[You wouldn't know it by reading this post, but it's actually about how happy and reassured I was by a story I managed to write earlier in the day. Seriously the story is one of my favorites and gave me a lot of confidence about the possibility of a fiction writing career]
I feel that the biggest themes in my life revolve around a few key points, self-confidence, self-love, and self-respect. I would say that self-reliance would be there, but in the end I feel that with the others it becomes a moot point. I also believe it takes more courage to allow other people to help you. In short, I find self-reliance to be rather depressing, though I'm more than open to discussion on the point.
Loving oneself really is a huge part of the key to happiness in life to me. If you are not happy with a part of yourself or hate something about yourself you truly have the power to change whatever it is you wish, and without being satisfied with oneself, one cannot be satisfied with others and will constantly live in doubt and confusion. There is also an acute difference between loving oneself and having a crush on oneself. I find that a lot of people who would claim to love themselves are simply selfish, and self-centered, using and abusing other people on the grounds that it is good for themselves. I refer to this as having a crush on oneself because like crushes it seems largely childish and lacks meaning.
Self-respect is one of those funny things which though I would like to say I have, I often doubt. To me self-respect is something which truly nobody else can ever understand, and those who try to make a claim at the amount you have are ignorant. I have often been told by friends that I need more self-respect, that I've gotta have some self-respect, that I've gotta start respecting myself, all the same sentence just re-hashed for purposes of showing how often I hear it. These things are often said after something particularly dick happens to me and I just shrug my shoulders. In my mind I have plenty of self-respect, and I have respect enough for myself to know how to take that which does not matter and truly let it slide (Fight Club, I find myself quoting from movies quite frequently in life, don't hate me). To me self-respect has a lot to do with having faith in yourself enough to weather minor slights for that which you love. It can be argued that one needs self-respect in order to respect and love others, but until you actually love, and you actually sacrifice, you won't know how much of yourself your own pride you will sacrifice when it comes down to it, and your supposed self-respect is equal to the courage held in shouts of bravery and in truth bravado from those who have never feared.
When I cut everything else away though, I always come back to self-confidence. Self-confidence is the trait which I find most attractive in the people I'm around. Nothing will ever give me the joy or sense of accomplishment as helping someone to be confident in themselves, and nothing ever makes me feel quite so enlightened or fulfilled as discovering a confidence in myself. Without a faith in oneself, a person becomes devoid of convicted action. I spoke of confusion and fear when I talked about a lack of self-love, but truly these traits are exhibited even more when a person lacks in confidence. Without a faith in ourselves it becomes rather hard to love ourselves or respect ourselves.
I will readily admit that I have confidence issues, I seek constant reassurance from my own accomplishments and those around me, and always have done. I don't know if this is a problem, certainly it has caused a number of problems in my life recently. In reality I don't know what is a problem nowadays, I tend to think that all things are just natural and there are no perversions, we each exist rather precisely in the manners which we do and where problems arise there is the opportunity for solution. I'll finish with two quotes from Richard Bach:
"Argue for your limitations and sure enough they're yours"
"Each problem comes to us with a gift in its hands"
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
We are the chameleons
It is important to realize at any given time that you have the unique opportunity to be whoever it is you wish to be. Right now I am in a Barton classroom preparing a lesson outline on the whiteboards for a class which does not exist. Due to my mode of dress it can easily be inferred that I am not a teacher. I found this classroom because it has a sign posted on the door saying that the lecture which would normally have occupied it during this time has been moved to another room entirely. 2 students have come in upon seeing me, I simply informed them that yes their classroom had been changed and this was currently the classroom for Psychology 243. Two hundred and Forty Three seemed a good course number to pick, since it seems like one which most likely does not exist and is therefore rather unlikely that any students would possibly be taking it to call me out.
I don't really think any of that is a necessary thought process since when it comes down to it my attitude and confidence alone are enough to disuade questions. This brings me to my point, we do all enjoy the luxury of being who we wish. You can create your reality as you choose by simply believing it and stepping forwards, a casual confidence is necessary throughout life in order to fit in as you wish, beyond that it is simply a case of choosing your role. My example is an extreme one, obviously I am not a college professor, but playing the part of one for this small time is certainly entertaining me, and the metaphoric and symbollic nature of what I am doing is demonstrative of the more subtle overarching ideal. This life is as much a work of theater as anything else, appearances are in fact what matters to the world, and events which are meaningless in any kind of grand view of things are still scenes within the play and they can enrich or depress us all.
Be what you wish, do as you desire, never let anybody tell you that you are not good enough or have no way, for in admitting defeat and in acknowledging the doubts of others we find ourselves being defeated. Never surrender and always be willing to change your role. We are each the chameleons of this society, and to change our skin is to change our existence within it.
I don't really think any of that is a necessary thought process since when it comes down to it my attitude and confidence alone are enough to disuade questions. This brings me to my point, we do all enjoy the luxury of being who we wish. You can create your reality as you choose by simply believing it and stepping forwards, a casual confidence is necessary throughout life in order to fit in as you wish, beyond that it is simply a case of choosing your role. My example is an extreme one, obviously I am not a college professor, but playing the part of one for this small time is certainly entertaining me, and the metaphoric and symbollic nature of what I am doing is demonstrative of the more subtle overarching ideal. This life is as much a work of theater as anything else, appearances are in fact what matters to the world, and events which are meaningless in any kind of grand view of things are still scenes within the play and they can enrich or depress us all.
Be what you wish, do as you desire, never let anybody tell you that you are not good enough or have no way, for in admitting defeat and in acknowledging the doubts of others we find ourselves being defeated. Never surrender and always be willing to change your role. We are each the chameleons of this society, and to change our skin is to change our existence within it.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Misunderstanding
Two or Three years ago I read a statement which said "I do what I want" and commited the simple line to memory. Since then at different points month to month I have considered those words. I've written a lot of scribbled notes of intention and free will, and whenever I've been at a complete loss for how to act, I've always turned to "I do what I want" as an overarching guide. The truth is everyone does what they want all the time, sometimes we may justify, or tell ourselves we are doing something for another, but in the end that is still what we want to do.
Those who know me and those who know me well are aware that I will often go out of my way for my friends. It's not any kind of goodness that drives me to do so, it's just what I want to do. I have frequently found myself looking out for the interests of others, particularly when it comes to relationships and persons of the female persuasion in general. Some months ago I was asked by a friend when I was going to start looking out for myself in life, and the truth is I already do and always have. I find it far easier to live with myself when I am facilitating the needs of those I love than when I am being selfish. In that way, being there for others has in itself become selfish.
Another important fact of doing what one wants is that the things we all desire are constantly changing, temporary whims and longterm desires are often in opposition and it can create a problematic decision. In general I tend to follow my temporary whims to keep myself happy, it's hollow but I can usually trust that I will always obtain my longterm desires anyway. This kind of confidence can often undermine the cause of longterm desires, but this confidence is neccessary in order to justify the indulgence of whims, and when it all comes out, so many of our decisions in life are an internal justification.
It has always been my opinion that not only America, but the entire earth is the land of opportunity, by definition life appears to be grounded in the abilities of discernment and choice. It has always been my firm belief that all dreams are attainable and everything we wish to do in this world is absolutely possible. This was found stated best to me in Richard Bach's Illusions; “You are never given a dream without also being given the power to make it true. You may have to work for it, however.” This quote is absolutely beautiful to me and speaks so clearly of our power as human beings. The message in this kind of quote is the reason willpower has always been the quality I have respected most in people. And I do not mean willpower as in the ability to resist temptation, but as in the kind of moxy and guts required to pursue that which you desire. Too often in this world the first steps are the ones that are never taken and even if they are, the subsequent ones are half hearted because of the strain.
I forget the exact wording but I usd to say something about mountains being worth climbing, and this is the example I use for willpower within the world and for struggle in general. Every mountain will be worth climbing, no matter the pain, and when you reach the summit the pains suffered and the time spent become their own reward. They say that nothing worthwhile in this world is easy, and I find this to be self-defining, for as soon as something is simplistic it also becomes unrewarding. In my real life experience I have found this to be absolutely true and the best example I find is in one of my friendships. There is a girl named Scarlet who I've known for a while now, I value my relationship with her more than anything in the world, more than my other friendships by far. The reason for this isn't the length of time that we've known each other, certainly not, since it really hasn't been all that long. The reason for it's value to me isn't how much we have in common, though I find that what we do have in common is substantial. Many people can point to their most valuable friendships as being with the people who know us best, and although this is very true of our friendship, at the same time I know for a fact that this is not why it is so important and powerful to me. The truth of the matter is that in the short time we have known each other I think we have come very close to hating one another, killing one another, or just screaming at the top of our lungs and never speaking again. But through every trial the friendship has persisted, and that has not only proven it's strength, it has created it.
None of your most important dreams will ever be easy, and you will never find them anywhere but inside yourself. There will always be other people around to help or hinder you, and there will always be forces on the outside that appear to hurt you or to bring you down, but none of this matters, none of it ever will. The decision to keep going will be yours alone and in the end it is the only decision that matters. There is not a single person in this world, with the exception of the person who kills you if that is to be your fate, who can stop you from doing what you want.
I do what I want, I always will, and I will always succeed. The only question I end up asking myself, and the question which we must each ask ourselves is why. Why do we wish to do the things we wish to do. Demystifying our motivations is one of the most important factors in self-awareness. Personally I have always looked to fear as my biggest motivator, it sounds grim, but it is true. My meeker actions in life are often out of fear of losing something; apology comes when I fear I've overstepped my bounds in being an asshole; compliance comes when I fear the loss of a friend and am more willing to suffer character blows than miss a person's company; surrender and doubt come when I fear a loss within myself as a result of continued action. Likewise the majority of my bolder actions are similarly motivated by a fear, a need to step forward and protect something before it is lost, a need to conceal the very fear which motivates me and attempt to dispell it by pure bravado. We each fear a great many things. I think it's a good place to start in understanding oneself.
I was asked very recently what it is that I fear, I replied that I am afraid of nothing. Sometimes I think this is true, and when I do think this, it is. We can each overcome our fears, we can each rationalize actions based upon them and in avoidance of them. Once again if we can discover our motivations we can take the reins from our subconscious and realize that all the power in the world is within us.
Much of what I have written here is old news, it is what I have known for years, but much of it is what I have realized in the past couple of hours. Often when I have time to think I will mete out such conclusions and decide to make a change in myself. Today I have decided to become unstoppable. It sounds ludicrous, but I find that at this time in my life there are a great many things around me and a great potential for me to lose a great many opportunities if I should allow myself to be stopped, as a result my only responsive action is to refuse to be halted by any means. I will do what I want, and no mortal force will be able to stop me. Don't let them stop you either.
Those who know me and those who know me well are aware that I will often go out of my way for my friends. It's not any kind of goodness that drives me to do so, it's just what I want to do. I have frequently found myself looking out for the interests of others, particularly when it comes to relationships and persons of the female persuasion in general. Some months ago I was asked by a friend when I was going to start looking out for myself in life, and the truth is I already do and always have. I find it far easier to live with myself when I am facilitating the needs of those I love than when I am being selfish. In that way, being there for others has in itself become selfish.
Another important fact of doing what one wants is that the things we all desire are constantly changing, temporary whims and longterm desires are often in opposition and it can create a problematic decision. In general I tend to follow my temporary whims to keep myself happy, it's hollow but I can usually trust that I will always obtain my longterm desires anyway. This kind of confidence can often undermine the cause of longterm desires, but this confidence is neccessary in order to justify the indulgence of whims, and when it all comes out, so many of our decisions in life are an internal justification.
It has always been my opinion that not only America, but the entire earth is the land of opportunity, by definition life appears to be grounded in the abilities of discernment and choice. It has always been my firm belief that all dreams are attainable and everything we wish to do in this world is absolutely possible. This was found stated best to me in Richard Bach's Illusions; “You are never given a dream without also being given the power to make it true. You may have to work for it, however.” This quote is absolutely beautiful to me and speaks so clearly of our power as human beings. The message in this kind of quote is the reason willpower has always been the quality I have respected most in people. And I do not mean willpower as in the ability to resist temptation, but as in the kind of moxy and guts required to pursue that which you desire. Too often in this world the first steps are the ones that are never taken and even if they are, the subsequent ones are half hearted because of the strain.
I forget the exact wording but I usd to say something about mountains being worth climbing, and this is the example I use for willpower within the world and for struggle in general. Every mountain will be worth climbing, no matter the pain, and when you reach the summit the pains suffered and the time spent become their own reward. They say that nothing worthwhile in this world is easy, and I find this to be self-defining, for as soon as something is simplistic it also becomes unrewarding. In my real life experience I have found this to be absolutely true and the best example I find is in one of my friendships. There is a girl named Scarlet who I've known for a while now, I value my relationship with her more than anything in the world, more than my other friendships by far. The reason for this isn't the length of time that we've known each other, certainly not, since it really hasn't been all that long. The reason for it's value to me isn't how much we have in common, though I find that what we do have in common is substantial. Many people can point to their most valuable friendships as being with the people who know us best, and although this is very true of our friendship, at the same time I know for a fact that this is not why it is so important and powerful to me. The truth of the matter is that in the short time we have known each other I think we have come very close to hating one another, killing one another, or just screaming at the top of our lungs and never speaking again. But through every trial the friendship has persisted, and that has not only proven it's strength, it has created it.
None of your most important dreams will ever be easy, and you will never find them anywhere but inside yourself. There will always be other people around to help or hinder you, and there will always be forces on the outside that appear to hurt you or to bring you down, but none of this matters, none of it ever will. The decision to keep going will be yours alone and in the end it is the only decision that matters. There is not a single person in this world, with the exception of the person who kills you if that is to be your fate, who can stop you from doing what you want.
I do what I want, I always will, and I will always succeed. The only question I end up asking myself, and the question which we must each ask ourselves is why. Why do we wish to do the things we wish to do. Demystifying our motivations is one of the most important factors in self-awareness. Personally I have always looked to fear as my biggest motivator, it sounds grim, but it is true. My meeker actions in life are often out of fear of losing something; apology comes when I fear I've overstepped my bounds in being an asshole; compliance comes when I fear the loss of a friend and am more willing to suffer character blows than miss a person's company; surrender and doubt come when I fear a loss within myself as a result of continued action. Likewise the majority of my bolder actions are similarly motivated by a fear, a need to step forward and protect something before it is lost, a need to conceal the very fear which motivates me and attempt to dispell it by pure bravado. We each fear a great many things. I think it's a good place to start in understanding oneself.
I was asked very recently what it is that I fear, I replied that I am afraid of nothing. Sometimes I think this is true, and when I do think this, it is. We can each overcome our fears, we can each rationalize actions based upon them and in avoidance of them. Once again if we can discover our motivations we can take the reins from our subconscious and realize that all the power in the world is within us.
Much of what I have written here is old news, it is what I have known for years, but much of it is what I have realized in the past couple of hours. Often when I have time to think I will mete out such conclusions and decide to make a change in myself. Today I have decided to become unstoppable. It sounds ludicrous, but I find that at this time in my life there are a great many things around me and a great potential for me to lose a great many opportunities if I should allow myself to be stopped, as a result my only responsive action is to refuse to be halted by any means. I will do what I want, and no mortal force will be able to stop me. Don't let them stop you either.
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Evolution
I missed a subway train today, that is to say, I could have gotten on it but chose not to. The doors had already closed and the train was pulling away, much as it has done so many other times. As with those numerous other incidents I could have run and leapt onto the small platform in between the cars but in the last second I hesitated. My feet did not leave the ground and I just watched the train go down the tunnel. I then had 8 minutes to sit and think. I didn't miss the train so that I could get this time, but it was there just the same. I began to think of how I've changed in recent months and who I have become. 4 months ago I would most certainly have jumped onto that train, 4 months ago I was still fully aware of the possibility of falling between the cars and being crushed, but 4 months ago I really didn't care. 4 months ago my roommates would have told you that I operated outside a number of laws of physics, probability and certainly society. These roommates have come to scornfully refer to the new me as Sam 2.0, in the following entry I will attempt to pass on the information I personally posess on this change. This'll probably take a few hours, so I'll be updating as the night goes on.
Since Sam 2.0 is the newest incarnation, the prior existence is known as Sam 1.0. This is somewhat of a misleading title, since Sam 1.0 was not the original but regrettably I have had a lot of memory loss problems throughout my life and at this stage I remember only very small patches of inconclusive events pre-1.0. 1.0 was born on September 8th, 2005, technically 1.0 is still alive and my roommate exclaim with joy when they see signs. Nobody really knows when 2.0 was born, the manifestations were slow and subtle at first. Sam 1.0 was not thought of as a roommate, but as a welcome infestation, much like the koala infestation of Mitch Hedberg. The quote used to describe me was taken from a play and read "There is no law, human or divine, that this man has not ignored." I'd be lying if I said I didn't really like that.
Sam 1.0 was selfish and crude, Sam 1.0 behaved in a number of ways that were largely incomprehensible to those around him, Sam 1.0 was apparently a lot of fun for a lot of people to be around. The truth of the matter though is that Sam 1.0 was never real, I find in most of my recollections that Sam 1.0 was never a person, but rather an ironic parody of one, it is for this reason that I feel that it is long since time that Sam 1.0 fade into an obscurity of vague referrences and myth. As such I have decided to compile an ongoing list of the various things which made Sam 1.0 who he was.
(I just want to interject that speaking about myself in 3rd person is not a general habit, and it's actually rather difficult.)
Sam 1.0
--Sam 1.0 never closed bathroom doors. When sam 1.0 took a shit, went to piss, showered, the door was always open. The reasoning given for this, Sam 1.0 had nothing to hide from his friends and was also so cripplingly short on time on this earth that he felt he should multitask to a level that he refused to interrupt conversation for something as silly as biology or cleanliness. On that note it's rumored that Sam 1.0 once managed to hold a conversation while simultaneously shitting, brushing his teeth and reading The Merchant of Venice. I can neither confirm nor deny this.
--Sam 1.0 could take any 12 ingredients from a kitchen, place them in a single container and consume them without flinching. He referred to this practice as 'cooking' but most agree that the act was some sort of hybrid between chemistry and ballistics research.
--Sam 1.0 hated women. I'm not sure how true this really was, but Sam 1.0's vernacular was composed of a wide array of sexist terminology and phraseology. For whatever reason my roommates seem to have loved this most about Sam 1.0.
--Sam 1.0 failed the easiest Math class offered at Temple University, this is an important fact to point out since I got a 760/800 on my SAT math section.
--On other academic fronts Sam 1.0's standard practice for essay writing was to sit with a bottle of Vladimir Vodka and compose his writing between the hours of 5 and 7 am.
--Sam 1.0's musical taste was non-existent. There was quite literally no type of music that Sam 1.0 would not listen to and he preferred to hear music that he disliked.
--Sam 1.0 seemed to have a crush on himself, and it can be readily agreed that he was severely lacking in maturity
After Sam 1.0 there was a three month period which I refer to as the Resurrection of Trev. I'm not sure exactly how I want to continue this post, so it will likely be left like this for a while, I'll be sure to let everyone know if I do update it.
Since Sam 2.0 is the newest incarnation, the prior existence is known as Sam 1.0. This is somewhat of a misleading title, since Sam 1.0 was not the original but regrettably I have had a lot of memory loss problems throughout my life and at this stage I remember only very small patches of inconclusive events pre-1.0. 1.0 was born on September 8th, 2005, technically 1.0 is still alive and my roommate exclaim with joy when they see signs. Nobody really knows when 2.0 was born, the manifestations were slow and subtle at first. Sam 1.0 was not thought of as a roommate, but as a welcome infestation, much like the koala infestation of Mitch Hedberg. The quote used to describe me was taken from a play and read "There is no law, human or divine, that this man has not ignored." I'd be lying if I said I didn't really like that.
Sam 1.0 was selfish and crude, Sam 1.0 behaved in a number of ways that were largely incomprehensible to those around him, Sam 1.0 was apparently a lot of fun for a lot of people to be around. The truth of the matter though is that Sam 1.0 was never real, I find in most of my recollections that Sam 1.0 was never a person, but rather an ironic parody of one, it is for this reason that I feel that it is long since time that Sam 1.0 fade into an obscurity of vague referrences and myth. As such I have decided to compile an ongoing list of the various things which made Sam 1.0 who he was.
(I just want to interject that speaking about myself in 3rd person is not a general habit, and it's actually rather difficult.)
Sam 1.0
--Sam 1.0 never closed bathroom doors. When sam 1.0 took a shit, went to piss, showered, the door was always open. The reasoning given for this, Sam 1.0 had nothing to hide from his friends and was also so cripplingly short on time on this earth that he felt he should multitask to a level that he refused to interrupt conversation for something as silly as biology or cleanliness. On that note it's rumored that Sam 1.0 once managed to hold a conversation while simultaneously shitting, brushing his teeth and reading The Merchant of Venice. I can neither confirm nor deny this.
--Sam 1.0 could take any 12 ingredients from a kitchen, place them in a single container and consume them without flinching. He referred to this practice as 'cooking' but most agree that the act was some sort of hybrid between chemistry and ballistics research.
--Sam 1.0 hated women. I'm not sure how true this really was, but Sam 1.0's vernacular was composed of a wide array of sexist terminology and phraseology. For whatever reason my roommates seem to have loved this most about Sam 1.0.
--Sam 1.0 failed the easiest Math class offered at Temple University, this is an important fact to point out since I got a 760/800 on my SAT math section.
--On other academic fronts Sam 1.0's standard practice for essay writing was to sit with a bottle of Vladimir Vodka and compose his writing between the hours of 5 and 7 am.
--Sam 1.0's musical taste was non-existent. There was quite literally no type of music that Sam 1.0 would not listen to and he preferred to hear music that he disliked.
--Sam 1.0 seemed to have a crush on himself, and it can be readily agreed that he was severely lacking in maturity
After Sam 1.0 there was a three month period which I refer to as the Resurrection of Trev. I'm not sure exactly how I want to continue this post, so it will likely be left like this for a while, I'll be sure to let everyone know if I do update it.
His anger exploded like never before!
First class of the semester is over, I'm feeling pretty good about the whole thing. I'm definitely in a much better place than before, I feel more equipped to deal with things as they come and I'm ready to focus on my studies and get this degree out of the way. I had almost forgotten what it's like to wait for the elevators at Anderson, what a glorious 10 minutes of nostalgia that was.
My personal favorite feature of those elevators is the person who waits for 5 or 10 minutes in the crowd just to go to the 2nd or 3rd floor. I list them as a feature since they don't appear to be human, since if they were human that would be suggesting that they are in college, and if they are a human being smart enough to be in college I would think that they might posess the intelligence to see how moronic it is to wait with a mass of people and then cramp yourself onto a smelly elevator just to avoid a 20 second walk up some stairs. Perhaps I'm mistaken.
I had class this morning with one of my roommates, Andy and I are taking American Realism and Naturalism, which is brewing up to be as exciting as it sounds. I've never pretended that the classes in my major are exciting. While sitting in class this morning I saw one of the Great Antagonists in the hallway going to one of his classes. The Great Antagonists are all the people who I have accidentally or purposefully fallen into opposition with during my college years. There are several of them and they all seem to appear in close proximity to me with alarming frequency. One of the Great Antagonists from last year ended up commuting this year because due to his falling out with my friends and I he elected not to live in the city any longer. I heard a report today that the reason he listed for his commuting was that if he lived at home for a semester and worked full time he would be able to 'finally afford a car' which is interesting to me since he owned a car last year and chose to sell it because he didn't need one. I am perpetually fascinated by the lies people create.
Anyway, I must be off, much to do and the sun fades fast in these winter days. In parting I'd just like to posit that it may be possible to relieve Blue Balls by sneezing, this hypothesis is based upon both theory and empirical evidence, however I myself am unwilling to continue this research further. I will provide starting notes for anyone who wants to pursue this painful but gentlemanly research, just drop me an email.
My personal favorite feature of those elevators is the person who waits for 5 or 10 minutes in the crowd just to go to the 2nd or 3rd floor. I list them as a feature since they don't appear to be human, since if they were human that would be suggesting that they are in college, and if they are a human being smart enough to be in college I would think that they might posess the intelligence to see how moronic it is to wait with a mass of people and then cramp yourself onto a smelly elevator just to avoid a 20 second walk up some stairs. Perhaps I'm mistaken.
I had class this morning with one of my roommates, Andy and I are taking American Realism and Naturalism, which is brewing up to be as exciting as it sounds. I've never pretended that the classes in my major are exciting. While sitting in class this morning I saw one of the Great Antagonists in the hallway going to one of his classes. The Great Antagonists are all the people who I have accidentally or purposefully fallen into opposition with during my college years. There are several of them and they all seem to appear in close proximity to me with alarming frequency. One of the Great Antagonists from last year ended up commuting this year because due to his falling out with my friends and I he elected not to live in the city any longer. I heard a report today that the reason he listed for his commuting was that if he lived at home for a semester and worked full time he would be able to 'finally afford a car' which is interesting to me since he owned a car last year and chose to sell it because he didn't need one. I am perpetually fascinated by the lies people create.
Anyway, I must be off, much to do and the sun fades fast in these winter days. In parting I'd just like to posit that it may be possible to relieve Blue Balls by sneezing, this hypothesis is based upon both theory and empirical evidence, however I myself am unwilling to continue this research further. I will provide starting notes for anyone who wants to pursue this painful but gentlemanly research, just drop me an email.
Friday, January 12, 2007
Welcome to the future
So I just came here from facebook where I took a look at a recently formed group entitled something along the lines of: "Join this group and petition so thet mountain dew Baja Blast is mass produced" which made me think a great many things. Firstly I think that this might be the best symbol of exactly what recent technological advances have given us.
When I get home I find myself going through a very definite routine. Check IM's, check email, check facebook. All over the place I now visit websites to find out if anything interesting has happened in my few hours absense from the screen. Not that there's anything wrong with any of these things, it's now ridiculously easy to leave shallow communications for whoever you want, to create groups and drive people to a purpose from behind your keyboard, or to fight for your cause in an internet forum.
My one lament in the midst of this technology has to be the death of the letter as an art form. The form of a letter, the effort involved and the fact that it takes such time to arrive makes it so that whatever is written within has to be something a fraction more lasting than an email instantly delivered or an IM conversation. Every now and again I attempt to ressurect letter writing, it's difficult though, much harder than just typing, you have to think about what you say when you hand write something because it's a lot harder to go back and change your spelling errors. The last letter I wrote was over a year ago, I wrote it to someone very important to me, and I sent them flowers. They didn't speak to me for over a week. Somehow letters have become the artform of stalkers I fear, and stationery caught up with a stigma of creepiness. Ah well, maybe I'll write another letter sometime soon with better results.
Cellphones and Instant Messenger are definitely the two most popular forms of communication now. I enjoy instant messenger a lot, cellphones less so, perhaps because mine sucks something awful. Cellphone conversations are alright I suppose, but whenever I'm having an actual conversation I can't help but keep wishing the person were there with me so we could just be hanging out having the conversation. Instant messenger is handy because you can talk to so many people at once, but by the same token instand messenger and other forms of online communication are rather inappropriate for certain forms of communication.
Arguments, internet arguments, oh God on high how have you delivered us to such times. Internet arguments are about as pointless as regular arguments, the only difference being that regular arguments are generally settled by who has the bigger ego and snuffs the weaker person, meanwhile on the internet there are very few ways for would-be tough-guys to swing their metaphoric dicks around effectively and as such the arguments just go on endlessly. You'll see this in a variety of places, and all the arguments are fruitless since each party is completely convinced of their side and will not listen to evidence to the contrary.
This is the problem I've always had with arguments in general, arguments are something which should generally be reserved for a personal level, like spouses in a disagreement. When people start shouting back and forth at each other about communism vs. capitalism or pro-life vs. pro-choice you just end up with an ugly shitstorm. What generally needs to happen is for each side to stop taking things so personally, to sit down and maybe discuss and try to understand one another better, rather than what tends to happen, which is that neither side actually seems to care about a given issue, they are more focused upon being the one who is right. The minute you start trying to be the one who is right rather than attempting to divine what right is you are in a fruitless argument.
Anyway, I dislike arguments in general, but I find the ones on the internet more tedious since they are more often waged between nerdy social rejects without the confidence to carry on their tirades in an actual forum, as opposed to real life arguments which are far more entertaining battles of ego and wits between two individuals who are both socially adept, posessed of a strong will and who have each read the Asshole Handbook from cover-to-cover. The real life ones are largely as pointless, but at least you get to see who the superior arguer is and get some mental ass-kicking entertainment out of it.
The second largely innapropriate set of dialogue to pursue online falls into a vein which I will refer to as Bleeding Heart Bullshit. This is a slightly inaccurate title, but it's catchy so I'm keeping it. What I'm talking about is dealing with romance online, I'd like to list a few big NO'S in my book and give brief reasons as to why:
1) Asking someone out online. To be honest I've always thought the idea of "asking someone out" is absolutely ridiculous. You ask someone to go somewhere with you, don't ask for the "going out" status. Status is a sham and it's bad enough to cling to such notions. But if you're going to ask someone to be your boyfriend/ girlfriend I think it's really best to do it in person. I mean, really the only excuse to do it online is if you just don't get the chance to see them for an extended period of time, and if that's the case then....should you really be 'going out'?
2) Dumping someone online. Alright, this one can be broken when you really don't want to see someone ever again.....but at the same time, do yourself a favor and tell them in person because the person you're dumping probably falls into one of two categories a) they are alright and deserve the respect of being told honestly in person why you're breaking up with them or b) they are a disgusting human being and seeing the look on their face as you remove all romantic prospects between the two of you will make you feel better about the time you've wasted with them, and perhaps it will teach them to shape up and be a more decent human being themselves in the future.
3) Arguing Online about relationship related things. Please please please take this to heart. I cannot possibly hope to stress this enough. IF you argue with a significant other online your words WILL be misconstrewn, just deal with it in person.
Long story short, dealing with romance online is a bad idea, forms of online communication remove candor and emotion and leave entirely too much room for rampant misinterpretation and manipulation. Anyway, this feels unfinished but I'm gonna go ahead and end it here anyway, have a good night everyone.
When I get home I find myself going through a very definite routine. Check IM's, check email, check facebook. All over the place I now visit websites to find out if anything interesting has happened in my few hours absense from the screen. Not that there's anything wrong with any of these things, it's now ridiculously easy to leave shallow communications for whoever you want, to create groups and drive people to a purpose from behind your keyboard, or to fight for your cause in an internet forum.
My one lament in the midst of this technology has to be the death of the letter as an art form. The form of a letter, the effort involved and the fact that it takes such time to arrive makes it so that whatever is written within has to be something a fraction more lasting than an email instantly delivered or an IM conversation. Every now and again I attempt to ressurect letter writing, it's difficult though, much harder than just typing, you have to think about what you say when you hand write something because it's a lot harder to go back and change your spelling errors. The last letter I wrote was over a year ago, I wrote it to someone very important to me, and I sent them flowers. They didn't speak to me for over a week. Somehow letters have become the artform of stalkers I fear, and stationery caught up with a stigma of creepiness. Ah well, maybe I'll write another letter sometime soon with better results.
Cellphones and Instant Messenger are definitely the two most popular forms of communication now. I enjoy instant messenger a lot, cellphones less so, perhaps because mine sucks something awful. Cellphone conversations are alright I suppose, but whenever I'm having an actual conversation I can't help but keep wishing the person were there with me so we could just be hanging out having the conversation. Instant messenger is handy because you can talk to so many people at once, but by the same token instand messenger and other forms of online communication are rather inappropriate for certain forms of communication.
Arguments, internet arguments, oh God on high how have you delivered us to such times. Internet arguments are about as pointless as regular arguments, the only difference being that regular arguments are generally settled by who has the bigger ego and snuffs the weaker person, meanwhile on the internet there are very few ways for would-be tough-guys to swing their metaphoric dicks around effectively and as such the arguments just go on endlessly. You'll see this in a variety of places, and all the arguments are fruitless since each party is completely convinced of their side and will not listen to evidence to the contrary.
This is the problem I've always had with arguments in general, arguments are something which should generally be reserved for a personal level, like spouses in a disagreement. When people start shouting back and forth at each other about communism vs. capitalism or pro-life vs. pro-choice you just end up with an ugly shitstorm. What generally needs to happen is for each side to stop taking things so personally, to sit down and maybe discuss and try to understand one another better, rather than what tends to happen, which is that neither side actually seems to care about a given issue, they are more focused upon being the one who is right. The minute you start trying to be the one who is right rather than attempting to divine what right is you are in a fruitless argument.
Anyway, I dislike arguments in general, but I find the ones on the internet more tedious since they are more often waged between nerdy social rejects without the confidence to carry on their tirades in an actual forum, as opposed to real life arguments which are far more entertaining battles of ego and wits between two individuals who are both socially adept, posessed of a strong will and who have each read the Asshole Handbook from cover-to-cover. The real life ones are largely as pointless, but at least you get to see who the superior arguer is and get some mental ass-kicking entertainment out of it.
The second largely innapropriate set of dialogue to pursue online falls into a vein which I will refer to as Bleeding Heart Bullshit. This is a slightly inaccurate title, but it's catchy so I'm keeping it. What I'm talking about is dealing with romance online, I'd like to list a few big NO'S in my book and give brief reasons as to why:
1) Asking someone out online. To be honest I've always thought the idea of "asking someone out" is absolutely ridiculous. You ask someone to go somewhere with you, don't ask for the "going out" status. Status is a sham and it's bad enough to cling to such notions. But if you're going to ask someone to be your boyfriend/ girlfriend I think it's really best to do it in person. I mean, really the only excuse to do it online is if you just don't get the chance to see them for an extended period of time, and if that's the case then....should you really be 'going out'?
2) Dumping someone online. Alright, this one can be broken when you really don't want to see someone ever again.....but at the same time, do yourself a favor and tell them in person because the person you're dumping probably falls into one of two categories a) they are alright and deserve the respect of being told honestly in person why you're breaking up with them or b) they are a disgusting human being and seeing the look on their face as you remove all romantic prospects between the two of you will make you feel better about the time you've wasted with them, and perhaps it will teach them to shape up and be a more decent human being themselves in the future.
3) Arguing Online about relationship related things. Please please please take this to heart. I cannot possibly hope to stress this enough. IF you argue with a significant other online your words WILL be misconstrewn, just deal with it in person.
Long story short, dealing with romance online is a bad idea, forms of online communication remove candor and emotion and leave entirely too much room for rampant misinterpretation and manipulation. Anyway, this feels unfinished but I'm gonna go ahead and end it here anyway, have a good night everyone.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Overrun by bandits
The past couple of months have been challenging. To say that I've been short of money is akin to saying that Stephen Hawking has a modicum of difficulty going one on one with Shaq these days. I've held a job for over 3 months without being paid due to my lack of identification, my final check from my last job got lost in the mail, and to top it off I've had difficulty recovering funds lost due to a stolen checkbook. I've had other problems, but these are the ones which I feel stand out most to the public. My other major public problem came in the fact that I wasn't signed up for classes and had been mistakenly removed from the records system at Temple. Wubbos.
In the past week I have gotten the majority of this sorted out, 2 weeks from now I should receive a nice sized paycheck from Barnes and Noble, in another 2 weeks I should receive the final check from my other job, and I signed up for classes 3 days ago. I've had some time to think lately while doing various tasks at Barnes and Noble, I'm very much in love with the notion of repetitive manual labor as meditation by the way. The past few months have definitely been much more interesting without any money, I've also found that when I don't have any money most of my other problems dissappear. Girl problems have been at an all time low, I've been applying myself with my writing a lot more, although to be honest that has really waned lately. I'm actually looking for someone to help me out in that sense, just to read the stuff I write, criticize and prod me to continue. I suppose what I'm really looking for is a friend who can act as my editor, only I wouldn't pay them.
But back to my original point, most of my other problems have dissappeared while I've had no money, and it got me thinking about the roots of our problems. When it comes down to it almost every problem I've ever had can be found rooted inside myself. Overthinking, overanalyzing, overreacting, all of these things stem from a boredom, from an idle mind and too much time on one's hands. Whenever there's a single defined problem or task to accomplish, other problems fade to the background and sort themselves out, or even cease to exist. With this in mind I'm wondering if perhaps I would be better off continuing with my financial problems rather than trading them in for social ones. I've always been comfortable with financial difficulty, to be honest I really don't even believe in it, I'm confident that finances will not be the death of me and I've always posessed the bravado and ingenuity to obtain the things I desire without having any money. In contrast social problems are my crippling downfall. I spent the better part of last semester in a bottle after getting dicked around by a girl (This terminology is actually completely false, as stated before practically all problems are self-inflicted, but it sounds better to say that you are drinking your way to oblivion for love or romance or some crap than just saying 'I was drinking because I was a fuckup'), in the end it caused me to lose my scholarship and not take classes this semester passed. Remembering back to those days I can't help but think that not being able to go to the movies weekly isn't so bad.
So.....In light of this I have come up with a solution, as soon as I get paid I'm going to do several things first, purchase an xbox 360. Second, buy gifts for some people I really care about, third , take a bum out to dinner, Fourth, buy a dozen cases of beer, fifth, I dunno.....but pretty much the point is I need to get rid of this money and fast. This post is pretty poorly structured, but oh well. Tomorrow I will being with a new segment of this blog, a segment entitled "Teatime with Trev" which I think it appropriate since that's the name of the overall blog it's contained within. Stay tuned.
In the past week I have gotten the majority of this sorted out, 2 weeks from now I should receive a nice sized paycheck from Barnes and Noble, in another 2 weeks I should receive the final check from my other job, and I signed up for classes 3 days ago. I've had some time to think lately while doing various tasks at Barnes and Noble, I'm very much in love with the notion of repetitive manual labor as meditation by the way. The past few months have definitely been much more interesting without any money, I've also found that when I don't have any money most of my other problems dissappear. Girl problems have been at an all time low, I've been applying myself with my writing a lot more, although to be honest that has really waned lately. I'm actually looking for someone to help me out in that sense, just to read the stuff I write, criticize and prod me to continue. I suppose what I'm really looking for is a friend who can act as my editor, only I wouldn't pay them.
But back to my original point, most of my other problems have dissappeared while I've had no money, and it got me thinking about the roots of our problems. When it comes down to it almost every problem I've ever had can be found rooted inside myself. Overthinking, overanalyzing, overreacting, all of these things stem from a boredom, from an idle mind and too much time on one's hands. Whenever there's a single defined problem or task to accomplish, other problems fade to the background and sort themselves out, or even cease to exist. With this in mind I'm wondering if perhaps I would be better off continuing with my financial problems rather than trading them in for social ones. I've always been comfortable with financial difficulty, to be honest I really don't even believe in it, I'm confident that finances will not be the death of me and I've always posessed the bravado and ingenuity to obtain the things I desire without having any money. In contrast social problems are my crippling downfall. I spent the better part of last semester in a bottle after getting dicked around by a girl (This terminology is actually completely false, as stated before practically all problems are self-inflicted, but it sounds better to say that you are drinking your way to oblivion for love or romance or some crap than just saying 'I was drinking because I was a fuckup'), in the end it caused me to lose my scholarship and not take classes this semester passed. Remembering back to those days I can't help but think that not being able to go to the movies weekly isn't so bad.
So.....In light of this I have come up with a solution, as soon as I get paid I'm going to do several things first, purchase an xbox 360. Second, buy gifts for some people I really care about, third , take a bum out to dinner, Fourth, buy a dozen cases of beer, fifth, I dunno.....but pretty much the point is I need to get rid of this money and fast. This post is pretty poorly structured, but oh well. Tomorrow I will being with a new segment of this blog, a segment entitled "Teatime with Trev" which I think it appropriate since that's the name of the overall blog it's contained within. Stay tuned.
Saturday, January 6, 2007
I love you so much
So I'm on my break from work and feel I should share this anecdote. I'm often asked questions by girls along the lines of "what's it like to date you Sam?" sometimes this is asked with a look of interest, and sometimes it is asked with a facial expression of incredulity and fear. This story is for those belonging to the second group.
I'm completely in love with a girl, and I haven't seen her in over two weeks except for a short time on new year's. She's been sick and stuck at home and it's really sucked, she sent me a text message one night saying that she couldn't get to sleep because she was thinking about me, which was really awesome because I was experiencing the same thing. Long story short I really care about this girl, and tonight she's coming back to the city and we're hanging out.
Now I'm on my lunchbreak for work and arrived home to decide what I would eat. What I have chosen to consume is a 2lb can of Country Style Baked Beans and two open-faced grilled cheese sandwiches. I feel it's time to put this love to the Ultimate Flatulence Test. If she's still around after tonight I'll know it's true love for certain.
Some come on now ladies, who wants to date the Trev?
I'm completely in love with a girl, and I haven't seen her in over two weeks except for a short time on new year's. She's been sick and stuck at home and it's really sucked, she sent me a text message one night saying that she couldn't get to sleep because she was thinking about me, which was really awesome because I was experiencing the same thing. Long story short I really care about this girl, and tonight she's coming back to the city and we're hanging out.
Now I'm on my lunchbreak for work and arrived home to decide what I would eat. What I have chosen to consume is a 2lb can of Country Style Baked Beans and two open-faced grilled cheese sandwiches. I feel it's time to put this love to the Ultimate Flatulence Test. If she's still around after tonight I'll know it's true love for certain.
Some come on now ladies, who wants to date the Trev?
Friday, January 5, 2007
Pimp My Vaccuum
So I totally forgot to actually write about what I wanted to regarding QVC in my rush to get to work this morning. Last night my roommate and I sat down to watch some QVC, as is our custom on rare occassions, QVC can really be pretty hilarious in the wee hours of the morning. Tonight though we tuned in just in time for a showcase of some new bra, I forget what it was called. Anyway, we watched in silence for about 10 minutes, during which time they were explaining how these bras worked. The whole time I was sitting and just marvelling at the level of technological development that has gone into the female undergarment industry, I mean seriously some of the stuff they were explaining sounded so ingenious that it must have come from some MIT engineering grad.
My roommate watched in a similar silence and told me what he had been thinking about later. Apparently he had a rather different reaction to my astonishment at the technological end of the show. My roommate told me how amazed he was that women wear underwear. He stared me right in the eye and said something very similar to "It's like they do people things....you know, like regular people do." Aparently in the 10 minutes of watching this QVC showcase my roommate had stumbled upon the fact that women are actual functioning human beings, as opposed to just being antagonists, extras, background npcs, supporting cast, red shirts, whatever terminology you want to use.
It's long been a theory of mine that a lot of the hatred and misunderstanding that exists in the world stems from the fact that people do not recognize one another as being people, as I have said before, we all use labels to simplify people and negate the reality of their existence, maybe we could all take a page out of my roommate's book and take a minute when we judge someone to realize that hey....that person put underwear on this morning too.
My roommate watched in a similar silence and told me what he had been thinking about later. Apparently he had a rather different reaction to my astonishment at the technological end of the show. My roommate told me how amazed he was that women wear underwear. He stared me right in the eye and said something very similar to "It's like they do people things....you know, like regular people do." Aparently in the 10 minutes of watching this QVC showcase my roommate had stumbled upon the fact that women are actual functioning human beings, as opposed to just being antagonists, extras, background npcs, supporting cast, red shirts, whatever terminology you want to use.
It's long been a theory of mine that a lot of the hatred and misunderstanding that exists in the world stems from the fact that people do not recognize one another as being people, as I have said before, we all use labels to simplify people and negate the reality of their existence, maybe we could all take a page out of my roommate's book and take a minute when we judge someone to realize that hey....that person put underwear on this morning too.
Not a real person......A QVC shopper
I'll admit I've purchased something from QVC before, it was a power washer that could aparently clean anything from decks to concrete to children's faces. I think it might actually remove children's faces though so don't go trying that without reading the instructions. Regardless, I bought the power washer for my dad for his birthday, and he stil has never used it. You might think I might be a bit pissed off by this, after all I did buy it for him and the least he could do is use it once. But no, I have no right to be angry, because the reason I bought it for him was selfish and assinine.
Earlier that year on mischief night I pulled pranks on our neighbors, rearranged lawn furniture, moved a for-sale sign, and silly stringed messages onto driveways saying "help, I've trapped in your driveway." Of course as an alibi I had to prank my own house so no-one would suspect (I would like to point out that this was a few years ago, I swear I'm not this kind of person now...). So I sillystringed pretty much my whole house and made a real mess.
Well, all the neighbors cleaned up their yards and houses, meanwhile I was far too lazy to wipe off the walls of my house. As a resul the silly string caked on and became largely irremovable. Finally in February as my Dad's birthday is coming around I see the power washer on QVC and immediately order it so that my dad can clean up my mess from 3 months prior. My mom was actually pretty thrilled, but I think she just liked the idea of having a power washer around. My dad saw right through the bullshit though, he's never touched that power washer and I can't say I blame him. Since then the gifts I get for my dad have improved significantly.
Earlier that year on mischief night I pulled pranks on our neighbors, rearranged lawn furniture, moved a for-sale sign, and silly stringed messages onto driveways saying "help, I've trapped in your driveway." Of course as an alibi I had to prank my own house so no-one would suspect (I would like to point out that this was a few years ago, I swear I'm not this kind of person now...). So I sillystringed pretty much my whole house and made a real mess.
Well, all the neighbors cleaned up their yards and houses, meanwhile I was far too lazy to wipe off the walls of my house. As a resul the silly string caked on and became largely irremovable. Finally in February as my Dad's birthday is coming around I see the power washer on QVC and immediately order it so that my dad can clean up my mess from 3 months prior. My mom was actually pretty thrilled, but I think she just liked the idea of having a power washer around. My dad saw right through the bullshit though, he's never touched that power washer and I can't say I blame him. Since then the gifts I get for my dad have improved significantly.
Thursday, January 4, 2007
When you're here, you're family
My roommate does not want me to screw his sister. Prior to knowing this I really had no desire to screw his sister either, but then that urge to be contrary that exists as a strain in every warm blooded human being kicks in and tells me the idea is hilarious. Unsurprisingly two of my other roommates and their friend Steve from Nebraska has the same notion and it made for an excellent night.
It was New Year's day and obviously the night before had been eventful to various degrees for all involved. I found myself waking at noon to make pancakes for those that were still in the house, I got some cookbooks for Christmas and though I didn't use them directly to make these pancakes, I think their presence allowed me a modicum of additional pancake manifesting talent. I thought the pancakes were nourishing and delicious, but don't take my word for it, simply observe the sparkling testimonials of the hungover slobs who enjoyed them:
"Hey man, nice pancakes" - Graver
"Why's the oven turned all the way up?" - Sean
"You used all the Bisquick..." - Andrew - "And weren't those eggs bad.....and that milk was old"
Well, whatever, despite the supposed lack of quality of ingredients the pancakes were still fantastic, which to me just shows how amazing of a cook I am. Me and Bisquick, we're going places. Anyway, drawing upon the kind of cosmic energy to make those pancakes really took it out of me so I returned to bed. I awoke again at 5:45 and was promptly told that my roommate's parents were going to be arriving soon and that they would be taking us out to dinner. We were extremely let down to find out however that his younger sisters would not be in attendence, which cut our jokes for the night down to about 8% of what they could have been before.
Having just woken up I found myself in the same clothes as New Year's Eve, which just happened to be a dress shirt, thin black tie and black pants, so I slipped some shoes on and went out the door. Outside we found that Sean's parent's car couldn't fit all of us, a shame, but why? I had thought they had such a big car! Oh wait.....His sisters are taking up two of the seats. Perfect. My roommate Andrew tosses me the keys to his car and we head out behind Sean's family.
It's wonderful when Andrew lets me drive his car, I don't have a liscense, but I love to drive so much it's exciting. As we're heading down Broad Street I get the idea that if I want to date/ have relations with Sean's sister/ sisters I will have to earn the approval of his Dad. I decided that in order to assert my Alpha Male status and gain the influence neccessary to peruade Mr. Sean's Dad to this decision I should probably burn him on Broad Street. I get my opportunity when a Police van tries to make a left, switching lanes with a determined grace I willfully cruise far past the SUV containing my roommate and his family.
At this point I think it's all in the bag, but fate was determined to make this a challenging night after all. As I rounded city hall I can hear Andrew repeating something over and over to me, after the third time I decide to listen, he's asking me what the hell I'm doing, then he just throws his hands in the air. Evidentally I had just run a complete redlight with my roommate's family directly behind me. Members of my car panic, what will happen now? The Dad is going to think I'm irresponsible, that perhaps.....I'm a dipshit. At this point though there's nothing we can do, so we decide to find parking.
Finding parking was naturally a challenge and we are impatient people, so after about 2 minutes Andrew tells me to just give up and we'll park down on Bainbridge, which is familiar territory since we often park there while visiting lady-friends. So we head down to Bainbridge and I perform the worst paralell parking sequence of my driving career. Seriously, I've had nightmares about paralell parking and none of them were half as bad as this. I think I put 3 miles on my roommates car just adjusting back and forth.
We get out of the car now and head for the restaurant, we get a call on the way, aparently the family found really close parking and is now waiting for us. Shit. So much for holding onto any of that Alpha Male status bullshit.
From this point though the night takes a Turn for the Trev©. At dinner I introduce myself as Sam, the Pre-Law major. Dressed in shirt and tie and speaking with a British accent no one is willing to doubt me and the family is immediately impressed. Throughout the meal Sean's mom is telling me to get the phone number of the waitress, meanwhile the older sister wants to know everything about everything to do with all of us, and through it all Sean is disowned by his parents in favor of our third roommate Keaton Dubs.
In short the dinner was thouroughly entertaining for all involved, well, all except poor Sean, but I think he liked it anyway. There was a lesson I was going to get to here, but I've long forgotten it, maybe later.
It was New Year's day and obviously the night before had been eventful to various degrees for all involved. I found myself waking at noon to make pancakes for those that were still in the house, I got some cookbooks for Christmas and though I didn't use them directly to make these pancakes, I think their presence allowed me a modicum of additional pancake manifesting talent. I thought the pancakes were nourishing and delicious, but don't take my word for it, simply observe the sparkling testimonials of the hungover slobs who enjoyed them:
"Hey man, nice pancakes" - Graver
"Why's the oven turned all the way up?" - Sean
"You used all the Bisquick..." - Andrew - "And weren't those eggs bad.....and that milk was old"
Well, whatever, despite the supposed lack of quality of ingredients the pancakes were still fantastic, which to me just shows how amazing of a cook I am. Me and Bisquick, we're going places. Anyway, drawing upon the kind of cosmic energy to make those pancakes really took it out of me so I returned to bed. I awoke again at 5:45 and was promptly told that my roommate's parents were going to be arriving soon and that they would be taking us out to dinner. We were extremely let down to find out however that his younger sisters would not be in attendence, which cut our jokes for the night down to about 8% of what they could have been before.
Having just woken up I found myself in the same clothes as New Year's Eve, which just happened to be a dress shirt, thin black tie and black pants, so I slipped some shoes on and went out the door. Outside we found that Sean's parent's car couldn't fit all of us, a shame, but why? I had thought they had such a big car! Oh wait.....His sisters are taking up two of the seats. Perfect. My roommate Andrew tosses me the keys to his car and we head out behind Sean's family.
It's wonderful when Andrew lets me drive his car, I don't have a liscense, but I love to drive so much it's exciting. As we're heading down Broad Street I get the idea that if I want to date/ have relations with Sean's sister/ sisters I will have to earn the approval of his Dad. I decided that in order to assert my Alpha Male status and gain the influence neccessary to peruade Mr. Sean's Dad to this decision I should probably burn him on Broad Street. I get my opportunity when a Police van tries to make a left, switching lanes with a determined grace I willfully cruise far past the SUV containing my roommate and his family.
At this point I think it's all in the bag, but fate was determined to make this a challenging night after all. As I rounded city hall I can hear Andrew repeating something over and over to me, after the third time I decide to listen, he's asking me what the hell I'm doing, then he just throws his hands in the air. Evidentally I had just run a complete redlight with my roommate's family directly behind me. Members of my car panic, what will happen now? The Dad is going to think I'm irresponsible, that perhaps.....I'm a dipshit. At this point though there's nothing we can do, so we decide to find parking.
Finding parking was naturally a challenge and we are impatient people, so after about 2 minutes Andrew tells me to just give up and we'll park down on Bainbridge, which is familiar territory since we often park there while visiting lady-friends. So we head down to Bainbridge and I perform the worst paralell parking sequence of my driving career. Seriously, I've had nightmares about paralell parking and none of them were half as bad as this. I think I put 3 miles on my roommates car just adjusting back and forth.
We get out of the car now and head for the restaurant, we get a call on the way, aparently the family found really close parking and is now waiting for us. Shit. So much for holding onto any of that Alpha Male status bullshit.
From this point though the night takes a Turn for the Trev©. At dinner I introduce myself as Sam, the Pre-Law major. Dressed in shirt and tie and speaking with a British accent no one is willing to doubt me and the family is immediately impressed. Throughout the meal Sean's mom is telling me to get the phone number of the waitress, meanwhile the older sister wants to know everything about everything to do with all of us, and through it all Sean is disowned by his parents in favor of our third roommate Keaton Dubs.
In short the dinner was thouroughly entertaining for all involved, well, all except poor Sean, but I think he liked it anyway. There was a lesson I was going to get to here, but I've long forgotten it, maybe later.
Wednesday, January 3, 2007
The Perfect Cup of Tea
You know what they say; another day another dollar. Though in this case it appears to be another day another blogger. I've never really found much joy in writing online up until now. I used to have another blog, but deleted it because with the people who were reading it, I couldn't actually write anything I cared about at all, all the entries were largely meaningless as a result. I'm sure most of these entries will be equally meaningless, but at least that will be the fault of my life containing no meaning, rather than simply being stifled for fear of being exposed.
Why did I decide to start writing this blog? Is it because Zack Cyphers has one and I want to be able to comment on it in a non-anonymous fashion? Is it because of Hustler's blog which I used to find funny until I realized it was filled with the same cheap humor I use daily and find detestable in myself? Perhaps it is because I am emotionally unstable and have this burning desire to share my inner pain. Maybe it's because I'm under the impression that I'm much funnier than I really am and want to entertain people. Unfortunately none of the above are true, really I just want to further propogate my Trev nickname in an online forum in the hopes that people realize how awesome it is to have a nickname that's just another person's ordinary name.
The first thing I'd like to talk about is lies. Lies are amazing, I mean, just living and listening to people for one day you are bound to hear hundreds if not thousands of them. It's at the point that it seems practically impossible to trust anyone if they say something serious, when you add sarcasm into the mix it is virtually impossible to take anything at face value. I feel as though language has become such a weak communicator on many social levels at this point. It becomes far easier to convey messages through innuendo and body language. After all, kisses, hugs and fists to the face are rarely misinterpreted.
Today I wore a shirt and tie to work, in years to come historians will ponder the reasoning behind it. When asked I told everyone that I have recently been listening to the Danse Macabre CD by The Faint. For whatever reason, this CD always puts me in the mood to dance around with a thin black tie on, I suppose it could have something to do with the album cover, but if I admitted that I think I'd feel a lot less original for it. Regardless by all accounts it seems a fairly bizarre reason to alter one's mode of dress so drastically for an entire day. However, it is in fact the truth.
Later in the day another coworker asked why I was dressed how I was, for whatever reason I decided to lie. Zack started it I think, so I'd like to blame him, but regardless I found myself telling her that my friend had died. That I hadn't come from the funeral because they had died in California earlier in the year but that I had been to visit her parents earlier in the morning. Of course this seemed a much more believable reason, and it should, because it could easily be true. A friend of mine did die earlier in the year in California, and I could conceivably have gone and visited the parents earlier today.
Immediately after telling this lie I thought a great number of things, first I flashed back to Acting class from last semester and thought about the play "Jesus Hopped the A Train," specifically the scene in which the attorney is trying to get Angel to tell a true lie, or a lie based upon truth so that it is more believable. I thought about the scene and realized I had just 5 minutes ago very instinctually done just that.
I've always been pretty big on truth, it's something I think about a lot. I like to search for meaning behind things, and I like to get to the bottom of things. Something I've always said is that in order to tell the truth you have to know how to lie. Lisa's always said the more simple: "it takes a liar to catch a liar" which I like too. Regardless this is how I've justified the improvement of my lying skills as it were.
I really don't lie very often, however I also rarely tell people the whole truth. I remember the last time I was completely honest with someone about who I am, I don't remember enjoying it too much, laying ourselves completely naked before people is scary. For several months I've concealed information using the truth, this is something new I decided to do when I didn't want people knowing who I was sleeping with. I began having two relationships at a time, that way whenever anyone who I didn't want knowing about one of them would ask me about my love life or what I did over the weekend I could tell them the truth and simply play up and only explain the relationship that it didn't matter if they knew about.
How fucked up is that?
The real trouble with lying comes in the fact that after a while it becomes very difficult to extract oneself from lying. This is the first time I've ever really admitted why I've been casually seeing a number of women lately. I'm not a manwhore, I'm not a pimp, I'm not smooth, I'm just hiding the person I really love because I've been afraid. Fear and love, both can motivate us to do so many things, but I suppose that's an entry for another time. I'll finish this later.
Why did I decide to start writing this blog? Is it because Zack Cyphers has one and I want to be able to comment on it in a non-anonymous fashion? Is it because of Hustler's blog which I used to find funny until I realized it was filled with the same cheap humor I use daily and find detestable in myself? Perhaps it is because I am emotionally unstable and have this burning desire to share my inner pain. Maybe it's because I'm under the impression that I'm much funnier than I really am and want to entertain people. Unfortunately none of the above are true, really I just want to further propogate my Trev nickname in an online forum in the hopes that people realize how awesome it is to have a nickname that's just another person's ordinary name.
The first thing I'd like to talk about is lies. Lies are amazing, I mean, just living and listening to people for one day you are bound to hear hundreds if not thousands of them. It's at the point that it seems practically impossible to trust anyone if they say something serious, when you add sarcasm into the mix it is virtually impossible to take anything at face value. I feel as though language has become such a weak communicator on many social levels at this point. It becomes far easier to convey messages through innuendo and body language. After all, kisses, hugs and fists to the face are rarely misinterpreted.
Today I wore a shirt and tie to work, in years to come historians will ponder the reasoning behind it. When asked I told everyone that I have recently been listening to the Danse Macabre CD by The Faint. For whatever reason, this CD always puts me in the mood to dance around with a thin black tie on, I suppose it could have something to do with the album cover, but if I admitted that I think I'd feel a lot less original for it. Regardless by all accounts it seems a fairly bizarre reason to alter one's mode of dress so drastically for an entire day. However, it is in fact the truth.
Later in the day another coworker asked why I was dressed how I was, for whatever reason I decided to lie. Zack started it I think, so I'd like to blame him, but regardless I found myself telling her that my friend had died. That I hadn't come from the funeral because they had died in California earlier in the year but that I had been to visit her parents earlier in the morning. Of course this seemed a much more believable reason, and it should, because it could easily be true. A friend of mine did die earlier in the year in California, and I could conceivably have gone and visited the parents earlier today.
Immediately after telling this lie I thought a great number of things, first I flashed back to Acting class from last semester and thought about the play "Jesus Hopped the A Train," specifically the scene in which the attorney is trying to get Angel to tell a true lie, or a lie based upon truth so that it is more believable. I thought about the scene and realized I had just 5 minutes ago very instinctually done just that.
I've always been pretty big on truth, it's something I think about a lot. I like to search for meaning behind things, and I like to get to the bottom of things. Something I've always said is that in order to tell the truth you have to know how to lie. Lisa's always said the more simple: "it takes a liar to catch a liar" which I like too. Regardless this is how I've justified the improvement of my lying skills as it were.
I really don't lie very often, however I also rarely tell people the whole truth. I remember the last time I was completely honest with someone about who I am, I don't remember enjoying it too much, laying ourselves completely naked before people is scary. For several months I've concealed information using the truth, this is something new I decided to do when I didn't want people knowing who I was sleeping with. I began having two relationships at a time, that way whenever anyone who I didn't want knowing about one of them would ask me about my love life or what I did over the weekend I could tell them the truth and simply play up and only explain the relationship that it didn't matter if they knew about.
How fucked up is that?
The real trouble with lying comes in the fact that after a while it becomes very difficult to extract oneself from lying. This is the first time I've ever really admitted why I've been casually seeing a number of women lately. I'm not a manwhore, I'm not a pimp, I'm not smooth, I'm just hiding the person I really love because I've been afraid. Fear and love, both can motivate us to do so many things, but I suppose that's an entry for another time. I'll finish this later.
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