Wanted

Endurance test codename "Bella" failed miserably.

Whenever I convince myself to throw down a couple sets of pushups, pullups, layups, etc., the number of reps per set always decreases with each passing set. Yesterday I observed the same trend with a horrible drama movie (Bella). Turns out, I can only do 3 sets of hyperdrive drama - 40 minutes, 5 minutes, and 3 seconds. Let me summarize the plot so you can sympathize.

Chapter 1:
Flash back to a day in the good-old days when Jose was a star soccer player - the kind that can sign passerbys' faces and not get pounded for it. Don't finish the flashback, but allude to a bad ending.

Flash forward - Jose had a 5 inch beard, 6 inch eyebrows, and works for his slavedriver brother as a chef. Jose finds time every day to look down garbage disposal units, up at clouds, deep into people's eyes, and experience profound emotional turmoil on account of the girl his car turned into a puddle. ...No wait, that isn't revealed till Chapter 3.

Screw it. New summary: Jose meets...umm...damn!...can't even remember her name. Argh!

New summary: Jose and some woman with onions stuffed under her eyelids and lemons in her cheeks search desperately for a botox injection to arrest their facial twitching. Meanwhile, a series of flashbacks reenacts a little girl getting run over in increasingly artistic and provocative manners. I have a bad feeling now you're going to say it sounds interesting, but believe me, it was crap.

Saw Wanted today. First, let's get the bad jokes out of the way:

It should have been called Wanted: A Plot.
This kind of crap is definitely not wanted.
I just wanted it to stop, please! Make it stop!
It has been weighed, it has been measured, it has been found wanting.

Now the review:

Short version (SPOILER ALERT):
It sure was a load of crap.

Slightly longer version (SPOILER ALERT):
The plot is fairly simple. Basically it's a thinly veiled ripoff of the Matrix. A bunch of supposedly beautiful people (Matrix) run fast (Matrix), shoot even faster (Matrix), bend some laws of physics (Matrix), break others (Matrix), and do all of these in slow motion (Matrix). If the movie were played entirely at full speed, it would barely skid over the 10 minute mark. To make up for this, there are of course some excellent if ruthlessly abused plot twists.

One such plot twist involves identity of the main character's father, initially an unknown. The trend however is quickly established. Every successive man who dies in the movie is instantly awarded paternity. Not to point out the obvious, but this is dramatic! This ain't Gosford Park. I didn't stay past the credits to see the final act where Angelina Jolie finally receives the honor, but I have full confidence in her abilities as a father.

Another, equally excellent plot twist involves an Oracle - do I hear Matrix again? However, in this "remix," the Oracle turns out to be...can you guess? Is it a dragon? A hobbit? Kiera Knightley? All equally good guesses, but when you find out, you'll all be slapping your foreheads and/or slitting your wrists screaming "WHY??? WHY DIDN'T I GUESS THAT, IT'S SO OBVIOUS!" You've probably guessed it by now, but I'll tell you anyway - a loom. Yea, one of those thread gizmos.

Oh well, at least Morgan Freeman dies.

The Eve of Tomorrow's Tomorrow

Time to broaden my musical horizons. I've been listening to the same Led Zeppelin song for the last 8 years. This moment, some of Michael Jackson and Madonna are trickling into my downloads directory. Michelle's leaving early tomorrow for five fun-filled days of nostalgia-for-home-camp. After the emotionally charged days of the past several weeks, I lack the energy for a twenty minute sobfest, so she's kindly allowing me to escape with a quick and groggy morning hug and a five day consolation session with my parents. Piece of cake compared to the daily.

Today's been a long day. In the morning I campaigned in the east for hours, attaining a mere status of Roc upon victory. I resumed the murder and pillage in the evening, and lasted only an hour before tapping out from fatigue. I just don't have the stamina of my 12-year old self. And even victories just don't have that same taste of glory anymore. I wish someone would just uninstall Heroes from my machine.

I've started and dropped four or five books in the last couple days. High Fidelity, Me Talk Pretty One Day, Fight Club all received a frustrated Alt-F4 for failing to arouse lasting interest. The survivors are:

Battle Cry of Freedom - being at Barnes and Nobles, it's irritatingly un-Alt-F4-able.
The Diamond Age - I haven't yet reached the fateful page 25 where decisions are made and sentences carried out.
Mosaicos - the Spanish textbook endures even the harshest down-sizing.

I've been given the 5-minute movie warning. All thoughts suddenly scramble, and all I see in front of me is the tower of ice cream I'll soon be erecting, and shortly afterward, consuming.

Last thing. Eric Wang has challenged me to a duel tomorrow. Weapon of choice - tennis racket. Place - Rutherford (duh!), the Wang is as always car-free. Chances of winning - we'll know tomorrow after the match; I've narrowed it down to 0% or 100%.

Bad Movie

Saw Wall-E today. Blah.

The first 6 hours of the should-be trilogy were almost bearable. There were cuteness, silly music, and cockroaches - apparently a recipe for success judging by IMDb's thousands of satisfied fans. It used to be that when prompted for my opinion on a movie, I could safely defer to IMDb; this saved the trouble of later defending said opinion. But now IMDb must be in league with the movie companies because the average rating for a crappy movie is around 8. Wall-E is rated an astounding 9.3. I would have been happy to agree if I hadn't watched it. Unfortunately I did, and even the IMDb-sponsored professional applauders in the theater couldn't convince me of a single point deserved above a "5 for special effects."

"It's OK, it's over, you made it," I thought, as I made my way back to the car with my parents and my little sister. Wrong! My dad, though he claimed the movie had bored him into a stupor, would not stop reenacting the aforementioned boredom, with such skill that I fell asleep at least 8 times behind the wheel on the 2-mile ride home. Bored my ass! Now the traitor's probably voting on IMDb to infalte Wall-E's rating to an even greater obscenity.

Just heard from Chun, she loved it of course. This is good intel - she is not to be trusted.

Showed grandma our music today. Can't say she loved it. I showed her ~5 songs, and when I mentioned Mario was still finishing one of them, she asked "why finish? They all sound the same." Ouch. No worries though, grandma's been discredited. I grabbed a piece of apple pie as I left her house, and it smelled like cheese. When she shoved a tomato under my nose to smell the divinity, it smelled like the fish she'd been slicing. Hey, if she can't tell the difference between those...

The Great Depression

Today I came within an inch of damnation. A day after posting on Craigslist, I was surprised and delighted to see that someone was interested in my quality services as a tutor. Not just interested, they wanted me to tutor their currently mediocre but soon to be genius offspring, every day of the week. One or two more such customers, I thought to myself amidst a fit of giggles, and I'd never need a job again. I went to sleep blissfully ignorant of the storm gathering in my Inbox.

I woke up this morning, and found four more wonderful emails from wonderful people with wonderfully thick children. This is where I should have pricked up my ears. Instead, I pranced around the room, threw handfuls of credit cards into the air, and only then got to reading.

Woe was me. At first glance, the emails spoke of normal people who wanted to send me baskets full of checks. But things tended quickly to the creepy. The writing had obviously missed out on some grammar and spellchecking. At the same time, the people all claimed to be from England - a little-known country that chiefly exports clones of Henry Higgins - the Naziest language Nazi of all. Everything suddenly became crystal clear. I was being asked to participate in something intrinsically un-American, and thus undoubtedly Communist-inspired. I was being asked to give an American education to a foreigner!

I was shocked! Revolted! ...But slightly tempted to participate. This last thought that zigzagged through my mind scared me most. After much deliberation, I have decided to do the right thing and turn myself in to the government. Tomorrow will likely be my last day as a free American, for temptation is harshly but justly punished in our wonderful country.

Made some more progress with my music - the Tina-turned-Chun song is moving along beautifully.

I'm writing and expecting...yearning for...nay, praying for an interruption, because material is scarce, and my movie hormones are flaring at full throttle. Tonight still lives with the promise of another B-rated film ruthlessly sacrificed to my addiction, but time is passing and...was that my name being called? Hm...no, that was just me saying it aloud. Enough! I suppose tonight, I'll have to initiate the ritual.

I Love Watermelon

I have pimped out all of my skills on Craigslist, with the frail hope of earning a dollar here and there giving private lessons. If there's something you want to learn that I don't know, and that you are willing to pay for, tell me. I will learn it and teach it to you.

Went to Barnes and Noble's again today, read a bunch of books that failed to make an impression on me. My sentimental half screams that this is because I'm still heartbroken from The Time Traveler's Wife, but I punished it with a Civil War book. Next time it'll keep its fat mouth shut.

Did some writing today - got well on my way into a song that started out about Tina, but tragically lacked a necessary depressing quality, and thus slowly transformed into a love song for Chun. I am now frantically juggling Tina between a slow blues, and an open window.

Meanwhile, Mario has come out with a new single, mourning his love for Iris, who is unfortunately a willing captive of a better man. The song is nearly complete, lacking only lyrics, but they will undoubtedly come around soon and be somewhere high on the scale from 1 to Pathetic.

Michelle asked me to tuck her in today. I considered it for a brief moment and then laughed in her face, a move which somehow doesn't hold the same element of surprise as it used to.

Michelle has a fat friend, who conveniently stores all self-consciousness for her condition in Michelle. Whenever Mom says "hey Michelle, where's fatty?" or Dad asks "where's Piglet?," Michelle inexplicably gets as offended as if it were her own liposuction-filled future they're talking about. Being intrinsically mild-mannered and considerate, I generally restrain my witty insults, and if anything, try to turn the conversation to safer and less fertile ground - such as how fat people contribute to society. By the way, has anyone found the answer to this one yet?

Long Day

Mom's looking over my shoulder, so I can't unleash my full writing potential. Half will do.

Went to Hana's house today. They were definitely unprepared to entertain me. I was counting on at least some singing, money showering, and "we're not worthy"'s accompanied by heads banging against the floor, but all I got was a good meal and an even better serving of boooring. They all camped out in the den and watched a recorded Turkey-Germany soccer match, and no amount tears or begging succeeded in making them tell me to shut up and go home. I don't understand, if you have a match taped and can watch it any time, why would you ever watch it? Especially when I'm around waiting to be entertained.

Mom's learning Stairway to Heaven so she can go to Guitar Center and piss them off - all guitar stores have Stairway to Heaven on their blacklists. Luckily for them, she only practices once every couple of months, usually in different and not always consecutive years.

Chun studying for MCATs is reflecting poorly on my self-esteem. Every now and then, she'll come at me with a "hey, I've got a really easy question for ya...," just to make sure I feel like a moron when I can't even understand what it's asking. I of course proceed to do just that, and she has her fill of laughs. Then she leaves me and returns to her career-building, while I frantically shake my computer upside down so my tears don't short its circuits.

Michelle's having a sleepover today, so there are suddenly two Michelles in the house (her friend is also a Michelle). This is pretty much your classic domestic nightmare. Right now they're upstairs and judging from the sounds, they're either mudwrestling, practicing dropkicks, or sacrificing an uncooperative goat. I hear thud after thud, and lots of giggling that'll soon make its way downstairs, meet Mom, and seamlessly become sobbing if not screaming.

Guests

My cousin and grandma from Baltimore dropped by yesterday on short notice. My cousin is a business guru with grandma's thuggish good looks. We skipped the usual midnight movie showing, and talked in bed till 3 AM. He told me some wild stories about taxi drivers and hookers, and I reciprocated with my own wild tales of sitting on the couch in our lounge. He was so impressed, he passed right out, so I went to sleep as well. In the morning he was gone, but he'll be back for more stories. They always come back.

I've been breezing through The Time Traveler's Wife - an extremely easy and entertaining read. It is drawing near the end, and my magic 8-ball is growing increasingly pessimistic. The level of drama, nostalgia, sentimentality, and inevitability has gotten so high that my tear glands are begging for an interlude. I've been drinking a lot of Gatorade to replenish my fluids. The only thing that cheers me up is thinking about how hard Chun'll be crying when she's reading it. Other people's tears always provide for quality entertainment, and Chun also has excellent delivery. (Don't worry Chun, the fall of my reputation as a dry-eyed stoic will protect yours.)

Watched a sappy Russian movie from the 80's today, a close relative of my worst enemy - Les Parapluies de Cherbourg. Watch it (the French one) if you're ever feeling more than usually sadomasochistic. The Russian movie was entertaining in comparison, despite being a colossal bore.

Michelle has volunteered me for a set of pushups with dad. I miss my couch.

An Argument for Contraception

Got back from the awards ceremony barely alive. It is definitely going high up on my experience blacklist, right next to the Happening. The awards ceremony is a species of revenge against parents - a hybrid of PTO meetings, school concerts, and Nazi concentration camps. Parents are herded into the bleachers of the gymnasium, shoulder to shoulder, so as to promote rapid sweat gland activation. The room is then heated to 400 degrees. Flesh eating bacteria are deployed from ceiling vats. Six-inch knives are passed out - small intestines and kidneys are removed and passed down the aisle for holding. No bathroom breaks. Then the ceremony commences.

The teachers hold all the power. Figuratively, and literally, because they're walking around with coolers on their heads and little battery-powered fans in their hands. They have a small table stacked with awards, but don't be fooled, it's the most misleading table in the world. Every plaque is really a 500-sheet ream of certificates, every certificate is perforated and turns into 50 ribbons, and every ribbon has 100 stickers on it, to be handed out individually.

The awards start out auspiciously - band, chorus, biggest nerd. You think - this can't take much longer, everyone's already gotten at least three. I was particularly deluded - my sister had the best spot due to her last name - Vayngrib. Applause was requested to be held till all names were called, and for each group, she was almost always the last one. Thus, applause invariably occurred right after her name, which I'm sure has completely corrupted her ego.

Musically talented, artistically talented, dance troupe...on and on, and they all sound reasonable, and they all sound like they're nearing the end. In the back of the gym, you can see some of the teachers playing a drinking game - whenever students from their class receive an award, they take a shot. By now you can hear them too. Most parents are still fighting - cheering and pretending to be happy to not give the teachers the satisfaction - but many have already zombified.

Then it gets ridiculous.

Biggest Jew-fro, Ugliest Girl, Student You Didn't Know We Had, Biggest Bully, Most Hopeless, School Slut, Most Awards This Year, Biggest Asskisser...The parents are losing hope, who makes these up? I can smell fear, or is that the rapidly spreading pitstain of my neighbor?

Finally...after an eternity of sadism, the teachers have had their fill. The parents of the children who received less than 20 awards are called up, and stoned in front of everyone. By this time, no one cares, and are just thankful for the extra breathing room. The bell finally rings, and everyone who's still alive exits with their heads down. A few are carried out on stretchers.

Movies

Saw some more movies today - Get Smart, and the new but still less than incredible Hulk.

Get Smart was fairly entertaining. The Rock plays what he looks - a jolly imbecile. Steve Carell cracks the usual metajokes - they're funny because they're not funny - which is really confusing for my sense of humor; I feel like it's part of some horrible setup to get me to laugh in the wrong situation. Anne Hathaway, my pet peeve, is a little less annoying than usual; I managed to sit through 2 hours of her without slitting my wrists or gouging my eye sockets out with the car keys. I've been trying to zero in on what exactly irritates me about her, ever since her debut into my life with The Princess Diaries. After this insightful movie, I got to wondering again. It's not her legs, or her breasts, I reasoned. Not her skin, not that cute little mole on the inside of her left butt cheek, not her hair, not the blonde bombshell she used to be before the plastic surgery. Hmm...what else is there to a person?? And then I had a breakthrough, when I accidentally hit the mental zoom-out button. The flash went off right away. It's her mouth! That thing looks so normal, and then she speaks. Suddenly, you're staring at a hole with a head attached to it. This made me suspicious. Had I seen Anne Hathaway before The Princess Diaries? After doing some research, I finally found that her breakout role was actually much earlier - on the cover of the Pink Floyd DVD - The Wall:

Now to juxtapose it with today:

Here's another:

What a skeleton in the closet!
(Upon further investigation, I have found that I'm pretty much the last person on the Internet to realize her mouth is huge. Oh well, at least now we all know.)

The new Incredible Hulk was admittedly better than Ang Lee's version, but then again, most of my turds are. Edward Norton has built up some good acting momentum, so he probably felt safe cashing in. Robert Downey Jr. has lost all self-respect - in the movie, he makes a cameo to pimp out himself and Iron Man. After the movie, when I took my ritual cleansing piss, he was handing out flyers by the urinals. I held my bladder till I got home.

Tomorrow's a busy day. I have to wake up at 8 to drive Michelle to school. Then I have to wake up again at 9 to attend some bogus post-graduation award ceremony. She seems confident that she's gonna get something. I'm not up for anything this year, so I'll just be praying for an early dismissal.

Yesterday

Was invited to go to a wine/liquor tasting event in New York today. I declined, as I usually do most invitations, and instead sat at home and imbibed some Harry Potter y la Piedra Filosofal.

Michelle's steadily getting better at guitar, but more importantly, her patience is growing by leaps and bounds. She can now practice a song for 35 straight seconds before getting distracted by something shiny. What's even more amazing, there's a 50% chance that that shiny something is an item she already owns, and doesn't require me to drive her to buy immediately. These two put together explain the sharp drop in my frequency of driving to the store from 20 times/day 2 years ago to 4 times/day these days. The sneaky third factor is that she probably already has most of what's in most stores by now. I am slowly earning my freedom.

Still recovering from the emotional drain The Happening inflicted on me.

Blah and Blah

Ohhhhh Shaymalayma. I was wrong about you. You managed to make me laugh with your stupid stupid movie.

Mario left today, I think. I guess we'll find out soon.

Chun uploaded a bunch of pictures today, from senior ball, our trip to Maine, so I freed up some time in my busy schedule for some narcissism. Our house is already a narcissist's dreamhouse - wall-length mirrors in every bedroom - but when you're as special as me, you can't help wanting to be surrounded by yourself from all sides.

The trip to Maine, in case someone doesn't know, was an extreme adventure into mother nature. For four days, twelve of us (6 guys, 6 girls) camped out, without even so much as a firepit(!), in a beautiful home in Acadia National Park.
There was only one Wii, two TVs, central heating, and a half dozen bedrooms worth of accomodations, but luck favors the brave. We managed to survive the harsh conditions by always looking for that silver lining - the Stop & Shop at the end of the driveway, our two cars, and 12 credit cards. Everyone made it out more or less alive, and no one got pregnant from the late night orgies. Still, I wouldn't recommend it.

Almost got roped into a Dickens movie today, an idea that could only have spawned from the Masterpiece-Theater-zealot mind of my materfamilias. At the last moment I was stricken with a sudden case of jaw-breaking yawns and I was mercifully allowed to go to bed. Dickens stayed downstairs and entertained my mother for the next two hours. Dad didn't even put up a fight, he just went straight to bed and cried himself to sleep.

Think I'll go to Barnes and Noble tomorrow. It's time to get disillusioned with Queen.

And Thursday

My sister finally graduated from elementary school! This is a very exciting event in our house, because for the past week there's been no shutting her up about it. But now it's over, phew, and we can all take out our crusty earplugs.

Going to see The Happening tomorrow, by Shaymalayma. No surprises expected, so I'm gonna go ahead and review it ahead of time:

Review of The Happening

Shaymalayma's coin is consistency, and he showered us with handfuls in The Happening - a thoroughly predictable series of loud sounds trailed by Shaymalayma's staple plot devices - "absolutely nothing," and "more and even louder sounds." The few times when the obnoxious offenses to our ears were followed by visual gratification - something mildly fear-inducing - I was too distracted by the loud yawns in the audience to appreciate the cinematic genius. The moral? Go see Don't Mess With The Zohan instead.

Fortunately I'm still in the "haven't seen The Happening yet" stage, and let me tell you people, you just don't appreciate life till you have something like a Shaymalayma movie on your horizons. I am going to live these next 15 hours to the fullest.

Mario's leaving tomorrow, so I'm practicing my tearful farewells. I still haven't decided what I'm going to say when we part. I've narrowed it down to the following possibilities, please help me choose:

"I'll never forget you...David Mario Mendiola."
"Be strong!"
"Don't cry, no, please don't cry! I can't take it when you cry."
"We'll meet again...David Mario Mendiola."
"I'll write every day."
"You...were the Frank Lau of my life."

On second thought, I think I'll just free style.

Wednesday

I've been losing consciousness a lot lately. I find myself waking up at any given time of the day in front of the open door of the refrigerator with high expectations of finding something.

I had a dream today where yet another girl fell for my charms. If girls are anywhere close to as easy in real life as in my dreams, then I've missed out on college life more than I thought. Unfortunately my conscience is also much less dormant in the dream world, and wouldn't let me do a damn thing before talking it over with Chun.

Another unreported case of stomach abuse happened today, and sadly, no one will ever know. I had a dinner appointment with grandma, and those are not broken without consequences (Grandma has a collection of brass knuckles). However, I hadn't told Mom of my plans, and just as I was about to go, she called me to the dinner table. I stuttered something or other in my defense, but she grabbed my by the figurative nape of the neck and fed me till she deemed me full. Meanwhile, grandma called me on my cell, and demanded to know why I wasn't there when the food was hot and already on the table. I told her I'd be there as soon as I could but she demanded to know why I couldn't leave the house immediately. I bleated something about being there soon and hung up hoping everything would just blow over. It did eventually, but I had to suppress many a gag reflex, and Mario had to eat about half of the food on my plate while she wasn't looking.

On another note, "nasal septum" has vacated its spot on Google Trends as #37 most popular search. #37 is now occupied by "thong injury" - a rather radical jump in interest content. I am eagerly anticipating tomorrow's winner.

Last One

Boring movies have a poor effect on my hygeine. Yesterday's movie put me to sleep so well, I decided not to waste the state and render watching the movie a worthless experience; I ended up going to sleep without showering. Today I was more careful and showered in the afternoon, as I have another boring movie lined up for this evening.

Yesterday Michelle went to her friend's house, and managed to escape with a half-a-piece of cake. Today she proudly got yesterday's booty out of the refrigerator, and in an exercise in generosity, offered me half. A family-wide battle immediately ensued for the cake, and my half of the half-piece quickly disappeared from my horizons. Mom demanded to know how much she was getting, and although Mario didn't voice any concerns about his fate, he was clearly having trouble controlling his drooling. Dad was sitting at his computer in the other room, but his silent protests were more eloquent than any complaints he could have delivered out loud.

Being a veteran of such conflicts, I quickly forfeited my share, and suggested that we all just satisfy ourselves with letting Michelle stuff herself, and then make her feel guilty afterwards for the rest of her life. Unfortunately immediate gratification was more popular today, and Mom didn't give up till Michelle conceded her a sliver. Once the sliver was successfully chomped, Michelle realized that the peace offering was a mistake, and that she had merely whetted the beast's appetite. Sensing danger, she smeared the fork with cake in the most unappetizing way she could, and began running around the room with it, offering a lick to anyone who wanted one. This quenched most appetites without even requiring her to deliver on her offer. Crisis successfully negotiated, and having gotten away with just a small tithe to the lioness, Michelle chomped the rest of the cake in peace. All that remains now is an extra dirty dish in the middle of the cluttered kitchen table, and not being the first one left out, it isn't particularly likely to cause a fit from the resident dishwasher. Another point for Michelle.

I ended up recording some vocals for the Natasha song, but with completely different lyrics. Meanwhile, here's the Guitar Pro version, with the original lyrics, the synth representing the vocals.

Breaking News

Saw In Bruges yesterday. It's quite the menagerie of plot devices: There's a 30-year-old retarded child played by Colin Farrell, a midget, a global midget war between white midgets and black Vietnamese midgets, a priest who can't stop bullets, a gun-toting Lord Voldemort, a league of principled hitmen, and a handful of dead children. Ironically there's very little plot other than a parade of the aforementioned items, and some witty dialogue. It was enough to keep me entertained, as I also had some popcorn, but my dad didn't ration his portion well and began whining less than half way through the movie. The ending, SPOILER ALERT, is one of those unsatisfying "Everyone died. Wait did they? I think I saw an arm move! Credits roll, and now we'll never know."

Mom offered me to help her cook dinner today, and I suddenly realized how much I missed grandma, so Mario, my sister and I visited her for dinner. We visited, but karma caught up to me, and I ended up having to help grandma fix her Cablevision after a storm knocked out the electric power. This included some quality time on the phone with Liz from Cablevision Customer Service. She must have been following a script, because the first words I heard from Liz were long-winded flaccid assurances about how anxious she was to be of help to me. Then she made me do all sorts of ritual dances around the TV and Cablevision box, and read her the codes from all the barcode stickers in the room. Despite Liz's help, I eventually managed to figure out where the DVD player's power button was.

On another note, a new song was born today, to commemorate yesterday's failed hang-out with Natasha. She was to go on a morning hike with her parents, and then call me so we could decide what we were doing. I ended up calling her at 7PM, and she blew me off. I cried a little from loneliness, and held a short funeral service for the $1.50 she cost me in text messages. When I woke up this morning with red-rimmed eyes, I decided to devote a song to yesterday's tragedy. The song's done, but I haven't recorded the vocals yet so it'll probably be up tomorrow. Meanwhile, Mario and I decided to write some more songs about other girls, so Anna, Lucy, Tina, watch out, our lyrics are rarely completely complimentary.

Today

About time to start a blog, if at least to give my stalkers an edge. Been resisting for a long time, but being a quitter, and in the interests of self-promotion, I'm abandoning my reluctance and embracing the soon to be enormous publicity.

Just came home for the 30 day weekend before I'm off to Texas. I'm already immune to cold, but still quite sensitive to heat, so it's time to learn that new skill - how not to get a heat stroke. I've decided the best way is through daily practice.

Our band, whose name is yet to be determined, but whose place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has already been assured, today held one of those once-a-year practice sessions. We ran through the staple song of our performance(s) - Clean Kitchen. It took some work, because despite having three guitars, we only had one cable, and one amp. Also, only 50% of the two of us knew how to play it. Oh, and we're still

looking for a drummer and singer.

Nevertheless, Clean Kitchen Unplugged now exists.

I've been slacking a little in my apprenticeship with the Spanish language. I started reading Harry Potter y la Piedra Filosofal hace un mes, y he leido solamente 35 paginas. My progress into the book resembles a logarithmic graph. Today I was able to satisfy my conscience with a mere opening of the PDF file.

If anyone wants to suggest a name for the band, I'd condescend to at least hearing the suggestion. So far, today, we've come up with the following possibilities:

buzz
buzzed
fuzz
strapless
unemployed
samurai love
12 string samurais
something kinky
santa's girlfriend/mistress

Our current MySpace page is Not4Profit, but we are not committed to being poor forever, so we're looking for a more permanent name.

By the way, graduated from college a couple days ago. Haven't gotten my diploma yet, not having gone to the ceremony. Is there an actual use to a diploma?

Realized I only actually left ~2 people when I left college - those few that ventured over to the couch I sat on the past two semesters. I managed to phase out most of my friends by graduation, saving myself the tearful goodbyes and future house calls. The people I will miss are so few that I can say with almost 100% accuracy that you're not one of them.

Don't expect more than two entries in this blog including this one, I'll probably forget to write in it after this entry.