Meditation2

How I interpret your actions

Today the Bliss Spa VW bus rolled in front of my office to conduct a taste test of brownies. After eating A LOT of brownies, the lady serving the brownies gave me a sample of "Lovehandler"-- some kind of moisturizer that's supposed to tone your abs (lies!!!). I took one and then she gave me three more packs.

Thanks, I really needed the ab toning moisturizer after those 5 brownies. UGH.

The unbearable sleeplessness

I am 100%, completely, utterly, awake. It's 2:41am. I worked on my new website, read the new issue of Lucky, and went through work emails.

Insomnia recap:
Sunday-- no sleep
Monday-- no sleep
Tuesday-- a bit of sleep
Wednesday-- a bit of sleep
Thursday-- drunken coma sleep
Friday-- AWAKE

Please god, let me sleep!

Take that!

I got a new job! w00t! *happy dance*

More dinero! A staff of designers! Bigger office! Nicer computer equipment! I was told no one in the company is crazy! Apparently their printer sucks too though.

The details

You wouldn't think it matters all that much, but with the volume of mail I've been receiving today it's gonna drive me freaking insane. Why does everyone send me emails with the same completely generic subject line that aren't even related to the other emails with the same subject? There's a reason why subject lines exist and it's not to make work harder. :grumble:

You know you're at work too late...

...when you hear the people upstairs very obviously having sex. Oy.

I'm too young to die!

So, I wake up this morning feeling like shit (after having suffered a migraine yesterday afternoon) so I do a little research on Wikipedia to find that 1 in 20 people in the United States die from pneumonia. Fantastic.

I can't decide if my friends are nice or mean

"Friend": but anyway, you need to go get a big tub of ice cream from albertsons, youre not going to feel hungry. you need to force yourself to eat.

Me: i'll try to eat.

"Friend": no try! do eat, or ill come tomorrow and stuff you full of food.

Also, being sick and single is probably one of the worst things ever. You can't exactly ask your buddies to cuddle with you to make you feel better. :sigh:

Magic Bean

I have pneumonia. I've been sick for more than three weeks now. First, I had an on again, off again cold and then when I thought I was all better I was too busy working and going out to take care of myself and bacteria moved down my lungs.

Fucking sunshine and daises

Who loves the sun
Who cares that it makes plants grow
Who cares what it does
Since you broke my heart

Who loves the wind
Who cares that it makes breezes
Who cares what it does
Since you broke my heart

Pa pa pa pa
Who loves the sun
Pa pa pa pa
Who loves the sun
Pa pa pa pa
Not everyone
Pa pa pa pa
Who loves the sun

Who loves the rain
Who cares that it makes flowers
Who cares that it makes showers
Since you broke my heart

Who loves the sun
Who cares that it is shining
Who cares what it does
Since you broke my heart

Who loves the sun

"Best of Yelp"

That bacon wrapped hot dog cart in the Mission? Seriously, WTF?

Oh my job...

I know that writing about your job online is a bad idea but I sure wish I could write about mine! Monday was so bad my boss left flowers on my desk.

Day, like, 8 of exhaustion

I am so tired and yet not one bit sleepy. Being the sort of person that falls asleep almost as soon as my head hits the pillow, not being able to stay asleep is driving me up the wall.

I'm not depressed at all; I think I'm just lonely.

Wow

Tonight has ended up being really, really shitty. I'm going to bed.

Serious eye rolling time

Today's Daily Candy starts off with:

Decorating would be so much easier if you had computer powers. Hideous light fixture? Delete. Unassembled furniture? Auto format. Dark room? Open new window.

I'm still not sure if I like Daily Candy or not.

How lame

The boyfriend gets to spend a week in Puerto Vallarta and I'm stuck in 45 degree San Francisco. I believe on this day last year I was flying into Hawaii... :sigh:

Finally

They holiday season is officially over-- and not soon enough. I called my brother today to let him know that my dad's girlfriend sent him a couple polo shirts over for Christmas.
His response: I thought Dad bought those for me
Me: Nope, his girlfriend.
Brother: sigh So, Dad didn't get us Christmas gifts... again.
Me: Guess what his girlfriend sent me? A box of ginseng powder.

Ginseng powder. Fun.

At least my Jewish, Christmas hating, boyfriend and his younger brother decided that it would be cheer me up on Christmas to make me dinner and decorate holiday cookies. Those cookies were mostly decorated with Jewish things but they were drawn with red and green frostings which is Christmas-y enough for me.

New Year's Eve was spent hunting down mixers at the supermarket and then drinking cava straight from the bottle on the roof of a friend's apartment who was not there because they were invited to a party or something Later, for reasons I no longer remember, I ended up at Beauty Bar and went home with a balloon tied to my wrist.

I guess it wasn't so bad after all.

Now, if I can get through my birthday today without getting depressed I'll confirm that this past holiday season wasn't so horrible.

Sweet 12 hour work day!

I left work at exactly 9:12 PM last night. That means I worked for 12 hours straight. Today I showed up at the office at 8 AM. Go jobby job!

I still hate driving... a lot

Last week I nearly plowed my ex-boyfriend over with my ridiculous car, The Stiletto, as I was driving home from work. There's this one super busy four-way stop in Potrero Hill with a turn that's difficult to look around because there are usually big trucks parked on the corner. When it was my turn to make my right turn, I just about crashed into two pedestrians who suddenly jumped into the crosswalk. Right as I was thinking to myself, "Crazy pedestrians!" I look at one of the guys and realize it's an ex.

How terrible would it have been if I had actually crashed into him? "Judge, I swear, I didn't do it on purpose!"

Fast forward to Saturday. I was up at the Tahoe cabin, bumming around, waiting for it to snow. As is the case throughout Tahoe, my cell phone reception was spotty. When I looked at my phone shortly before going to bed, I saw that I had a voice message. I was too lazy to leave the house to hunt down some reception so I decided to check my message in the morning. On the way to the ski area the next morning, I checked my message-- it was from my brother asking me to call. So I called.

"Hey, you called me."
"Why didn't you pick up?"
"I'm in Tahoe, I don't have reception."
"I got hit by a car."
...

He told me that he was hit by a speeding car while he was walking in a parking lot. He says he's doing okay but that he did have to go to the hospital. He seems in reasonably good spirits but he's worried now that he can't work. I'm hoping he's not permanently hurt.

It's pretty weird and oddly synchronous.

As drivers and pedestrians, please be careful!

The saddest season of the year

On our way to, essentially, a stranger's house for Thanksgiving dinner, my brother and I both agreed that this was the worst Thanksgiving ever.

This is how we got there.

At the urging of my boyfriend, who was going to spend Thanksgiving at his aunt and uncle's friend's celebration in Saratoga, I called my brother to see what he had planned for the traditional day of gorging. I call him while he's at work and he says, "I'm going to Uncle Jay's [in Gilroy]." Since I'm still very fearful of driving on the freeway I told him I would figure out how I would get down to Gilroy to my relatives' house and that I'll call him on Wednesday. Since DZ was planning on driving to Saratoga, I figured I could catch a ride with him to the San Jose where I would meet up with my brother. Things were going fine until Wednesday rolled around and I called my aunt to see what time Thanksgiving dinner would be served.

Me: Hey, I'm just calling to see what time my brother and I should show up tomorrow.
Aunt: Oh, uh, we're not having Thanksgiving dinner this year.
Me: Oh.
Aunt: You guys don't have plans? What about your boyfriend?
Me: No, we don't have plans. My boyfriend has his own plans.
Aunt: Oh, I'm sorry.
Me: Um, it's okay.

Of course at this point I'm starting to get that sad, lonely, I-hate-the-holidays feelings.

I call my brother to tell him the news. He responds, "Oh. Well, that sucks. My roommate and our friend is having dinner at my place. You could hang out here." I think it over for a moment. Alone or with my brother's friend, who I do not like at all. It being the holidays I chose being with someone I don't like. (Don't most of us do that every holiday?) So, there is our plan.

Thanksgiving afternoon, DZ and I get in the car with my homemade pie (with one slice missing) to head to San Jose. I call my brother to get directions to his place in the car but he's not picking up. Eventually he calls me back to say that his roommate and friend decided to cancel their home cooked meal plans. Apparently, they're not in the mood now, but he does say that his friend, Frankie, invited us to his mom's for dinner. We know Frankie, but we don't know his family. My brother sighs and says, "I guess we're going to have a Mexican Thanksgiving... whatever that is." When we get to my brother's neighborhood, we get lost because of my vague Google Maps directions. We end up circling the neighborhood because my brother isn't picking up his phone. DZ looks visibly frustrated, meanwhile I'm fully engaged in holiday sadness, weeping my usual holiday tears. Eventually, my brother calls me and I get dropped off. DZ zooms away to Saratoga.

My brother's roommate is sitting on the sofa tinkering with her laptop looking disappointed. Their friend lets himself into the duplex and plops down on the sofa. Apparently, he changed his mind about dinner and went to the supermarket to gather ingredients for dinner. When he got to the check out he found out his credit card was maxed out. No Thanksgiving dinner for him. At least they had my pumpkin pie.

Once my brother emerged from his room, dressed and ready to leave, we headed down to Safeway to pick up some beer and something else. It would be even more awkward than it already is to show up empty handed. We find a pretty fruit torte and get a case of Budweiser. We are on our way.

After a missed freeway exit and the subsequent backtracking, we park on the street and step out in the neighborhood. All the driveways are stuffed with cars and the entire neighborhood smells of roasting turkeys.

We ring the doorbell and a lady answers it saying, "Uh, hi." "We're Frankie's friends," says my brother. She kind of nodded and let us in. Frankie's relatives look at us strangely. The asian kids, here at their family dinner. Frankie gives both of us a hug and his mom offers us the Thanksgiving buffet. As usual, it's meat heavy-- two turkeys and a ham.

My dinner:
1. French roll with I Can't Believe It's Not Butter
2. Canned corn, buttered
3. Mashed potatoes
4. Apple pie with a dollop of Cool Whip

I take my paper plate and settle down into a green plastic lawn chair that's been brought in from the patio and watch Frank's brothers play a few of their thousands of games on a tricked out XBox. Ninja Turtles, Mario Kart, The Simpsons.... I'm watching Frank's baby waddle around the living and the cat running away from a overly aggressive toddler. I guess it's about 9pm when my brother and I decided to leave. It's icy cold in San Jose. The turkey smell is gone from the neighborhood. As we're walking to the car, he says, "Well, that was awkward but it was really nice of Frank to invite us." I nod.

We drive up to my brother's place to find it dark and empty. David shows up and they chat for a little while before he and I head back into the city.

I'm hungry so we drive through the Mission.

Safeway is closed as are my usual burrito spots. Even the dim sum place on 16th St that saved my Christmas last year was closed. So, we head to DZ's place and I heat up some packaged curry and boil water for soba noodles. Dinner is consumed and then I'm ready to sleep.

Next year I'll be making my own dinner.

All I can say is OH MY GOD

I got this email today from USF.

USF received news today that William Garner, a former professor and Dean in the School of Education, has agreed to plead guilty on charges of possessing child pornography.

The University of San Francisco is shocked and disturbed by this news.

USF had no knowledge of any wrongdoing by Dr. Garner, who resigned from USF in July 2006.

Attached is a copy of the news release issued by U.S. Attorney Kevin Ryan.

Gary McDonald
Director, USF Media Relations
---

Department of Justice
United States Attorney Kevin V. Ryan
Northern District of California

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Luke Macaulay
November 15,
2006
(415) 436-6757
WWW.USDOJ.GOV/USAO/CAN

Luke.Macaulay@usdoj.gov

FORMER USF EDUCATION DEAN AGREES TO PLEAD GUILTY TO POSSESSING CHILD PORNOGRAPHY

Former Professor William Garner Agrees to Recommended Sentence of 63 Months Imprisonment, $12,500 Fine, and $50,000 Restitution

SAN FRANCISCO: United States Attorney Kevin V. Ryan Announced that Dr. William T. Garner was charged today and has agreed to plead guilty to possessing child pornography. This charge is the result of an investigation by the United States Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

In agreeing to plead guilty, Garner admits to the charge that he knowingly possessed visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct. According to the plea agreement, Garner possessed more than 15,000 images containing child pornography, including images of prepubescent minors and images portraying sadistic or masochistic conduct or other depictions of violence. He obtained the images through the use of the Internet.

"The children depicted in these images are the victims of horrible abuse, and we will vigorously prosecute individuals possessing these materials," said U.S. Attorney Kevin V. Ryan. "Taking sex offenders off the
street and out of our neighborhoods is a high priority for the Department of Justice and our office."

Garner, age 66 and a resident of San Francisco, is charged in a one-count information with violating Title 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(4)(B). Garner has agreed to plead guilty.

Garner is Professor Emeritus in the School of Education at the University of San Francisco. He was previously the Dean of the School of Education at USF and was the co-founder and director of the Center for Instruction and Technology at USF.

Under the terms of the plea agreement, which must be approved by the Court, Garner and the government have agreed to recommend a sentence of 63 months imprisonment, a $12,500 fine, a term of supervised release from two to five years, and restitution of $50,000 payable to the San Francisco Child Abuse Prevention Center, a charitable organization located in San Francisco.

"We know that child abuse is something a child may never outgrow so our work at the Center is to stop it from happening," said Kathy Baxter, Division Director of the San Francisco Child Abuse Council. "If approved by the Court, we will use these funds to continue our work in educating children, their caregivers and the community about ways to prevent abuse and continue our work in improving the systems that deal with child abuse."

The arraignment of Garner is scheduled for December 7, 2006, before Magistrate Judge Bernard Zimmerman in San Francisco. The Court has not yet set a date for sentencing. The maximum statutory penalty for violation of Title 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(4)(B) is 10 years imprisonment, a fine of $250,000, and restitution. However, any sentence following conviction would be imposed by the court after consideration of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and the federal statute governing the imposition of a sentence, 18 U.S.C. § 3553.

The information filed against Garner contains only allegations and, as with all defendants, he must be presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

Nathanael Cousins is the Special Assistant U.S. Attorney who is prosecuting the case with the assistance of Nai Saelee, legal technician. The prosecution is the result of a six-month investigation by the U.S.
Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). ICE agents were assisted by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

Grumble, grumble...

Today was my first day driving alone in my brand spanking new shiny shiny speedy and (most importantly) totally inappropriate-for-me car.

I have officially decided that driving in San Francisco sucks ass. I had to drive around double parked cars on almost every block I drove on during my behind-the-wheel test! How other people pass the test is beyond me. Well, on the brightside, I do actually own a car and have my very own parking space.

Hooray for a driver's license, car, and parking space.
Boo for SF's crazy drivers.

I took it for granted

I came home and my tv was gone and replaced with this one:

Even sadder Lappy

My dear, less than one year old, Lappy has once again returned to the Apple store for repairs. It's for the same fucking problem. I will once again recieve a new logic board, a repair which costs about $1,000. That will bring the total of my repairs in the last three months to almost $1,800. They may as well just give me a new fucking laptop!!!

Spurned but that's okay

Yeah.

I'm taking a three day break from drinking then it's back to boozing at Voda and then sipping Johnnie Walker Blue Label on Wednesday.

I can't believe everything that happened yesterday happened in one day. I met up with our 18 person group at the Ferry Building early in the afternoon to take the ferry to Alameda. Once we got off the ferry we had to make a 20 minute (?) walk to the Hangar One distillery which is actually in an old airplane hangar. We ended up tasting about 12 different drinks from the company that produces Hangar One, St. George. We had a very smokey whiskey, grappa, raspberry and pear brandies, some other liquers, and a lot of vodka. They had one drink they called Qi Iced Tea which tasted like a Thai iced tea. Very tasty indeed. I loved their straight vodka, it's such a smooth sipping vodka it makes me wonder if it's really vodka at all. The distiller called it the world's most dangerous vodka. After we the tasting we walked back towards the ferry but we thought we had missed it so we took a detour and stopped by Rosenblum. We all chipped in $5 and bought a few bottles to drink while sitting outside and enjoying the incredibly beautiful weather.

At this point I was starting to get mopey watching a couple of lovebirds in our group making out and cuddling at every opportunity. Then someone mentioned that their boyfriend recently disappeared while she was at work and she hasn't heard from him since. Love sucks.

Later on, back in San Francisco, I had dinner with a couple friends before heading to a rooftop party to enjoy the KFOG Kaboom fireworks. We missed most of the fireworks because we were sitting in a cab trying to get to SOMA but I did see the last 5 minutes of it and even that was amazing. The party was relaxed and intimate. I got a chance to talk to a friend who told me that she had a very disturbing dream where I was yelling at her. I told about some of the things that have been going on and she was pretty freaked out by the synchroncity of events and her dream. I felt sad and more distant so I decided to leave the party but once I got outside I feel like going home anymore.

A couple friends and I ended up at 500 Club late into the night. We knew it was time to leave when this crazy, drunken girl tried to put a glow in the dark necklace on me. She had one flip flop on.

Despite it having been a long, full day, I wasn't tired at all. That combined with me having felt mopey the entire day I really didn't want to go home and be tempted to sit on my sofa and listen to sad music so a friend kept me company for a while before I decided I should go home to sleep.

I slept really well even though I didn't sleep for very long.

These are Steve's photos:

At Rosenblum Winery sipping on not so tasty wines. This is my fake smile. Pretty good huh?

Steve licking the sediment off the cork of dessert wine.

Hangar One distillery equipment. It's made of copper.

This is the post-distillery and post-winery photo. See? I'm doing fine! Go my heroic liver!

If I don't blog within the next couple days...

It's because my head exploded.

Exhibit 1:
I took my old 35 mm camera to Coachella. It had film already loaded in it and had a few frames already exposed. I had no idea what they might be photos of. I got the roll developed today. Not only were there photos of one exboyfriend, there were photos of TWO exboyfriends. That would make those photos two years old.

:partial explosion:

Murphy's Law

My vacuum broke.

My PowerBook broke (hardware AND software problems).

My debit card doesn't work.

Can't clean, can't use Lappy, can't spend money. :( What's next?

ARGGHHH!!!

Goddamnpeiceofshit. I was trying to write a review for Mitchell's Ice Cream and them I get that BS. Lappy, why do you hate me so?

LCD

Most people are such cheerleader softies that they won't ever tell you that something you created sucks. It's not constructive to tell people that their work is good when you haven't even looked at it carefully. I hate that. I design because I care. I look at the details (within the context of the bigger picture) because the details are important. A lot of self-professed experts overlook the details thinking they don't matter. I know they've read Tipping Point and yet they still don't get it. When you design for the lowest common demonitor you're gonna end up with shitty pieces.

Okay, so by now you're trying to think of ways to argue with me about this. I don't want to get into it. Designing sucks. Caring sucks. Nobody else really cares unless it's about making money and jerking off.

Petty attacks

There should be a name for the thing that happens on Yelp when someone writes a review as a passive agressive response to a previous review. This same thing could happen on any other review site too. If you know of an existing name for this please comment to let me know.

Health insurance makes me ill

Holy crap! I got an invoice from Blue Cross telling me that I need to pay $450 for when I went to see the nurse to have my foot checked out. I do not how paying for health insurance is useful when I have to pay $450 to see an incompetent nurse at a clinic. Is the $450 for the Xray? I had no idea they were so expensive!

This is blows.

The Ideal Birth Date

I see that a few Yelpers have reviewed Birthdays. I would give my birthday just one star out of five for sure. January 2nd??? Come on! It's a week after Christmas and a day after New Year's. People are still suffering from NYE's drinking! Hardly anyone ever remembers my birthday (and I don't blame them, I blame the date).

Childhood sob story: My parents used to take me to Toys R Us every year on my birthday. They generously let me pick a present for myself. The problem though was all that was left in the toy store after the Christmas shopping season were returns and toys in destroyed packaging. I had to pick from everyone else's Christmas leftovers. (At least it was an improvement over the one combo Christmas/Birthday gift they used to pull on me.)

The last time I had a birthday party was when I turned 16. The party was so boring that I haven't even dared throw another party since then.

Anyway, I'm taking suggestions for a new birthday. This coming year is my zodiac year, I want to make it a good one.

What day in January would be the ideal one?

Technie-music woes

Grrrrr. So I bought the new Franz Ferdinand album which is a DualDisc CD/DVD (and also comes in a jewel box with a curved side). I tried to slip it into my PowerBook's drive but it wouldn't slide in easily. I need to rip it so I can listen to the album with my iPod so I gingerly tapped it in. It went in and then it popped right now. Grrrrrr. Goddamnmotherfucking... I knew I should have just bought it from the iTunes store where it is $7 cheaper. The slip of paper in the case that explains the DualDisc says that it will not work in a limited number of CD and DVD models. It just had to be the PowerBook, huh? Fuck me. Grrr!

The Deftones CD I bought also would not rip but I think it won't work because it's too old. Gaaah.

Time to return CDs to Amoeba.

I hate Thursdays

I really, really hate thursdays. Really, really, really hate them.

Also, my brother moving out has been only marginally better for us and significantly more expensive.

I wanna pull my hair out and roll into a ball in the corner and cry now.

Lacking skillz

Flipping Ticketbastard! Green Day at the Warfield show sold out in like 60 seconds. Bleh. I have no ticket buying skills.

And WTF? People posted tickets for Thursday's show on Craigslist even before they went on sale? ARGH.

I hate boys

Nevermind, I give up.

I'm not a man hater

A boy (not my brother or my father) said this to me:
"I think you should just give up on boys entirely. They're all stupid."

Things that make me say goddamnmothereffingpieceofshit

I found this image today while sorting my images today. My PowerBook's screen looked like this once a while back. I don't know what that means, but it was not a good thing. (Look! I was working on my website!)

I found this photo I took from my dorm room window too. The empty lot on the far right is where the building I live in now was built.

666 is a palindrome too

If you think orphans, teenage pregnancy, and aborted fetuses are funny you'll love Palindromes. Skip this movie and keep your $10 if you have a soul would like it keep it around a while.

"Another hour and 40 minutes of hatred for the world and everyone in it"
-- Jeremiah Kipp, filmcritic.com

The love affair continues

I fucking hate Ticketmaster. I checked my credit card statement today and they charged me twice for my Coachella tickets. That's nearly $300!!! Fuckers. Then I called then and told then what was up. The guy on the phone said, "Oh, we've been getting a lot of calls about that." So he transfers me to another guy who tells me that they can only refund the face value of the tickets meaning that I'm still gonna be charged for the service fees. That's $40 for a mistake I never made. The second set of tickets they're saying I bought wasn't even recorded in my Ticketmaster account nor did I recieve a confirmation email or tickets. WTF?!? I never ordered 6 tickets!!! I bought 3! Ugh. Fucking. ARGH! If you feeling like bitching them out please do.

Fuck you, Ticketbastard.

bR0kEn

AppleCare is yet again sending me another box in the mail so I mail my laptop out for repairs. How could I have the EXACT same problem as I did before? They probably didn't replace the hard drive. Ergh. This is it's 3rd trip to AppleCare. I asked the AppleCare guy on the phone if Apple replaces bad equipment and he said they determine if it needs to be replaced on a case by case basis. I hope they have sympathy for me. Fucking Mac. At least the ancient Dell laptop I'm using now still kinda works.

My Yoshitomo Nara watch is broken according to the technician at Macy's. :( So I bought a new watch so I won't have the wear the one my dad got me. I'm hopeless.

On saturday the fire alarm in my building went off. I went outside but as usual there wasn't a fire. However, someone's sprinkers turned on and ruined their condo and the two units below theirs. Now my brother is freaked out that we might accidently activate the sprinklers causing our home and belongings will be ruined. Water damage is no joke. He's got me worried too now.

Some of my neighbors have apparently been stalking and videotaping our building manager at his house and spreading rumors that's he gay and has AIDS. WTF?!? I think he's good manager who actually gets shit done. People can be so evil and stupid. It pisses me off!

Phrase

I really hate the saying "more power to you" especially when said in a sarcastic tone.