I am in a tug-of-war between wanting to write on my memory-packed Xanga and wanting to start afresh here. I don't like letting go of sentimental things.
My problem with Xanga is not so much that it's memory-packed, but more that it's Xanga. I prefer Blogspot, but I'm sure if I move here I'll want to relocate once again, when something more appealing comes along. In search of the perfect blog-host.
I am also constantly debating how much to really share about myself. As I get older and information gets more and more easy to come by, I find myself valuing my privacy. It's kind of a surprise because I never saw myself as a particularly private or mysterious person, but now I kind of want to be one. I see that I used to drop a lot more information in my Xanga entries, and now I am a lot more hesitant. I didn't even do that 25 things questionnaire that went viral on Facebook. Although now that it has come to light that Facebook has devised a plot to own everything that we post there, I'm starting to wonder if the creators weren't just trolling for interesting ideas for stories and characters. But I feel like people who blatantly steal other peoples' content for profit are probably not storytellers at heart.
So yeah, laying it all out for everybody to see vs. buttoning my lip. I feel like this must be a common struggle for people who want to write. There are a lot of writers who somehow seem to manage to seem totally confessional and be fairly private, all at once. Smoke and mirrors.
I bought a new shampoo and conditioner and today my curls look a little curlier and more structured, despite the rain. And yes, I am still using the same after-shower hair products.
The clouds are haulin' it across the sky, post-sideways crazy rain. I'm sure there will be more rain shortly.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Kids, Adults, and In Between
Whenever I start writing after midnight, I usually end up pulling an unintentional all-nighter, which pretty much wipes me out for the following day. Tonight I wasted a perfectly good night of sleep to write a long blog entry. A blog entry. I should be working on my "real" writing. Sigh.
I don't know if I've addressed this here, but I've talked about it recently with friends....
When I was a kid, I used to look at adults and think that they really had it together. I thought that on some distant and unfathomable morning I would wake up and somehow be secure in the knowledge that I was an adult.
But that's not really how it seems to be working out. Sometimes I feel like a grown-up, and sometimes I feel totally unprepared. Maybe once I have an income again, I'll feel more mature. Sometimes I just need to dress the part to feel it. Maybe a lot of being an adult has to do with feeling like an adult. Not that you can't still be young at heart.
It's crazy how everything is relative. I remember being in kindergarten and seeing the sixth graders and thinking that they were big, tall adults who could squish me under their feet. Now I see sixth graders and think that they are...well, twelve years old.
By a similar token, I will occasionally see a really hot guy and find out that he's in high school...like, 5 years younger than me...and feel like a total perv. Because I mistook a teen for an adult.
It's also funny to think about age gaps between couples. If I am 21 and date a 27-year-old, that's acceptable. But when he was 21 I was (I can't do math)...15-ish...that would have been a scandal. Or if a man marries a woman the same age as his daughter or something...we don't really want to start thinking about that math.
When I was 18, I went on a date with a 30-year-old, and my funny friend, Mike, made a huge list of "when he was doing this, you were doing that" to illustrate the age difference. We figured out that my date could theoretically have been my elementary school teacher. So to all you elementary school teachers, keep an eye out for potential future dates/spouses/f-buddies. It's a waiting game, for sure.
I don't know if I've addressed this here, but I've talked about it recently with friends....
When I was a kid, I used to look at adults and think that they really had it together. I thought that on some distant and unfathomable morning I would wake up and somehow be secure in the knowledge that I was an adult.
But that's not really how it seems to be working out. Sometimes I feel like a grown-up, and sometimes I feel totally unprepared. Maybe once I have an income again, I'll feel more mature. Sometimes I just need to dress the part to feel it. Maybe a lot of being an adult has to do with feeling like an adult. Not that you can't still be young at heart.
It's crazy how everything is relative. I remember being in kindergarten and seeing the sixth graders and thinking that they were big, tall adults who could squish me under their feet. Now I see sixth graders and think that they are...well, twelve years old.
By a similar token, I will occasionally see a really hot guy and find out that he's in high school...like, 5 years younger than me...and feel like a total perv. Because I mistook a teen for an adult.
It's also funny to think about age gaps between couples. If I am 21 and date a 27-year-old, that's acceptable. But when he was 21 I was (I can't do math)...15-ish...that would have been a scandal. Or if a man marries a woman the same age as his daughter or something...we don't really want to start thinking about that math.
When I was 18, I went on a date with a 30-year-old, and my funny friend, Mike, made a huge list of "when he was doing this, you were doing that" to illustrate the age difference. We figured out that my date could theoretically have been my elementary school teacher. So to all you elementary school teachers, keep an eye out for potential future dates/spouses/f-buddies. It's a waiting game, for sure.
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Motor Memory
Sometimes when I'm typing a website into my internet explorer, my left hand will trip out and my right hand will type on regardless, which results in my trying to go to "google.om." I think that .om would be a great domain (if that's what it's called) for spirituality-related (especially Buddhist) websites.
Does it ever totally amaze you to think of how smart our brains and muscles are, that we can process what we're thinking and be able to type words, without even really thinking about it? I know that I will often be talking or looking away while I type, but still my fingers/brain can handle it. That's one of the miracles/mysteries of the universe. Also, the way our brains process language is sort of astounding to me, especially when we trip up and show our mental processing cards a bit. For example, sometimes I type "our" instead of "are" and vice-versa. My brain obviously knows the difference between those two words, but something makes it confuse homophones when I type. Crazy crazy.
Speaking of our fascinating brains, I have started a new blog at www.remembermethis.blogspot.com. It's dedicated to memories of things that never really happened, or memories of probably real events that only one person claims to remember. Email me if you have one of those types of memories--I want it to be a sort of PostSecret/Overheard in NY of wacky or poignant false memories. I only have a few of my own, and I don't want it to be all, me me me.
Does it ever totally amaze you to think of how smart our brains and muscles are, that we can process what we're thinking and be able to type words, without even really thinking about it? I know that I will often be talking or looking away while I type, but still my fingers/brain can handle it. That's one of the miracles/mysteries of the universe. Also, the way our brains process language is sort of astounding to me, especially when we trip up and show our mental processing cards a bit. For example, sometimes I type "our" instead of "are" and vice-versa. My brain obviously knows the difference between those two words, but something makes it confuse homophones when I type. Crazy crazy.
Speaking of our fascinating brains, I have started a new blog at www.remembermethis.blogspot.com. It's dedicated to memories of things that never really happened, or memories of probably real events that only one person claims to remember. Email me if you have one of those types of memories--I want it to be a sort of PostSecret/Overheard in NY of wacky or poignant false memories. I only have a few of my own, and I don't want it to be all, me me me.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
What's in a Decade?
First of all, I'm listening to the new Death Cab single. I didn't even know that they had a new single until my friend sent me a link to the video. I'm out of the loop. The cover art for the single and the upcoming album looks amazing. I kind of want to buy a poster version of the cover art and frame it and put it in my new apartment. My new apartment which doesn't yet exist.
My life is completely hypothetical starting a month from now. I cannot really get over that. I am interviewing for internships even though I need to find a paid job, just because it's terrifying to think that I might have no prospects on the morning after I graduate. I know I keep harping on this and some day I will look back and say, "Why did I worry so much?" and tell college seniors to just go with the flow. I know because I always look back and wonder why I worried so much. But then I think that maybe if I hadn't worried, things might not have turned out the same. Hmm.
Anyway, due to my worrying, my heavy book tote, and the fact that I usually write on my laptop while propped on my elbows in bed (today I'm sitting up), my whole body feels achy and wanky. My neck is a particular trouble area. I know basically zero about muscles (film and writing major here) and the art of massage, but last night two of my friends felt my neck and went, "Whoa! This is not good." Of course my neck is strained; it's holding up my GIANT BRAIN. Just kidding. Although if thoughts and worries had weight to them, my head would probably have toppled off of my neck long ago. But yeah, if I touch my neck it hurts. Sometimes too much to sleep. If I'm stressed now and things aren't even THAT stressfull, I probably have this to look forward to for the rest of my life. GREAT. I mean, I realize that I'm particularly stressed right now, but you know what else is stressful? HAVING a job. Growing up. Kids. Oh God.
A couple of days ago at the sound department, one of my 22-year-old co-workers (male) mentioned that he would like to be a father when he's 27. Another female co-worker and I pointed out that if that's what he wants, he should really be married within the next three years. So he should really meet his wife ASAP. No pressure. This guy just recently quit smoking, and he admitted (maybe jokingly) that it's partially about finding a girl (kudos to him either way). But anyway, the point is that these timelines are starting to form. (As a side note, though, as a guy it's easy for my friend to say he wants to have kids sooner than me and the other girls, because once he has kids he doesn't have to be the mom. The stakes are different.)
Yesterday I was thinking about the word "decade." It's such a small easy way of saying TEN YEARS, but the funny thing about decade is that sometimes it's used to denote a long stretch of time, and sometimes it's meant to compress time. I could say, "Decades ago women wore corsets," and that's kind of neutral. But if I went to an interview and they said, "We'll call you sometime in the next decade," that would seem ludicrous. Or when I talk to people and realize that it could take a decade to reach my career goals, that seems like forever, even though I'll only be in my early 30s in a decade (only, ha). But then when I think that within a decade I will probably be married and have two kids, it feels like, "Oh my God, a decade is too short! It's just around the corner." Sort of.
Don't get me wrong--I am looking forward to this next step. It's just a scary, strange transition involving so many decisions. That's why I'm kind of obsessing over it. Eventually I'll write another post about something more fun than my neuroses. Hopefully.
My life is completely hypothetical starting a month from now. I cannot really get over that. I am interviewing for internships even though I need to find a paid job, just because it's terrifying to think that I might have no prospects on the morning after I graduate. I know I keep harping on this and some day I will look back and say, "Why did I worry so much?" and tell college seniors to just go with the flow. I know because I always look back and wonder why I worried so much. But then I think that maybe if I hadn't worried, things might not have turned out the same. Hmm.
Anyway, due to my worrying, my heavy book tote, and the fact that I usually write on my laptop while propped on my elbows in bed (today I'm sitting up), my whole body feels achy and wanky. My neck is a particular trouble area. I know basically zero about muscles (film and writing major here) and the art of massage, but last night two of my friends felt my neck and went, "Whoa! This is not good." Of course my neck is strained; it's holding up my GIANT BRAIN. Just kidding. Although if thoughts and worries had weight to them, my head would probably have toppled off of my neck long ago. But yeah, if I touch my neck it hurts. Sometimes too much to sleep. If I'm stressed now and things aren't even THAT stressfull, I probably have this to look forward to for the rest of my life. GREAT. I mean, I realize that I'm particularly stressed right now, but you know what else is stressful? HAVING a job. Growing up. Kids. Oh God.
A couple of days ago at the sound department, one of my 22-year-old co-workers (male) mentioned that he would like to be a father when he's 27. Another female co-worker and I pointed out that if that's what he wants, he should really be married within the next three years. So he should really meet his wife ASAP. No pressure. This guy just recently quit smoking, and he admitted (maybe jokingly) that it's partially about finding a girl (kudos to him either way). But anyway, the point is that these timelines are starting to form. (As a side note, though, as a guy it's easy for my friend to say he wants to have kids sooner than me and the other girls, because once he has kids he doesn't have to be the mom. The stakes are different.)
Yesterday I was thinking about the word "decade." It's such a small easy way of saying TEN YEARS, but the funny thing about decade is that sometimes it's used to denote a long stretch of time, and sometimes it's meant to compress time. I could say, "Decades ago women wore corsets," and that's kind of neutral. But if I went to an interview and they said, "We'll call you sometime in the next decade," that would seem ludicrous. Or when I talk to people and realize that it could take a decade to reach my career goals, that seems like forever, even though I'll only be in my early 30s in a decade (only, ha). But then when I think that within a decade I will probably be married and have two kids, it feels like, "Oh my God, a decade is too short! It's just around the corner." Sort of.
Don't get me wrong--I am looking forward to this next step. It's just a scary, strange transition involving so many decisions. That's why I'm kind of obsessing over it. Eventually I'll write another post about something more fun than my neuroses. Hopefully.
Saturday, April 5, 2008
Celeberate!
The other day I was typing an email at my internship, and I accidentally wrote that we were going to "celeberate Mother's Day!" Freudian slip?
Everybody who knows me fairly well knows that my personality is a weird mix of childlike joy about the world and extreme cynicism, and I feel like celeberating is a good description of the way I often speak about certain topics. When I think about it, I'm kind of surprised that the word "celeberate" doesn't already exist. I just submitted it to Urban Dictionary, and if all goes well it will be as popular as "frenemy" in the near future (what I really need to do is use it in a screenplay and then get that screenplay produced).
One entity which I find myself simultaneously celebrating and berating all the time is the United States of America. Lately my poor roommate has been subjected to hearing me ask a slew of rhetorical questions beginning with, "How can we reconcile...?" The "we" is almost always non-white people, and when I say non-white I basically mean everybody who didn't come here on the Mayflower or from an affluent Western European country. Because when you think about it, Irish people and Jews are techincally Caucasian but we got a lot of shit (and in some cases, still do) from America when we first got here. Occasionally I am enthused about America, but more often than not I want to talk smack. Even when I'm saying good things about America, I'm usually not 100% pleased. For example, "The great thing about America is that everybody's free to pursue their dreams...in theory." That's celeberating the USA!
Other things that I love to celeberate: religion, the film industry, USC, my friends and family. Sorry losers! You know I love you. And you know I celeberate myself all the time.
Another "institution" which I can't help but celeberate--because I really am not sure how to feel-- is the male/female practice of courting/relationships. Sometimes I think, "Oh, I can't wait to have a special man to share my whole life with!" and other times I think, "Someday soon I'm going to get married and spend the rest of my life compromising my goals and dreams and being stuck in one place (unless we're rich and can afford multiple homes)." Last night I was having this very discussion with my friend Brennero, and he was jokingly referring to having kids as "popping out some anchors." Every year all of this "some day I'll be an adult with a 'real life'" stuff is getting closer and closer, and the prospect of jumping into that life is half wonderful, half horrifying. Suddenly a lot of people I know are engaged or married, and I'm thinking, "Whoa, whoa!" (that makes me think of horses). Right now it's scary enough going forward into life as an independent person (as opposed to being a dependent--I am really going to miss being on my parents' insurance policies).
My whole life right now feels overshadowed by the fact that a little over a month from now I will graduate from college. That means that I will lose my housing and my university job, my friend-base will scatter, and I ought to have lots of creative work ready to show to people. Luckily almost all of my film friends are in the same boat of not having a job lined up (film jobs usually need to be filled immediately, so we can't really get them until classes end). As much as I'm excited to go out into the world (and getting kind of jaded about university life), I feel like my identity is being stolen. I'm going to miss being able to go to cheap arts events on campus, walking past the music school and hearing opera singing echo mysteriously around me, running into friends everywhere, always being able to stop by the sound department and see a friendly face, etc.
Oh well. People graduate from college every year, and most of them turn out okay.
Let's have a celeberation!
Everybody who knows me fairly well knows that my personality is a weird mix of childlike joy about the world and extreme cynicism, and I feel like celeberating is a good description of the way I often speak about certain topics. When I think about it, I'm kind of surprised that the word "celeberate" doesn't already exist. I just submitted it to Urban Dictionary, and if all goes well it will be as popular as "frenemy" in the near future (what I really need to do is use it in a screenplay and then get that screenplay produced).
One entity which I find myself simultaneously celebrating and berating all the time is the United States of America. Lately my poor roommate has been subjected to hearing me ask a slew of rhetorical questions beginning with, "How can we reconcile...?" The "we" is almost always non-white people, and when I say non-white I basically mean everybody who didn't come here on the Mayflower or from an affluent Western European country. Because when you think about it, Irish people and Jews are techincally Caucasian but we got a lot of shit (and in some cases, still do) from America when we first got here. Occasionally I am enthused about America, but more often than not I want to talk smack. Even when I'm saying good things about America, I'm usually not 100% pleased. For example, "The great thing about America is that everybody's free to pursue their dreams...in theory." That's celeberating the USA!
Other things that I love to celeberate: religion, the film industry, USC, my friends and family. Sorry losers! You know I love you. And you know I celeberate myself all the time.
Another "institution" which I can't help but celeberate--because I really am not sure how to feel-- is the male/female practice of courting/relationships. Sometimes I think, "Oh, I can't wait to have a special man to share my whole life with!" and other times I think, "Someday soon I'm going to get married and spend the rest of my life compromising my goals and dreams and being stuck in one place (unless we're rich and can afford multiple homes)." Last night I was having this very discussion with my friend Brennero, and he was jokingly referring to having kids as "popping out some anchors." Every year all of this "some day I'll be an adult with a 'real life'" stuff is getting closer and closer, and the prospect of jumping into that life is half wonderful, half horrifying. Suddenly a lot of people I know are engaged or married, and I'm thinking, "Whoa, whoa!" (that makes me think of horses). Right now it's scary enough going forward into life as an independent person (as opposed to being a dependent--I am really going to miss being on my parents' insurance policies).
My whole life right now feels overshadowed by the fact that a little over a month from now I will graduate from college. That means that I will lose my housing and my university job, my friend-base will scatter, and I ought to have lots of creative work ready to show to people. Luckily almost all of my film friends are in the same boat of not having a job lined up (film jobs usually need to be filled immediately, so we can't really get them until classes end). As much as I'm excited to go out into the world (and getting kind of jaded about university life), I feel like my identity is being stolen. I'm going to miss being able to go to cheap arts events on campus, walking past the music school and hearing opera singing echo mysteriously around me, running into friends everywhere, always being able to stop by the sound department and see a friendly face, etc.
Oh well. People graduate from college every year, and most of them turn out okay.
Let's have a celeberation!
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Daylight Savings + Paper Cuts = Dreams of a Broken Camera
Ever since Daylight Savings Time began (last Sunday at 2am PST, in my world), the weather has been gorgeous. Nice weather means that summer is coming, so when it's warm out the Pavlovian effect of my years of student-hood is that I cannot focus on my work, home- and otherwise, because my brain is thinking, "A big long vacation must be imminent." Even though I have worked every summer since I graduated high school, I can't break the association of nice weather with carefree goodtimes...and with swimming. Luckily, Spring Break starts Friday, but I still have 5 weeks of student-hood after that until summer vacation (at which point I'll plunge into the terrifying abyss of regular person-hood...forever). Ironically, I am looking forward to summer because being free from school and homework will mean that I can find a nice grueling full-time job!
Perhaps with the thoughts of a potentially non-summery summer in mind, all I wanted to do on Sunday was float in a big ol' swimming pool. The world saw that and mocked me viciously. I went to the lab where my students were working and watched a man work on a film in which a girl jumped into a swimming pool over and over again. I walked past the McDonald Swim Stadium and saw a fully-clothed girl standing on the highest high dive platform and looking down at the water. I tried to go put my feet in the pool at my apartment, but I couldn't get my key to unlock the gate. Pathetic. True story.
I just finished reading two parts of Gertrude Stein's "Three Lives," entitled "The Good Anna" and "The Gentle Lena." Basically the stories are about women who spend their lives working hard at doing everything they ought to, and they are never happy and they die sooner than they should. So I was walking around thinking, This is a nice day and I shouldn't waste it sitting inside! (Well, actually I wanted to go inside a theater and watch "Compleat Female Stage Beauty," but when I got turned away that seemed like a sign that I should really go to the beach.)
So I called my friend and he did not want to go to the beach. He needed to go to Michael's (the store). Well, actually he wanted to go to a place called Hobby Lobby, but that store doesn't exist in California, as I had to remind him. And that's a stupid name for a store, so I'm glad it doesn't exist here. Anyway, he wanted to go to the closest Michael's, which is in Inglewood, but I told him I'd go along for the ride if we went to the Michael's in Santa Monica. So guess what? Next thing I know I've got my feet in the surf (and my friend is waiting for me on a concrete ledge next to the bike path because I tricked him and he doesn't want to walk in the sand).
In the past few days I was having a big debate with myself about whether I ought to move to New York City after graduation, but now I'm thinking that I haven't really had the living-in-LA experience. I've just had the going-to-college-in-LA experience. So I am probably not ready to leave LA yet. I like being able to go to the beach on a nice day. I know New York City has the Hudson River, but it isn't the same (only Kramer swims in it). Also, people seem to live in New York City because they hate LA (among other reasons-- and calm yourselves, I'm being facetious), and I don't hate LA enough yet to leave. I'm not really sure that I hate anything. My parents always used to say, "Don't say 'hate.' Hate is a strong word." It's interesting that the same word can have different intensities for different people. Also, would I really be hating LA, or my experiences with certain people here? (Or the traffic?) Just saying.
Okay, so my beach pilgrimage happened (the Chaucer kept running through my head: "So priketh hem Nature in hir corages/Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages"), and I was pleased that I really actually acted on something I really wanted to do (although I never actually went swimming; walking in the surf was symbolic). I took a few pictures, which came out well considering that I can't really see my camera's screen in the sun.
The beach thing was also appropriate because I had a dream a few nights ago that I was sitting at a little outdoor dining patio overlooking the water and a sort of shiny city beyond it (possibly somewhere abroad), and Carson Kressley and George Clooney were there too. Carson was wearing these cool glasses with dark blue square (okay, rectangular) frames, and the glasses actually had many other layers which could fit over them, including goggles (for SWIMMING?) and sunglasses (which, yesterday while I was driving to Universal, my passenger/friend put sunglasses on over his glasses). In the dream, I tried to take a picture of Carson in these amazing glasses, but I couldn't, because my camera was not really working, and then some other people wanted pictures with him and my opportunity was lost.
So then last night I had ANOTHER dream that I was trying to use my camera and it wasn't working/wasn't taking the pictures I wanted at the moment I wanted them, and then the moment was lost. This is an interesting new dream, because for years my things-are-wrong dream was the ever-popular teeth-falling-out dream, which is not very cool at all. I don't even need to try to breech my subconscious to know that I really AM worried right now because in two months I will need to start a new life with a new job and a new apartment and blah-de-blah and I have no major prospects yet...and really no minor prospects either. And also--I need to get a new camera. Mine IS kinda shitty.
Oh yeah, and I keep carelessly reaching into things and getting paper cuts. This is real life, not a dream...er, nightmare. I reached into my bag yesterday and got a juicy paper cut on my left middle finger, right on the pad...and I extremely dislike cuts (I typed HATE at first, haha hypocrisy). Then today I reached into my sound locker and got a cut on my right side-pinky. And I keep accidentally sticking my hands into crazy painful things like salsa and mango juice and In 'n Out secret sauce (I ordered my first "secret menu" item last night-- protein style!).
I just had a thought-- I always say that I had a lot of dreams, or I had a bad dream, etc...I very rarely say "nightmare." I wonder if other people would categorize some of my dreams as nightmares...it's all semantics, I say. It's all personal point-of-view.
My roommate read some statistics that claim that there are more suicides during the months when Daylight Savings Time is in effect. I can't really understand that because it's during the summer and there's more light later into the night...isn't that conducive to cheerfulness? I just went and looked it up on Wikipedia and it turns out that many countries (such as Kazakhstan) don't observe Daylight Savings Time because of possible health complications. I guess it really does a number on our circadian rhythms, that bumped hour (notice I didn't say biological clock...I love it when people confuse the two and accidentally make ridiculous statements).
My, look how the time has flown! And I thought I had nothing to post about.
Perhaps with the thoughts of a potentially non-summery summer in mind, all I wanted to do on Sunday was float in a big ol' swimming pool. The world saw that and mocked me viciously. I went to the lab where my students were working and watched a man work on a film in which a girl jumped into a swimming pool over and over again. I walked past the McDonald Swim Stadium and saw a fully-clothed girl standing on the highest high dive platform and looking down at the water. I tried to go put my feet in the pool at my apartment, but I couldn't get my key to unlock the gate. Pathetic. True story.
I just finished reading two parts of Gertrude Stein's "Three Lives," entitled "The Good Anna" and "The Gentle Lena." Basically the stories are about women who spend their lives working hard at doing everything they ought to, and they are never happy and they die sooner than they should. So I was walking around thinking, This is a nice day and I shouldn't waste it sitting inside! (Well, actually I wanted to go inside a theater and watch "Compleat Female Stage Beauty," but when I got turned away that seemed like a sign that I should really go to the beach.)
So I called my friend and he did not want to go to the beach. He needed to go to Michael's (the store). Well, actually he wanted to go to a place called Hobby Lobby, but that store doesn't exist in California, as I had to remind him. And that's a stupid name for a store, so I'm glad it doesn't exist here. Anyway, he wanted to go to the closest Michael's, which is in Inglewood, but I told him I'd go along for the ride if we went to the Michael's in Santa Monica. So guess what? Next thing I know I've got my feet in the surf (and my friend is waiting for me on a concrete ledge next to the bike path because I tricked him and he doesn't want to walk in the sand).
In the past few days I was having a big debate with myself about whether I ought to move to New York City after graduation, but now I'm thinking that I haven't really had the living-in-LA experience. I've just had the going-to-college-in-LA experience. So I am probably not ready to leave LA yet. I like being able to go to the beach on a nice day. I know New York City has the Hudson River, but it isn't the same (only Kramer swims in it). Also, people seem to live in New York City because they hate LA (among other reasons-- and calm yourselves, I'm being facetious), and I don't hate LA enough yet to leave. I'm not really sure that I hate anything. My parents always used to say, "Don't say 'hate.' Hate is a strong word." It's interesting that the same word can have different intensities for different people. Also, would I really be hating LA, or my experiences with certain people here? (Or the traffic?) Just saying.
Okay, so my beach pilgrimage happened (the Chaucer kept running through my head: "So priketh hem Nature in hir corages/Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages"), and I was pleased that I really actually acted on something I really wanted to do (although I never actually went swimming; walking in the surf was symbolic). I took a few pictures, which came out well considering that I can't really see my camera's screen in the sun.
The beach thing was also appropriate because I had a dream a few nights ago that I was sitting at a little outdoor dining patio overlooking the water and a sort of shiny city beyond it (possibly somewhere abroad), and Carson Kressley and George Clooney were there too. Carson was wearing these cool glasses with dark blue square (okay, rectangular) frames, and the glasses actually had many other layers which could fit over them, including goggles (for SWIMMING?) and sunglasses (which, yesterday while I was driving to Universal, my passenger/friend put sunglasses on over his glasses). In the dream, I tried to take a picture of Carson in these amazing glasses, but I couldn't, because my camera was not really working, and then some other people wanted pictures with him and my opportunity was lost.
So then last night I had ANOTHER dream that I was trying to use my camera and it wasn't working/wasn't taking the pictures I wanted at the moment I wanted them, and then the moment was lost. This is an interesting new dream, because for years my things-are-wrong dream was the ever-popular teeth-falling-out dream, which is not very cool at all. I don't even need to try to breech my subconscious to know that I really AM worried right now because in two months I will need to start a new life with a new job and a new apartment and blah-de-blah and I have no major prospects yet...and really no minor prospects either. And also--I need to get a new camera. Mine IS kinda shitty.
Oh yeah, and I keep carelessly reaching into things and getting paper cuts. This is real life, not a dream...er, nightmare. I reached into my bag yesterday and got a juicy paper cut on my left middle finger, right on the pad...and I extremely dislike cuts (I typed HATE at first, haha hypocrisy). Then today I reached into my sound locker and got a cut on my right side-pinky. And I keep accidentally sticking my hands into crazy painful things like salsa and mango juice and In 'n Out secret sauce (I ordered my first "secret menu" item last night-- protein style!).
I just had a thought-- I always say that I had a lot of dreams, or I had a bad dream, etc...I very rarely say "nightmare." I wonder if other people would categorize some of my dreams as nightmares...it's all semantics, I say. It's all personal point-of-view.
My roommate read some statistics that claim that there are more suicides during the months when Daylight Savings Time is in effect. I can't really understand that because it's during the summer and there's more light later into the night...isn't that conducive to cheerfulness? I just went and looked it up on Wikipedia and it turns out that many countries (such as Kazakhstan) don't observe Daylight Savings Time because of possible health complications. I guess it really does a number on our circadian rhythms, that bumped hour (notice I didn't say biological clock...I love it when people confuse the two and accidentally make ridiculous statements).
My, look how the time has flown! And I thought I had nothing to post about.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Tampopos
This is the time of the semester when work really ramps up. I went from working less than ten hours a week to working about ten hours a day...but it will go back down after next Friday...and back up right around finals. Ironically when I'm working so much I feel really good on the making money and being a good worker/smart sound person/entertaining co-worker front, but things go totally crappy on the doing creative things/feeling rested/getting any homework done front. If I don't make any sense today, blame it on my lack of sleep.
Out of fatigue, today I'm going to use my a back-up story that I've been storing in my head and write about tampons. Yes, tampons. (Gentlemen, I understand if you want to avert your eyes, though I don't plan on going into any graphic details.) I didn't want to neglect the blog any longer, and I have to walk back to work in an hour or so. I could nap, but that's not very creative. Appealing...yes.
Girls (ahem--women): Remember when you were little, and tampons just seemed like the most awful idea ever? And pads seemed like a good idea until you realized that they were adult diapers? And then all of a sudden one day you sucked it up and tried tampons and they were a total revelation? Out of all of the inventions of the modern-day world, tampons are what make me glad to be a 21st century woman. Seriously, if not for the lack of tampons I would be totally willing to live in ancient Greece or 1955 or whenever. Tampons are the eighth wonder of the world, and if they had been invented back in ancient times they probably would have been hanging in the Gardens at Babylon.
Women: Remember when buying tampons was a totally mortifying experience? When a tampon falling out of your backpack would have been grounds for switching schools? I remember watching some sort of sex ed video in 5th or 6th grade where some girl gets her period and is walking around with a box of menstrual things and RUNS INTO HER CRUSH and he's cool with her big box of tamps. And I remember thinking, that is so totally unrealistic. And that's probably still true of high-schoolers, but now if I ran into my hypothetical crush while buying a big box of Super Plus Tampax Pearls (the best--I'm sorry, I know they're plastic and killing the Earth, but I love them anyway), I would find the situation hilarious, but not embarrassing.
I remember in books and sex ed tapes the girl would usually be pretty psyched about "becoming a woman" and her mom would want to throw a party or something. I was pretty much like, let's keep this on the DL (down-low), Moms. Both of my sisters were young-uns when I was pubertizing, and I...it sounds crazy but I don't remember thinking, "Oh, someday they'll be pubescers, too." It was more like, "Oh, they're going to think I'm a freak."
When I focus on my computer screen, the room feels like it's spinning. Kind of cool. Kind of a concern.
Growing up in Orange County, which is sort of the Bible Belt of Southern California, I had many friends who thought that wearing tampons was more or less akin to losing your virginity. That's pretty high on my personal internal scale of ludicrosity. One of my friends literally said, "I just don't know if I could go through with it [trying tampons]. Maybe if I got really drunk I'd be willing to try." Um, hello--it's not sex, it's a tampon. After you insert it you don't need to smoke a cigarette or get it to cuddle with you in bed. Am I alone here? The tamps will set you free, people! Haven't you ever seen the tampon ads with the girls in the bathing suits or wearing the prom dresses? It's all true! They're delightful! They're not scary or invented by the Devil! (FYI, the Devil keeps himself busy by inventing painful shoes and convincing shiteous people to audition for American Idol.)
When I was in high school I told my friend that I wanted to invent a line of tampons that would have really cute little wrappers to appeal to high schoolers. Well, Tampax Pearl totally stole my thunder and put little designs on their wrappers, and recently added several more colors and even cooler designs! Pretty much every good idea I've ever had has been instituted by someone else way before I was old enough to get the ball rolling. For example, I thought of the idea for the movie "Bicentennial Man" when I was a wee child. But whatever, I'll let Isaac Asimov have that one.
Recently on Jezebel there was a big debate over whether tamps ought to be flushed, and some people acted like it was a total given that flushing is okay. I always thought that they were supposed to be flushed until the day my sophomore year roommate (whom I almost never talked to) awkwardly informed me that she'd had to use her chopsticks to unclog the toilet while I was in class (this still brings much glee to my cruel little heart, because I had to act sorry but I really just wanted to laugh my stomach out). A guy I met once who worked with LA sanitation was like, you have no idea how badly the high school sewer lines get clogged, so for now I'm in the "don't flush" camp (I know, ew-- but did you know that some sorority houses have corroded pipes because of all of the acidic vomit?).
Okay, so by now you know that I am totally willing to talk about tampons. BUT recently I saw a scene in a movie that totally outraged me because I was like, "that is NOT realistic." The movie was "The Player," and in the scene Whoopi Goldberg plays a detective, and Tim Robbins in the suspect (and Lyle Lovett is some other quiet cop and he is kind of awesome but then he swats a fly and it's way too slapstick). Anyway, so Tim Robbins is sitting there waiting to answer questions about the murder (which he actually committed), and suddenly Whoopi starts loudly talking to her female co-worker. She says the following things, "Did you take my tampons?...Oh, here, I found my tampons...Oh wait, these aren't mine, I use the Supers," etc. She is pretty much waving the box in Tim's face. Then she unwraps one and swings it around by the string. I was watching this film in the class, and all the girls were going, "Oh no she didn't!" (Okay, I was leading the charge.)
First of all, if you have a client/suspect/man sitting at your desk, that is not the right moment to talk loudly about tampon usage and needs. Hypothetical tampon talk is okay in front of men, if you know them really well. Actual "can I have a tampon/I'm on my period" talk will skeeve guys out and is unnecessary. Unwrapping a tampon and swinging it around is beyond crazy. For one thing, tampons are crazy-expensive. At least 40 cents each. True story. Guys have no idea how much money they save by not having to buy tampons or makeup. Also, even though periods are not that bad, guys are totally clueless as to what it's like to deal with that. I just thank the Forces that Be for giving periods to women, because can you imagine if guys had periods? They'd probably be completely incapacitated. But anyway, that movie was writted by a man and directed by another man. They just don't understand. My professor actually said that the tone in that scene was so crazy that it almost sank the movie. Take that!
That was back in the day when tampons were in boring white wrappers.
But anyway, talking about tampons is totally liberating. Encourage your friends to use tampons. They will not lose their virtue. I cannot imagine being allergic to tampons. I shouldn't have said that--I don't want to jinx myself. I am going to go knock on all sorts of wood. Oh my gosh, best double entendre ever. (Upon rereading, there is at least one other totally unintentional instance of sexual imagery in this post...let me know what you find!)
I didn't think of it until after I typed it.
Oh, PS, I totally learned a new word the other day-- yonic. It's like the female (read: vaggy) equivalent of phallic.
Out of fatigue, today I'm going to use my a back-up story that I've been storing in my head and write about tampons. Yes, tampons. (Gentlemen, I understand if you want to avert your eyes, though I don't plan on going into any graphic details.) I didn't want to neglect the blog any longer, and I have to walk back to work in an hour or so. I could nap, but that's not very creative. Appealing...yes.
Girls (ahem--women): Remember when you were little, and tampons just seemed like the most awful idea ever? And pads seemed like a good idea until you realized that they were adult diapers? And then all of a sudden one day you sucked it up and tried tampons and they were a total revelation? Out of all of the inventions of the modern-day world, tampons are what make me glad to be a 21st century woman. Seriously, if not for the lack of tampons I would be totally willing to live in ancient Greece or 1955 or whenever. Tampons are the eighth wonder of the world, and if they had been invented back in ancient times they probably would have been hanging in the Gardens at Babylon.
Women: Remember when buying tampons was a totally mortifying experience? When a tampon falling out of your backpack would have been grounds for switching schools? I remember watching some sort of sex ed video in 5th or 6th grade where some girl gets her period and is walking around with a box of menstrual things and RUNS INTO HER CRUSH and he's cool with her big box of tamps. And I remember thinking, that is so totally unrealistic. And that's probably still true of high-schoolers, but now if I ran into my hypothetical crush while buying a big box of Super Plus Tampax Pearls (the best--I'm sorry, I know they're plastic and killing the Earth, but I love them anyway), I would find the situation hilarious, but not embarrassing.
I remember in books and sex ed tapes the girl would usually be pretty psyched about "becoming a woman" and her mom would want to throw a party or something. I was pretty much like, let's keep this on the DL (down-low), Moms. Both of my sisters were young-uns when I was pubertizing, and I...it sounds crazy but I don't remember thinking, "Oh, someday they'll be pubescers, too." It was more like, "Oh, they're going to think I'm a freak."
When I focus on my computer screen, the room feels like it's spinning. Kind of cool. Kind of a concern.
Growing up in Orange County, which is sort of the Bible Belt of Southern California, I had many friends who thought that wearing tampons was more or less akin to losing your virginity. That's pretty high on my personal internal scale of ludicrosity. One of my friends literally said, "I just don't know if I could go through with it [trying tampons]. Maybe if I got really drunk I'd be willing to try." Um, hello--it's not sex, it's a tampon. After you insert it you don't need to smoke a cigarette or get it to cuddle with you in bed. Am I alone here? The tamps will set you free, people! Haven't you ever seen the tampon ads with the girls in the bathing suits or wearing the prom dresses? It's all true! They're delightful! They're not scary or invented by the Devil! (FYI, the Devil keeps himself busy by inventing painful shoes and convincing shiteous people to audition for American Idol.)
When I was in high school I told my friend that I wanted to invent a line of tampons that would have really cute little wrappers to appeal to high schoolers. Well, Tampax Pearl totally stole my thunder and put little designs on their wrappers, and recently added several more colors and even cooler designs! Pretty much every good idea I've ever had has been instituted by someone else way before I was old enough to get the ball rolling. For example, I thought of the idea for the movie "Bicentennial Man" when I was a wee child. But whatever, I'll let Isaac Asimov have that one.
Recently on Jezebel there was a big debate over whether tamps ought to be flushed, and some people acted like it was a total given that flushing is okay. I always thought that they were supposed to be flushed until the day my sophomore year roommate (whom I almost never talked to) awkwardly informed me that she'd had to use her chopsticks to unclog the toilet while I was in class (this still brings much glee to my cruel little heart, because I had to act sorry but I really just wanted to laugh my stomach out). A guy I met once who worked with LA sanitation was like, you have no idea how badly the high school sewer lines get clogged, so for now I'm in the "don't flush" camp (I know, ew-- but did you know that some sorority houses have corroded pipes because of all of the acidic vomit?).
Okay, so by now you know that I am totally willing to talk about tampons. BUT recently I saw a scene in a movie that totally outraged me because I was like, "that is NOT realistic." The movie was "The Player," and in the scene Whoopi Goldberg plays a detective, and Tim Robbins in the suspect (and Lyle Lovett is some other quiet cop and he is kind of awesome but then he swats a fly and it's way too slapstick). Anyway, so Tim Robbins is sitting there waiting to answer questions about the murder (which he actually committed), and suddenly Whoopi starts loudly talking to her female co-worker. She says the following things, "Did you take my tampons?...Oh, here, I found my tampons...Oh wait, these aren't mine, I use the Supers," etc. She is pretty much waving the box in Tim's face. Then she unwraps one and swings it around by the string. I was watching this film in the class, and all the girls were going, "Oh no she didn't!" (Okay, I was leading the charge.)
First of all, if you have a client/suspect/man sitting at your desk, that is not the right moment to talk loudly about tampon usage and needs. Hypothetical tampon talk is okay in front of men, if you know them really well. Actual "can I have a tampon/I'm on my period" talk will skeeve guys out and is unnecessary. Unwrapping a tampon and swinging it around is beyond crazy. For one thing, tampons are crazy-expensive. At least 40 cents each. True story. Guys have no idea how much money they save by not having to buy tampons or makeup. Also, even though periods are not that bad, guys are totally clueless as to what it's like to deal with that. I just thank the Forces that Be for giving periods to women, because can you imagine if guys had periods? They'd probably be completely incapacitated. But anyway, that movie was writted by a man and directed by another man. They just don't understand. My professor actually said that the tone in that scene was so crazy that it almost sank the movie. Take that!
That was back in the day when tampons were in boring white wrappers.
But anyway, talking about tampons is totally liberating. Encourage your friends to use tampons. They will not lose their virtue. I cannot imagine being allergic to tampons. I shouldn't have said that--I don't want to jinx myself. I am going to go knock on all sorts of wood. Oh my gosh, best double entendre ever. (Upon rereading, there is at least one other totally unintentional instance of sexual imagery in this post...let me know what you find!)
I didn't think of it until after I typed it.
Oh, PS, I totally learned a new word the other day-- yonic. It's like the female (read: vaggy) equivalent of phallic.
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