The Impending Fall

"The Impending Fall" would be a pretty cool band name, but that's not how I meant it. The impending fall as I was originally intended is the time of the year that is soon approaching, and my favorite season. It was officially here as of September 22, but I like to associate autumn with the weather and its cool climate. Unfortunately, however, the weather I love isn't exactly here yet so I'll just label this time as post-summer, and not quite fall. There's an aura of melancholy in the fall, and it somehow provokes a strange sense of self-relfection in me--moreso than I already typically do. And Lord knows how I love melancholic reflection.

The trees and days begin to wither. The colors turn from vivid to subtle and the change represents a kind of crippling, fleeting beauty. There's a peace in the staleness of the dead air that's relaxing and comforting. You can listen to somber music and it's perfectly acceptable to feel a little sorry for yourself; it's the season, you can say.

The fall brings out a stark contrast between it and the summer, and I dislike the summer quite a bit. I mean I enjoy the longer days and the lack of expected responsibilty. I like jumping into a pool and staying there until I turn into a raisin, but I just hate being hot in general. I'd much rather wear some jeans, a sweater and a coat, and enjoy the kind of comfort you can't feel by merely taking clothes off in the summer. You can only take off so many items of clothing before you're naked and still unpleasant. But in the fall--and winter as well--when you're cold you put on a beanie and a jacket and your body is at ease.

It's soothing to be warm and content, which is why I'm waiting for the day I can wallow in my melancholic self-reflection outside in a big, comfy jacket.

TEST 2

So I was walking down the street and a dog came up and it said “Hey you piece of shit, I just pooped. Pick it up.”

“Eat shit and die, you bastard,” I retorted to the talking dog.

“Oh no you didn’t. I’ll fuck yo’ ass up, bitch.”

“Bitch? I’m not the one whose a DOG!” Zing!

The Peculiar Neurodegenerative Inhabitants of the Kazawa Atoll

1. I haven’t seen Royal Tenenbaums in a couple years and I watched it again today. I forgot how good it was. Wes Anderson is one hell of a filmmaker and can write an amusing mix of dry humor and deeper (existential?) insight. And whoever helps pick the music for his films kicks ass too: Nick Drake, Vince Guaraldi, Van Morrison, Elliott Smith, etc. Lastly, Gweneth Paltrow is freakishly beautiful in the movie. And here are some noteworthy quotes from the movie:

• “I’ve always been considered an asshole for about as long as I can remember, but that’s just kind of my style.” “I don't think you're an asshole, Royal. I just think you're kind of a son of a bitch.”

• “Let’s shag ass.”

• “I’m very sorry for your loss, your mother was a terribly attractive woman.” [Royal talking to Uzi and Ari about their recently deceased mother.]

• “I’ll talk some jive like you’ve never heard.” It’s important to note that when I first watched this in the theaters I almost crapped myself during this scene.

2. There should only be one “World’s Best Grandpa” or any other “World’s Best…” shirt in circulation, for obvious reasons.

3. It irritates me to see girls sit in the middle of truck cabins just to be closer to their boyfriends. And perhaps I’m just a little jaded about obvious outward expression of affection, but it just seems so pointless. At the least it’s annoying for the driver. Being unnecessarily crammed up against your loser of a boyfriend, making it difficult for him to drive is ridiculous when there is a perfectly good seat to the right that will seat your insecure, hyperaffectionate ass. Affection, like all other good things, is best when done in moderation. So that ten minute drive from the gas station to Burger King will not solidify your relationship or make it any better because you touch his leg while he’s driving. So to all you lame girls who do this: ride in the passenger's seat; don’t ride bitch (which is aptly named).

4. Listen up uncool people, have I got some good news for you! I’ve noticed some really cool people this week and have picked up on their speech habits. Do/say these things and in no time you will be much cooler:

• Call CDs “albums”.

• Refer to movies as “films”.

• Songs are no longer songs; they are “tracks” or “cuts”.

• Wear sunglasses where it is highly impractical to do so.

Late night nostalgia.

The almost forgotten half-empty bottle of cologne slipped out of his hands as he watched it crash onto the bathroom floor, flooding the tile cracks with aromatic memories from his not too distant past. It was frightening how one smell of that cologne conjured up all the emotions tied to her—not of the whole duration of the relationship—but of a very specific time early on, when things were innocuous and optimistic and full of potential.

*

He sat down on her wicker footstool and looked up with his eyes while keeping his head down. His arms were wrapped snugly around his knees. The yellow reflection of the bathroom lights bounced off the mirrors and the tinged white walls glowed with a fleeting evanescence that crept away moments later. The strands of long hair that flowed beautifully in front of him were surveyed in detail to take notice of every shapely golden contour. He reached out and rested his hand on her hip. Her head swiveled back towards him as she released a lingering smile and then calmly continued brushing her hair as if he was only there in spirit. “You smell good,” she said, directed towards his reflection. Rising to his feet and wrapping his right arm around her waist, he admired her profile in the side mirror to her left and noticed her blue eyes were especially poignant at that moment. There was a comfortable silence and an unspoken communion between the two as they watched each other through their reflections. “Ready?” she asked. And with a simple nod of his head they swayed out of the room hand in hand. The lights went dark, and the memory fades.

More.

1. I hope you like my new header. Actually, I don't hope you like it, you just better like it. Because it's sweet. And it's colorful, and colorful pictures are always sweet. But seriously, I took this picture last night and was pretty amazed how awesome the the colors turned out. I'm not the kind of guy to pat myself on the back, but I am giving some serious self-pat action for this picture. Why? Because it's sweet. And colorful.

2. I know just enough html code--which is almost nothing--to figure out how to put in my header and take out the old one.

Thursday Morning Ramblings

1. It's been a while since I've practiced Catholicism, and I've been noticing my guilt for things typically shunned by the Church has been dwindling to nonexistence. I mean I haven't killed anyone or done anything horrid, but it's been the cussing and drinking offences, my disregard for traditional dating practices, and my utter apathy about practicing Catholicism that has me not caring much about dealing with my conscience, or lack thereof. Those things, when they occurred when I was a practicing Catholic, would give me the gutwrenching feeling of moral guilt and I'd willingly lead myself to the confessional for some soul cleansing. Now, however, I'll do the sinful deed and feel little to no remorse for it. In both situations (practicing and non-practicing) I was/am perfectly aware of what is considered moral or immoral but in the latter the consequences of immorality don't ring true as important, or even valid. This dichotomy between the morality of me as a practicing Catholic and that of a non-practicing one deals with the same moral relativity that I always adamantly tried to argue against. Moral absolutism seemed such an obvious point to argue in favor of when I had religion to back me up, but now that the religious presence isn't so much a factor things don't seem so black and white.

2. I've woken up the past few nights at 3:00am or so and eaten a couple spoonfuls of peanut butter because I can't find anything else that's sweet. So I'll drink some milk to satiate the PB, and then I wake up at 10:00 with the horrible taste of lingering peanut butter and old milk in my mouth. It's pretty gross.

3. I know a guy that's super annoying. I think we all know a variation of this guy; he's one of those people that come into your life to make you value your real friends just a little bit more. He's relentlessly obnoxious and talks merely for the sake of talking and rarely has anything remotely important to say. Anyway, today he came up to me and said "Damn, Joe* is fucking annoying, man. He won't shut up!" I agreed and smiled at the irony of the situation, both surprised and interested in why he thought Joe was annoying. I would assume that someone as annoying at The Guy would find someone who is the opposite of himself to be annoying. I guess he isn’t aware of his annoyingness, which is interesting. And sad.

*Joe's name was changed to maintain his anonymity to the three people that read this.

4. Carson Daly is so unfunny it’s painful. But he did have a ridiculously hot Brit girl who has been in some really crappy movies, Claire Forlani, on his pathetic show tonight. So it was cool to filter out Daly’s voice and enjoy her hot British accent. And there was also some horrible band on. Do not listen to The Bravery. They suck.

5. I added my flickr account to the right of the screen.

6. I wore my newfound pants to work today and they rocked.

Hunt for the Missing Pants Update

9.21.05
Status: Missing pants found at the bottom of my hamper. Such a relief, and such a shame I didn't check in the most obvious place.

PantsWatch '05

9.20.05
Status of missing work pants: still missing. I'm perplexed.

My head: the last four days.

1. I tried looking up the medical diagnosis of the little white balls of chunky mini-vomit by googling "white balls throat" and didn't find anything conclusive; just some info on tonsilitis, some gay porn and a few people asking "what the fuck are these nasty things in my throat?" One guy said they were "tonsil crypts", and an ex-girlfriend told me you get them when you drink beer. But I just think she was trying to get me to stop drinking. It didn't work.

2. I've gotten a couple job offers and the reality of the situation is a little frightening. I'm comforted by a sense of reassuring complacency while living in town; my entire existence here is my safety net. I have a place to live, great friends, decent job, my family, lots of places to stay if I have too many beers on a Saturday night. There's no real urgency. If I fail at something here in my hometown I have my net to catch me, but as soon as I leave I'll be in a new, huge city by myself working to pay for stuff I already have taken care of here, trying to make it as a rockstar with a philosophy background and a crappy job. If I fail there, however, I'll splatter on the ground with my blood, guts, and pride oozing on Sepulveda Boulevard because I have no net. But I guess that's what it means to be an adult.........right?

3. There's more but I'm tired. I'll write tomorrow.

Rotting Donkey Carcass

1. So it has come to my attention by the lovely Alison that I have broken my solemn vow of blogging daily. It was just a little overly ambitious and even a bit quixotic. So here's my reworked solemn vow: I will write when I feel like it, which seems to be a couple times a week. That's right, no absolute consistency; utterly impulsive.

2. I can't find my work pants. Why is that a problem? BECAUSE THEY'RE MY PANTS. Where else would they be other than in my house? I don't go around sleeping in other people's houses and forgetfully leave my work pants on their driveway. I've checked everywhere and it seems that they're M.I.A. That's a bit disconcerting. Even worse, I'm now stuck with having to wear sub-par pants to work, which is horrible. If I'm going to be somewhere I don't want to be for over eight hours dealing with assholes and buttfaces, I at least want the lower half of my body to be comfortable.

3. I want to find out exactly what those nasty, rancid, vomit-inducing little white chunks of barf that get stuck in the back of your throat are. They make me uneasy.

4. In a relationship/friendship, how long does it take to shorten that person's name and comfortably call them by it? i.e., Megan->Meg, Conlan->Con, Leslie->Les, Ryan->Ry, etc.? Does it just happen? Or does there have to be a minimum time frame or does it revolve around how much personal information has been shared between the two? Interesting.

More Misanthropic Musings

1. I think I'm going to call in drunk today. I'm not drunk, but if I stayed home instead of going to work I'd make sure I would be.

2. If I ring something out for a customer and that particular item is not in the system and that customer replies with "Oh well it must be free today! Hahaha!" and then stand there smugly thinking he/she came up with something clever and original, I will punch that person in the face. I hear that stupid shit every day and it makes me sick.

3. The new Death Cab for Cutie is really good. A more critical review will follow soon.

4. My thoughts exactly, Roscoe.

I told you this wasn't going to be important.

1. I ID’d a woman whose last name was Looza today at work. I chuckled to myself. I could just hear Adam Sandler taunting her: “Hey there Mrs. Looza. Is that your Looza husband? I think I can see your Looza kids over there. Look at you guys! Your family is a bunch of Loozas!”

2. Jamie Cullum: “I’m an expert on Shakespeare and that’s a hell of a lot, but the world don’t need scholars as much as I thought.” –Twentysomething

3. Kanye West: laughable and hilarious, at best. Ridiculous and not well-spoken, on the other side of the spectrum. Kanye looks like an pouty, angry and nervous eight year-old, forced to give a speech in front of his 2nd grade class that he was practicing all night at his grandma's house the night before. Mike Meyers looks like he's about to vomit, and after he finishes the teleprompted message of "...the destruction of the spirit of the people of Southern Louisiana and Mississippi may end up being the most tragic loss of all," Kanye chimes in with his Peter Griffin-like brilliance in perfect monotone, "George Bush doesn't care about black people." At first I only read what was said, and was initially confused that he would actually say that on live TV. But after I actually saw the clip I was laughing, a lot. The whole exchange was just too damn cartoonish for it to be real. But lo and behold, both Kanye and his unbridled eloquence were for real.

And on a lesser note, his new CD is halfway decent but he needs to write a song that doesn’t use a sample for God’s sake. I do jam out to “Touch the Sky” in my car but I only have the CD because of Jon Brion’s co-production, like Conlan.

4. This makes me laugh.



5. I have a really difficult time finding sunglasses that fit my head properly. This is either because a) my head is malformed, b) specifically, my ears are not aligned with each other, c) I’m too cheap to buy expensive glasses that could possibly fit my head because they’re designed to do so, or d) the only glasses that would fit my head are ugly, so I don’t buy them. My last pair were a little cockeyed but I liked the design, so I just tilted my head at times to counteract the unevenness.

I graduated from college and all I got was this lousy handshake.

So there I was, a wide-eyed and eager twenty year old fresh out of a three year academic black hole at a junior college, deciding what to finally major in.

Architecture? Been there.
Music? Just got out of it.

I like to read and love to think. I'm halfway decent at writing and can prove my arguments--whatever they may be--reasonably well. I think history is interesting. So I put the pieces together, then a dim light bulb appeared over my noodle and "philosophy" came to mind. It seemed like a good choice since it fit my rational disposition and gave me an excuse to not pursue a real degree. I heard about philosophy classes being open to intelligent conversation and rational debate, and that they were taught by brilliant hippie Berekely grads who wore flip-flops to class and encouraged free thinking. I heard it didn't matter how ridiculous your argument was but how well you proved it.

So I enrolled in the Fresno State philosophy program with an emphasis in Religious Studies and convinced myself this would be a good thing.

*

Two years later I'm sitting on a wooden barstool at my parents' kitchen counter, sending resumes to any employer whose job description includes "good personality" and "go-getter". As much as I enjoyed analyzing The Critique of Pure Reason and discussing Aristotle's Ethics, I am now realizing Kant can't get me a damn job, contrary to all the people who consoled me by saying "well at least it's a degree, that's all that people really look for." Bullshit. Employers do in fact look for people with degrees, but degrees with specific skill sets and particular academic background. Do I like design and am I good at it? Yes I do and yes I am, but I don't have the piece of paper to prove it. Of course I thought about this prior to my enrollment of the philosophy program but I was eased by the romantic idea of an impractical degree finding me a lucrative, practical job.

I'm employable, but in the broad sense of the word. I have good people skills, I can write well, I'm organized, I haven't murdered anyone, blah blah, etc., but that pretty much only leaves room for jobs as a receptionist, customer service rep, or a retail push-button monkey. I've already worked at a retail store for two years and I'm not about to go much longer working in that terrifying hell; my perspective on humanity is already bleak enough as it is, I don't need another five years of misanthropic cynicism to bog me down.

So I suppose this post has come to the point of this: If you're an employer in Los Angeles and have a job opening for a creative, smart, sarcastic misanthrope with an astute knowledge of modern philosophy, call me. We'll talk.

My solemn vow..

I will write one post a day. I don't guarantee it to be good, funny, relevant, clever, interesting, important, or even readable, but it will be words on the screen.

Gas

I'm sadly aware that I am getting a gallon and a half of gas for five bucks, when back in the day--by which I mean earlier this year--the quick five dollar gas break could at least hold me over for a day and a half, maybe even two. Now that same five dollars will barely get me enough gas to go home and review my checking account to see how much money I just wasted by going home.

But the only thing more ridiculous than the hourly-inflating gas prices are the daily news reports of how ridiculous the gas prices are. I know how much I have to spend on gas and I'm not happy about it, but I don't need some toothless hillbilly from Madera screaming "I just can't believe how bad these prices are. I can't afford to do anything," as he struggles to pump gas because the camera crew is shoving a microphone in his face. And these pointless interviews are daily. Without fail, every time I've watched the news for the past three weeks there has been a rookie news reporter interviewing some poor schmuck at the gas pump, asking him his feelings on the increasing gas prices, as if his opinion meant anything. But everyone's opinion is the same: high gas prices are shitty. Nobody is going to say "High gas prices? I'M FOR 'EM."

So if I ever get asked about my feelings on high gas prices on television I'll just eff with them and respond with Mitch-like execution "I HAVE ALWAYS THOUGHT THAT KOALA BEARS ARE INCREDIBLY CUTE," finish pumping my gas, and drive away happily knowing that, like everyone else, my opinion on the matter doesn't mean shit.