migblog

eminem's song, ass like that, is addicting. ga-doing-doing-doing.

i believe there was a good summer kick-off with the three-day weekend, because everyone has had huge smiles on their faces recently. people are nicer, the weather's awesome, and there's just enough to do where i'm not bored out of my mind and i'm not busy runnning around doing stuff every hour.

they keep showing these ads about the new season of reno 911 and i'm so amped, but they also show reno 911 action figures during the promo and they're not real. what a huge disappointment. if those things were real, i would own the entire collection twice over: one set to keep forever, and another to play around with. and if they were fully poseable? even better.

despite having enough to do, i think i need to get in better shape this summer. i've gained some chub over this past year, and man, it's not looking pretty. at least my metabolism's still pretty fast, in the sense that it can somewhat catch up to the barrage of unhealthiness i put in my body, but still -- a week of beer, pizza, and prepared foods isn't exactly your sesame street, five-a-day kind of diet.

then again, it is summer, so i guess i have an excuse to laze about three days out of the week.

you know what else is cool? strawberry floats. i make them extra-not-good-for-you-but-extra-good-to-you by making them with extra creamy breyer's vanilla ice cream. and then strawberry fanta. and then strawberries. and then you have two in one sitting and then you get the bestest sugar crash in the entire world, and then you wake up two hours later, eyes glazed over, and wondering what just happened since you have a spoon in your hand and empty pinkish glass on your coffee table. mmm. high fructose corn syrupy goodness.

i was speaking with my brother over the phone today and found out that he was going to be in ireland and england for the next ten days. what a butt. i would go, but i don't have any money. i should look at what sta has for deals during the summer. maybe i can go somewhere in july or august, just so i can say i did something. berkeley, as intense as it is, just gets a little monotonous sometimes. at least i'm not in summer school, but that's no way to spend summer here anyway.

someone from southern california better come up here and visit. if i can't go to orange county this summer, orange county is coming to me.

anyone else enjoying these nights when the sun doesn't go down until 9pm? it's amazing, no? the light just screams for picture-taking.

annie lennox is one crazy bitch.

posted by Open Source Food @ 4:07 PM 1 comments

it's getting to the point where, in typical summer fashion, the weather and the times both aid in the destruction of my otherwise existent sleep cycle and my restlessness to do busy work overcomes the ample rest periods of watching reno 911 and sealab 2021 reruns and old-school 80's movies like batteries not included and short circuit. the past few days have marked not only the beginning of summer but also the growig anxiety that is my last year of undergraduate life.

i had fun these past few days. i recharged and finally fell into a comfortable sleeping pattern, after the ridiculous toll of virtually six days of non-stop finals. yes, ridiculous, but well worth the agony of having to endure fifteen weeks of "same shit, different day." i rediscovered the city of san francisco, and i reacquainted myself with doxylamine succinate, the wondrous bringer of sleep to those who need it. i partook in a quest for a bar that didn't card, a game that revealed true identities and true friendships, and an evening of two magnums of wine coupled with the numa numa dance and waking up the next morning not realizing i had slept over in westminster house.

there too was the object of the touted third episode of star wars, which, as anticipated, would be better than the first two movies but still carried the weight of the horrible acting that is hayden christiansen. as i've heard it quoted before, "it's probably going to suck, but you're still going to see it." and you know what? people did see it. and people probably liked it better than the first two anyway.

jon got back from argentina with plenty of stories to tell, like the supremely cheap restaurants and the stray dogs, as well as the street urchins who were so impressed by being given a dollar they wished they could go to america "so that when they begged for money, they could receive dollars." capitalism at its finest: the dollar as a symbol of prosperity, transcending bounds of when and where people ought to beg for a living.

but there have been many downs, as we discover, in this very thing we call relaxation. planning a free weekend is hard enough (i had expected my parents to be here this weekend) but, due to their cancelling plans last minute, i found myself with a sudden yet disappointing freedom over the memorial day weekend. what's a guy like me to do? what else, but buy the second season of chappelle's show on dvd and watch it, once through, then with commentary, then the special features, then those with commentary. this one was definitely a good buy. rick james, wayne brady, lil jon, the whole shebang -- there were very few moments that were unfunny or stilted, because this show is so awesomely written it's amazing.

the lulls in between don't get any better, either. it's that feeling of high anticipation and worried anxiety hat you feel whenever you're waiting for something to happen -- a phone call, a tv show, a letter in the mail -- and the extremes you feel when either success or failure dominate the situation. you can't help but feel even worse when you fail, but that's why you set yourself up for failure so that if you do succeed, it's unexpected and feels just that little bit better. (call it pessimistic or cynical, but if it works, then it's got a place somewhere, right?)

but it's not even june and i want to break free of the rut. i don't want to work for the man anymore. i want to just sing and not care. i want to just run away somewhere, i don't know, drive, and spend the day on the coast and watch the waters dance and the sun play along the golden sands. i want to go to the beach and smell the salty air, i want to go to a bonfire and feel the heat as the night air turns crisp and brisk. i want to watch the stars, i want to dance, i want to have a goddamned picnic because i never have time to plan a goddamned picnic and goddammit, i want to have a picnic.

i just want to have something like a summer, even though i haven't really been stuck in a rut yet. is that so much to ask for? is that so much to worry about? and is it really that big of a deal if i don't go home this summer and not see my family for a little bit? is it that big of a deal if i feel excluded from a california summer? and is it even better if i dont say anything because everyone else will have the benefit of the doubt?

doubts or not, i don't stand to make anything out of nothing. there's worrying, but i worry too much in the first place. i just want it all somewhat there, almost done and over with, ready to be looked over a few times but not too much because i'll just get tired of it.

i need to figure out what's going on, and then i'll have my answer. berkeley's a hell of a place to be in, kids, and it takes a certain kind of person to wrestle and grasp the concepts of self-actualization and integrity while you're left to read four readers and type up pages upon pages of mindless, derivative drivel.

speaking of mindless derivative drivel, have a good summer. keep in touch. (and then it was a seventh grade yearbook entry.)

bo bice should have won, but vonzell is still my american idol.

posted by Open Source Food @ 1:19 AM 1 comments

i am DONE, bitches!!!!!!!!!

woo! free at last! thank god, i am free at last!

[happy dance]

posted by Open Source Food @ 11:17 AM 0 comments

so i know it's almost midnight and everything, but walking around outside felt like it was eight in the evening, maybe because the sun set at around eight and it felt like a good, warm summer night.

and i know it's finals week here in berkeley, and that i ought to be more cordial, but i really do think that i shouldn't be doling out all that good luck to all you other kids because god knows i absolutely need it more this time around. i took my first final yesterday and i felt all right afterwards, which i guess is an okay feelig considering i didn't puke out of either sheer excitement or anxious disgust.

one down, four to go: in the spirit of taking more finals, i think i'm going to give myself a final of cleaning everything up starting from my apartment after finals, and then start going to work (if i'm up to it!).

like i've said before, i'm so ready to just take my finals. i'm so ready for them to be over with. and i'm so ready to either get kicked in the ass by the goddamned things or kick their ass (moreso the latter than the former, but you never know with these things -- they're like those crocodiles steve erwin deals with, you know: ugly and beautiful all at the same time). and i will be so relieved when they're over because they're over, and then i'll be so hesitant to look at bearfacts and look at what the 'final exm grades' button says.

and i know a couple of you out there are in the same boat as i am, so i'm pulling for you, too.

by the by, did anyone else out there know that it was national masturbation month this month (otherwise known as 'do it yourself' month)?

this is about enough procrastination, right? i swear i have a final in eight hours. i just... whatever. we'll all float on all right.

buenos aires!

posted by Open Source Food @ 11:43 PM 0 comments

bown-bown doot doo doodn bump ba da da bamp bamp.

i have been nerding out on the air cds so much.

that really just means i'm not studying for finals when i really should be.

five more days. it's just five more days.

then what?

posted by Open Source Food @ 4:35 PM 0 comments

that weekend felt wonderful.

beginning on friday with the senior tourguide send-off at 3 was a good kickstart. it was in senior hall, one of the more architecturally interesting buildings on campus, and it was solemn. it was funn. and man, it was memorable. of the many people i've met through my years here at cal, tourguides really are a different breed. they're spirited, but contained; reserved, but outgoing; and of course, unique to the core.

we even got to climb down the steps of the campanile (who else gets to do that but carillonists and tour guides?!?)! it was totally a cool experience -- we got to peek in the floors where the animal bones and fossils were kept, and we even got to listen in to a carillon student practice his final piece.

then there was the big giant bash at raleigh's, where we downed three tablefuls of food in the span of an hour. (and let's not even mention the pitchers of happy juice made of fermented hops and barley and all other kinds of goodness.)

we then traversed over to the sigma kappa house to see one of our very own, ra-ra, sing at the air concert. it was good (they sounded awesome!), but we couldn't keep richard awake especially since there were some parts of the show that were, say, more dramatic and eyebrow-raising than others.

soon after, we all met at the campanile, this time to go underground. the steam tunnel outing was definitely one of the most memorable times i have ever had, especially with a ragtag group of people, capped off by escaping wheeler hall being chased by two university employees while the thirty-or-so of us ran wild westward. we all reconvened once gain at the tower, where we all watched the men's octet and the overtones sing their sets in a wonderful stupor.

when they finished, i got dragged along by artists in resonance (who too were there in attendance, as were my brother and three other new members) to sing (!) at the u-bench, and then made our way to kappa delta rho to end the night with -- what else? -- more singing, more alcohol, and more breaking the ice and evading awkward silent moments.

i got back home at 4.30, ready to wake up at 2 in the afternoon.

then there was a day of hiking, all around campus and then up to the big c, and then it was a walk over to the cal jazz choir show. they also sounded great, and it was a good change of pace to see them decked out in their fancy outfits. the girls looked gorgeous.

but more memories are coming, i'm sure. and that's only a weekend i'll never forget -- hopefully there's another one waiting in the wings, hopefully taking me away to distract me from the fall season, or even make me forget about next spring.

good times.

posted by Open Source Food @ 12:01 AM 0 comments

i am so ready for finals, but finals aren't ready for me yet.

i thought today was friday, and i wanted it so badly to be friday, but no. that would mean completing this paper i have. and it's supposed to be twenty-some-odd pages long. and considering i just finished a monster of a paper yesterday, i am so ready to take a test where you just open a blue book and write for three hours. it sounds disgusting, i know, but when you think about it, no one can bs a paper quite like i can.

and i bs quite good when it comes to finals.

there are these certain words that show up just around finals time that never seem to surface elsewhere in my daily vocabulary. examples of this range from "mitigate" to "transmogrification," from "pulchritudinous" to "unergative." big words: they'll get you far enough to where you feel smart as all hell but won't land you any sort of lucrative job. (or a job at all, for that matter.)

speaking of finals, it's also around the time when evaluations come out for instructors. i think for the first time in my career here i'm going to be brutally honest in my evaluations. no more just circling 7's or writing "good gsi" on there; no, i think i'll actually take the ten minutes allotted and fill that shit out.

you can feel it getting just a little crazier here at berkeley, too. the weather turned from summer to gloom almost literally overnight, and as you might expect, everyone's just a bit down because whenever they look outside and see clouds and fog instead of sun and tanktops, that old feeling of euphoria where you can't wait to get out of class just dies. and you die a little inside. and a little more because you can't stand the monotone of your gsi's voice, nor the incessant tap-tap-screech-scratch of the chalk going across the chalkboard.

i feel fulfilled after this semester. granted, i didn't go to a few lectures and a few discussions, but this would really be the first time i could say that i was spent after a semester of hard classes. they were all interesting in their own veins; the instructors just as interesting as the material they presented. (of course, some of them were much more interesting than the others, but i guess that's what makes it even more interesting.)

and i don't just mean fulfilled like "i'm so over going to college," but fulfilled in the sense that i really felt like i accomplished something, like i had finally found that goddamned spot where i was supposed to be, where i'm just content with all my classes and the grades i will probably get. i don't care if i get out of academic probation, and you know, that feels just as good to say as i'm done with my paper.

so despite the weather being crummy, i feel just fine. i still have internet thanks to my clueless neighbor upstairs, my kitchen is finally clean again, and the only thing left for me to do is finish my laundry (if only that bitch would stop laying claim to the laundry room once the afternoon happens!). but i still can't wait until finals happen, because once they happen, that feeling of a burden being lifted of your shoulders feels good -- a little too good, but good nonetheless -- and i am so ready to have this giant rock of five tests off of my back.

so here's to finals week (they lie and call it finals week when it's more like "week and a half of finals"), where students go crazy in the main stacks, where coffee is more precious than quarters, and where food only seems to matter when you really need to know how to do math or biology.

to your musings and dealings with cunctatorship and procrastination, i bid you good luck, and of course, go bears.

posted by Open Source Food @ 10:34 AM 0 comments

it's already may, and the only thing i have to show for it is bags under my eyes.

april was crazy like crazy. i had to talk my mouth off, sing my throat out, and all of this while projects went on and i was under the weather for a week. i still have homework to finish, two papers to write, and my dear god, finals to study for. in a week and a half it's all over or it's all over.

talking to pre-freshmen is a bit tedious. it's exciting for the first hour, and yes, you always have to be more than happy to answer their silly questions that they could have answered by looking at the info sheet they were just given, or if they had paid attention during the tour, or if they hadn't come late and ruined the question-asking experience for the rest of the group.

singing was fun, though. yay artists in resonance. yay me singing tenor ii next year. and yay for extremely long audition processes.

i got kind of motivated near the end of april, but it was for all the wrong reasons. (then again, isn't that the only way to get motivated in the first place? you make yourself sound like a horrible person until you realize everyone else does it too.)

and while we're at this whole "everyone else is doing it so why can't we" stuff (yay cranberries references), i saw the first episode of the season for family guy. not that i wasn't going to watch it tonight anyway, but you know. it's nice to have seen something about a week ahead of everyone else and yeah, brag about it. neener neener. hah.

this mountain of laundry that's growing ever so slowly is getting to me. maybe this week i'll start procrastinating by doing laundry, and then doing my papers, and then finishing the project.

i never knew i could plan to procrastinate. revelation? maybe. will it happen? probably not.

thanks everyone for showing up to spring show party -- it was a blast.

woot.

posted by Open Source Food @ 2:02 PM 0 comments