't say 'til death do us part.
Tonight we're celebrating Lauren's birthday at Araya's, everyone's favorite vegan Thai restaurant of joy and love. Tomorrow I have at least one social engagement, and my mom's bringing a set of plastic yard furniture up in the morning. Yay for outdoor dining!
That's about all from me today. Wish me luck.
Wednesday, July 07, 2004
Like Clockwork
Few things change, really. I mean, they change progressively, they move on, but they don't vary wildly from one instance to the next. Like all the bullshit associated with my menstrual cycle, for instance.
The day or two before things start, I get emotional, depressed, and have some big speech for Kevin about things that annoy me in the relationship. The next day, I realize I'm fucking bleeding. By early afternoon, I'm doubled over with severe lower abdominal discomfort. Is this too much for your eyes? Too fucking bad. It's too much for my afternoon, and I'm living it. You can always stop reading. I feel like puking--though I won't--and no position or amount of ibuprofen helps.
Fortunately, this is only for the first day. The other days are just annoying for the whole bleeding thing, but not feeling nauseous.
Also, Kevin did not like the Muppet Show episode I showed him last night. This is unconscionable.
And I need to set up filters on my chiasmus.org e-mail inboxes. I have gotten way too many piece of shit virus spam in the past few months. Not that these matter on a linux server when I'm reading mail in pine, but they're irritating.
And I still need a job. Pooh.
The day or two before things start, I get emotional, depressed, and have some big speech for Kevin about things that annoy me in the relationship. The next day, I realize I'm fucking bleeding. By early afternoon, I'm doubled over with severe lower abdominal discomfort. Is this too much for your eyes? Too fucking bad. It's too much for my afternoon, and I'm living it. You can always stop reading. I feel like puking--though I won't--and no position or amount of ibuprofen helps.
Fortunately, this is only for the first day. The other days are just annoying for the whole bleeding thing, but not feeling nauseous.
Also, Kevin did not like the Muppet Show episode I showed him last night. This is unconscionable.
And I need to set up filters on my chiasmus.org e-mail inboxes. I have gotten way too many piece of shit virus spam in the past few months. Not that these matter on a linux server when I'm reading mail in pine, but they're irritating.
And I still need a job. Pooh.
Monday, July 05, 2004
Yay America!
Do I do this every year? Friends, I will never comprehend the celebration of our nation with the explosion of copious items that make one feel as in a war zone.
"HOORAY, WE SECURED INDEPENDENCE FROM THE BRITS 200+ YEARS AGO, LET'S BLOW SHIT UP!!!"
I know. I lack patriotism. So sue me. (Never know if the FBI will come knocking on your door, either.)
I mean, yes. America means a lot to me. It's where I'm from and all, and I've grown to have a fondness for the people I know, the places I've seen, and the ideals I've espoused that come from my exploration of a country I've seldom left since I was born. When you consider I'm 22 years and 6 months old and I've been outside of the U.S. for maybe two months, total, it adds up to a lot of American Experience.
There's a lot to like, admire, respect, and even love about America. But that doesn't mean I can't be irritated when people choose to express that by acting like complete idiots.
I just spent a few weeks touring the interstates and state highways of several western states. We've built roadways that allow you to see some amazing scenery while you're zooming happily from place to place. (We'll forget for a moment that we have to drop a pantsload of dollars on gasoline to fuel the cars that take the roads, and what a disaster that is for the environment and what a mess it makes of our foreign policy.)
I saw huge chunks of nature set aside and reserved for future generations as state and national parks. The sights are incredible. I love the city, but being somewhere like Yosemite or the Arches give me pause.
I saw a film by a man who, using his Constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression, railed against the current administration with damning evidence mixed with humor and sadness for two hours. And I experienced a theater full of people watching and applauding as these men were torn apart. I saw that dissent is alive and well.
I bought fruits and vegetables from local growers who brought their wares to Ballard to sell on a sunny Sunday afternoon. Independent, organic agriculture is thriving in my state, at least in a small way. I still have options besides the bin of tomatoes from who-knows-where at Safeway.
I saw many people all over the place, many of whom are no doubt immigrants. I don't know what they were all looking for when they came here, but I hope they're finding it. I have nothing but respect for people who choose a country. It has to give a person a deeper valuation of what it means to be part of a nation like that, something I wouldn't know unless I emigrated somewhere.
I saw my housemate's smiling face as she told me her fiance, stationed for the last year and a half in Iraq, was on his way home. That she might see him again in a month.
And I thought, maybe there is still some hope left.
But why do the kids gotta blow up firecrackers until 1 a.m.? That shit ain't right.
"HOORAY, WE SECURED INDEPENDENCE FROM THE BRITS 200+ YEARS AGO, LET'S BLOW SHIT UP!!!"
I know. I lack patriotism. So sue me. (Never know if the FBI will come knocking on your door, either.)
I mean, yes. America means a lot to me. It's where I'm from and all, and I've grown to have a fondness for the people I know, the places I've seen, and the ideals I've espoused that come from my exploration of a country I've seldom left since I was born. When you consider I'm 22 years and 6 months old and I've been outside of the U.S. for maybe two months, total, it adds up to a lot of American Experience.
There's a lot to like, admire, respect, and even love about America. But that doesn't mean I can't be irritated when people choose to express that by acting like complete idiots.
I just spent a few weeks touring the interstates and state highways of several western states. We've built roadways that allow you to see some amazing scenery while you're zooming happily from place to place. (We'll forget for a moment that we have to drop a pantsload of dollars on gasoline to fuel the cars that take the roads, and what a disaster that is for the environment and what a mess it makes of our foreign policy.)
I saw huge chunks of nature set aside and reserved for future generations as state and national parks. The sights are incredible. I love the city, but being somewhere like Yosemite or the Arches give me pause.
I saw a film by a man who, using his Constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression, railed against the current administration with damning evidence mixed with humor and sadness for two hours. And I experienced a theater full of people watching and applauding as these men were torn apart. I saw that dissent is alive and well.
I bought fruits and vegetables from local growers who brought their wares to Ballard to sell on a sunny Sunday afternoon. Independent, organic agriculture is thriving in my state, at least in a small way. I still have options besides the bin of tomatoes from who-knows-where at Safeway.
I saw many people all over the place, many of whom are no doubt immigrants. I don't know what they were all looking for when they came here, but I hope they're finding it. I have nothing but respect for people who choose a country. It has to give a person a deeper valuation of what it means to be part of a nation like that, something I wouldn't know unless I emigrated somewhere.
I saw my housemate's smiling face as she told me her fiance, stationed for the last year and a half in Iraq, was on his way home. That she might see him again in a month.
And I thought, maybe there is still some hope left.
But why do the kids gotta blow up firecrackers until 1 a.m.? That shit ain't right.
Thursday, July 01, 2004
How I Spent My Summer Vaction
Usually, people write these essays at the end of the summer, rather than the beginning. And they're 9 years old, not 22. The former is a fatal flaw: Unless the most stunning part of your break from school occurred at the end of August, you've probably forgotten all the best details.
It's weird to be home again, and using a proper computer with a mouse and real keyboard. I just ripped out all my lettuce and spinach, which were overgrown and infested with some kind of disgusting insect. So sad. At least I know they'll grow next time I try.
Anyway, leaving off from the previous entry, which saw our heroes rocketing their way south to Santa Cruz via the scenic Silicon Valley suburbs of Milpitas and Fremont, the mall was a success in that it wasted sufficient time, and we found our way to Fremont, a Cost Plus where mom drooled over cobalt blue dishes, the BART station, and a Trader Joe's with little difficulty.
The house in Santa Cruz was advertised as "funky and eclectic," and it was, I suppose. Mom said this disdainfully upon seeing the place, though I'm not entirely sure why. It was a fine base, located near Paradise Point, which is very popular with surfers. The stereotype of surfers as hot, shirtless white boys in the California sun is a myth, however--every surfer I saw, boys and girls, were dressed in full-body wetsuits, negating the influence of hotness on my opinion of them.
Santa Cruz's downtown is one of my favorite among smaller-town shopping districts. Lots of neat little spots to eat and spend money on things you actually want. Terrible, really. I went to Streetlight and limited myself to only three CDs, including some older Lambchop and Mountain Goats releases and the new Wilco. I didn't even browse the vinyl, knowing it might melt in the van before it got home. I went to Bookshop Santa Cruz (bypassing the giant Borders entirely--support local businesses!) and picked up five goddamn magazines. My mom got David Sedaris's new book on audio CD so we could hear him read six hours of fabulous text on our long drive up the coast. And I got a new pair of shoes.
One can't wear scratched and falling apart 8-hole Doc Martens to job interviews she has yet to even secure, can she?
Among other highlights, we went down to the other end of the Monterey Bay and enjoyed Point Lobos State Reserve, which is one of my favorite places anywhere. This time we saw harbor seals sunning themselves on the near rocks, while the sea lions were farther out. My sister and I also witnessed two gulls have a fight to the death, which was pretty interesting. I didn't know gulls fought over anything but sand-covered hot dogs.
After a few days, we took the scenic route up the coast and into San Francisco to help my sister move from a shitty apartment to a great one, but the traffic and the parking made mom anxious about staying, so we didn't.
And because she insisted on taking Highway 1 up the coast, it took about four hours to arrive just slightly north of San Francisco, in a tiny town called Gualala. The next day, we drove until we reached Crescent City. The next, Seaside, to check progress on the beach house, then Portland to stay with the Cambodians. By this time I was quite done with beautiful beach scenery and welcomed the smiling faces of my little nieces before passing out on the family room floor.
In Portland, my mom and I went to Lloyd Center to shop for her very particular model of sneakers at Nordstrom and see Fahrenheit 9/11. We would've seen it earlier, but it was totally sold out in Santa Cruz. I would spout some opinion, but I don't have one--it's worth seeing, if only so you can participate more intelligently in the dialogue surrounding the film and the issues it brings up.
And, joy and rapture, Burgerville for lunch. Mom just ordered whatever I ordered, so I hope it didn't kill her stomach. Usually dairy is not a happy thing, and the berry smoothies (not so much a Jamba Juice-esque deal as a milkshake made with fat-free frozen yogurt and fresh berries) have a lot of that.
I hung around Olympia for a few hours, in part to avoid rush hour and in part to make sure I saw Becky. We met for dinner at Apollo's, which is a good, happy medium for us.
And then I went home, so now I am there. With little to nothing to do besides get groceries, put crap away, and find a fucking job.
The listings today are depressing as hell, but I'll get some delicious food to make some healthy meals and be cheery anyway.
It's weird to be home again, and using a proper computer with a mouse and real keyboard. I just ripped out all my lettuce and spinach, which were overgrown and infested with some kind of disgusting insect. So sad. At least I know they'll grow next time I try.
Anyway, leaving off from the previous entry, which saw our heroes rocketing their way south to Santa Cruz via the scenic Silicon Valley suburbs of Milpitas and Fremont, the mall was a success in that it wasted sufficient time, and we found our way to Fremont, a Cost Plus where mom drooled over cobalt blue dishes, the BART station, and a Trader Joe's with little difficulty.
The house in Santa Cruz was advertised as "funky and eclectic," and it was, I suppose. Mom said this disdainfully upon seeing the place, though I'm not entirely sure why. It was a fine base, located near Paradise Point, which is very popular with surfers. The stereotype of surfers as hot, shirtless white boys in the California sun is a myth, however--every surfer I saw, boys and girls, were dressed in full-body wetsuits, negating the influence of hotness on my opinion of them.
Santa Cruz's downtown is one of my favorite among smaller-town shopping districts. Lots of neat little spots to eat and spend money on things you actually want. Terrible, really. I went to Streetlight and limited myself to only three CDs, including some older Lambchop and Mountain Goats releases and the new Wilco. I didn't even browse the vinyl, knowing it might melt in the van before it got home. I went to Bookshop Santa Cruz (bypassing the giant Borders entirely--support local businesses!) and picked up five goddamn magazines. My mom got David Sedaris's new book on audio CD so we could hear him read six hours of fabulous text on our long drive up the coast. And I got a new pair of shoes.
One can't wear scratched and falling apart 8-hole Doc Martens to job interviews she has yet to even secure, can she?
Among other highlights, we went down to the other end of the Monterey Bay and enjoyed Point Lobos State Reserve, which is one of my favorite places anywhere. This time we saw harbor seals sunning themselves on the near rocks, while the sea lions were farther out. My sister and I also witnessed two gulls have a fight to the death, which was pretty interesting. I didn't know gulls fought over anything but sand-covered hot dogs.
After a few days, we took the scenic route up the coast and into San Francisco to help my sister move from a shitty apartment to a great one, but the traffic and the parking made mom anxious about staying, so we didn't.
And because she insisted on taking Highway 1 up the coast, it took about four hours to arrive just slightly north of San Francisco, in a tiny town called Gualala. The next day, we drove until we reached Crescent City. The next, Seaside, to check progress on the beach house, then Portland to stay with the Cambodians. By this time I was quite done with beautiful beach scenery and welcomed the smiling faces of my little nieces before passing out on the family room floor.
In Portland, my mom and I went to Lloyd Center to shop for her very particular model of sneakers at Nordstrom and see Fahrenheit 9/11. We would've seen it earlier, but it was totally sold out in Santa Cruz. I would spout some opinion, but I don't have one--it's worth seeing, if only so you can participate more intelligently in the dialogue surrounding the film and the issues it brings up.
And, joy and rapture, Burgerville for lunch. Mom just ordered whatever I ordered, so I hope it didn't kill her stomach. Usually dairy is not a happy thing, and the berry smoothies (not so much a Jamba Juice-esque deal as a milkshake made with fat-free frozen yogurt and fresh berries) have a lot of that.
I hung around Olympia for a few hours, in part to avoid rush hour and in part to make sure I saw Becky. We met for dinner at Apollo's, which is a good, happy medium for us.
And then I went home, so now I am there. With little to nothing to do besides get groceries, put crap away, and find a fucking job.
The listings today are depressing as hell, but I'll get some delicious food to make some healthy meals and be cheery anyway.
Wednesday, June 23, 2004
"Let's Get the Hell Out of Reno"
...And other early-morning adventures in auto travel.
After leaving Aspen, we made a mid-day side trip to Arches National Park in southeast Utah, which was beautiful. (Pictures will arrive on the photo gallery at some point, I promise.) Unfortunately, it was hot--being a midsummer's afternoon in the desert and all--and mom isn't much of a hiker, like, even less of one than me, so after eating lunch and taking a looksee at a few easy-to-reach arches and one distant viewpoint of the famed Delicate Arch, we got back on the road.
There were lots of Sunday drivers. And boy, do we hate Sunday drivers. By the time we got to Salt Lake City, we were so full of malaise about the whole state that instead of keeping with original plans to stay the night in SLC, we kept driving west on I-80. This enabled us to have some amazing views of the salt flats in the late afternoon, which was a pretty surreal sight to behold. We ended up staying just across the border in West Wendover, Nevada, where the rooms were dirt cheap and the amenities remarkably good.
Monday morning was an easy drive: clear across Nevada (passing three "no hitchhiking--they could be prison escapees" signs) to Reno. Reno was confusing and sketchy, but we did find some good all-you-can-eat sushi lunch special near the mall/airport. We ended up staying at the Best Western near the airport, which looked good at first but ended up being stupid. They advertise all over that they offer wifi in all the rooms, but they mention nowhere that there is an exorbitant charge for this service. It was a bit of a fiasco that made us write an angry complaint letter. Also, the walls were paper fucking thin, and apparently my nose whistles and sounds like a baby crying.
Mom wanted to go to a casino and get rid of the pile of nickels she'd won at the border casino the night before, so I went along. We went to the Peppermill, which isn't in downtown, because we were afraid of downtown, and had dinner at the insanely flashy new Oceano. But the food was good. Then we spent way too long upstairs while mom kept winning nickels and I pissed away a $5 bill just so I wouldn't bug her to leave as often. And I lost constantly.
I learned that I really don't enjoy gambling that way. Maybe if I knew how to play the table games, it would be more enjoyable, but slots as they are now lack even the most elementary sensory stimulation to seem exciting. They're just surrounded by flash and insanity that I think could give me a seizure, and all you're doing is pressing buttons. It was worse than playing video games and bowling combined, two things I find intolerable, frustrating, and unbelievably dull. (Note: I do, however, like watching other people play some video games. I have no explanation for this. I just hate playing them myself.)
Also, the trashy old ladies who hover over nickel slots like that's how they're going to make their fortune are very sad.
When we woke up at 6:30, the room was pitch black. When we realized we were both awake and not disturbing one another's slumber, mom said: "Let's get the hell out of Reno, then." And we did.
It was a 3-hour drive to Tioga Pass on the east end of Yosemite, but another two hours across the park and back in to see the Valley. It was gorgeous, but hot and full of people. We realized it was probably out of our means to stay in the park, and mom didn't want to have to drive all the way back in the morning. So we decided we'd seen enough for this trip--I'd love to come back--did our business with scattering the ashes, and headed west.
Originally we planned to stop somewhere short of the Bay Area, a place at a junction in the road with a Comfort Inn, but when we got there, we decided not to and just kept driving. We made it to Oakland before sunset.
Mom wants to avoid driving and parking in San Francisco, so we're skipping that for now. We'll do it on our way back north. So today we're just going to some giant suburban mall and getting Margot to take the BART to Fremont and we'll pick her up. We'll head to Santa Cruz from there, a day early.
After leaving Aspen, we made a mid-day side trip to Arches National Park in southeast Utah, which was beautiful. (Pictures will arrive on the photo gallery at some point, I promise.) Unfortunately, it was hot--being a midsummer's afternoon in the desert and all--and mom isn't much of a hiker, like, even less of one than me, so after eating lunch and taking a looksee at a few easy-to-reach arches and one distant viewpoint of the famed Delicate Arch, we got back on the road.
There were lots of Sunday drivers. And boy, do we hate Sunday drivers. By the time we got to Salt Lake City, we were so full of malaise about the whole state that instead of keeping with original plans to stay the night in SLC, we kept driving west on I-80. This enabled us to have some amazing views of the salt flats in the late afternoon, which was a pretty surreal sight to behold. We ended up staying just across the border in West Wendover, Nevada, where the rooms were dirt cheap and the amenities remarkably good.
Monday morning was an easy drive: clear across Nevada (passing three "no hitchhiking--they could be prison escapees" signs) to Reno. Reno was confusing and sketchy, but we did find some good all-you-can-eat sushi lunch special near the mall/airport. We ended up staying at the Best Western near the airport, which looked good at first but ended up being stupid. They advertise all over that they offer wifi in all the rooms, but they mention nowhere that there is an exorbitant charge for this service. It was a bit of a fiasco that made us write an angry complaint letter. Also, the walls were paper fucking thin, and apparently my nose whistles and sounds like a baby crying.
Mom wanted to go to a casino and get rid of the pile of nickels she'd won at the border casino the night before, so I went along. We went to the Peppermill, which isn't in downtown, because we were afraid of downtown, and had dinner at the insanely flashy new Oceano. But the food was good. Then we spent way too long upstairs while mom kept winning nickels and I pissed away a $5 bill just so I wouldn't bug her to leave as often. And I lost constantly.
I learned that I really don't enjoy gambling that way. Maybe if I knew how to play the table games, it would be more enjoyable, but slots as they are now lack even the most elementary sensory stimulation to seem exciting. They're just surrounded by flash and insanity that I think could give me a seizure, and all you're doing is pressing buttons. It was worse than playing video games and bowling combined, two things I find intolerable, frustrating, and unbelievably dull. (Note: I do, however, like watching other people play some video games. I have no explanation for this. I just hate playing them myself.)
Also, the trashy old ladies who hover over nickel slots like that's how they're going to make their fortune are very sad.
When we woke up at 6:30, the room was pitch black. When we realized we were both awake and not disturbing one another's slumber, mom said: "Let's get the hell out of Reno, then." And we did.
It was a 3-hour drive to Tioga Pass on the east end of Yosemite, but another two hours across the park and back in to see the Valley. It was gorgeous, but hot and full of people. We realized it was probably out of our means to stay in the park, and mom didn't want to have to drive all the way back in the morning. So we decided we'd seen enough for this trip--I'd love to come back--did our business with scattering the ashes, and headed west.
Originally we planned to stop somewhere short of the Bay Area, a place at a junction in the road with a Comfort Inn, but when we got there, we decided not to and just kept driving. We made it to Oakland before sunset.
Mom wants to avoid driving and parking in San Francisco, so we're skipping that for now. We'll do it on our way back north. So today we're just going to some giant suburban mall and getting Margot to take the BART to Fremont and we'll pick her up. We'll head to Santa Cruz from there, a day early.
Saturday, June 19, 2004
I Belong at Sea Level
My mom and I are in Aspen until tomorrow morning, when we're leaving for Salt Lake City. I don't like Aspen much: though surrounded by picturesque mountains and all manner of babbling brooks, greenery, and chirping aviary, the altitude isn't good for my head. Neither are the price tags and people that pay them.
I have, however, seen many a prairie dog, and for that I am grateful. Or something.
I even saw one popping its head out of a hole!
It totally reminded me of this game I had (which was promptly taken away due to its violent content) where you shot prairie dogs. No, not Oregon Trail. That was hunting, for life-or-death purposes, not just shooting helpless but potentially diseased rodents for pleasure. And in the end you still got dysentery and died in your caulked wagon while your family hocked three sets of clothes to pay for your funeral on the side of the dusty road.
So, anyway, Aspen is not my kind of place. There's no...what's the word...poor people? That probably sounds bad, but I realized that the thing I like about big cities that do have all this fru-fru shopping and gourmet restauranteuring is not that it only has those things, but that those things contrast with the amazing range of diversity of people, culture, socioeconomic status, and, of course, food. I don't know what to think of $9 falafel. It's just unheard of.
(Okay, so actually I had the $9 falafel in Boise, and it was really tasty, but I wouldn't put it past these Aspen culinary snobs.)
Just, I don't know. Anywhere that doesn't have at least one part of town devoted to thrift, eating on the cheap, and people who don't own $3 million summer homes isn't my kind of place.
It's reverse snobbery, but whatever.
Boise was surprisingly nice. We had a bad experience at the Pizza Hut getting my brother some takeout dinner, but what do you expect from teenagers in the middle of Idaho? The cities in Utah sort of frighten me, but the scenery is lovely. Not as lovely as Colorado, but lovely like Arizona but without the totally insane heat. Just unpleasant heat. The town we stayed in, Green River, is a glorified truck stop in the middle of nowhere, the junction of SR-6 and I-70.
I'm thinking that when I get back, I need to make a mix CD (or just a playlist) of songs detailing the road trip. Yes, John Denver's "Rocky Mountain High" will make an appearance, if only because my mom loved John Denver and had to play it soon after entering Colorado, in part as retribution for all the raunchy comedy CDs my brother and I played. But so will Built to Spill's "Twin Falls," because every time the signs said Twin Falls I started getting that song stuck in my head:
My mom's good, she got me out of Twin Falls, Idaho...
There will be more.
Anyway, as I said, tomorrow we're headed for SLC once more. I'm hoping to have a gander at Arches National Park, having read a book about it once and finding it interesting, although we'd be doing just the thing the author of the book found so stupid: driving right through. The next day, we're off to Reno, because... well, it's on the way. Then, we're planning to go to Yosemite, which neither of us have seen, and scatter some of dad's ashes, because he wanted us to. Then it's to San Francisco to collect Margot, and we're off to a few days in Santa Cruz, which I am definitely looking forward to. Movies, hippie towns with good food, a record store I actually like, gorgeous ocean views, the beach--ahhhh.
I think we're going to explore a little more of Aspen's downtown today, have dinner with my brother, and try not to spend a third day in a row watching cable in the condo we're renting. Because that just isn't right.
I have, however, seen many a prairie dog, and for that I am grateful. Or something.
I even saw one popping its head out of a hole!
It totally reminded me of this game I had (which was promptly taken away due to its violent content) where you shot prairie dogs. No, not Oregon Trail. That was hunting, for life-or-death purposes, not just shooting helpless but potentially diseased rodents for pleasure. And in the end you still got dysentery and died in your caulked wagon while your family hocked three sets of clothes to pay for your funeral on the side of the dusty road.
So, anyway, Aspen is not my kind of place. There's no...what's the word...poor people? That probably sounds bad, but I realized that the thing I like about big cities that do have all this fru-fru shopping and gourmet restauranteuring is not that it only has those things, but that those things contrast with the amazing range of diversity of people, culture, socioeconomic status, and, of course, food. I don't know what to think of $9 falafel. It's just unheard of.
(Okay, so actually I had the $9 falafel in Boise, and it was really tasty, but I wouldn't put it past these Aspen culinary snobs.)
Just, I don't know. Anywhere that doesn't have at least one part of town devoted to thrift, eating on the cheap, and people who don't own $3 million summer homes isn't my kind of place.
It's reverse snobbery, but whatever.
Boise was surprisingly nice. We had a bad experience at the Pizza Hut getting my brother some takeout dinner, but what do you expect from teenagers in the middle of Idaho? The cities in Utah sort of frighten me, but the scenery is lovely. Not as lovely as Colorado, but lovely like Arizona but without the totally insane heat. Just unpleasant heat. The town we stayed in, Green River, is a glorified truck stop in the middle of nowhere, the junction of SR-6 and I-70.
I'm thinking that when I get back, I need to make a mix CD (or just a playlist) of songs detailing the road trip. Yes, John Denver's "Rocky Mountain High" will make an appearance, if only because my mom loved John Denver and had to play it soon after entering Colorado, in part as retribution for all the raunchy comedy CDs my brother and I played. But so will Built to Spill's "Twin Falls," because every time the signs said Twin Falls I started getting that song stuck in my head:
My mom's good, she got me out of Twin Falls, Idaho...
There will be more.
Anyway, as I said, tomorrow we're headed for SLC once more. I'm hoping to have a gander at Arches National Park, having read a book about it once and finding it interesting, although we'd be doing just the thing the author of the book found so stupid: driving right through. The next day, we're off to Reno, because... well, it's on the way. Then, we're planning to go to Yosemite, which neither of us have seen, and scatter some of dad's ashes, because he wanted us to. Then it's to San Francisco to collect Margot, and we're off to a few days in Santa Cruz, which I am definitely looking forward to. Movies, hippie towns with good food, a record store I actually like, gorgeous ocean views, the beach--ahhhh.
I think we're going to explore a little more of Aspen's downtown today, have dinner with my brother, and try not to spend a third day in a row watching cable in the condo we're renting. Because that just isn't right.
Sunday, June 13, 2004
Road Trip Readiness
I still have to pack, and I'm leaving tomorrow as soon as I get up. Which will have to be early, because I want to avoid some traffic. I probably won't, though. I'm not capable of getting up at 5 and 6 is too late. Oh, well.
Even morning people have limits.
Here's the basic rundown of where we're going, how, and why:
Day 1: I drive to Olympia, then mom and I pack the van and pick up Paul from Sarah's and head to Boise via Portland. One night is promised in this scenic city.
Day 2: We make a long drive from Boise to Green River, Utah, where we stay one night. I would've preferred making it to Moab, but that's way out of the way.
Day 3 through Day 6: Drive to Aspen and stay four nights outside of town, in Snowmass. Make sure Paul is comfortably settled and aware of how to use laundry facilities.
Day 7: Begin trek to San Francisco by driving to Salt Lake City and staying one night. May stop to see ghost towns on the way; mom is big into ghost towns.
Day 8: Continue trek (and ghost town stops, perhaps) into Reno for the night.
Days 9 and 10: Make the 3+-hour drive to San Francisco. Crash one night with Margot. Or two, actually, if all goes according to plan.
Day 11 through Day 13: Drive to Santa Cruz and stay three nights in a house near Pleasure Point. We plan to kidnap Margot for this. I also hope to take my mom down to Monterey for at least one day.
Day 14...: Head back up the coast. May stop longer in SF; may not. Meander up to Seaside, where we check on the house's progress. Then home.
I will probably be very ready for home at this point. And still desperately seeking employment. Sigh.
Even morning people have limits.
Here's the basic rundown of where we're going, how, and why:
Day 1: I drive to Olympia, then mom and I pack the van and pick up Paul from Sarah's and head to Boise via Portland. One night is promised in this scenic city.
Day 2: We make a long drive from Boise to Green River, Utah, where we stay one night. I would've preferred making it to Moab, but that's way out of the way.
Day 3 through Day 6: Drive to Aspen and stay four nights outside of town, in Snowmass. Make sure Paul is comfortably settled and aware of how to use laundry facilities.
Day 7: Begin trek to San Francisco by driving to Salt Lake City and staying one night. May stop to see ghost towns on the way; mom is big into ghost towns.
Day 8: Continue trek (and ghost town stops, perhaps) into Reno for the night.
Days 9 and 10: Make the 3+-hour drive to San Francisco. Crash one night with Margot. Or two, actually, if all goes according to plan.
Day 11 through Day 13: Drive to Santa Cruz and stay three nights in a house near Pleasure Point. We plan to kidnap Margot for this. I also hope to take my mom down to Monterey for at least one day.
Day 14...: Head back up the coast. May stop longer in SF; may not. Meander up to Seaside, where we check on the house's progress. Then home.
I will probably be very ready for home at this point. And still desperately seeking employment. Sigh.
Friday, June 11, 2004
Peekatures from Graduation
Are here.
Speaking of pictures, I'm thinking of getting a new digital camera with grad present money (but not spending all of it). My Olympus is very...tired and sad. So I'm looking at prices and comparing details on DPreview.com and thinking maybe I should do something more productive with the cash than pretend I want to take pictures of something other than overgrown onions on my counter at night.
Well. Eventually, I'll be able to travel again, and then I'll want to spend my money on traveling expenses and need to already have a camera that doesn't suck. So it's sort of an investment in that respect.
We're getting ready for the road trip. We leave on Monday as soon as my brother finishes his early finals and head straight for Boise. The second night we're aiming for Green River, Utah, and by the middle of the third day, we plan to be in Aspen. We've got four nights in a studio in Snowmass, which is cheaper than actually staying in Aspen, plus we'll have a kitchen of sorts and don't have to pay the exorbitant costs of eating out all the time in Aspen, either.
Did you know they make coffee machines you can plug into the cigarette lighter in your car? Is that a bad idea? I am leaning towards it being good, because instant soup or red beans and rice on the road sounds like a better lunch to me than McDonald's, which sounds like death. Plus, you know, coffee that isn't ass.
After surviving a few days in a fancy-ass resort town, we leave my brother and head for San Francisco to see my sister. This looks like a two-day drive, with a stop at the Utah-Nevada border. The hope is to get a few days away from it all in Monterey or somesuch before heading home. I might also be able to score an interview or two with places I've applied and never heard back from (insert sad face).
The beach house is about two months away from completion. It's going to be awesome.
Speaking of pictures, I'm thinking of getting a new digital camera with grad present money (but not spending all of it). My Olympus is very...tired and sad. So I'm looking at prices and comparing details on DPreview.com and thinking maybe I should do something more productive with the cash than pretend I want to take pictures of something other than overgrown onions on my counter at night.
Well. Eventually, I'll be able to travel again, and then I'll want to spend my money on traveling expenses and need to already have a camera that doesn't suck. So it's sort of an investment in that respect.
We're getting ready for the road trip. We leave on Monday as soon as my brother finishes his early finals and head straight for Boise. The second night we're aiming for Green River, Utah, and by the middle of the third day, we plan to be in Aspen. We've got four nights in a studio in Snowmass, which is cheaper than actually staying in Aspen, plus we'll have a kitchen of sorts and don't have to pay the exorbitant costs of eating out all the time in Aspen, either.
Did you know they make coffee machines you can plug into the cigarette lighter in your car? Is that a bad idea? I am leaning towards it being good, because instant soup or red beans and rice on the road sounds like a better lunch to me than McDonald's, which sounds like death. Plus, you know, coffee that isn't ass.
After surviving a few days in a fancy-ass resort town, we leave my brother and head for San Francisco to see my sister. This looks like a two-day drive, with a stop at the Utah-Nevada border. The hope is to get a few days away from it all in Monterey or somesuch before heading home. I might also be able to score an interview or two with places I've applied and never heard back from (insert sad face).
The beach house is about two months away from completion. It's going to be awesome.
Sunday, June 06, 2004
I Am A 1950s Housewife
Oh my gosh, you guys, I've been having the most fun time evar!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111
Well, except not really. But it's all right.
I cleaned my house.
I am DONE with motherfucking UNDERGRAD. This feat is very anticlimactic.
I'm gonna start missing it soon. Any day now. Yep.
No, really, there's a lot to miss about college. This isn't like finishing high school, you know. Besides, I now (well, whenever they mail it months from now) hold a piece of paper that says maybe I'm qualified to work somewhere more prestigious than, say, Wal-Mart. More prestigious, just as overworked and underpaid. But I probably don't have to wear a uniform. I hope.
...Oh, hell.
To celebrate the astonishingly dull presentation of our award, Marilee and I went out to Ivar's Thursday night for some much-needed grub. The next day, only Kim joined us for some Thai lunch to say good-bye and whatnot. The rest of the group is seemingly done with us, I guess. Well, bye, then.
Friday night I made Indian food with Kevin, which we both totally forgot to put onions in, so it wasn't quite right.
Most of the weekend I am spending doing relaxing chores around the house. Yep, very relaxing indeed. Cleaned the entire top floor of the house, including my room which has needed sweeping since January. Did an insane amount of dishes. Made the vegan roasted potato salad again--recipe forthcoming--and when the late-night munchies hit, made the low-fat vegan chocolate chocolate walnut cookies that are awesome. Seriously, they are awesome even if you don't know about the vegan and low-fat parts. The funny part is the vegan boyfriend doesn't like them unless, as he found out last night, they are still warm and melty.
Today I await the awakening of Kevin so we can go to Uwajimaya and get stuff to make a ridiculous amount of Thai red curry tomorrow. I'm going to make one typical tofu and veggie, one pumpkin (maybe mussuman), and one mussuman fish curry with tilapia. Mmmm.
I am on a bit of a tilapia kick after making up a yummy dish of them at mom's house last Sunday. I just threw them in a dish with soy sauce, fresh-squeezed lime, sherry, and a dash of chili-garlic sauce a few hours before dinner and let them marinate, then cooked them in the pan with the juices for maybe 10 minutes total. Delish. I am especially fond of tilapia upon learning that they are a sustainable food, able to be farmed nearly anywhere in the world with little environmental damage and eat vegetarian food. Neat. (I would provide a link, but my source appears to be down. Check out the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch program if you are curious.)
It seems like a good sign that I'm obsessed with food again. I was too dizzy and busy for a few weeks there to even think about it. Whew.
Another thing I am able to do again that I've missed for the sake of the project is renting DVDs. I picked up the next disc of Queer as Folk I hadn't watched and the first disc of Chappelle's Show since everyone is talking about it. I am amused by the latter, but increasingly frustrated with the former. It's predictably trashy, and not in a good way. Oh well.
Before I stop babbling, here's the potato salad:
-Probably about a pound of red potatoes
-Some cloves of garlic, the tips trimmed off
Wash and chop potatoes into bite-sized portions, but do not peel unless you are lame and don't like red potato skins. Leave garlic in the skin. Toss with olive oil, salt and pepper. Roast until tender. (I've been doing about 18 min. in the toaster oven on broil.)
Chop the following:
-About 8 gently rinsed marinated artichoke hearts
-A skewer of fresh rosemary
-2-3 stems of fresh basil
-Small handful of pinenuts
Mix with a spoonful of olive oil, a dash of basalmic vinegar, and salt and pepper.
When the potatoes are roasted, pick out the garlic and remove skins. Crush or chop as necessary. Put potatoes and garlic in the bowl with uncooked, chopped ingredients and mix. This is best if allowed to sit and mellow for a few hours at room temp, but can also be eaten immediately or refrigerated.
Th-th-th-that's all, folks.
Well, except not really. But it's all right.
I cleaned my house.
I am DONE with motherfucking UNDERGRAD. This feat is very anticlimactic.
I'm gonna start missing it soon. Any day now. Yep.
No, really, there's a lot to miss about college. This isn't like finishing high school, you know. Besides, I now (well, whenever they mail it months from now) hold a piece of paper that says maybe I'm qualified to work somewhere more prestigious than, say, Wal-Mart. More prestigious, just as overworked and underpaid. But I probably don't have to wear a uniform. I hope.
...Oh, hell.
To celebrate the astonishingly dull presentation of our award, Marilee and I went out to Ivar's Thursday night for some much-needed grub. The next day, only Kim joined us for some Thai lunch to say good-bye and whatnot. The rest of the group is seemingly done with us, I guess. Well, bye, then.
Friday night I made Indian food with Kevin, which we both totally forgot to put onions in, so it wasn't quite right.
Most of the weekend I am spending doing relaxing chores around the house. Yep, very relaxing indeed. Cleaned the entire top floor of the house, including my room which has needed sweeping since January. Did an insane amount of dishes. Made the vegan roasted potato salad again--recipe forthcoming--and when the late-night munchies hit, made the low-fat vegan chocolate chocolate walnut cookies that are awesome. Seriously, they are awesome even if you don't know about the vegan and low-fat parts. The funny part is the vegan boyfriend doesn't like them unless, as he found out last night, they are still warm and melty.
Today I await the awakening of Kevin so we can go to Uwajimaya and get stuff to make a ridiculous amount of Thai red curry tomorrow. I'm going to make one typical tofu and veggie, one pumpkin (maybe mussuman), and one mussuman fish curry with tilapia. Mmmm.
I am on a bit of a tilapia kick after making up a yummy dish of them at mom's house last Sunday. I just threw them in a dish with soy sauce, fresh-squeezed lime, sherry, and a dash of chili-garlic sauce a few hours before dinner and let them marinate, then cooked them in the pan with the juices for maybe 10 minutes total. Delish. I am especially fond of tilapia upon learning that they are a sustainable food, able to be farmed nearly anywhere in the world with little environmental damage and eat vegetarian food. Neat. (I would provide a link, but my source appears to be down. Check out the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch program if you are curious.)
It seems like a good sign that I'm obsessed with food again. I was too dizzy and busy for a few weeks there to even think about it. Whew.
Another thing I am able to do again that I've missed for the sake of the project is renting DVDs. I picked up the next disc of Queer as Folk I hadn't watched and the first disc of Chappelle's Show since everyone is talking about it. I am amused by the latter, but increasingly frustrated with the former. It's predictably trashy, and not in a good way. Oh well.
Before I stop babbling, here's the potato salad:
-Probably about a pound of red potatoes
-Some cloves of garlic, the tips trimmed off
Wash and chop potatoes into bite-sized portions, but do not peel unless you are lame and don't like red potato skins. Leave garlic in the skin. Toss with olive oil, salt and pepper. Roast until tender. (I've been doing about 18 min. in the toaster oven on broil.)
Chop the following:
-About 8 gently rinsed marinated artichoke hearts
-A skewer of fresh rosemary
-2-3 stems of fresh basil
-Small handful of pinenuts
Mix with a spoonful of olive oil, a dash of basalmic vinegar, and salt and pepper.
When the potatoes are roasted, pick out the garlic and remove skins. Crush or chop as necessary. Put potatoes and garlic in the bowl with uncooked, chopped ingredients and mix. This is best if allowed to sit and mellow for a few hours at room temp, but can also be eaten immediately or refrigerated.
Th-th-th-that's all, folks.
Wednesday, June 02, 2004
All's Well That Ends Well. Well, Well...
The past few days have been From Hell, and not like the ill-advised Johnny Depp movie.
Since Monday, I've been clamoring to finish up every last pesky detail of our project, which you can currently find living here until we find a more permanent home. There are a lot of pesky details, indeed. Some of them have gone uncorrected in this version because of some last-minute fuckups. But there it is, graceful as she goes.
That's the behemoth that's turned me into the weird-dreaming, tired-in-every-conceivable-way, hating-to-help-people-with-software-ever-again monster that greets you tonight.
Except I just found out we learned the class prize for best project. Pot was $400, so each of us gets $80. We have to attend some wonky award ceremony--I sure hope it's not during my work shift, but I won't find out until tomorrow--and make a poster and stuff, but hell. $80.
And on Friday we find out if we won the big $1000 library prize. That would be rad, but I'm not holding out too much hope.
In job news, I'm looking at Amazon and a bunch of Bay Area places still. I think this weekend will be another mad cover letter-writing session, sigh.
And I'm basically done with college. Hell yeah.
Since Monday, I've been clamoring to finish up every last pesky detail of our project, which you can currently find living here until we find a more permanent home. There are a lot of pesky details, indeed. Some of them have gone uncorrected in this version because of some last-minute fuckups. But there it is, graceful as she goes.
That's the behemoth that's turned me into the weird-dreaming, tired-in-every-conceivable-way, hating-to-help-people-with-software-ever-again monster that greets you tonight.
Except I just found out we learned the class prize for best project. Pot was $400, so each of us gets $80. We have to attend some wonky award ceremony--I sure hope it's not during my work shift, but I won't find out until tomorrow--and make a poster and stuff, but hell. $80.
And on Friday we find out if we won the big $1000 library prize. That would be rad, but I'm not holding out too much hope.
In job news, I'm looking at Amazon and a bunch of Bay Area places still. I think this weekend will be another mad cover letter-writing session, sigh.
And I'm basically done with college. Hell yeah.
Saturday, May 29, 2004
Brilliant, Disastrous Disaster
This summer's hot apocalyptic fantasy is everything I expected: bad, bad, worse, and rife with cliches. In other words, AWESOME.
I mean. Just. Wow. For one thing, I always find it amusing when a movie features Los Angeles getting destroyed. I like L.A.'s self-destructive fantasies. If I'm ever a grad student in film, I'll write a masturbatory research/analysis paper on the subject.
Rupert Murdoch evidently financed the movie. You can tell, not only from checking the IMDb listings, because every fake news clip is a FOX News channel. Even funnier is that the movie is quite heavy-handed in its anti-global warming stance, and conservatives are all Skeptical Environmentalist on us lately. The explanation for this I see? Perhaps Murdoch took into consideration the utter uneblievability of the film when he paid into it, thinking that people might be swayed to the opposite point of view. The global warming stance is portrayed, in the eyes of the discerning moviegoer, as completely unreal.
Dennis Quaid is a terrible actor.
Plus, they used the exhausted cliche of a main character making a pointless journey to "save" a family member, and in the process finds affection once more with an estranged ex-spouse. Couple that with the lone scientist who has the explanation for the problem that no one else believes except one other dude, but then it's TRUE, only by the time they figure that out they're all doomed, anyway, and you have the major plotline of any disaster movie.
But this had even less motivation than most I've seen. The fact that it has characters is almost incidental.
The cgi wolves were terrible. The tidal wave that swallowed Manhattan was really terrible, because anyone who has ever seen a regular wave knows that the ocean wouldn't move like a big pile of sludge like it did here. It moves fast and it moves hard. You can't really outrun it like they did.
I don't want to write spoilers (although, really, who cares? You don't see this crap to be surprised if you see it at all), but what happened with the scientists in Scotland was insanely stupid.
I went with a big group--including Jana, who normally dislikes it when I ruin movies by mocking them, but in this case, she mocked right along with me--and we got shushed at least once. Dude, who takes this seriously? Half the theater was laughing at all the badness, too, so it wasn't like we were lone assholes.
But anyway, I loved this because it was so incredibly bad. If you like to watch bad movies and laugh at them, watch it. Otherwise, skip it.
I mean. Just. Wow. For one thing, I always find it amusing when a movie features Los Angeles getting destroyed. I like L.A.'s self-destructive fantasies. If I'm ever a grad student in film, I'll write a masturbatory research/analysis paper on the subject.
Rupert Murdoch evidently financed the movie. You can tell, not only from checking the IMDb listings, because every fake news clip is a FOX News channel. Even funnier is that the movie is quite heavy-handed in its anti-global warming stance, and conservatives are all Skeptical Environmentalist on us lately. The explanation for this I see? Perhaps Murdoch took into consideration the utter uneblievability of the film when he paid into it, thinking that people might be swayed to the opposite point of view. The global warming stance is portrayed, in the eyes of the discerning moviegoer, as completely unreal.
Dennis Quaid is a terrible actor.
Plus, they used the exhausted cliche of a main character making a pointless journey to "save" a family member, and in the process finds affection once more with an estranged ex-spouse. Couple that with the lone scientist who has the explanation for the problem that no one else believes except one other dude, but then it's TRUE, only by the time they figure that out they're all doomed, anyway, and you have the major plotline of any disaster movie.
But this had even less motivation than most I've seen. The fact that it has characters is almost incidental.
The cgi wolves were terrible. The tidal wave that swallowed Manhattan was really terrible, because anyone who has ever seen a regular wave knows that the ocean wouldn't move like a big pile of sludge like it did here. It moves fast and it moves hard. You can't really outrun it like they did.
I don't want to write spoilers (although, really, who cares? You don't see this crap to be surprised if you see it at all), but what happened with the scientists in Scotland was insanely stupid.
I went with a big group--including Jana, who normally dislikes it when I ruin movies by mocking them, but in this case, she mocked right along with me--and we got shushed at least once. Dude, who takes this seriously? Half the theater was laughing at all the badness, too, so it wasn't like we were lone assholes.
But anyway, I loved this because it was so incredibly bad. If you like to watch bad movies and laugh at them, watch it. Otherwise, skip it.
Friday, May 28, 2004
Jebus Lord
I finally saw the real Jesus movie: Monty Python's Life of Brian.
Thanks to a theatrical re-release, I've finally not slept through a Python film. I think I've mentioned this before, but until last night, I've never stayed awake during a Monty Python movie, no matter how amusing. And I do find them funny, I just... can't... stay... awake... couch so comfy... mmmmssffghhzzz.
So, I saw it. The whole thing. That's about all I have to say, because everyone else, everywhere, has already seen it and can quote multiple lines and would recognize the whistling from "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" after two notes and I'm spent.
Hee.
Tonight I have plans to see The Day After Tomorrow with Haremites who also enjoy bad disaster movies. My only concern is the audience at Mountlake, Jana's favorite theater. Will they be snark-friendly, or honestly horrified at the havoc "global warming" wreaks on Earth depicted in the film? (Not that I'm a global warming doubter, I just know this is fake to the hilt. I'd be disappointed if it weren't.)
It's Memorial weekend, so lots of stuff is going on. Jana's celebrating her birthday, Graylan's hosting a barbecue, my sister's flying up (and will give me some paperwork regarding a place in SF)...
My projects are damn near complete. The copyediting/layout final might require some further nitpicking or rearranging, but I could leave it alone, come in on Wednesday, hit 'print,' and be done. It was about two solid hours of layout work, and I think it looks all right. I don't have much to contribute to my other group project at the moment, but I'm sure I'll help finish it up. We present on Wednesday.
I am still contemplating this whole moving thing. As I see it, I have three major options: One, stay in Seattle, find a job that pays but isn't what I want to do forever (like working at Trader Joe's), and see what I can do to pick up some useful experience on the side. Two, stay in Seattle until I can find a place in California that will hire me, then move. Three, move to San Francisco in a month or so and get a job from there. I don't really like the first option unless I can find something semi-good up here, like doing editing for Amazon. Still not what I want to do forever, but it's closer. The trouble with the other two is that I don't even know if I can get a job doing what I want, if I could get a job that would pay the bills in the meantime, or how to build up sufficient experience to get hired anywhere. So, anyway, I don't know. But I'll keep you posted.
Thanks to a theatrical re-release, I've finally not slept through a Python film. I think I've mentioned this before, but until last night, I've never stayed awake during a Monty Python movie, no matter how amusing. And I do find them funny, I just... can't... stay... awake... couch so comfy... mmmmssffghhzzz.
So, I saw it. The whole thing. That's about all I have to say, because everyone else, everywhere, has already seen it and can quote multiple lines and would recognize the whistling from "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" after two notes and I'm spent.
Hee.
Tonight I have plans to see The Day After Tomorrow with Haremites who also enjoy bad disaster movies. My only concern is the audience at Mountlake, Jana's favorite theater. Will they be snark-friendly, or honestly horrified at the havoc "global warming" wreaks on Earth depicted in the film? (Not that I'm a global warming doubter, I just know this is fake to the hilt. I'd be disappointed if it weren't.)
It's Memorial weekend, so lots of stuff is going on. Jana's celebrating her birthday, Graylan's hosting a barbecue, my sister's flying up (and will give me some paperwork regarding a place in SF)...
My projects are damn near complete. The copyediting/layout final might require some further nitpicking or rearranging, but I could leave it alone, come in on Wednesday, hit 'print,' and be done. It was about two solid hours of layout work, and I think it looks all right. I don't have much to contribute to my other group project at the moment, but I'm sure I'll help finish it up. We present on Wednesday.
I am still contemplating this whole moving thing. As I see it, I have three major options: One, stay in Seattle, find a job that pays but isn't what I want to do forever (like working at Trader Joe's), and see what I can do to pick up some useful experience on the side. Two, stay in Seattle until I can find a place in California that will hire me, then move. Three, move to San Francisco in a month or so and get a job from there. I don't really like the first option unless I can find something semi-good up here, like doing editing for Amazon. Still not what I want to do forever, but it's closer. The trouble with the other two is that I don't even know if I can get a job doing what I want, if I could get a job that would pay the bills in the meantime, or how to build up sufficient experience to get hired anywhere. So, anyway, I don't know. But I'll keep you posted.
Wednesday, May 26, 2004
Almost
I'm almost sure I'm moving. Margot found a place that sounds absolutely lovely: a block from Golden Gate Park, backyard we can plant edibles in, pets are allowed so we can so get a bunny, big rooms and lots of space, reasonable (for SF) rent, landlords about to renovate the place a bit so it's even more inhabitable.
I don't have a job landed or anything, but I will. I'm sure of it. I'll figure something out. So far I've made out seven cover letters and resumes, with and without writing samples. I'm sure I'll need to do a lot more fishing before something bites, but it's a good start.
I'm almost done with school, forever. Not an absolute forever, maybe, but probably permanent. One project is nearly finished--I'll post a link when it's up on the school server instead of my home box, which I don't want Google to cache--and another will be done shortly because it's fricking easy. I have to copyedit five stories, trim two, and stick them (up to four can jump) on a broadsheet layout in InDesign and on a paper dummy. With photos that she'll send us. And write headlines and captions. And print out the full copyedited originals. It's nothing compared to the insanity of the other.
I am almost really fucking bored of work.
I am not even almost off work, though. And I'm hungry.
I am almost sure I'll listen to Sufjan Stevens when I get home, though.
I don't have a job landed or anything, but I will. I'm sure of it. I'll figure something out. So far I've made out seven cover letters and resumes, with and without writing samples. I'm sure I'll need to do a lot more fishing before something bites, but it's a good start.
I'm almost done with school, forever. Not an absolute forever, maybe, but probably permanent. One project is nearly finished--I'll post a link when it's up on the school server instead of my home box, which I don't want Google to cache--and another will be done shortly because it's fricking easy. I have to copyedit five stories, trim two, and stick them (up to four can jump) on a broadsheet layout in InDesign and on a paper dummy. With photos that she'll send us. And write headlines and captions. And print out the full copyedited originals. It's nothing compared to the insanity of the other.
I am almost really fucking bored of work.
I am not even almost off work, though. And I'm hungry.
I am almost sure I'll listen to Sufjan Stevens when I get home, though.
Sunday, May 23, 2004
Sunsets and Silhouettes
It struck me tonight as I was driving home: I love the look of traffic at dusk in Seattle. There's something about the slowly deepening blue sky as it meets the black pavement swarming with a dizzying sea of lights, marked by the occasional tree silhouette. I'm sure it's just as romantic elsewhere, but nowhere like Seattle.
Everything about Seattle and the Pacific Northwest has me contemplating sadness today. Yesterday I made somewhat of a decision about my future--it's looking increasingly like I'll end up moving to San Francisco this summer and getting a place with my sister.
I'm still coming to terms with this idea.
I'm not sure if it excites me, or if it just terrifies me. The more I look for a job, the more jobs I see in the Bay Area. Pretty much a handful there to none here, as far as jobs I'd actually want go. And really, I have wanted to live there for awhile. I just didn't think it would be so soon.
On Saturday, I wrote five cover letters and sent emails to the appropriate persons. All were jobs in California and all were jobs I think I'd actually want. The jobs in Seattle are either crap or require more experience than I have.
Of course, I don't know if this means I actually have a shot at gainful employment in San Francisco. I just know my options are by far less limited. I didn't even know what kind of job, exactly, I was looking for until I found a half dozen postings for it on the SF Craigslist.
To answer your next question, it's likely Kevin would move back to his home state as well. His landlords are selling the apartment he's lived in for the last year and a half and the new owner might kick him out within a month. Besides, he hasn't found a job here yet, anyway.
We both like Seattle more--but realize we may have to wait 'til we're older to be able to appreciate it. With jobs and things. Is California truly the land of opportunity? I don't know. But for me, it's sure looking that way.
Everything about Seattle and the Pacific Northwest has me contemplating sadness today. Yesterday I made somewhat of a decision about my future--it's looking increasingly like I'll end up moving to San Francisco this summer and getting a place with my sister.
I'm still coming to terms with this idea.
I'm not sure if it excites me, or if it just terrifies me. The more I look for a job, the more jobs I see in the Bay Area. Pretty much a handful there to none here, as far as jobs I'd actually want go. And really, I have wanted to live there for awhile. I just didn't think it would be so soon.
On Saturday, I wrote five cover letters and sent emails to the appropriate persons. All were jobs in California and all were jobs I think I'd actually want. The jobs in Seattle are either crap or require more experience than I have.
Of course, I don't know if this means I actually have a shot at gainful employment in San Francisco. I just know my options are by far less limited. I didn't even know what kind of job, exactly, I was looking for until I found a half dozen postings for it on the SF Craigslist.
To answer your next question, it's likely Kevin would move back to his home state as well. His landlords are selling the apartment he's lived in for the last year and a half and the new owner might kick him out within a month. Besides, he hasn't found a job here yet, anyway.
We both like Seattle more--but realize we may have to wait 'til we're older to be able to appreciate it. With jobs and things. Is California truly the land of opportunity? I don't know. But for me, it's sure looking that way.
Saturday, May 22, 2004
Satire Disobeys
I received some peculiar spam on my seldom-checked mail.com account:
From: roberta
To: bad_day@cheerful.com
CC:
Subject: -
Date: Sun, 16 May 2004 02:09:58 +0000
Show Full Headers Back To [INBOX]
veze strook somer.
asshen neigh, eldres themsel twyes.
anthiocho stanch noot
satire disobeys.
Maybe I'm getting hexed over the intarchathexweb.
(Also, double entendre!)
From: roberta
To: bad_day@cheerful.com
CC:
Subject: -
Date: Sun, 16 May 2004 02:09:58 +0000
Show Full Headers Back To [INBOX]
veze strook somer.
asshen neigh, eldres themsel twyes.
anthiocho stanch noot
satire disobeys.
Maybe I'm getting hexed over the intarchathexweb.
(Also, double entendre!)
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