INSA's website went live today, thanks to some hints that Mariko was able to glean from the ICS website as to how to map a network drive. I have questions as to why they don't support FTP like everyone else, but whatever... they're free spirits.

Check it out and comment about Mariko's work; I think she's done a great job :)

So busy lately... I'm in the middle of doing some homework for Writing 31, so I'll be breif.

I've been listening to a podcast that I really enjoy... It's called "The Bitter Young Professional". Find it on the iTunes music store, or check it out on podcast.net. Anyone that starts to play a "hardcore indie rock" song, then interrupts it about a minute in with the words "Well, on second thought, the song fuckin' sucks. I hate screaming; it pisses me off pretty much." is awesome in my book. Rock on!

Sonny: Start a podcast!

Highlight of August 28, 2005: Waiting for my new 20 gig ipod to finish syncing...

Thanks to all of you who were thoughtful enough to call/e-mail/comment/change-my-wall; it really meant a lot to me to hear from you guys :)

Sorry to dissapoint, but it looks like the usual coffee with the Deidrich's people (and if I decide to be a good boy, some work on fiction) will probably be all I get up to in celebration of my brithday... But hey, what can ya do?

PS: Lien, I'll get on that shortly.

Birthday tomorrow. 20. No comment.

Hung out with Dana tonight. It's a treat to get to hang out with someone so interesting. Only bad part is that I feel kinda compelled to tell the few stores I have. Problem with that? Some of my stories make her feel uncomfortable; Chris, respect and sympathy.

Just got my new IBM ThinkPad from work. Sweet sweet retro-styled goodness.

Myabe I'll use it as an excuse to post more often... haha :P

Kinda strange though. The FedEx guy just left a $1900 package on the doorstep; apparently no signature was required.

In the face of misfortune, my first reaction was to ask "Why me?"

After nearly two decades, I feel this question needs revision: "Why not me?"

Sonny, thank you. Without your phone call this revelation may have been a long time coming.

Life is strange...

I drank way too much coffee today, but damn was it good.

12 (13 a few minutes ago) days until I turn 20, and I really couldn't care less. At least for me the teenage years entered like an obese depressed lion, and exited like a lonely (but thinner) lamb. I've got a lot to learn, and a lot to live for, but it's no longer age that's holding me back.

I went to Heidi's birthday party yesterday, which was interesting. At first the party was a little depressing; I knew that there was basically no chance of anything like that happening for my birthday -- no offense to my friends, but you have to admit it, there's basically no chance for any wild parties (or really anthing out of the ordinary) for Mitch's 20th -- and I fixated on the fact that Heidi had both the friends and resources to make it happen. After a while, however, the party began winding down and getting downright weird. I saw firsthand what happens when you rely on a rotten framework of old friendships hastily reassembled in the social vacuum of summer break... Sad -- but that's the way life is; at least now I have a little more perspective on my social life.

pear.php.net's online package description and download application somehow manages to list dependancies backwards -- it tells you what packages depend upon another package, but leaves you clueless about which packages it depends on... dammit.

Lack of updates due to a shitty internet connection. Not much I can do, I think the cablemodem is dying... either that or cox has decided to eff with us again.

Class starts tomorrow. Hopefully it'll be cool. *Crosses fingers*

No effin way... no effin way.

Tonight was such a weird night. Went downt to Deidrich's for a cup with the intention to leave to go hang out with Joe and Sonny... Met Geoff, Andrea Langstaff (Dodge was working...), and Cory and one of his highschool friends. We started having a conversation about terrible (as in disgusting/offensive) jokes. I was kinda off, but I did manage to come up with an alternate punchline to one... "What do you call two hundred black people on the bottom of the ocean?" Cory suggested that the 'correct' answer was "a good start." My answer was something along the lines of "an insurance claim." Yeah, I know, it's terrible...

Cory eventually started talking about cars and other manly-man-ish, and, as usual, I felt a little overwhelmed. Testosterone just ins't cool in large quantities. This lasted a good twenty to thirty minutes, before Cory and Co took off to go "drink in Costa Mesa." Yeah, whatever -- not my life, nor one I would choose to live.

Talked a little bit with Andrea Langstaff, which was cool -- she's apparently working on a story titled Bananaria (spelled phonetically -- that's for you Sonny!)... I'll spare you the details because it's still a work in progress, and I'd feel bad stealing her thunder.

I was getting ready to take my leave when David and Brett rolled up. Some crazy shit had happened, and they were a little scared about driving home. I don't blame them, but they essentially trapped me at the coffee house until about 1:30. Idk, we had a good time laughing it up with the Andreas; Dodge was having a bad day, so I hope that we helped to make it a little better in the end.

Oh, and the pastry lady (or fairy, as she prefers to be titled) showed up and offered us free pastries if we hung out at the shop when she showed up next time. To me it sounded like a desperate cry for friends; I can sympathize.

Fake.

Life seems so fake to me; I snuggle in the warmth of old friendships, perhaps exhausting other people's tollerance for me, fully knowing that in a matter of weeks my social reality will fall like an ill-designed house of cards. I miss the foundation. I miss knowing the people around me. I miss the days where we all rode the same bus, to the same school, and attended the same classes. We didn't know how lucky we were in those days. Sure it came at a price, overexposure leads to drama, but in retrospect, maybe the price wasn't so bad?

Sorry for the melancholy, but I just returned from one of the most ungratifying social experiences of my life. Sonny, if you're looking for an end-of-life partner, I'm your man. (Just kidding of course.)

PS: Ryan, I still agree with you that old, lasting friendships are the most valuable, but there's a difference between talking on the phone and sitting down over coffee to talk about life. We need to do that sometime soon, before I lose you to Russia.

I live in a suburban jungle.

Im trapped inside all day for work, and I have to have the windows open for light and air If I value my sanity. Consequently, I've become reasonably attuned to the ambient noise of the street... Man do I hate ambient noise. The neighbor to our south has some kind of tropical bird that spontaneously decides to start immitating a dying child, or pewee herman... for hours. Today one of the neighborhood cats is in heat. Fuck. I need to get the hell out ouf here.

louise only got from me
innocent poetry
i thought she’d play to not listen
still i can hear myself
speak as if no one else ever would know her the same
some say she knowingly
tastes like a recipe
all are so foolish and willing
still i can picture you
bend as if wanting to
bow as the curtain went down

cuddle some men, they’ll remember you bitterly
fuck ’em, they’ll come back for more
i asked my louise, was she leaving so crippled me?
then came a knock at the door

i came for my woman
he came with a razorblade
bound like a song for the ocean
i hope that she’s happy
and blamed for the death of the man who took her from me

some say they saw in me
innocent poetry
some say they’ll never be certain
but still it’s been written
a history of lovers
in given and taken ink

cuddle some men, they’ll remember you fittingly
cut ’em, they’ll come back for more
i ask my louise, would she leave then so crippled me?
then came a knock at the door

louise came to rescue me
missing the irony
blood made her heart change its beating
i hope that she’s happy
unblamed for the death of the man she found better than me

History of Lovers, Iron and Wine (And Calexico?)

Very interesting song when you take the acoustics and musical tone into account... Maybe they really are all around us.

This room sucks. It's finally cool enough to work if the windows are open, but now the sun's going down and I can barely make out the screen over the glare; fuck that.

Weird fucking weekend. Depressingly uneventful -- well not uneventful, but one big social misfire.

Brett -- you're a douchebag. Mister "Phantom Bonfire"... Whatever, it's cool.

Pooja -- maybe I am an asshole for playing along, but, as far as event planning goes, you're close to 1 for 5.

Mike -- you don't read this, but thanks for understanding where I'm coming from.

Sonny -- street scene... fucker.

Probably going to Deidrich's later on tonight... lick my wounds.

Hung out at Deidrich's alone for a while. That's really really drepressing. To make things worse, I saw a cute new (at least to me) barista (perhaps Langstaff's replacement?) on bar tonight. She smiled at me, and I did my best to smile back (kinda hard when you know you're going outside to sit and contemplate how alone you are) and all seemed well. As I was sitting outside, she came out and started talking to a few of the regulars. That's when her boyfriend showed up. Man, it hurts to see people laughing, talking and having a flirtatiously good time while you're sitting there staring into a cup of coffee wondering if it would be better if the world just ended all of a sudden. I went to my car to grab something, and as I walked, she kinda appeared out of nowhere heading in the opposite direction. We made eye contact, and after such a display, I couldn't help feel akward; we both managed one of those (or at least what I interperet as one of those) "perhaps we'll meet later, on better terms", hi's. Whatev.

Brett showed up and we talked a little bit. Mostly we talked about how helpless we felt when alone, and how horribly dependant we were on other people. that's more than a little sad, but it's just something you're going to have to come to terms with... Then we started talking about David and his latest batch of drama. Won't get into details here, but wow, that guy; he dosn't do it to himself, but it's like life has it out for him.

Finally Pooja texted me, and I shiped off to a 'random house party' just north of UCI. It was fun -- a little frat boi for me, what with the host running around topless and in board shorts while challenging as many women as possible to beer pong -- but it turned out alright. Molly and her friend (her name is pronounced: K.*leen [retrospective: Kaylen] but fuck me, I can't remember the the middle.) I got to talk to them a little more, and I think they're starting to warm up to me just a tad -- as friends. Or maybe it was just the alcohol. eff.

Left the party early with intent to go hookah with Mike, but he didn't pick up his phone so they ended up leaving. They were a little lost on the way out, so I whipped out the thomas guide and got them to culver safely. Glad to be of service.

Called up Brett -- who was supposedly going to a party with John and David -- but he was more or less headed home, so I met up with David at Earls. We had coffee and an early breakfast while talking about life. I must say that I'm proud of that guy. He's been through a lot of shit, but I think he's finally figured out a way to stay above the stress. I could just see it in his eyes... I've put a lot of effort into trying to help David out, and it's just gratifying to see him begin to spread his newfound adult wings... I'm not sure whether to thank him, or congratulate him, so: Thank's man, you deserve it.

Oh god -- some of the INSA officers are apparently suffering from douchebag-syndrome... their (narrow) vision of what INSA should be just isn't compatable with a few of my allies.

Let's play deluge the listserv with lots of useless, unimaginative responses...

19:00: + Akwardly foreign, or at least foreign sounding.

19:11: + Confusingly contradictory and muddled.

Deadlines are coming in hard and fast... INSA's getting ready to launch the static page, and I've still got to hunt down and kill the morons that are running the spirit servers, because my logins don't work anymore. Whatever, the prototype that's going up tomorrow isn't really designed for linking to (at least not yet), so I'll probably stash it on my server for the time being, just to let people observe it. EventRobot's heating up too -- we've got the PCD project running full steam ahead, and there's a lot of work to be done. At least it's somewhat interesting, even if Mambo's shitty code makes it a pain sometimes.

Not sure what's going down tonight. I should go running, but I'm so tired after last night's failed attempt at sleep that I'm afraid I won't make it. I should also wash and clean out my car... Regardless of that ish, I'll probably end up getting coffee at Deidrich's and trying to glean some tidbits out of "Beginning PHP 5 and MySQL"

Sonny just text-messaged me from street scene, asking me to come down for tomorrow's show. Unfortunately that's not going to happen -- I've got a meeting, deadlines, and lack the $50 at the moment. I need to get paid.

Been having trouble sleeping (obviously, noting the time of this entry) and it's starting to take a toll on me...

Do get to catch a lot of late night movies though, AMC's my 2-6am savior... Tonight it was Hell and High Water. A scif-fi/action movie with a submarine. Novelties include cool (for the 50's -- but admirable and better than some films today) special effects, nuclear weapons, and a woman on board to break up the roudy bunch of guys that normally populate such movies. Plot's weak as hell though, so be warned; this one is for the fun of it only.