Category Archives: life

For when I get philosophical about my apartment, job, boyfriend, etc. Big picture stuff.

humor, life

I’m talkin’ ’bout zobos here, people

i'm gonna go with 'probably'

I’ve been writing a zombie novel for the last… year or so.  Although I haven’t done any writing for it in at least half a year.  Regardless, I need to get back on that, because I love to write, and zombies are just a great subject.  How much time have my friends and I spent chatting about what we would do in case of a zombie apocalypse?

The plan is roughly this: weapons, allies, supplies, in that order.

Weapons
We go to Sport Chalet, and pick up some aluminum bats.  They’re an ideal weapon because they’re light, fairly compact, they never wear out, they never run out of ammo, and they require very little upkeep (rust would be an issue eventually).  We also need to pick up some paintball masks to guard our mouths and eyes from any splattering zombie heads (which would be pretty excessive, what with the bats).  Plus, masks are fucking scary, and if we want to intimidate another group of people, masks can only help.  They would also lend to the group a sense of uniformity and solidarity; both essential when shit gets hairy because during a big fight, we have to be able to distinguish living from undead, and we have to watch each other’s backs.
Personally, I’d love to get my hands on a samurai sword, since they’re sharp as shit and my arms would get tired (and then ripped) after swinging that bat all over.  They’re so efficient; you don’t need a huge wind-up to get the job done (although if the dismembered head could still bite, this could prove to be a problem in the future.  Best to eliminate the problem entirely by smashing the head into oblivion).

Allies
Find your crew and stick together.  Being a loner is good for the sake of simplicity, but it makes sleeping, bathing, urinating, and pretty much everything else you do without your friend Aluminum Bat in your hands hazardous.  Someone has to be there to yell, “Watch out!” when that zobo you thought you took care of comes crawling out from under a car.  And people need to interact with each other.  It keeps the mind alert and relaxed in (what I would imagine) would otherwise be a mind-numbing, frantically stressful existence.

Supplies
When I say supplies, I mean basic stuff like rations, toiletries and clothing.  This stuff is last because with enough armed allies, you can take whatever you want from whomever you want.  The zombie apocalypse will be a war zone.  Survival is priority one.  Brutal, but true.

I’ve got zobos on the brain because I just watched Zombieland with some friends, and omg that shit was hilarious.  So much better than I thought it would be.  The kid with the rules?  Awesome.  My personal favorite?  The double-tap.  That’s just good policy.  I’m on board with that.

I’ve been writing a zombie novel for the last… year or so.  Although I haven’t done any writing for it in at least half a year.  Regardless, I need to get back on that, because I love to write, and zombies are just a great subject.  How much time have my friends and I spent chatting about what we would do in case of a zombie apocalypse?  The plan is generally this: weapons, allies, supplies, in that order.Weapons
We go to Sport Chalet, and pick up some aluminum bats.  They’re an ideal weapon because they’re light, fairly compact, they never wear out, they never run out of ammo, they require very little upkeep (rust would be an issue eventually).  We also need to pick up some paintball masks to guard our mouths and eyes from any splattering zombie heads (which would be pretty excessive, what with the bats).  Plus, masks are fucking scary, and if we want to intimidate another group of people, masks can only help.  They would also lend to the group a sense of uniformity and solidarity; both essential when shit gets hairy because during a big fight, we have to be able to distinguish living from undead, and we have to watch eachother’s backs.
Personally, I’d love to get my hands on a samurai sword, since they’re sharp as shit and my arms would get tired (and then ripped) after swinging that bat all over.  They’re so efficient; you don’t need a huge wind-up to get the job done (although if the dismembered head could still bite, this could prove to be a problem in the future.  Best to eliminate the problem entirely by smashing the head into oblivion).

Allies
Find your crew and stick together.  Being a loner is good for the sake of simplicity, but it makes sleeping, bathing, urinating, and pretty much everything else you do without your friend Aluminum Bat in your hands hazardous.  Soemone has to be there to yell, “Watch out!” when that zobo you thought you took care of comes crawling out from under a car.  And people need to interact with eachother.  It keeps the mind alert and relaxed in (what I would imagine) would otherwise be a mind-numbing, frantically stressful existence.

Supplies
When I say supplies, I mean basic stuff like rations, toiletries and clothing.  This stuff is last because with enough armed allies, you can take whatever you want from whomever you want.  The zombie apocalpyse will be a war zone.  Survival is priority one.  Brutal, but true.

I’ve got zobos on the brain because I just watched Zombieland with some friends, and omg that shit was hilarious.  The kid with the rules?  Awesome.  My personal favorite?  The double-tap.  That’s just good policy.  I’m on board with that.

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badness, life

Losing my mind

I’m occasionally attacked by giant, imaginary bugs.

At first I thought it was a recurring nightmare.  Then I thought it was a night terror, but I have vivid memories of them every time.
I’m also usually awake.  Which makes them hallucinations.  Right?
I’ve experienced this about… no more than 8 times I guess.  The first time was more than a year ago, and I can’t remember when the last time was.

because neon chairs exist, and neon bugs don't

Here’s how it goes, every time: I’m lying in bed on my back.  I’ve been asleep at least a couple hours.  I look up at the ceiling, and there’s a huge, spindly bug with black and neon coloring (red, yellow, or green) descending slowly toward me.  It’s not more conscious than other bugs, but its intent is to land on me and do something (I’m not sure what, I just don’t want this thing landing on my fucking face, which is exactly where it’s always heading).
The first few times I saw one, I just hid under the blanket, terrified.  After a minute of cowering, I would venture a glance and it would be gone.  Or I would wake up Boyfriend and frantically ask if there was a bug.  Of course, there wasn’t.
My first encounter with these, I saw about three in a month, maybe more.  Those were the most terrifying.  All I could do was hide and pray each one would go away.
Later, as I got frustrated by my terror and hiding like a baby, I tried swatting at them.  This didn’t actually produce any change; they were always out of reach, even if I waited a second or two for them to get closer (which I only remember doing once, because who the fuck would  let this thing get any closer than it already was?).  It was getting closer, just never within reach somehow.  After the futile swatting, the hiding commences.
Naturally, all this thrashing would scare the shit out of Boyfriend who would wake up expecting me to be on fire.
That brings us to another part of this: Boyfriend.  He’s always there when this happens.  This has never happened without him sleeping next to me.  He knows now to immediately comfort me and tell me there are no bugs, they’re not real, it was just a dream.
I have no idea what causes these hallucinations.  I wasn’t taking any drugs, not even birth control at the time.  And why bugs?  I don’t have any phobias… at all.  I mean, no one likes bugs, but not everyone has hallucinations about them, so… wtf?
I’m gonna have to draw one at some point, if I can.  They don’t make any noise, so I don’t know how I know when one’s there, nor how they move so slowly through the air (no batting wings, no threads).  They just drift, and that’s part of what makes them so scary.

honestly, this picture is just about life size

Edit: Aaaaaand of course, what’s spinning its invisible threads just above the surface of my bathroom sink this morning?  A HUGE fucking daddy long legs.  Literally the largest I’ve ever seen.  Its legs hit the wall at least two inches apart.  That fucker was enormous.

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life

Vacation, visitation, fried egg station

the runny yolk is essential

I have… (wait lemme count)… ten days off starting tomorrow (well, starting right now). Ten days, four of which will be spent traveling to/from or visiting the east coast. Boyfriend will be here for the last day, so that leaves me with roughly five days all to myself to do family functions and do my own thing (whatever that is).

So here’s the plan:
-Wake up as late as possible- not to be super lazy (but that’s good too), but to increase the sleep factor.
-Eat a delicious breakfast- cereal is ok, but I wanna try stuff I usually don’t have time for; a fried egg sammich comes to mind.
-Play computer/video games- I recently noticed that we have Shadow of the Colossus lying around, and I loved the way it looked when I watched a friend play it, so I’ll give it a shot. Plus, I’m gonna break down and buy the WoW Cataclysm expansion. I mean, they’ve changed EVERYTHING, how can I not experience it? Say your farewells now, loved ones (none of whom even know I have a blog). I’ve also been conquering the advanced maps on Portal (so good!). I’m good at this game, people. And it makes me proud.
-Clean up apartment- yikes, THIS needs to get done tout de suite. Mostly my carpet needs a solid vacuuming (and not with our tiny little PoS vacuum, I’m talking a real vacuum, the kind that weights as much as a small elephant and sounds like a B-52 taking off), and High School Friend Roommate needs to do her dishes (I haven’t complained once, she knows it’s an issue, I trust her, she’s cool, STOP LOOKING AT OUR KITCHEN LIKE THAT I’LL TAKE CARE OF IT).
-Ride my bike- I love my bike, and I never get to ride it because both jobs are so far away now (downtown and South Bay respectively). Plus, I need to get my ass in shape. Literally, my butt is soft, gotta fix that shit. And the weather’s clearing up tomorrow after five straight days of rain (torrential downpour while on the freeway today. NOT CUTE).
-Read a book- I’d like to finish Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. It’s the last in the trilogy, and I want to be able to say, like a good nerd, “Yeah, I’ve read the books. They’re wordy but beautiful.” And they have been, so far, so I’m looking forward to finishing this giant fucking book that’s been sitting in my car for months now.
-Do some sketching- I need to do something creative. I got a Moleskine notebook for just that purpose, so I’m gonna try to find a few things to sketch to improve my ability to accurately put stuff down on paper. I’d also like to learn how to paint at some point. One step at a time.

Sister and I are supposed to bake cookies this Friday too, so that’ll take up the whole day. Now that I look at it, this is a lot to get done in the, like, three free days I’m actually getting out of the break.But as long as I’m relaxing, or doing holiday plans, I’m happy. I need to be content with whiling the days away. I’m good at relaxing once I get home, but I have trouble feeling good about spending a whole day doing nothing but sleeping, eating, watching anime, playing games, etc. I don’t consider myself a very hard worker, but i definitely feel guilty when I make no progress where progress could be made. I need to give myself a break now and then.

And I’m really looking forward to surprising Boyfriend on the east coast. Have I mentioned that lately? He’s totally clueless, it’s AWESOME. Can’t wait to see his friends (very cool guys), can’t wait to make him smile. This is gonna make him so happy.

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goodness, life

Endless vocabulary

James Murray of the OED

April 2, 2010: I posted this on Facebook, and quickly realized that if I was going to be this hilarious and brutally clever, I needed what any self-respecting college graduate working 12-hour days needs: a blog.

English is an amazing language. With over half a million words, it’s the largest, and best-known language on the planet, and it’s still growing. But there isn’t a word for everything.

Non Sequitur
I was watching some reality TV the other day (the hair cutting one), which mostly consists of a bunch of hair stylists being super friendly one minute, then brutally snappy the next. A couple of them were having a pointless argument which I was mindlessly enjoying when I realized that one of them was using nothing but non sequiturs to win the argument. And it was working. It went something like this:

x-You don’t know how to do a pixie cut.
o-Where did you learn to cut hair?
x-New Jersey.
o-I bet it was ghetto.
x-Your pixie cut looks like crap.
o-Your pants look like crap.

I’ve had conversations like this; they make me crazy, and I’m not ashamed to say that the last time this happened (philosophy class at USC), I snapped. I ended up completely abandoning our discussion to berate this guy on derailing the conversation just to gain the illusion of victory. I remember saying things like, “Stick to the topic, or stop talking,” and “I feel like we’re having two different conversations, and yours is dumb.”

Why isn’t there a word for this person? The English language has a word for just about everything, so why not someone who depends solely upon non sequiturs to win a discussion?

Instead of making up a whole new word, I propose that this word already exists; all we need to do is modify the definition to include those brainless shells of people who choose to free associate their way through conversations.

Derailer
Though currently confined to use within the railway community, derailer is an English word for a device that intentionally takes a runaway railcar off its track. I can think of no better metaphor for people who obliterate coherent discussion with their inconsequential input on a regular basis than a device whose sole purpose is to screw up the forward progress of a strong, useful machine.

Derailer. Use it, people. Use it to shame your family, friends and coworkers into becoming more useful conversationalists, and save them from the vengeful gaze of the ghost of Productive Conversation (yes, it’s dead, you killed it).

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goodness, life, manfolk

The art of the slow-dance

I like slow-dancing, but I hate dancing to love songs. It seems trite, and I don’t like being told what to feel about the person in my arms. But I love to dance to good, slow songs like Norah Jones’ The Long Day is Over. It’s one of my all-time favorite songs.

The Long Day Is Over by Norah Jones

Slow-dancing to a song like this is the physical equivalent to making promises of love; to commit, to watch and listen carefully, to touch tenderly and thoroughly, to choose that dance partner over all others in some way. Bearing in mind that I haven’t slow-danced since high school (Winter Formal 2001!), I find it so easy to make these kind of promises because at my core, I’m just a big softie. I’m a romantic. And it kills me that no one knows this.

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goodness, humor, life

Kids are amazing

So… kids are amazing. This is the best thing I’ve seen all fucking day. Week. Whatever, it’s been a rough fucking month with everything that’s been going on, so I needed a bunch of kids pulling a harmless miracle of a prank on an opposing team to make me smile. And smile I did 🙂

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goodness, humor, life

The relativity of everything

Sometimes as I people-watch, I pretend I’m an alien, and try to imagine how strange the things we do might seem to someone with no experience with humans. In no particular order, here are a few I enjoy feigning ignorance about:

The morning coffee ritual– Sleep inadequate to recharge daily energy levels in adults. Supplement required for productivity.
Children playing pretend– Instantaneous construction of increasingly complex false reality, usually while (mostly) conscious of its falsehood.
Singing– Experimental noises from the human throat meant for entertaining others or oneself. Usually louder and noticeably more tonal than speech.
A crowd at a sporting event– Adults playing pretend; two armies clash with one clear victor. A simple sense of morals, similar to their young.
Young women doing each other’s makeup– Bonding through mutual assistance to increase mating appeal.
Funerals– Collective support through gathering and discussion of deceased with acceptable (often encouraged) demonstrations of a sense of loss (in some cultures).
Dancing– Demonstration of physical ability through study and imitation of traditional movements. Self entertainment, a form of relaxation through solitary or collective physical movement, usually accompanied by music with strong attention to percussive instruments. Demonstration of rhythm (the ability to anticipate the next iteration of a percussive sound) and physical coordination to potential mates. Movement for the sake of movement.
Meditating– Attempt at alternate thought patterns and occasionally the eventual abandonment of the body through total lack of movement, vision, speech and interaction with anything.
Kissing– Physical contact, specifically with the lips, of one or more people to demonstrate romantic, sexual, or familial preference or greeting.
Telling a joke– Attempt to elicit a joyful reaction from others, usually to bond or gain acceptance.

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