no one ever told me.

funny...i have no idea why i'm thinking that line, "no one ever told me"...but i felt like it would make a good title. let's see what comes out.

you ever look back and wonder what you'd do differently "had you known better?" i still remember the first time i realized my mom had lied to me. dumb, but it was about magnets. i was asking her why you could magnetize a paperclip by rubbing it with a real magnet...and i was still at that age where "mom and dad know everything" and i didn't realize at the time that she was struggling to answer me. in the end, she finally convinced me (at my suggestion) that by rubbing the paperclip in one direction you were kind of "pushing" these little magnetic particles or something magical off the magnet and they were deposited on the paperclip and voila, magnetism.

later, when i learned what was going on inside the wonderful world of ferro-magnetics...i was a little dumbfounded. initially i think (i'm struggling a little to remember exactly the chain of feelings) i was offended that my mom wouldn't just tell me the truth that she wasn't sure. what i do remember is that in the end i was, for lack of a better word, amused and interested. it opened up a whole new world for me to understand, simply, that mom and dad don't know it all. that i don't always need them to accomplish or learn something.

and, moreso (perhaps unfortunately) that i don't have to trust everything i hear from mom, dad, or anyone else for that matter. and, to the disgust of everyone on earth, now i don't trust anyone it seems :)

i just deleted a lot trying to figure out what i'm trying to say...that's rare.

i dunno...being a skeptic is interesting. on so many levels i can't even pick an avenue to describe it. being with tammy (hey tam look away! i'm going to talk about you!!! ;) HAS made me realize more about myself than anyone in my life...family exempt. ironically, the reason is because i'm so comfortable with her that i'm not afraid to ask about things i don't quite understand or *cringe* agree with. looking back i don't think that's really ironic. i'm sure you could've seen that coming. i could never be a journalist. i just like the word ironic, damnit.

oh god, i'm...fuck...what's her name. alaniss morisette! fuck!

back to my point. some people applaud me for questioning the world around me, some laugh, some thrash, some go *thhhhbbbppptttttttt* (stick your tongue out, close your lips around it, and BLOW). non of this "plllltttt" bullshit. who the fuck ever thought that was the otomotopia for that sound? sidenote, i once bet my mom either $5 or $20 that i would remember otomotopia, alliteration, and personification for the rest of my life. definitions. spelling was never part of the deal ;)

i stuck a pin through a cockroach (we call 'em "two inchers") a few minutes ago and i'm watching the poor thing squirm.

eeeeiiiither way. tam, i hope you knew i was joking about you not reading up there. to continue, i learn different things from different kind of people. and in the end, i want to learn something from a conversation. if you don't, what's the point? i imagine i could get a lot of shit for asking that question, but i think there're people out there who'll agree. many, actually. the thing people don't always realize is that sometimes it's not just the topic of conversation that you're learning something about. heh, i remember giving my first x-girlfriend this big schpiel about how her body language never agreed with her words (this was in a letter, of course...)...and it's things like that that you can learn BEYOND the conversation. she liked poetry and liked quoting things that advocated "loving recklessly" and that "love is blind"....convenient, no? enough about the x.

as i was saying, it's not always the topic of conversation you learn things about. i think what i'm most interested in is train of thought. how people arrive at certain beliefs or ideas. how this blog as gone so fuckin' far off the map. mosters be lurking here! or something....*awkward pause*

to attempt to tie this whole thing up in a nice bundle...after 23 years, i still don't understand my mom's train of thought. she ROUTINELY surprises me with the kinds of comments she makes, and i can't figure out where she gets them. i figure looking at anyone under a microscope (nonstop for 23 years) would produce the same confusion, though. hell, looking at myself for the past 23 years (and reading through my writings in those years)...dude. WHAT the FUCK. as much as i question the world around me, i question myself 10 TIMES as much. i could've said a billion times as much and it woudl've meant the same thing...'cause it doesn't really mean anything, in the end.

i'm a raging skeptic.

i question everything.

i just hear myself talk more than you.

who's on first?


the roach stopped fighting.

back

took a vacation from vacation (hah) and went to cali from last thursday to this past wednesday to visit lewis (bro) in huntington beach. it's about an hour south of LA...a town pretty much built around a beach break, haha. so weird. the entire place is populated by mostly surfers and their girlfriends. charmed life.

short story, went to hurricane harbor and magic mountain straight from the airport (redeye flight) and rode our last rollercoaster at like...10:15 (park closes at 10). such a sweet time. goliath is HUGE. and so much fun. i hadn't ridden a rollercoaster in a really long time, we had a blast.

theeeen....surf, surf, surf...surf movies, eat, drink, surf. that was pretty much my weekend. paddled out into 10 ft. windchopped storm surf about 3 hours before i was supposed to be on a plane. and by 10 ft. i mean 10 ft. FACES, not hawaiian scale. either way, imagine a wall of water the size of a house rolling towards you. um...yeah i was a little scared. i caught two waves, decided i should try not to kill myself, and paddled in. i just had to do it : ) there was one other guy out when i went out, and two who followed me...i guess that shoulda' told me what to expect.

all in all, sweet times. my life is much brighter :)

more later

league finals tonight

peace

you know you have a rat problem

you know you have a rat problem when the rats make a nest out of empty rat poison packages.

amusing

the panopticon?

http://www.boingboing.net/2005/08/08/photopool_the_panopt.html

fishing.

i just realized...i think i'm on california time. how convenient. cali here i come! (tomorrow night)

*yawn*

oldschool

so i'm lookin' through old shit cleaning out bookcases and such and find this class journal from...3rd grade? i dunno. i was 8, here it is, letter for letter:

****
spelling L6 unit 1 review. write a story using 12 spelling words from leason 1 to 5. Underline the spelling words in your story. Write a titel for your story.

10-16-90


The snake the bird and the pipe

Once a snake and a bird found a pipe. They were curious about it. There was a note on it. It said made in the U.S.. They went home. The next day, they went back and they brought a tray full of hay to plug up the pipe just incase something comes out. As they were puting it in a big wind came and blew all the hay away. What a neet pipe of mine ya. I will take it home and keep it in my own room. I will paint it yellow and blue, But first I will put soap on it to clean it. But than a big cloud of smoke came out. They did not smile. No wonder I can't get a wife.

*****

pure genius.

one more:


****
April 30, 1991
The bird that wouldn't go to sleep

Once there was a baby bird that never wanted to go to sleep. He went to sleep at 11:45 and woke up a two o'clock in the morning. At school he's always tired. At night, he ate his stew very slowly. After dinner he ran around the house singing: I'm not going to sleep tonight! By that time his parents knew he wasn't going to sleep. They've gone to ask him so many times: Aren't you going to sleep yet? EVery time they asked him that he said: I won't go to sleep for the whole night. He was very unlike his parents. Soon he grew tired but he still didn't want to go to sleep. He almost fell asleep. Than had an idea. When ever he splashed water in his face he woke up. So he went and took a bath. For the wrest of the night he didn't go to sleep. At school he wasn't tired anymore. The techer thought that was pretty unusual. At the end of the day she told the class to go to sleep early. She told them that cause they had a test the next day. So that night the baby bird went to sleep early. He liked it pretty much so he kept doing that for the wrest of his life.

The End

***


so weird. even then i was an insomniac i guess. i vaguely remember not sleeping well in elementary school, but 8/9 years old? shit.


peace

sometimes wish i'd never been born at all

so on friday night i went out to this local bar/grill with my mom and some of her coworkers. interesting smattering of people (women), mostly around 25-25 yrs. old. two other guys showed up later and i felt a little less awkward, but whatever. i'm no stranger to feeling awkward in a social situation.

either way...i think i spent $10 all night and we ate pupus (appetizers) 'till we were all full and drank 'till we were all drunk (including the birthday girl...). apparently some girl's husband owns a car dealership and bought about four rounds when we all should've stopped.

EITHER way. this bar's set up for karaoke. always fun. i successfully manage to pass the mic on for most of the time...and one'a the dude's turns to me and goes, "you know freddy so-and-so, right?" to which i reply, "no, but i know freddy mercury."

my last mistake.

he (unknowing to me) orders bohemian rhapsody and about two drinks later i get a mic. they make me stand up. one girl's acting out my words. another girl's filling in on the other mic. aaaaand i'm drunk with my mom. in case you don't remember, my volume is directly proportional to my blood alcohol level...haha. i got everyone's attnetion in the bar and i got a wonderful applause after. it was a lot of fun, i must say, even though i didn't know anyone there. it's such a nice feeling to make complete strangers smile.


on another random note, came across goose's blog about Monty. jesus christ you fuckers are geeks. not that i should really talk....

the only thing that came to mind was a text conversation between two people trying to write story line by line taking turns...and at some point all the guy can say is, "maybe i should pick SOME OTHER FUCKING TEA." i find that i'm so much quicker to find things tedious these days. i need to get my mind working again...i'm fuckin' lazy.

and i think i might've fractured my wrist...that would be kind of interesting considering i don't actually know how i did it. i only realized it hurt after our game...and i couldn't pick up the beer coooler to bring it back to my car when the cops came. then i couldn't even use it to turn the steering wheel. and thinking back i can't for the life of me remember falling on it.


fuck.

January 28, 2003

that was my first blog. or...blob (go read! they're funny!)

blogger says i've posted 756 times. 32 months, 756 posts, 23 +change posts a month.

DAAAAYYYMMMNNN

that's pretty fucked up...especially when you consider for the past maybe...six months i'm lucky to post once a week. god...it's too easy to spend time on your computer in college when you basically live next to it. when your room is your only piece of privacy and your computer's there? too convenient. kinda like having a fridge full'a beer under your computer monitor for three years...THAT was a real good idea, too.

oh, beer and bacon :)

big lebowski's on comedy central, "shut the hell up, donny" just doesn't cut it, dude. of course, it made me nostalgic of college. you fuckers. i'll have to admit, i didn' tlike this movie as much as you freaks did, but it is a great movie. for example, i can't watch it without cussing and i'd rather blog. aaaaand someone left some shitty merlot from my party that i'm drinkin' and i'm in a blogging mood (read: buzzed). not that i have much to write about but somehow, things come out *shrugs*.

people say i write a lot like i talk. i remember once posting on the newsgroup under someone else's name (read: drunk) and most people knew it was me. i kinda like that. i hear it in my head and i put it in my fingers. there is some sort of filter somewhere in here...*fumbles through basement*. oh well.

i think the worst blogs (except the ones that are never updated) are the ones that are contrived. for example...when you know someone really well and read their blog and think...wow...that was bullshit. that sucks. to me at least. to me, utopia would be where everyone could be themselves and not "worry" about how they'll be receieved. this could be considered contrary to my veteran groupies who remember the panopticon...but to me it makes sense. in the panopticon...life is open. sure, you may have to change to fit in...but you're not worrying. you know. and you make the decision. you'll fit in when you want how you want where you want and with who you want. no comments behind backs and dirty rumors...you don't have to worry. if so-and-so doesn't like how you so-and-so, you can choose to care or flick so-and-so a s-and-so.

sure, some of my shit is contrived....*ponders*. i'd guess most of what's contrived is what i don't say, though. as much as i can imagine myself writing, this blog is all truth, but not necessarily the whole truth. hurts too many people putting their lives out there. i was faced with the choice of either telling everyone that eveyrthing they tell me is public knowledge (or will be) or conforming to society and keeping other peoples' secrets. i've found there aren't many people like me in the world who would be happy to share everything...so i decided to conform to continue being friends with the people i liked being friends with. shallow philosophies dreamed up in the mind of a fuckin' engineer aren't worth losing friends for.

i blogged a lot less when i decided that. it was amazing to me, when i thought about it, how much of my life involves other people. maybe it's not so amazing to other people? i for one think the goddamn universe revolves around me. maybe that's why. when i finally started trying to seperate what's mine and what's "shared", i found that there isn't much in this pretty little head of mine that can stand alone in the world. or at least stand alone in the digital world for you to see and be interested enough to read through.

this is where i ask....who's still with me??? stoops was one'a the few people who ever answered that question. thanks stoops, even if you're not here ;)

this takes me back a few notches to elementary school where i really did have as much fun as i needed in my own li'l noggin (say it with an irish accent!). towards the end of elem. school i decided that there's more to learn about the people around me than i'll ever BEGIN to learn alone...so in 7th grade i decided to change that, and said hi to the first person i sat next to in class. ended up being a longtime friend who, although he probably doesn't know it and we don't talk anymore, taught me a lot in the years to follow.

i'm in one'a those moods where i wonder where society's going. what is society for. is it better than chaos? i saw the chronicles of riddick recently and was reminded how much i liked the idea of the 'ruler' of a mass being the strongest. at some other point it was the smartest who ruled. now...not that i want to get into politics, it's whoever can appeal to the masses. remember gladiator? "win the crowd". that's all society is. appeal to the largest sect and you rule. countries as a whole don't follow their leaders anymore...the majority does. and the dozens of minorities in different circles of the venn fight their leader. and fight the majority. and 49% of the world could potential be up in arms at any given moment in time. now that i think of it i suppose 99% of the world could be up in arms with a strong dictator...but hey at least they'd be unified :)

oh! and then they could unify against the leader...and then 99% of the world is happy...until they start fighting again. rinse and repeat? fuck, i dunno.

*more wine*

times like these i consider going back and editing...or deleting. but fuck it. i always liked hearing trains of thought out loud...even my own. i'll just let you laugh at my idea of politics :) you ever read one'a those "choose your own adventure" books where at the end of each section you get to choose like...one of a few options and it says "if you choose to kill this dude instead of that dude, go to page 99"? that's how my train of thought goes. of course...the way i read those books i kept going back and forth if i didn't like the consequences of my choice. and yeah...THAT's a better description of how my train of thought goes. a twisted web of dozens of dead ends. i just hold on to the longest string until i find a longer one...

i like to think that can mean i have an open mind. and i still do. but it's constantly challenged. to me i think a lot of people who say they have an "open mind" just never make any decisions about anything. afraid to believe in something because there MIGHT be something out there more believable. the fact that i take a stand on the most believable paths in my web makes most people think i'm closed minded.

too late to untangle that one at the moment. open to suggestions ;)


*sip*

who made it?

crash

looking back and all i've accomplished and accumulated this past year since graduating college...it's been the longest year of my life. i came home in the middle of june and started work on july 1, 2004.

with the money i had, i bought some clothes, bought, insured and maintained a really cool car (and learned a shitload about car mechanics), bought a camera, drank well, bought a lot of drinks and food for people, bought a lotta plane tickets to fly home to see a new girlfriend (one'a the few things i spent my money wisely on), and bought a lotta surf wax and sunscreen, i guess.

here at the end of my frist year, i've made a small dent in my debt, my camera died two nights ago, i might be selling my car soon to get something more useful (truck/SUV), i don't drink as much, i don't go out as much, i don't fly anywhere 'cause i work at home home (but i get to see my lovely girlfriend more), and i'm still buyin' surf wax and sunscreen. oh, and i'm a much better surfer...which is good since i have no medical insurance.

i guess this is where the cheesy music starts and i say it was all worth it because of what i've learned. like i said, it was the longest year of my life. i've learned more about myself and the world this year than i had in probably the decade before it. i guess how much i've learned could be equally proportional to how much my life's changed. my career's going in a different direction (not that i ever HAD a direction), i have a new love in my life, i've lost a love in my life even though he still lives half an hour away (dad), got a lotta useless toys, lost a lotta useless toys, made a lotta new friends, lost a few old friends...helped someone get through some hard times...it goes on. and it goes on. and that's all i want, for it to go on.

i realized somewhere in this past year that i need for things to change. to move. i get so frustrated when things get stagnant and i can't progress. hell, even a digression is better than stagnance, sometimes. you'll learn something from digression, but stagnance just pays the bills. rinse, repeat. some people find solace in stagnance...and call it stability, i suppose. what would i call it...

settling.

i think of everything in life as an oscillation. everything oscillates. i started thinking like this after i studied a little bit of darwin in a summer program at the university of kansas between 8th and 9th grade. rabbits and foxes...too many rabbits, the foxes have more food and eat 'em all. foxes get stronger and more plentiful, rabbits get weaker and less plentiful. foxes starve, rabbits thump. rinse, repeat. "theory" usually predicts some sort of equilibrium but infinite randomly occuring variables always seem to prevent that, and the balance continues to swing....sometimes too far and it dies, and something else develops. rabbits get HIV and die in one winter, foxes die the next winter after eating all their young...and mushrooms thrive on their carcasses to produce a supershroom capable of space travel. but then the hippies eat all the shrooms and eat their young. hippies are gone and yuppies take over.

what?

i dunno. i'm not even drunk. but either way, i like movement. interesting things hapen when things move and oscillate and change and take on more variables.

screw equilibrium.

screw it in the ear.