Green Paper House

My senses take me back

2008-05-09T21:05:00.000-07:00

What compelled me to come back and write after another three month hiatus? Just take a look at two posts before this - something about listening to music that I was into during college makes me want.. to... write... a... novel. Seriously, I would be laughing if it weren't so sad and true. I've been very busy, and I think about writing, but I don't. I also think about playing guitar, but I don't. Then I have a free Friday night and I decide to listen to old 7"s. And I'm 19 again and I just want to write about my feelings all night.

I was actually reminiscing on the bus ride home today that even the last year of college is now fading away. I remember thinking sometime in the middle of college that high school seemed far enough in the past to not count anymore, and I was eager to embrace that as I hated high school (although, in retrospect, I took everything a little too seriously), and I was now a different person, a grown-up. Now, it's just kind of scary. Because I think I like the younger (21) me better sometimes. I'm much more even-keeled now, but back then I had a lot of friends, had a lot of energy, and was generally a lot more optimistic.

So what the hell was I listening to in college? Mostly, emo and hardcore in the beginning, and more mathrock and post-punk later. Tonight, I've been listening to Texas is the Reason, The Promise Ring, I Hate Myself, Twelve Hour Turn (one of my all-time favorite Florida bands), The Get Up Kids (I listened to Something to Write Home About my entire freshman year), Hot Water Music (obligatory for Florida residents), Piebald, Braid, and I'll just stop writing because I think the picture is clear.

Fuck, it's been five years since I've been in a band. And I like to imagine that I'll always be involved in music, I'm just on a break because of grad school. When in reality, it's probably more like I'm on a break because of grad school, but after that it's a postdoc, and then a real job that will take up entirely too much of my time, then settling into family life sometime after that. And there are probably no more bands in my future. That is depressing.

I think it's just the aches of leaving youth behind. I don't really want to go to house parties and drink cheap beer until I puke anymore, or make out with two people in one night (true story). But I do want those moments back sometimes. The wide-eyed awe with which I took it all in my freshman year - when I would go with K.C. and Lowell to shows, sometimes up to Orlando just for the night. Finally joining a really good band during my last year in Miami, and spending a lot of late nights with the best set of guys I had known at that point!

I'm sure looking at this from the outside it seems so trite. But I don't think I'm doing it justice. And I suppose what I'm saying is fairly universal; most people, at some point in their youth, had experiences that they want to relive over and over. Whatever they may be. For me, Miami will always be a singular time in my life - I was only there between 17 and 21, and a lot of important growing up happened there. Things that I'll never associate with California (the only other place where I have lived), like the thought of humidity, automatically make me think of Dillon, Tony, and myself driving somewhere late at night with the windows down (because it's never cold at night) and some amazing new CD blasting. Always.

I should perform an experiment. I should come back again to write later while listening to something very current for me - like the new Portishead or something - and see how different my writing becomes. I'll suddenly write about the Democratic primaries, why we should leave Iran the hell alone, the postdoc position I'm starting in September, how I'm worried about my parents getting older, and generally sound my age. It would be interesting.

One third of a year

2008-02-13T23:17:00.001-08:00

I just did a hand count and it's been almost four months since the last post. I know I get busy, but I have to ask myself if I'm actually so busy that I can't reflect on life at least once every four months.

A long, long time ago I had a blog, before they were called blogs, and although it was anonymous, I posted so many details that everyone I knew found about it, read it, and laughed behind my back. It was especially mortifying because the boy I had a huge crush on, and who I wrote many an emotional post about, also found out. I later had a talk with a friend who also had a blog, and he said he thought it was sort of brave of me to put it all out there, that he felt he had to filter a lot out. I think he was just trying to be nice.

Right now I could just spill and spill and spill, because that's when I really need to write, when there's a lot to spill; too much going on in the head. But I guess I'm just choosing to filter, which leads to four month breaks. Because when I filter all the really personal stuff out, there's not much left. Finishing up my Ph.D., but I'm not sure what fulfillment I would get out of writing all those details down. Not going to too many shows. I have been getting some new music, thanks to a few Amoeba trips.

Trying to figure out what the hell to do after my school life is over, while trying to pretend that it's not a huge decision that is going to involve a lot of emotional issues for me. Hah! I've always been a student, it's practically who I am. Once that is taken away... it's kind of like looking over a large chasm right now.

B and I will be going up to San Francisco this weekend, which should be nice. I love San Francisco. I really love going to Aquarius Records, and Amoeba. And San Francisco always leaves me feeling content. I would like to live there if it didn't cost $2398723498734 to live there.

Listening: Sunny Day Real Estate - Rising Tide, and Tarentel - From Bone To Satellite

Another month bites the dust

2007-10-26T21:31:00.000-07:00

Well, there went October. Busy, busy month.

Lots of shows: saw Yellow Swans at the Smell (excellent, excellent set), William Basinski at the Hammer Museum, and Mum at The Orpheum. Thurston Moore is next Tuesday. Other good shows coming up too.

Drove down to San Diego for Jessica's birthday party.

Started guitar class again; intermediate guitar is going to focus a lot more on guitar theory. Violin 3 starts tomorrow.

And...kept working out! Fuckin'-a right. Averaging four times a week; spinning, step, and various cardio machines. I don't know if I look any different, but with the way I feel, I couldn't care less. I feel like I did back when I was 19.

I've got a birthday coming up, a trip to Hawaii with my mom. Shit, I'm even writing a new paper, moving my research along.

Life is damn good.

Despite all that, I can still listen to certain records that I connected with in college, when I think I had a lot more emotional stuff going on, and it just overtakes me. I want to go back, I want to do it all over again (of course with all the knowledge I've gained in the meantime). I think it has something to do with the ever increasing realization that mortality is not abstract, it's not a matter of chance. It's as real as it gets, and we only get one shot with this youth thing. When it's gone, it's gone. I don't want it to be gone.

Listening: Tragedy - Nerve Damage

Spun

2007-10-01T21:56:00.001-07:00

Well, it's official: I'm out of shape. Not kind of, or in an 'I could be more in shape' way. Out. Of. Shape.

2007 has been an interesting year for me. A lot of things have changed in my life; major things like a three year relationship ending and the ensuing change in the living situation, a new relationship, trying to get to the end of my educational career before I turn thirty (o.k. it will be long before I turn thirty, but still). In all that change, I had a lot of time to reflect on the priorities in my life, and realized I had let a lot of my interests stagnate. Aside from music, which has always been the number one thing I turn to outside of school, I had let a lot of friendships go, I didn't seek out new and interesting activities, I quit the radio station.

And I hadn't worked out in about six years. Since I lived in the dorms at UM. That's just sad. For a while, it didn't matter as much, since I was vegan. I was staying pretty healthy with my diet and a bit of walking. But the desire for overly decadent desserts and pizza overtook my willpower, and so even that (a five year commitment) became a thing of the past.

But over the past six months, I decided that I was going to make life more interesting for myself, outside of any relationship or the things I do at school/in lab. I started taking guitar lessons, violin lessons, blogged a little bit (o.k. not that interesting), and I'm taking some well deserved vacation time.

Seeing as it the beginning of a new year (having been a student for twenty years now, my year is September - June, with a three month hiatus) I decided it was time to bring regular physical activity back into my life. As a graduate student, the gym fee is already covered in the quarterly costs assessed before the term starts. However, I have always been bad at going regularly, and pushing myself enough to get a good workout. I decided to purchase the 'Fitness Pass', which allows me to attend any of the group style classes that take place all throughout the week. Today, being the first day for me, I chose to go to a novice spin class. I like the sound of 'novice'.

Just getting there, and I was proud of myself for getting over the first hurdle of just going. Set the bar low. Thank goodness it was so low, because I was pooped after the first half. I couldn't even do the parts where you stand up off the seat and ride the bike. I just had to stay sitting and try to keep it at the same pace as everyone else. So sad.

The upsides to this, thankfully there are upsides, are that today served as a wake up call to me letting me know just how out of shape I am, and I can only go up from here! That is optimism my friends.

Low

2007-09-28T16:18:00.000-07:00

Going to see Low tonight at The Troubadour. I love Low. I am excited to see them in a small venue again.

QOTD

2007-09-26T17:06:00.001-07:00

How can someone not have enough time to blog in a whole month?

international vacation

2007-08-28T18:22:00.001-07:00

B and I are leaving for the beautiful country of Costa Rica tomorrow morning, but I'm going over to his place in a few hours as he lives very close to LAX. My stomach is all tied up in knots - I have to admit it's nervousness. Going out of the country, leaving my cat for ten days (I am so lame, she is in good hands, but I know she will be depressed. I am so lame.), did I pack enough stuff?, do I have enough cash?. Stuff that really isn't a big deal, but when I put them all together my mind starts to race a little. Control freak much? Uh, duh. I've got my passport, wallet, lots of clothes, my camera, some flip-flops....and lots of other things, but really, I think I've got my bases covered.

I'm sure I'll be fine once we're there, and I'm drinking a fine Costa Rican alcoholic drink, lying on the beach or hanging out on the balcony....ahh I wish it was tomorrow already.

randomness

2007-08-22T20:10:00.000-07:00

First off, although I don't get Showtime (or cable for the record), I think Weeds is a fantastic show. I saw all of season one during a slow weekend sometime last year. When I get a free weekend (hello the end of September) I'll be renting season two.

But I just love the billboards for season three, which are posted all over Los Angeles (and probably many other cities too) and feature the most beautiful picture of Mary Louise Parker:

Forget Angelina Jolie or whoever else is considered "hot", this is the mesmerizing kind of beautiful. And I'm not into women! I don't think it's just the snake either...I wish my skin was as milky as that.

Second, I heard on the news today that there is a new application on Facebook...for cats and dogs! For cats! I have a cat, I have Facebook, so the loveliest cat in the world, Calliope, will now have a profile, so she can get more dates. Here she is looking all cute:

Third, I just found out about this seemingly very interesting event happening this Sunday at the Arboretum of Los Angeles, called Terrabyte 2.0, described on their website:

Be transported to a realm of ever-changing sounds, sights and spaces within The Arboretum’s beautiful gardens. Combining emerging technologies and spatial experimentation, you will find your way through an evening featuring soundscape performances by Boom Bip, Tycho, Test Shot Starfish, Eezir and Dewey dB, and Karl Fornander. An experimental lab, earth in space tours, planetarium presentation and various hands-on activities. Proceeds of this event support The Arboretum’s Plant Conservation Programs.

I think I'm going to try to go! More plans!

for each inch cut...

2007-08-21T20:07:00.000-07:00

It has been a long time since an August has flown by this fast (note that I have mentioned this in two consecutive posts). It's almost enough to not notice how hot it has been lately! Almost.

This past weekend was kept busy by the fact that B's brother Jim was in town, a last hurrah of sorts before he begins his new teaching job in Philadelphia. On Friday, I booked us free tickets to see a taping of Last Comic Standing, which ended up being a good choice. I like Last Comic Standing; among the mindless teevee you get in the summer (hello, America's Got Talent!) is this funny gem. I like to laugh. It' s an easy equation really. The taping was for the episode that is going to air tomorrow night. I'm glad we picked this particular week, as all five of the finalists performed. Every week after this, the audience will get to see fewer comics (arguably better comedy, but really, I'm all about quantity).

Most of the evening was spent waiting in line, and waiting for all of the theater seats to be filled. Once the filming started, it only took about an hour and a half, for a forty minute show. So if you see a dirty blond and two guys in the audience, stage right, that's us!

The activities continued on Saturday, as B hosted a BBQ at his place. Something that I find nice is that we've been together long enough for me to have met almost all of his friends. Now we have things to talk about when I see them, and the awkwardness of the first meeting is gone. There was an interesting, and quite long, conversation about ingrown toenails, and the remedies available. I'll summarize by saying I'm glad I've never had an ingrown toenail.

Yesterday, B brought Jim up to UCLA, and we walked around the campus for a bit before walking down to my favorite vegan place in L.A., Native Foods. I was vegan for about five years, although I'm just vegetarian now. Jim was also a longtime vegan, and still mostly vegetarian. I think he enjoyed it. I think B tolerated it. He's definitely a steak and chicken and pizza guy. It's good we have nights apart, I could be so fat.

The rest of this week will hopefully be spent laying low, relaxing a bit. Next Wednesday is when B and I leave for the Costa Rica trip, and I don't want to be overly stressed about anything before we leave. Although, Friday night will be spent at yet another low key party, this one involving karaoke and Guitar Hero. I am a master at the medium level, although very out of practice. I may have to rock beginner for a while.

Listening: Rainer Maria - Look Now Look Again (oh I sing along and pretend I'm 19 and emo again...cry cry sniff sniff)

the best parts of summer fly by fast

2007-08-15T20:21:00.000-07:00

August has been a busy month so far. Two weekends ago, I was busy on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Friday, B and I went to see his intern's band, 17 Pages, play somewhere in Irvine. We probably would have gone to support him, but I had extra incentive; one of B's coworkers also has a digital camera, and had gone to a show recently, taking what I thought were some pretty good pictures - B played up my photo skills, and well, a challenge was born. The band turned out to be pretty good, and it reminded me a lot of my hardcore days (to be young again...). Here are a few products of the night:

Saturday I found myself headed out to the Corona area to go to a family gathering. My cousin had recently gotten married in a ceremony on a cruise, and they threw a reception for all the family to attend. My cousin and his wife now live in Texas, so they had a Texas BBQ themed menu, and needless to say that as a vegetarian, I didn't eat much. I had enough not to pass out though, and got to take some pictures. Everyone kept asking about B, but he is pretty shy and I figured I needed one neutral family event (I had a breakup early in January from a three year relationship). I think he should meet my parents and brother first, then the rest of the family, maybe at Christmas. I have a huge family on my dad's side; he has 11 siblings, so that makes for a lot of aunts, uncles, cousins, and now my cousins' children.

Those are the eleven children (one aunt passed away about 15 years ago) and my Grandma. Can you tell it's a fun family? Very lively, that bunch.

Sunday I took it easy and hung out with Corey (my ex); I decided I needed to go to Amoeba, and to Amoeba it was. I got a lot of stuff, my favorite being the Noxagt - S/T c.d., although a close second would go to the Mammatus - S/T c.d.. I also got the new Fridge and DNTEL records, an older Comets on Fire album, two OOP Bedhead e.p.'s, and c.d.'s from Kings of Convenience, Rachel's, Jessamine, and Larsen. What a good trip! We then ate dinner at a place in Sherman Oaks called The Habit, and that was good, but the best part was the ice cream sundae with chocolate fudge, nuts, and whipped cream for only $2.25. Hell yeah.

That was just one weekend, I've still got more! (But less pictures.)

This past weekend was spent mostly at Caltech. One of B's college friends was getting married on the Caltech campus on Saturday, but arranged for guests to stay at the Caltech dorms (a lot of out of state people). I met B up there on Friday night, and got to meet some of his oldest and closest friends, who all turned out to be great. There was a lot of drinking, and fun times were had by all. Saturday was the wedding and reception (I got a lot of HUGE mosquito bites at the reception, but, what can I do?), followed by more drinking. I am so not young anymore. Hit me like a ton of bricks on Sunday. I left pretty early, and B stayed to go out to Dim Sum before saying goodbye to everyone. I could go into drunken detail...but really, you had to be there.

But there was no rest for the weary, as on Sunday, Jessica came up from San Diego to spend time with little old me. She got to town right as my apartment reached its peak temperature for the day, so we went and got iced tea and browsed around Cost Plus. I got some Swiss milk chocolate and a bottle of New Zealand riesling (my very first bottle of wine!). Now I just need some wine glasses. We then drove over to the Thai place in Silverlake that I'm in love with, and headed over to Spaceland to see Mr. Tube and the Flying Objects. Her boyfriend, Brad, plays the trumpet. It features Pall Jenkins on vocals/guitar; Pall being the center of two great San Diego bands: Three Mile Pilot and The Black Heart Procession. I saw The Black Heart Procession several years ago at the Knitting Factory, and the awesomeness of the show was diminished by the drunk person that kept dancing into me. Somehow, these people are drawn to me. D r a w n. Mr. Tube turned out to be fantastic; a more upbeat, danceable (not that I danced...pfft) kind of feel. But the pictures aren't ready yet. So actually that means I have no more pictures. Last Comic Standing just came on so I got lazy.

So much more to blog about! I should be one of those people who post five entries a day on various things. It would probably be easier to read.

Like, at the wedding this past weekend, the bride's sister and brother-in-law were playing these gorgeous instruments that I had never seen before. After a little searching today (god bless Google), I discovered they were 'thumb pianos', or as they are known in Zimbabwe, the 'Mbira'. And I want one! They are available for purchase on E-bay!

And then, there's like the news that the U.S. government (specifically our Preznit, of course) has labeled some of the Iranian military as a
terrorist group. Wow, I didn't know it was that easy. I want to play, I want to play! I would like to declare...the country of Switzerland to be a terrorist organization. "What, they're neutral?", you might think to ask. No, no, no, in this age of global terrorism, being neutral is as good as bedding with terrorists. Remember all that, if you're not with us, you're against us bullhonkey? Well, neutral sounds like 'not with us' to me. When does the war start????

close encounters of both the new and old kind

2007-08-08T10:25:00.002-07:00

Monday morning, just as I'm getting to the corner where the Chinese restaurant is on my walk to the bus stop, Craig Robinson crosses my path. If you don't know who Craig Robinson is by name, this is him:

My three favorite T.V. shows right now (comedy, otherwise Lost would bump one off) are The Office - watched it religiously this season, Arrested Development - RIP, watching with B on DVD right now, and Curb Your Enthusiasm - I own the series on DVD as well. Granted, Mr. Robinson had only small parts in one episode of both Arrested Development and Curb Your Enthusiasm, but who cares. And one of the only movies I saw this summer was Knocked Up, in which he plays a small, but very memorable, part. I haven't had a chance to see any of his stand-up though.

I didn't accost him or anything, and he seemed friendly enough, we exchanged polite stranger smiles as we walked past one another.

But what I want to know is, what the heck was he doing in the Palms neighborhood of L.A.? I have recently come to a deeper appreciation of my neighborhood, but really, there's not much there. Perhaps he was there on personal business, he probably is just a normal guy.

Then yesterday morning, as I was leaving my dentist appointment at the UCLA School of Dentistry (I like the experience of participating in the student dentist's education, and the appointments always make for good stories), I saw an old friend from middle and high school that I haven't seen since 1999. This was a guy who I "went out" with in both seventh and ninth grade. I think I was his first kiss, in ninth grade. I didn't talk to him, and I don't think he noticed me, as he looked pretty busy with a patient in the clinic area. I suppose something like this isn't entirely surprising, but in a way, it is. I know he went off to the Air Force Academy, and after that I really had no idea what his plans were. I definitely didn't know dentistry was in his future, but going to UCLA isn't improbable since we grew up in the southern California area. However, him and I being in the same place, at the same time by chance to me sounds unlikely. But there it was, and he looked so adult-like! I suppose I look older, but it's so gradual when you see yourself everyday.

Some of my life has been recovered

2007-07-30T23:29:00.000-07:00

I once again tried to boot the old PowerBook in target mode, but it didn't see the external USB keyboard that I hooked up in the hopes of it recognizing that I was pressing down on the 't' key (which is the way it knows to boot in target mode apparently). Rather, it actually booted up!! I put in my username and password, and all of a sudden I was staring at all my desktop files and my wallpaper. I jumped up and down in front of my labmate Jonathan. He looked at me like I was funny. My joy was slightly premature, as the computer froze about a minute later. I turned it off, and since the laptop keyboard was working, I decided to try and boot it in target mode again so I could do the full hard drive transfer, but it went back into death mode. We found some instructions online and pulled out the hard drive, attached it to some thing that I don't know the name of that allowed it to be plugged into the USB port. My new computer saw the hard drive! I decided the first thing to copy over would be my home directory, as my files are the most important. Applications...well they can be replaced. What I should have done (already with the should haves) is first moved just my 'Pictures' directory, and then my 'Research' directory, and then my 'Music' directory. All in all, my home directory had about 20 GB worth of data, about 10 GB of which is music. It got about 12 GB into the copy when the hard drive kind of petered out. I'm letting it rest overnight and really hoping I'll be able to get the rest (I really don't want to assume it's completely dead...yet). Because most of that 12 GB is the music, and damn if I didn't realize that I'd rather have my pictures than the music, since I can replace most of the music. Probably all of it with a little work. So I'm still kind of at square one, in terms of the research stuff I had on the computer, and my pictures. Thank god for Flickr. If I didn't have at least most of my favorite pictures uploaded there...I would be really depressed.

I did get all of the files on my desktop, and I got my 'Documents' folder which had some stuff, but nothing extremely important. Of course I managed to save my favorite lolcats pictures:

Now I can sleep easily. Sheesh.

Tomorrow night (as it's nearing midnight and I really should be getting up before 7 a.m.) I'll be backing up all the music, and whatever files I have. I swear. Now it's a matter of getting the programs back, most of which I think I can get from my adviser (i.e. Matlab). I downloaded Firefox tonight. I missed Firefox; Safari is pretty lame. All the Blogger functions work better in Firefox.

Interestingly, I did a Google search for 'flickr + facetioushorse' (which is my username, and the reason why I was searching for my Flickr site that way is because I have o.c.d. about mis-typing addresses into the address bar), and the last link on the page is actually an image search on search.com for 'bob + hair + cut'. Apparently, their image searches also go through Flickr, and there I am, the first result from their Flickr search. I feel kind of famous.

Listening: Grey Daturas - Path of Niners (oh how I missed you, Grey Daturas!)

There are some upsides to breaking a computer, right?

2007-07-29T22:14:00.000-07:00

There seems to be at least one good thing about the "PowerBook + water = dead computer" equation, and it is that I have to build my iTunes library from scratch. I'm not uploading things that I already had, in the hope that when I take the old hard drive out, I'll be able to transfer everything over. A lot of the stuff I had on there was sent to me by Joe, or uploaded from Corey's extensive library. (Corey is my now ex-boyfriend that I lived with for two years.) Corey has graciously offered his CD library to me, after I told him the story. I would say I had about fifty of my own albums on there. So what I've uploaded so far is mostly older stuff, which translates into a lot of my hardcore, post-punk, and basically heavier stuff. Some of it is also just indie stuff I haven't listened to in a long time, due to simple neglect. It's like travelling back in time! It's like getting my money's worth all over again!

Other than that, I can't think of any really good upsides to wrecking a perfectly good computer, but that's probably because I'm just not trying hard enough.

After going through last week, which was definitely worse than most in the recent past, it feels great to get back to my normal self. I realized only today that I was getting really uptight and neurotic last week, which I guess is my fallback personality when things aren't going well. I don't handle the stress of the unknown with grace. I sure wish I could learn how to do that. This weekend definitely helped me get my mind off of the computer problems, and helped me to not think about the fact that I made zero progress on my new paper. Friday was relaxing in that I spent the evening doing laundry and watching Sex and the City (contain your jealousy of my exciting nights)...and sort of mentally decompressing. Saturday morning I had a slight lapse into yelling in anger as I spent 30+ minutes on hold on a customer service line only to get cut off somehow. However, I recovered quickly and made my way over to violin, where we learned Canon in D. Only one more week of Level 1 violin. I'm so glad they've decided to add a Level 2 and Level 3. It ends up being $10 per one and a half hour class, which is so much more than reasonable. I couldn't afford private lessons.

One of B's friend threw a party on Saturday afternoon in honor of landing a job after many months of searching. On a personal sidenote, I think I would go absolutely insane if I couldn't find a job for months. I think it's some strange part of my personality. I am only starting to understand how out of control I feel if things aren't meeting a pretty high threshold of where I think they should be. I am not someone you would describe by saying "she goes with the flow". No, I try to control the flow. We had a lot of fun, and I met some more new people who were all very down to earth and interesting and funny.

Today was one of those days that put things in perspective for me, it was so great. I'm finally beginning to appreciate the art of sleeping in past 8 a.m. (really, not joking). B had planned ahead so we could make french toast when we got up, and it ended up turning out fantastic! We had taped Sarah Silverman's movie "Jesus is Magic" when it was on last weekend (Comedy Central showed it late at night, uncut and uncensored), and watched it today. Then I came home and made a to-do list and crossed everything off. So, it was the best of both the world of relaxation and the neurotic world of getting-things-done-on-a-Sunday. I think B is really good for me.

The only thing I'd like to do in the near future is make a trip to Amoeba. It's getting to the point where I'm beginning to feel cut off from the world, I don't know what is new, or what is great right now. I need that feeling of being on the cusp of what is current in music.

Listening: Oma Yang - From the Heart of Jumbo Malaria

well, that sucked

2007-07-24T22:42:00.000-07:00

Holy hell. This post was supposed to be written on Friday night. In fact, I was just settling in for a long night of uploading pictures to Flickr and writing a blog post when I lost control of my motor skills and, instead of just picking up the glass of water next to the PowerBook, I dumped the glass of water onto the keyboard of the PowerBook. I don't mean a few drops either. I was afraid I was going to be electrocuted if I touched the thing. Luckily I regained my senses and turned it upside down to let the water run out (that's right, run out) and popped the battery out, but not before the pretty pictures started appearing on the screen. So to recap, I took a cup of water and basically poured it in to a fully functioning, powered ON, PowerBook. It is basically dead, and my only hope is that the hard drive didn't get fried.

The computer wasn't mine, it was a sort of backup lab computer that my advisor let me use starting about a year ago. Since my own personal computer is a Windows 98, 6 GB monster of a machine (as I'm sure you can imagine), the Mac became my de facto personal computer as well (my advisor was aware of, and condoned, this). So although I didn't have a stroke right then and there, I have spent no small amount of time worrying about all those great digital pictures that I've taken since February, and all those albums that I got from other people, and the latest draft of the paper I'm currently working on.

"Didn't you back up?", you might be thinking.

Funny that you ask. Several months ago I bought an 80 GB external hard drive for this very purpose, knowing that this wasn't a computer I would be taking with me after graduation. However, I have since then made excuse after excuse, putting it off until a later day when I had more time. Well, that day never came. So ironic. And a sad, makes me want to cry ironic. Maybe in a few months this will be the hey, laugh at me kind of ironic.

The upside (beware the staggering rationalizations ahead) is that I realized I basically have no computer, and need one anyway for when I begin my professional (or academic) life sometime in the near future, so it makes perfect sense to invest in one now. And really, investment makes it sound so much better. I could either waste $500 on a Windows box (I use Linux at work, and have found that the Mac is completely compatible for work related projects) that would be used primarily for internet, or I could invest more money into a MacBook Pro that would not only be portable, but would serve as my first real computer that I could use for research purposes (I do computational work). So, I bought the MacBook Pro yesterday! I was a little stressed out, realizing it's going to take me a while to pay off this investment, but feel very comfortable with my decision today. It's a bit sooner than I would have liked, but I am the one who spilled the water in the PowerBook. Every action has a reaction, so I hear.

I tried to use the Migration Assistant (import old Mac hard drive onto new Mac hard drive), which boots the old Mac in Target Mode, but the old Mac was having none of it. I'm trying not to worry too much. It looks like we're going to have to remove the hard drive and physically turn it into an external hard drive so I can try and get all my data (and the programs, oh the programs!) off the old Mac.

Man, I am already tired of this post, but I had to tell that story to explain the five day absence. I should also say, that I can't post pictures from Joe's birthday bash or the NEMS BBQ right now. Those are all still on my memory card though, so if worse comes to worse, I can upload them again.

But in the last post, I promised to talk about several things: my new niece, car troubles, fancy dinners, and violin updates - wow!

My new niece: somewhat self explanatory, but there are details. She was born on June 28 early in the morning, and her name is Evellyn June. She's kind of cute, but the novelty of the newborn definitely only works once. Iain (her big brother) is now 15 months old and has is own personality now, and is starting to talk. He is so much fun to play with. I sound like a horrible aunt, but I'm just being honest.

Car troubles: also kind of self explanatory. Nothing too major (in terms of money cost), but a lot of mental hassle. I was driving home last Sunday afternoon to visit my family and see the new baby, and home is about a two hour drive east of here, when I had a tire blow out on me on the freeway. Now this wasn't the kind of thing that causes spinouts and wrecks; the tread just suddenly separated from the inner tube, so it wasn't completely flat. Scary nonetheless! I was able to safely get off the freeway and into a nearby parking lot. I had to call AAA since I don't have a jack and still had to drive about 50 miles to get to either place - back to L.A. or out to my parents' house. In the process of taking off the lug nuts, the guy breaks one of the studs. Thanks man! My brother says plenty of people drive with just three studs, but I don't know...So they guy puts on my spare for me and directs me to a tire store just a few blocks up the road. I decide that is probably the best idea and head up there. I get there and they don't have replacement studs, and somehow manage to break a second stud while taking off my spare. I definitely cannot drive anywhere with only two studs! These people ended up being nice and got the job done well, but it was a bit sketchy for a while. One of them was sent on an errand to Auto Zone to get two new studs and all new lug nuts. In the process of disassembling my disk area, the guy tells me my brake caliper is leaking brake fluid. I'm really glad he told me.

I got to my parents' house safely and the next day I asked my Dad to take off the spare to make sure everything looked okay, and to check if the brake caliper was leaking. Of course, it was. Also saw that my CV boot was broken, and we decided to get a whole new axle rather than taking the time with a boot repair kit. Funny story: about a year or two ago, the BRAKE sensor on my dashboard lit up, I asked my Dad bout it, and he thought it was just that the emergency brake sensor was broken and didn't register when I took the emergency brake off. Sounds good to me. After we fixed the brake caliper (and it turned out I had no brake fluid in the reservoir), the light went off. So I was being warned this whole time. Awesome. I'm so glad this was noticed before the inevitable accident that would have occured one day while driving around town when I just...couldn't...stop the car.

Fancy dinners: this one is a good story. B's friends Liz and Matt hosted a group of people at the Athenaeum (the Caltech hotel) for dinner. The occasion was to celebrate Matt's birthday. The traffic sucked, and I again affirmed the fact that I could never commute more than three to five miles in this city on a daily basis without significantly increasing my blood pressure, getting migraines, and becoming a horrible person in general. The dessert table was fantastic, I had various treats run under the chocolate fountain, and some kind of chocolate cheesecake thing.

Violin update: This Saturday we learned several harmony parts to our week 1 and 2 material - Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star and Ode to Joy. We also learned "low 2's", which I'm not going to explain. The week before that we learned a really beautiful little piece called New World Symphony. Only two more weeks left, and this Saturday was are learning Canon in D (except for the really hard part that makes you recognize the song - our instructor will be playing that part). There was some discussion of having some kind of recital at the end for family and friends. The thought makes me nervous. I practice, but it will take a long time for me to sound like I can actually play.

Time for bed. Now I can purge all of this information from my head, since it's been written down.

So to recap: Always, always leave glasses of water on the floor or some other lower elevation perch relative to an open, powered up laptop, check your brake fluid reservoir level if the BRAKE light is on in the dashboard panel, and for God's sake, BACK YOUR FUCKING DATA UP (that last one is for me).

Listening: Isis - Oceanic

The summers are no longer relaxing

2007-07-19T20:46:00.001-07:00

Only the second post of July so far! Bummer. A lot has been going on, and it is always more interesting to think about things and comment on them as they are happening since the little details are still there, but I've been too busy to sit down and write for a while. I have to go all the way back to July 7th to get up to date.

B was in San Francisco visiting some friends that weekend, and my friend Joe, who incidentally has a music blog called Listening Man, celebrated his 28th birthday by throwing a party at this house in Studio City (I prefer to say 'in the Hollywood Hills', since I arrived there by way of Mulholland Drive, but hey). I usually feel pretty ambivalent about parties, but I ended up having a lot of fun at this party despite going alone. I even took a lot of pictures. (Blogger is not letting me upload pictures at the moment...these will go in the next post. Pretend they are here.)

The second week at Caltech was much more fun socially, but academically frustrating for me, as the subject matter covered was almost pure physics: classical and quantum mechanics as applied to NEMS devices. It took me a while to get what a lot of the speakers were talking about. What I mean by that is so many of them started off running as if they were giving an actual lecture as opposed to talking to a more general scientific community, or graduate students that are not experts in the subject. Towards the end of the week, all of the participating students threw a BBQ in one of the courtyard of one of the undergrad dorms (Dabney). The undergrads gave us some looks, but didn't say anything. After the food was eaten, and people had drank more of the whiskey and vodka, some people jumped in the jacuzzi (yes, in the courtyard of the dorms), and some people jumped in the ballpit (like you find at McDonald's, and again, yes, in the lounge of the dorms), trying to make up rules as they went along for possible ballpit tournaments. For the second time in a week, I took a lot of pictures. I was glad I did. Those aren't ready to be posted yet though.

On my last night in Pasadena, B drove up for what was supposed to be a free catered dinner, with open bar, but apparently the order was never confirmed and there was no free dinner. So B and I decided to go to this great Mexican place called El Portal. Pasadena was really hot during the daytime, but I have to say the evenings were so, so pleasant. Maybe I'm just jealous because, although it is cooler here on the westside where I live, my apartment is so hot in the late afternoon and I get so little circulation that I have to turn the A.C. on to be mildly comfortable.

I think this about the halfway point of the post, but I'm feeling rundown from the long day (and not enough sleep last night), so maybe I'll postpone the rest until tomorrow night. I don't suppose too much will happen between now and then. Just some highlights of what is to come: my new niece, car troubles, fancy dinners, and violin updates - wow!

Listening: Modest Mouse - Building Nothing Out of Something

2007-07-06T19:33:00.001-07:00

The rest of last week (before the first) just flew by in a flash. The only highlights worth mentioning are the fact that the day after I posted my rant, someone just tore through the bathroom and left it a mess. That's right, two days in a row, lucky me. I took some pictures of it on my camera phone, but since I haven't gotten around to e-mailing them to myself yet, I doubt it's going to happen in the future. Suffice it to say it was actually slightly worse than what I described. It included an unwrapped maxi pad lying on the floor. Seriously.

Last Thursday, B and I went to the Echo to see Xu Xu Fang, as it was their record release party. They are my current favorite L.A. band, as they have that guitar driven, dark and swirly, yet catchy sound that I'm into. Female vocals float across the top, rather than standing out. Although, I have to say that since a recent lineup change in which they lost two guitar players (the previous lineup had three!) and gained a new second guitarist, their wall of guitar sound that I was digging has definitely weakened.

Saturday afternoon I was back in violin class after practicing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star every day, probably causing my old man neighbor to hate me. That's alright, he's always been a dick, banging on the wall when I talk in my room past 10 p.m. Yes, not a typo, I can't talk in my room after 10 p.m. without him banging loudly on the wall. We learned a much more challenging song: Ode to Joy by Beethoven. We slaughtered it very nicely. Unfortunately, I didn't have as much time this week to practice as I've been up at Caltech since Monday afternoon for a two week NSF summer school on nanomechanics. I suppose I could have brought the violin, but seeing as the walls in the dorms we are staying in are paper thin, I'm glad I didn't. If I were really good, I could justify it by saying my practicing would be like entertainment for those around me...but that's just a lie.

I'm going to go off on a bit of a tangent here, but I spent most of Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday in a strange mood due to my change in scenery. It had nothing to do with the course itself, which has been very interesting, and I've been learning a lot. It has more to do with the fact that when I was in high school, I really, really wanted to go to Caltech (or MIT) but didn't get in. I thought I was going to get in, which is what made it so disappointing. If there was anyone from my school that could get in, it was me, and I had yet to "fail" in life at that point, so I was just convinced they would want me. Well fast forward eight years, me seemingly over such a small detail (large though it may be to a seventeen year old). But something about living in the undergraduate dorms and actually pseudo-experiencing life at Caltech, I not only felt like I had regressed about six years in life to a time when life existed completely inside a ten foot by ten foot room and the surrounding campus, but I felt a sense of inadequacy and regret that that didn't get to become my life. Strange.

I should say that in general, I am happy with the direction my life took. The truth is, I wouldn't have been exposed to many of the things that have made me who I am if I had gone to a place like Caltech. I have to remind myself of that, because I do really like who I am as this adult.

Also adding to my feelings is the fact that B went to Caltech for his undergrad, and before now, I had always thought of it as the sort-of-distant past, the same way Miami is to me at this point. But being in the dorms where he lived and experienced so much is strange and makes me feel like there is so much I'll never be able to fully understand about him that occured at an important part of his life. This is really dumb though, as the inverse is also true, and he'll never get to know the Melissa that was kind of boy crazy and a dumbass at 19, and 20, and truthfully a little bit at 21 too. But I know that doesn't matter, that everything that happened in Miami is just the past. Who I am now is what matters in our relationship. Again, just some strange feelings.

I have the weekend off, and sleeping in my own bed will be nice. Seeing my cat is comforting as well; I worried about her all week, needlessly. Week three of violin tomorrow, I hope the amount of practice I did on Monday and today will get me through without too much embarrassment. I'll be going back to Caltech on Sunday night, so practicing this week will be scarce again. Oh well. Grad school has to come first.

Listening: Mum - Finally We Are No One

rants

2007-06-25T18:10:00.001-07:00

From time to time, a girl just needs to rant a little.

Rant one: What is up with the stupid ass girls that use the bathroom on the third floor of the engineering building at UCLA? Seriously, I find several things annoying about my fellow bathroom-mates, so much so that I find myself cursing under my breath while I'm trying to enjoy my bodily relief. My major gripe has to do with the seat covers. Pretty much once or twice a week I'll walk into the stall only to see that about 23 seat covers are lying on the floor and the toilet itself. Now, I understand that the mechanics of the whole seat cover thing are a little complicated (did I mention this is the engineering building?), however if you happen to pull out a few too many, why the hell don't you pick them up and put them in the trash? Do you get so confused by what is going on that you just run out, afraid of the paper seat covers?? I really, really just don't understand this mentality. This has to be the same person too, I just have this feeling. My second gripe has to do with talking on a cell phone in a stall in the bathroom. It's fucking annoying. I mean really. There are places all over UCLA where you can talk on your cell phone in relative privacy. The god damn bathroom stall is not one of them. For me at least; how the hell am I supposed to go pee knowing that whoever you are talking to can hear my business? I don't even talk on the phone while taking care of business. My third gripe has to do with the girls that are already in a stall when I enter the bathroom, and proceed to halt anything they are doing, waiting for me to finish, washup, and leave before they continue. Alright, I understand some desire for modesty on their part, but my god, this leaves me as the person that must suck it up and pee while they get to listen to everything I do, just so they can remain comfortable. It's a horrible double standard. I hate it. Conclusion: bitches don't understand bathroom etiquette.

Second rant: This is one that is near and dear to me, as I am a bus rider that has to walk to and from my destinations and the bus stops. People that do not respect the pedestrian right-of-way. I'm not talking about me jaywalking, or running across the intersection after the do not walk sign is lit, because those things are annoying to drivers, rigthly so. I do drive on the weekends, and have my complaints about lameass pedestrians that should probably be knocked out of the gene pool. Oh no, I'm a very courteous pedestrian. It's about the fuckers that floor it just as the light turns green (and the walk sign is lit) so they can turn right without waiting for the pedestrians to cross, or the people who do the same thing about 0.01 seconds after I've "cleared" the lane they need to be in, so to speak. I understand traffic sucks, but do you understand that a slight error in judgement on your part results in serious harm to me, and that really, you're just an asshole? No really, do you get this part? I've often (as in twice) remarked that if I ever get serious about some karma style retribution, I'm going to hold on to the keys in my pocket with a key outstretched, and when one of those fuckers goes squealing past me just as I'm stepping into the crosswalk, I'm just going to pull it out and let the car hit the key. Because really, that's what it is. I wouldn't have to really reach out to hit the car, it's more like, "whoops, your car just ran into my keys which were hardly an elbow-to-fingertip's length away from my body." Today, if you didn't see this coming, was one of those days, but slightly modified. Today, one super asshole was turning right after the light in his direction turned red, and I was crossing perpindicular to him. This almost turned out tragically, but I had time to yell out "Hey, fucker!" before he was gone. Not two seconds later, as I'm now about five feet into the crosswalk, another asshole comes careening to a halt, as his front right bumper is about to meet with my knee. Now this guy, this guy I wanted to really yell at. This asshole is now about to run through the red light, that's right, not a green light, hitting me in the process. I stopped and glared, and yelled a few words along the lines of "Are you fucking serious," but he wouldn't look me in the eye. Interestingly, and I can only hope this is what stops him from such egregious driving in the future, a girl that I presume to be his daughter was in the backseat without a seat belt on flew into the back of his seat, hitting her head in the process, as he had to slam on the brakes to avoid my previously mentioned knees. She looked like she was in quite a bit of pain. Well, too bad for her, she got stuck with a pretty shitty dad. In retrospect I really, really, no you really don't understand how much I really think I should have taken a swift kick to one of his headlights and yelled out, "When you look at that broken headlight, you fuck, think about driving a little better. Because if you had hit me, you would have won by a long shot. ASSHOLE!" But I didn't.

So think about these things before you take on a pedestrian. You risk getting keyed, which is not that big of a deal, but you also risk losing the college fund for your daughter, or yourself, which I would have heartily sued for if this guy had hit me. Heartily!

the whiskey days of summer

2007-06-24T17:10:00.000-07:00

Shortly after I wrote yesterday, I had to run over to Santa Monica College for the first meeting of the beginning violin class I enrolled in. This is not an actual college class, it's a community education class, and I'm taking it for fun. I got so much out of the guitar class that I decided if I'm interested in learning something, to just enroll. The first violin I bought was an E-bay disaster. This thing was poorly designed and the varnish was emanating off of this thing. I was ashamed to walk into class with it, so I went over to McCabes Guitar Shop and bought a new one, which is still a beginner violin. The difference is, I didn't feel bad walking into class with it.

The class itself went alright. I think guitar was easier since I had played before. Violin requires a whole set of skills that I have to aquire as I go along. I got a little frustrated when I couldn't get all the way through Twinkle Twinkle Little Star with the rest of the group. I had to remind myself that at least two of the people in the class had already played before, so probably had to spend less time thinking about how to hold the violin and the bow, and could concentrate on the notes and the finger positions. I practiced today and sounded a lot better, because I watched myself in the mirror to make sure my arm positions were doing what she said they should. That helped a lot. A little bit of practice every day this week and I should have the song down.

Later in the afternoon, B and I went over to the newly married couple Pat and Holly's house for a Whiskey Days of Summer party. I brought cupcakes and B brought whiskey. The premise for the party was to bring your favorite recipe for whiskey sours, as several people in the group have regional specific mixes passed on by their families. I've never been a huge fan of whiskey (I much prefer vodka, then rum), but these whiskey sours were good. Hamburgers (and boca burgers for us non-meat eaters) were grilled, people enjoyed the nice patio area
and the plentiful drinks, and later when it got dark, the newly purchased firepit was brought out. This is a part of the lovely patio area:

This is Pat creating the fire:

This is Liz enjoying the small fire:

When everyone seemed nice and toasty, the part was brought indoors. First, a very simple game of "hey, let's electrocute one another. huh huh huh." was played. See below:

Then the Trivial Pursuit, Pop Culture was brought out and I learned that I know nothing about apparently popular culture. Oh well, that's what playing outside instead of watching t.v. all day as a kid gets me.

Listening: Yo La Tengo - And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out

this passport is not a mirage

2007-06-23T10:43:00.000-07:00

I really wanted to write yesterday but got caught up in my weird compulsive cleaning. Actually, it's not so much cleaning, as it is a strange desire to go through all of my drawers (anyplace where things are stored in bulk really) and throw out old, outdated stuff, and reorganize what is left. I don't know why, but it feels really cathartic and when I'm done I feel way more accomplished than I should. The strange part is that I'm somewhat motivated by this thought: "What if I die? Do I want my parents to see all of my things in such disarray [which isn't true in the first place, but boy it sure seemed like it]?" And if I die, I am fully in control of what I'm leaving behind - no scary secrets here! Like I said, strange.

Thursday was going well, then by late afternoon it was sucking, because I was working on a timeline to get home, as Rose and I were going to see Tortoise at the El Rey. I get all worked up because I hate being late anywhere. Way too worked up; see the previous paragraph. So I had just missed the bus I needed to get home, and the anxiety was building up, apparently so much so that I became blind and got on the number 2 bus instead of the 12, and didn't realize it until the bus made a turn down Wilshire and I had to be let off Veteran and walk my ass all the way back, just missing the next bus. This was frustrating, and I was feeling especially mad at myself. Phew. I got home and made a very fast dinner, and proceeded to eat way too fast, making my stomach really upset for the next hour. Me thinks thou dost protest too much, stomach!! On the way to the El Rey, I realized I had next to no gas and proceeded to latch on that as the next thing to fret over. I. Am. So. Neurotic.

All that being said and done with, we are finally at the El Rey, and the place is still pretty empty. Some d.j. did a set as opposed to an opening act, which was a little ehh at best. But finally Tortoise played, and they did a fantastic set with two encores. Not bad. They played material off of Standards and It's All Around You, and as far as I could tell, nothing else. The only bummer for me was that the set was almost identical to the set they played last year at the Troubadour. But, a solid performance nonetheless, and it was the first time Rose has seen them, and I think she fully enjoyed the show. Before we left, I had an internal debate about bringing my camera, and decided against it, as I've never had the luck to get a good spot from which to take pictures. I tried to take some at Mum a few years back and they turned out el crapo. But of course, we got the perfect spot near the front but off to the right where we were on a raised platform and had a perfect view of the entire stage. One more thing to kick myself for. Two events in the past week that I regret not having my camera at. Why don't I just bring it everywhere? But, I did get a shirt for $5; it's a design from the Standards tour.

I've seen them three times now and I can't exactly pinpoint which has been my favorite show. The first time was 2001, and I saw them at Royce Hall on the UCLA campus (pre graduate school however), on the Standards tour. That was a great, great show and Jet Black Crayon opened, and has gone on to be a band that I thoroughly enjoy. They also played some older material. Then the Troubadour and El Rey, which had almost identical set lists. Kind of a toss-up.

Passport update: it turns out that expiditing my passport application produced better than expected results. I submitted the application last Wednesday, and got it in my mailbox this Thursday, eight days later. That includes the day it took to ship it back. So one week total processing time. Pretty good, considering that expiditing right now gives results in 2-3 weeks on average. I felt a sense of relief when everything went through without a problem, they didn't lose my paperwork or my birth certificate, and I can now buy my ticket to Costa Rica with confidence.

Listening: Tim Hecker - Mirages

the internet is more entertaining than the t.v.

2007-06-19T22:16:00.000-07:00

Granted, I don't have cable, but I do find the internet to be a much deeper sea of interesting things to choose from. And I really, really hate commercials. Whether I'm looking to learn about new things that enrich my life, or study something purely academic, or find those worthless gems that don't really add much in terms of substance, but you just can't step away even after a long amount of time has passed, and your eyes are feeling dry and are starting to sting and blur, the internet has it all. Yeah, that's the internet I love. Actually, last I heard, internet was actually capitalized, as in 'Internet'. I don't like the way it looks, so I'm not going to follow this rule.

Tonight I spent the better part of the evening, and will probably be up long after I should, perusing the best-of-craigslist. Most of it is so funny I find myself laughing out loud, with just my cat looking back at me, confirming that it's a little odd. I will freely admit most of it is peppered with obscenities, but I love obscenities when used at all the right points in a story emphasizing just how pissed you were at that point in time. I use obscenities a lot in my head when I'm mad and wish I could rant about something. A lot of the entries seem to be rants, or nicely penned F.Y.I. type posts from the people around us, i.e. service industry workers who just have to let a little steam out about all the assholes they have to deal with. I love it. I suppose to some people it's not a new find, but to me it is, and I'm excited about it.

I'm adding it to my favorite links section on the left.

Listening: Grey Daturas - Path of Niners

early summer parties

2007-06-17T20:43:00.000-07:00

I really do love this time of year. It might have something to do with the fact that I'm the eternal student, and have not yet disengaged myself from the end of the school year feeling of freedom. The warm, sunny days don't hurt either.

I also love summer parties. (The fact that I've never myself given a summer party is something I'm not proud of, and would like to change while I still have some young left in me). Yesterday, there was a surprise birthday party for a friend of B's. She's a bit older than us, and is married and has two young boys. The family is something else! Cutest little kids. We arrived on time to witness some of the setup, which included a P.A. system as some friends were going to be playing some cover songs. It turns out there was actually a surprise within a surprise at this party; the bass player of the group has been dating the girl that was singing for several years or more, if I heard correctly, and was going to propose to her during their last song, Walk the Line. Some of the people there were aware of the upcoming proposal, so the atmosphere of the party seemed to be a bit more electric.

Most of the afternoon was spent eating from the extensive food spread, drinking good beer (their parties are so, so good if you are a beer lover), and alternating between being a monster and being chased by the monsters - with the kids. Later, B's friend made her entrance and was sucessfully surprised, I think. Right around dusk, the music playing began. I am not sure what two of the songs were, but they played a Radiohead song, and Walk the Line was last. Although he looked nervous, the bass player managed to get the words out and completely surprised his girl! She looked genuinely surprised and elated. She did say yes! Champagne was brought out for everyone to enjoy. I had never witnessed a proposal. Now that I and my friends are apparently of the marrying age, I have heard proposal stories. So I'll just say it was an experience in and of itself, to witness a huge moment like that. Then we sang happy birthday to the birthday girl and had fantastic cake, and sat around the firepit that was brought out after night had fully settled. The acoustic guitar was passed around, and I got a chance to play Blackbird. I thought it went well, considering I usually get sort of choked up, a kind of stage fright when I play in front of others. All in all, a fantastic party that went off without a hitch for all involved.

I do wish I had thought to bring my camera though! Earlier in the day the thought crossed my mind, but I wrote it off immediately as being too cumbersome, that I should just focus on enjoying the night rather than capturing cool pictures. But really, if any party could have used pictures, it was this one! The proposal could have been captured (although it was videotaped, I am going to have to admit I'm a photo snob), and various pictures of everyone enjoying the day would have been nice to send along to the hosts. Oh well, could haves don't matter now.

On a sidenote, I would love to have one of these portable fire pits when I have a real yard. It was about three feet in diameter, so the fire was modest, but quite warm considering the night was a little chilly. It kept the party going much longer than it would have without it I think. It became the natural gathering point.

I need to go practice guitar.

Listening: Jessamine - Don't Stay Too Long. I picked up this album (which originally came out in 1998) a few years ago at Amoeba, and as I have a tendency of buying too many albums per trip, this one slipped through the cracks. I had listened to the album maybe once, probably not all the way through. I put it in the stereo on Wednesday when I was working from home and was completely blown away! This album is excellent. What I think happened is that the style of this album, which is a sort of more guitar driven version of Portishead or something lush like that, didn't fully appeal to me at the time I bought it. But now, it fits in perfectly with the Bardo Pond, wall-of-guitar-effects sound that I'm into right now. My favorite track is called 'Continuous' and is this seven minute dirge of guitars with this entrancing bass/keyboard/vocal thing going on over it. But the drums keep it out of the depressing realm, by staying upbeat. This gets me sort of excited about reviewing some other recent finds that have been better than expected. Maybe that is a good subject for the next post.

passport....a.k.a. why the government is lame

2007-06-13T18:02:00.000-07:00

If you have been following the news lately, there is a huge backlog of U.S. passport applications due the changing laws that will soon require a passport to travel back and forth between our neighboring countries of Canada and Mexico, and the Carribean. I haven't traveled much, but I assume that this just wasn't needed before? And of course it's all the name of security, because we're fighting the damn GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR, DON'T YOU KNOW THAT?

No matter, the real point of the story is that I was recently asked to join B on a trip to Costa Rica for a friend's wedding. Who is going to pass that up? Oh you would? Huh. Not me. But I don't have a passport!! For a few days I was in a panic after learning it was taking upwards of 12 weeks to get the passport when I realized last week was basically the 12 week mark until the trip date, and I had done little to research the passport issue. Panic mode!

I finally got all my paperwork in order (luckily my mom had given me her copy of my birth certificate sometime in the recent past, as she figured I need it more now that I'm well into adulthood, for things like this) and went down to my nearby post office today. Of course I paid the $60 to expidite the whole process up to about three weeks. I've learned that when it comes to matters where a lot is on the line financially, i.e. the cost of a trip to Costa Rica, it's better to pay a little to be safe rather than sorry. But good lord, after factoring in the cost of the pictures (side note, didn't come out half bad) and the express mail to get the passport to me, it was almost $200!! Money is a little tight right now as it is the end of the quarter, and my summer payment hasn't gone through yet. I'm getting to the point where I check my school system every day to see what the status is. I hate money stress. The fact that I wanted to make more money in interest, tying up a lot of extra money into a C.D., is something I'm regretting right now. Not entirely, but it would make things a little less stressful. Money issues could take up a whole slew of entries, but not right now.

So the passport application is off, and if all goes well, I would say four weeks should be reasonable, then I should be getting the passport in the mail right around the middle of July. It all doesn't go well, I should be receiving the passport no later then the middle of August. If things go horribly, and they lose my application or something, I suppose I could spend another $200 and still get a passport by the beginning of September. I really hope it doesn't come to Plan C...

Listening: Esmerine - Aurora

long weekends

2007-06-10T15:00:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy weekend; having friends visit from out of town does that. Friday, B came over. (B will from now on refer to the boyfriend). B had returned the previous night from a work-related trip across the country that lasted less than 24 hours. That's a high flying-to-working ratio for a trip! He was understandably tired. We finally got word that we were going to meet my friend Jessica and several other people over in the Silverlake area of L.A. to eat at a Thai place called Rambutan Thai. Jessica drove up from San Diego for the weekend. The food ended up being excellent, and well priced. Always a plus in my book. I would highly recommend this place for a romantic date on the cheap. It seemed to be expensively decorated and there was quite a hip crowd there.

We then decided to go to an ice cream place called Scoops, which is like the college radio of ice cream - all kinds of flavors that you've never seen or tasted before. I got mint and white chocolate chip ice cream, which like some stuff you hear on college radio, was not so good. Turns out this place was right around the corner from a very tiny venue called the Il Corral, which usually has noise/experimental shows for about $5. I learn more about L.A. all the time.

The people we are with are abounding with energy (where do they get it from, really??) and decide it's time to go bar hopping. We end up at a place back in Silverlake called the Cha Cha Lounge. Apparently this place is very popular, as it is full of trendily dressed twenty-somethings. There is a photo booth, but even after two beers, I cannot convince B to take pictures with me. That's o.k., he is photo shy. At this point, everyone is tired, but the others decide to go on to further adventures, while B and I decide to go home. Sleep was good.

Saturday, Jessica and I spent the day together. First we went to the MOCA at the Geffen Contemporary to see the WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution exhibit. Despite not having our school I.D.'s we convince the desk folk that we are indeed students and get the student rates. Nice. The exhibit was quite expansive, and covered female art from the 60's and 70's. Some of it was meant to be extremely liberating and some pushed the bounds, and I admit some of it just seemed to be there because it was made by a female artist.

This particular building of MOCA is in Little Tokyo, so Jessica and I decided to get sushi for lunch, followed by my very first taste of mochi ice cream. I had the strawberry flavor, which was excellent! I cannot wait to visit Little Tokyo again. I like sushi places:

We then made the mistake of visiting the Beverly Center go to to H&M at around 4 p.m. So many obnoxious people at this mall. Nothing much of note happened, but I got three shirts for summer. I think this summer, I am going to be very into heather grey. We had dinner at my favorite neighborhood pizza place, Mama's. Got the ravioli instead of pizza this time, which was also excellent.

A lot of great food this weekend, which was a much needed change in the routine. None of it being expensive made it even sweeter. Speaking of food, I was at the grocery store today and both blueberries and raspberries were on sale!! I love berries! But only if they aren't so expensive. Still trying to live on the cheap here. So I picked up some of both, and they are so good, I'm alternating typing and munching:

Time to go, B and I are going to see Paris, Je t'aime.

Listening: June of 44 - Anahata

What do you mean you have to 're-spray'?

2007-06-05T21:56:00.000-07:00

So today was, in the words of David Cross, good slash bad slash good again. I ended up skipping a day at school to take care of very important errands. The first of these very important errands being to get a haircut. "Hey, that's not very important," you say. The hell it isn't says I! Although I agree, if I were paying full price, it would make more sense to make an appointment on a day off such as Saturday. I used to do this, and then discovered the magic of the Vidal Sassoon academy in Santa Monica. That's not where I went today, but that's where this story has to begin from.

Almost two years ago now, I was approached while shopping in Santa Monica by a young guy that asked me if I needed a haircut. Incidentally, I did, and had an appointment the next weekend with my then current stylist at an Aveda salon near my parents house, a nearly two hour drive east. I decided to throw caution to the wind and cancel my appointment, and let this guy cut my hair. So he needed a model because he was training at the Vidal Sasson to be on their staff (he was well post-licensing at that point). I got an awesome haircut and best of all, it was free.

At that point, I decided I liked free haircuts and cheap color. Several months later I was getting highlights when I was approached by a young girl named Jamie who asked if I wanted a haircut. I was due, so said yes. She was also post-license and training to become staff. Well not too long after that she left Vidal Sassoon but remained in the L.A. area, so I followed her to her new place. So I get to be a hair model, and I just try to tip better than I would if I was paying full price, seeing as it's free for me. Not a bad deal. Additionally, there is a perfectly good reason for making appointments on Tuesday, as that is the only day she does training on models.

This is the haircut I got today: it's an A-line bob with layers in the back, which I've had for about two years now, but today she gave me these awesome blunt bangs.

That was the first good part about today. The second good part about today was that I got my car smogged and it passed. Also of note is the fact that I spent much of the late afternoon replanting the outdoor planter that I had purchased the supplies for this past weekend. I also finally cleaned off the balcony. Here's what my balcony looks like now:

What you can't see is how dirty the bench actually is. That's next on my to-do list. The unstated goal is to make my balcony the most inviting balcony I could possibly have, so that when I have those great imaginary summer parties where people are relaxed and comfortable and we're making great mixed drinks, they would feel drawn to spend some time on the patio.

The truth is, I probably won't have any summer parties. But maybe 2007 is the year of the summer party for me. 2007 has been an interesting year so far, so why not?

The bad part of the day is related to the title of this post. About a month ago, I got a notice on my door stating that on some weekday, workers were going to come in and spray for fleas and I needed to have the cat out for about half the day. Apparently one of the nearby units had a bad flea infestation. I don't know, and don't really care, but I understood and had the cat out, with no small amount of inconvenience for both me and the cat. I missed a whole day of work for that.

This evening, I come to find another one of these notices on my door for this coming Thursday. For 're-spraying'. What the hell? My apartment doesn't even have fleas, so you would think one spray would pretty much cover it, no? Just re-spray the unit with the problem. Damn. I guess I should consider myself lucky that I'm a grad student and have the flexibility to tell my advisor, "Oh yeah, just to let you know, not coming in on Thursday. K, thanks." What the hell would I do if I had a real job with this two day notice? I'm almost tempted to tell the manager that I absolutely cannot take the day off on Thursday to deal with this, but if she'd like to have them come on a Saturday, that'd be great - just to see what she would do.

Technically, that means the day went good slash good slash bad, which makes no sense. I guess I'll have to throw in the pizza I made for dinner after I got the 're-spray' notice, bumping me back to good slash bad slash good again.

Listening: Bedhead - Transaction De Novo

Calloused fingers

2007-06-04T22:08:00.000-07:00

I took a beginning guitar class this quarter through the UCLA Department of Recreation for several reasons: first, I wanted to learn how to play (good first reason, no?), and perhaps just as importantly, it was cheap! Much, much cheaper than private lessons. I spent two hours a week in class for the past eight weeks building up these fine callouses that I am damn proud of. And no small amount of time at home practicing. My goal for the summer is to practice what I know - this sounds a little dumb since I already know it, but the past hour that I just worked on the songs I already know may prove otherwise - and find new tabs online to learn over the summer.

Before this class started, I could play you some of the main chords, but not much more. Now, my extensive repertoire includes the following songs:

Wild Thing - The Troggs
Love Me Do - The Beatles
Good Riddance - Green Day
Times They Are A-Changin' - Bob Dylan
Mr. Tambourine Man - Bob Dylan (as covered by The Byrds)
Redemption Song - Bob Marley
Hurt - NIN (as covered by Johnny Cash, way better)
Brown Eyed Girl - Van Morrison
Everybody Hurts - R.E.M. (way more boring than I thought it would be)
Dust in the Wind - Kansas
Blackbird - The Beatles (my favorite of the class)

Not so bad considering it was only eight weeks. The class also humbled me I think. Since I picked up the bass when I was young, but never formally trained, I felt that I would automatically be good at guitar. Boy, was I wrong.

I also came to a breakthrough about why I quit violin when I was in elementary school. At the time, the lessons were so painfully boring, and I got it very easily - in my head. So much so that I thought practicing was a waste of time, especially when it involved very monotonous exercises. But that's just not true, there is a certain amount of practice you have to put in to train your brain and body to work together, no matter how much you understand it in your head. I realized the same is true for guitar - just because I have Blackbird memorized does not mean I can play it well. I can stumble through for sure, and am quickly improving. There's just that inevitable amount of time that must be spent repeating the song over and over.

I kind of like to joke with myself how much it goes to show that I just like the learning process itself, not the execution. It explains why I'd rather learn theory and read a book and solve problems on the computer than perform actual experiments. So in a way, taking guitar lessons has also served to teach me a little something about myself. Pretty good deal for $40.

Guitar was so much fun that I decided I should always, always, pursue things that interest me outside of engineering. Keep life more than one-dimensional. So my summer project is the beginning violin class that's being offered by the Santa Monica College Continuing and Community Education program. Again, private lessons would be far too expensive just to explore whether I really like violin, or if my younger instincts were somehow correct. Those lessons won't begin for a few more weeks.

For now, I'll just leave a link to a You Tube video of Blackbird that someone posted, I like to leave it playing in the background. I don't know how to embed, but it's the next thing on the to do list.

Welcome to the green paper house

2007-06-02T14:40:00.001-07:00

It would have been just 'paper house', but that was already taken, so welcome to the green paper house! My favorite color is green, so it seemed fitting that if I had to amend my chosen name, a favorite color could do nothing but make it sound better. A blog! How twenty first century of me.

I figured there was no better day than today to start an official account of things as they happen to be going on in my life. For starters, I got up early to avoid the crowds at OSH, which here on the westside of Los Angeles fills very quickly with those really rich, really bitchy kind of people. One thing I really hate about L.A. However, the fact that you can love and hate L.A. at the same time is the subject for a different post at a later time.

The list for the day included new plants for my outdoor DIY planters (I found some good tips in Venus magazine last year), many of which died sometime during the fall when my sliding glass door that opens to the patio decided to come completely off the tracks. Sorry plants. I also bought this great bench from Ikea last year that is in some serious need of some wood care products, which I also bought. Last, but not least, I was walking home from the bus stop several months ago and right in the middle of the sidewalk found this sort of delicate metal table that is in some serious need of cleaning and painting. So I got all the supplies.

The point is, the quest to make my apartment the most comfortable, inviting, and yet aesthetically pleasing is never over. Especially when there are magazines like Domino that just make you wish you had a lot more money and time. Little by litte, I remind myself.

But that's only half the day - I really like the artist Kurt Halsey, and he currently has a solo show here in L.A. at Gallery 1988. So I drove over, as he was going to be there today for signings, and bought several prints. This show is completely sold out, I think, not that I could afford an original piece. Anyway, his work is great if you're more into the drawn, comic style, and slightly romantic themes. I imagine a lot of "indie girls" are into it. Wait, am I an indie girl? I like the subtlety of his color palette, which veer more to the natural colors like brown and beige, with small touches of color in some of the pieces.

Now I'm writing a blog, and listening to the fantastic Can album, Tago Mago. My tastes as of late have veered away from both heavy and quiet music in favor of more guitar solo driven rock. But not just rock...it's a little hard to explain. There's a reason why I'll never be a good music critic, and it's that I don't have the tools needed to write truly descriptive reviews - a good vocabulary, and a knack for translating the purely emotional into words. That's what I get for being an engineer.

Life is good. But then again, it's Saturday.