GTBKA: October

Is cold.

Saturdays at Satellite.

I am at Satellite Coffee and am struggling to find the energy to write this post. I am writing though, because it makes me feel good and it is on my weekend checklist. Which, if you are curious, is something I scrawl in red colored pencil on a 3x5 card every friday for the past two fridays. It looks like this:

I am writing because it feels good. It feels like I am sharing and it feels like I am creating. It is expressive and I need some more of that. "I am an artist and that I something I have recently lost touch of" - Santana Lopez.

Last weekend the annual International Balloon Fiesta started in Albuquerque. Due to happy coincidence, our friend Becky was in town visiting and I didn't have to go alone while Kari worked the morning shift.

It was awesome.

And now I want to share a still from a video I took while a man moved his balloon across the parking lot. In the video he declares himself the modern Queen of Sheba and tells the story about how he found his wig. The punchline...

he got it at a Walmart in New York. The video is awesome but I posted this still to Instagram, believing it one of the most awesome photos I have ever took. Hot-air balloon, flames, fire symbol on the basket, Santa-figured man in blue wig and hawaiian shirt forging ahead, flying in the face of gravity. Needless to say it did not get a million likes (which it clearly deserves) and so I have chosen to repost the photo, to live eternally on this blog, that gets even fewer visitors than my Instagram.

Growing Up

I am now 33 years old, and it feels like much time has passed and is passing faster and faster every day. Day to day I have to make all sorts of choices about what is good and important and fun, and then I have to live with the forfeiture of all the other options those choices foreclose. And I’m starting to see how as time gains momentum my choices will narrow and their foreclosures multiply exponentially until I arrive at some point on some branch of all life’s sumptuous branching complexity at which I am finally locked in and stuck on one path and time speeds me through stages of stasis and atrophy and decay until I go down for the third time, all struggle for naught, drowned by time. It is dreadful. But since it’s my own choices that’ll lock me in, it seems unavoidable — if I want to be any kind of grownup, I have to make choices and regret foreclosures and try to live with them.

David Foster Wallace

I have never held a job for more than ten months and as my Dad says, I have never made any "real money." What I take that to mean is that I have never had an annual income greater than twenty thousand dollars (he does my taxes and would know this). I am ok with this.

However, now things are different. I have a full-time job that I am planning on keeping, as long as they allow it, for at least the next three years. I have been employed since January and have the potential to stay employed through December. Meaning, I may just break that 20K barrier.

All of that is great news. However, the truly difficult part is coping with the reality of a 40+ hr a week desk job with three weeks of vacation a year. Three weeks! I am used to at least three months and on top of that, there is no end in sight. This is what life is really like.

GTBKA - Public Radio

It has taken a while for me to come around to the idea. Not because I didn't like public radio but because I wasn't aware of it. Well, I was kind of aware of it. I knew it was primarily talk radio and that it was something a good liberal was supposed to listen to. Anyways, now I love it and even have some radio programs that I will try to tune in for. It it almost like the olden days before TV and America had yet to be "discovered."

So, on to brass tacks. There are two public radio stations in Albuquerque, KANW and KUNM. The former is the official NPR station of Albuquerque and the l latter is run out of the university. At this point I should note, all of the following is based on my observations and no actual research was conducted to arrive at these opinions, which, is also kind of a good general note for my blog as well.

KANW was the first station I found that streamed... or... broadcasted... national programming, mainly, Morning Edition, which is what I want to listen to on the way to work. The trouble was that I would be back in the car at the end of the day and it had seemingly had switched to a Spanish radio station with a predilection for mariachi. When I first moved to Albuquerque I didn't even mind it. I felt like I was really living in the southwest. That was how I discovered the truth behind the transformation. At five o clock KANW becomes an all-request music station. Listeners can call in and literally request any song of any genre they want. It just so happens that the only people who call in are fans of Spanish music. 

As much as I appreciated this, I would occasionally want some All Things Considered on my drive and that is how I found KUNM, a few ticks up the dial. They had the advantage of playing NPR programming both in the morning and evening. Furthermore, KUNM has some unique programming that you can only get away with in close proximity to a university. At noon there is a breathy radio hosts who likes to get high and share her favorites pieces from the latest jazz albums. She is always inviting us to an experience, which I like. Also, I have a feeling that at midnight I might tune in to hear Madame Psychosis on the radio. Which, I also like. 

On a final note, yesterday Kari and I took my car out for Sushi. The radio was tuned to KUNM and it was a little after 8:00 PM at which point, apparently, KUNM switches to a primarily Spanish Music radio station. 

GTBKA - Michael Thomas Coffee

I am in a coffee shop on the southern end of Albuquerque. The place is called Michael Thomas Coffee and they brew have two unique brews, one medium and one dark, at any given time. Each brew has a name and a history, although, today one is called Test Brew #5 (the other is called Tanzanian Peaberry, which is also their wifi password). The girl working tells me they are having a contest to name it. If I write down a potential name on one of these post its and they select it, I could win a free pound of Test Brew #5. 

There are four others inside the small shop with me - it is raining outside. One man with a new apple MacBook Pro. It has six stickers on the cover, mostly related to biking and coffee. He is bald and has the one of the bushiest beards I have ever seen. He is also wearing a teal t shirt. 

One woman. She has a lightweight down vest, thick framed glasses and dark brown hair. She is reading a book that has graphs in it. Not positive graphs but negative ones, graphs that slope downward in a troubling way. 

One man looks as those he has lived in New Mexico for at least the past 100 years. He skin is tanned, wrinkled and looks as though it could keep out any type of weather. He small but content I imagine. He is drinking the darkest roast, black with extra grinds. He has a hat that might be found in a Route 66 museum - the type they advertise for a hundred miles along the hwy - with a placard - first trucker hat to travel across country. 

One guy. He is reading a book I cannot see and is friends with the girl behind the counter. They are likely university students, comparative literature majors, or something fun like that.

I ask for the Test Blend #5 in a mug "for here." The girl rings me up, points to an array of mismatched ceramic mugs on top of the espresso machine. Help yourself, free refills. Chet Baker is playing on the stereo, it is grey outside and I feel at home. 

Albuquerque: An Introduction

Several people have asked me what I think about Albuquerque. I almost always reply the same way. Albuquerque is interesting.

Kari gives me a hard time for this. First she points out that I always say that and second she points out that it isn't really saying all that much. It doesn't tell people what they want to know, which I guess, is whether or not we like it here. 

I say interesting because I am intrigued by all the new things that come with a new city but also because I don't want to take a side of whether or not I like it here. This is primarily due to the fear that I may fall on the less-than-pleased side of the scale. Saying that I do not like a place is troubling, one for the reality of it, and two for the fact that it goes against who I am, which is to say, an optimist.  On my first trip out here my dad told me a story of my grandfather always telling him to look for the good in each new place they moved. Some cities my dad and his siblings we dragged to were kind of boring places to live (the Central Valley has an abundance of these) but they were closer to good skiing, which my dad was quite fond of.

For the most part I have done a good part finding the good in Albuquerque and not focusing on things it lacks. The city has an abundance of outdoor activities, great food, a bike trail that leads straight to my office and, probably most importantly, amazing job opportunities for Kari and I. On a recent trip to Portland, Tanner and I shared a good laugh over how when it comes down to it, geography is quickly out matched, priority-wise, by other factors in life. There may come a time when we push it to the top of the list but for now we are in New Mexico and we should make the best of it. 

All that is to say that there on not things I would immediately change about Albuquerque with a magic wand but to list them would be an exercise in negative thinking...

Things I would change immediately and irregardless of the cultural consequences:

• Crime and Drug Use: albuquerque has its share
• Drivers: it is ok not to think of your own safety when turning across five lanes of traffic but it takes either a jerk or an idiot to show such flippant disregard of others lives. 
• Public spaces: why is there no where go walking other than neighborhoods? The most hip part of town straddles a literal highway - Route 66 - and has sidewalks that barely allow two people to walk side by side. 
• Poverty: it humbling but mostly heartbreaking to see a population deprived of education and opportunity in the ways that parts of Albuquerque are. I don't know either the cause or the solution but when I told Eric that Albuquerque was interesting he bit his tongue remembering a home stay here while on choir tour. 

Sleep Deprivation is Pernicious

I woke up around 1:18 AM expecting my alarm to go off at any minute. What I mean by that is that I woke up and was awake. As opposed to many mornings where I wake up still asleep for some time.

I did some browsing on Patty (the iPad), which is never a good remedy for sleeplessness. I got up, stretched and grabbed some couch time with Cindy (the Kindle). I tried going back to bed but just ended up getting up a little bit later, resolved to start my day whatever the clock said. So, I showered in the second bathroom (we have two!) even though the water pressure doesn't hold up. I used used the Trader Joe's tea-tree tingle shampoo/conditioner as well as Dr. Bronner's peppermint soap, the result of which, my whole body is tingly. 

Doing my best to keep quiet I collected a bowl, a spoon, some cereal and some milk from the kitchen and retreated to the second bedroom / office (we really are spoiled in this apartment). If Kari had walked out she might have mistaken me for a thief, albiet one unusually concerned with breakfast items.

Now it is 4:23 AM and I am in the second bedroom / office. I know I should go back to bed and try again. I am also keenly aware of effects this will have on my day. It always happens in the slightest way. I will forget that I didn't get my required eight hours of sleep and be overcome with despair. Literally nothing in life will excite me and the thought of work, in any form, fills me with dread. I think this is called depression. However, like I said and for whatever reason, I will forget the cause. Which only deepens the emotions.

Sleep deprivation is pernicious. That is best word I can come up with.

Maybe today I will wear a ribbon around my pinky. If I can find a pink one I can tell people it is for breast cancer but really it is just to remind me "this is water."*

If you are wondering why I can't sleep, it is not a question I can easily answer. Now, all distractions aside and morning routines finished, I am forced to think about a reason. It could be work-stress. Yesterday was not a great day at the office. It could have been bad dreams. Just last night I had a dream that Craig was a psychopath and trying to murder me. What is worse is that I tried to kill him before he could kill me. I didn't succeed and psychopath Craig ended up killing me. What kind of crazy person dreams are these!

(Personal note to Craig: I am really sorry for my subconscious. I promise our relationship is sound and you are the least likely of all my friends to kill me. If anyone were to kill me it would probably be Drew)

(Personal note to Drew: I am sorry about that last comment I just thought it would be funny)

In any case it is probably a combination of stress, restless sleep and general restlessness at my last few days. I have not accomplished enough of the tasks I wanted to and ended up falling asleep just a few hours after getting home. I have noticed that many of the nights I find it hard to get to sleep, or get back to sleep, the thought that I am not fully using days is the main culprit. The temporary answer is to get to getting. Hence my current wakefulness. The long-term answer is more multi-faceted: organization, exercise, a peaceful heart, and so on. However, my guess is that these are life long pursuits and that every now and then I am going to wake up at 1:18AM.

* This is a reference to a commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace. It is really worth a listen and I won't give anything away by telling the joke which goes something like this: 

Two young fish swim by an older fish, the older fish says to them, "Hi Boys, how is the water?" One of them answers that it is fine and then, a little while later the other asks, "What is water?"

Other Photos, Other Days

I love having a camera on me all of the time.

But not all of the photographs make sense to post to Facebook,

or Instagram.

So here are some of my favorites,

from the past few weeks.

NXSW

It is the Friday before Christmas. I am still working, just remotely and currently in a busy coffee and crepe shop in the south of Salem. However, I am allowed a short break mid morning. So I am going to take 10 minutes to tell about my recent flight experience.

Southwest, is not just my new favorite airline but one of my new favorite things.

To start, last weekend Kari and I were working out logistics of our upcoming trip. Finding it easier to fly into San Diego I set out to see what it would take to change my flight from Ontario to San Diego. Having an absolutely horrible experience with changing flights in the past, I wasn't hopeful. However, southwest does not charge a fee for changing flights, just the difference in cost of the tickets, which was about twelve dollars.

I didn't realize this immediately but it was twelve dollars cheaper to fly out of San Diego. So, a few days before my flight I change tickets to San Diego and I actually get money back! I am sold at this point.

Finally, the day of the trip arrives. I show up with two bags, check them sans fees, and get on the plane. At this point the pilot announces that the flight is only about half full so that we should feel free to spread out and take up as much space as we like.

I had to transfer planes in San Jose and when I arrived I discovered that the flight was delayed by about half an hour. I didn't mind but when the delayed plane shows up and everyone gets on board the captain comes on and tells us that because we are awesome, having boarded so quickly, and because Southwest is awesome, scheduling flights with a fifteen minute buffer, we are actually going to be on time.

The Warby Parker Home Try-on Kit

I replace my glasses every two years or so and wanting a change in my occasional look, I ordered the Warby Parker home try-on set.

Basically, you pick out five sets of frames and they send you this package. You can then try on all five sets and ideally, order your favorite. Warby Parker is one of my new favorite companies because they are charitable (doing the Tom's thing but with glasses) and literary (Warby Parker is a hyrbid name from two obscure Kerouac characters)

Oh that is a picture of Redlands A.K. Smiley Public library. I just threw that in because I am about to get real superficial. Plus now that my phone has a decent enough camera, I take pictures everywhere I go and hey, isn't that a cool library.

These were my three favorite pairs... it takes almost nothing for me to drop what I am doing and take glamour shots of my self.

These are the same three photos, in a different pattern and juxtaposed against a picture from Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room.

3AM Checklist

1. Bathroom - because, well you know.
2. Glass of Water - because hydration is important.
3. Instagram - because my friends have awesome lives.
4. Flipboard - it is like Pinterest meets Reddit. Or possibly a baby that can beautifully organize all my favorite feeds... why a baby... I don't know.
5. McSweeney's Internet Tendency - because I am still in my twenties. I know the minute I turn thirty I will cease to be amused and think "these kids can't write."
6. Facebook - because, well you know. It is 3AM.
7. Catan, the app - because I just tried falling back asleep and can't.
8. Flipboard again - because I rolled the robber. Maybe I missed something.

Renaissance

I am resurrecting this blog. It might be a short rebirth - truth-be-told it might only be tonight - but I am turning again to this outlet because I think it fits me better than the rest.

Recently, I updated my life with the purchase of an iPhone and have been trying really hard to get into Instagram. Ideally it is the perfect social tool for me because it relies on images, which was the usual filter I would apply to browsing Facebook. However, right from the start I had some user issues, mainly, how to make my life look as interesting and appealing as possible. I know I am not alone in this.

However, this is a problem I could eventually get past. My life is awesome after all. But no, after applying just the right filters to my life, I then faced the issue of how to caption the damn thing. I wanted to write too much, to be witty and ironic, to tag the right people, to be appropriately conscious of the medium. The whole exercise just became too burdensome. You might think this all a little too neurotic and you would be right: #introvert #maybe #neurosis #somethingsneverchange #highschoolmemories

Then came the coup d'etat. Instead of inspiring jealously in all my friends, my 14 followers, which is a really, really questionable goal to begin with, I started feeling the tendrils of jealously* and I began to envy the awesome lives my friends are living. They do have awesome lives after all.

This, wanting to be a part of everything, has always been a struggle for me. I know Ryan and I have had conversations about it. I know it will undoubtedly continue, much like my use of Instagram. Hopefully I can stop at the happiness I feel seeing my friends successes and move on with more productive things, a category to which this blog belongs.

*Are tendrils of jealousy a thing? For some reason the only bridge in my mind between feeling and jealously is tendrils.

Strange Happenings in El Segundo

I am at a Starbucks in El Segundo waiting for my friend Evan to arrive at lax and without anyone immediate to talk to I am turning to this old thing.

First of all, I have been here about an hour and a half. A little over an hour ago started frappachino happy hour. Right before it happened the staff started really panicking and I overheard one of them saying that hopefully all of the girls don't show up right at three. I thought this was funny until an hour and a half later, the Starbucks is fully inundated with teenage girls giggling and sipping their outrageously flavored frappachinos. At least a hundred have came and went so far, it is amazingthis preteen propensity for flavored coffee slushies.

Second, I am minding my own business, doing some steel design homework when out of the crowd of girls steps a handsome looking man in a grey suit, no tie. He asks if I am doing design work or homework. I say HW and he says that's great, where do I go to school? I say UCI and as it turns out he is both a structural engineer and UCI alum. He invited me to stop by the office and I think I will, definitely, at least the next time I am in El Segundo, getting squeezed out of a Starbucks by teenagers needing a frappachino fix.

Professor 1

"This is a sparse matrix, a sparse, matrix. And mathematicians... they like."

The first professor I want to tell you about is a faculty member in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department. He is at least a head shorter than me and always wears tan or blue slacks, a striped dress shirt and a fleece jacket. He is Chinese and did his undergraduate and first graduate degree in China and then his second and third graduate degrees at UCLA. I only share this so you will know he has a bit of a heavy accent and is pretty much brilliant. 

He makes me thankful that the whiteboard is planar because if it was multidimensional, I am sure he would write in 3D. As is, by the end of class the contents of the whiteboard make my brain explode. He never erases, has the habit of enunciating with the DryErase marker and the even worse habit of placing the marker tip on the board, starting to walk, scanning the board and finally connecting to two bits of relevant information together. 

My favorite thing about Professor 1 is that while he rarely takes a breath while lecturing, seriously he talks continuously (if you really think about it this is amazing), he has moments where he gets completely sidetracked with a philosophical or serious personal thought. For instance, last week he was lecturing and made a note of a mistake made by the author of our textbook. He then pauses for a moment, a longer moment than he has all night, frowns at the screen and says, quietly and to no one in particular, "it's ok... everyone makes mistakes sometimes."

Bonus Pictures from Eric and Arisa's Wedding

I should be studying right now but am just having too much fun reminiscing about the weekend. Instead I thought I would share a little bonus with all of you who still glance this way every now and then. 

Here are some of the pictures from last weekend that didn't make the cut for the facebook album (although I am not sure why, there is no sixty-pic limit anymore... anyways). If you have not seen the facebook album and didn't know that I was in freaking Asheville, North Carolina, well I was and here are some pictures.

 

Clearly I am the only real pro photomaker

No don't, you are so ugly when you cry

 

 The undeniable allure of the iPad

 Drew, way to mess up the spacing

 

Groom in the background, dummy in fore

 "Whether we are super rich or dirt poor (but hopefully the former)..."

 

 "Arisa, you are not a Disney Princess but I love you anyway."

 Arisa: This is magical

Eric: Who invited that guy (just keep smiling)

And then we had to search for the reception... twenty one people never made it.

"Is that a PoTAeTOE!"

 "I am confused, what else do you want from us."

 

 Huaw!!!

 

Evan: Hi I am Evan.

Guy: Please stop talking to me. 

 En route to part II of the reception, clearly no one knows who this guy is or how he is related to Eric and Arisa.

Arisa: God this is good

Eric: We were supposed to cut the cake first (I am so embarrassed, why does she always have to attack cakes with her hands like that) 

 Ryan - you better not let this one go.

Bradie - you just made love to the camera all night.

Cuddlefessst 2011!!

Something changed in the dynamic

Love amidst chaos.

 If we just had a boat, you and me could sail away.

 And wouldn't that be awesome.

GTBKOC: Diamond Jamboree and Kula Sushi

One night Kari and I were out searching for a Japanese restaurant when we stumbled upon the Diamond Jamboree shopping center. We originally headed there for one restaurant but found that one busy, luckily, we had stumbled upon the Diamond Jamboree center where every restaurant is an Asian restaurant (with the notable exceptions of a bakery and a Yogurtland) and the grocery store, H-mart, is an Asian grocery store.

Tonight I returned with good friend Brandon Woods. We went to Kula Shushi Bar, a revolving sushi bar. You sit either at the bar, or at a table with direct access to the bar. The bar itself consists of two conveyor belts that slowly revolving, bringing new plates with different types of Sushi. Each plate cost two dollars. Brandon was not phased, he had been to a rotating sushi bar in Poland or something cool like that.

I was blown away.

Last Day of Summer

Technically, today is the last day of summer, the equinox being tomorrow and all. However, yesterday was my last day of summer. Classes began today. More on that later.

Late in the afternoon I decided that the last day of summer should, in some way, be commemorated. It was easy enough to decide on how this might be done.

This summer I spent the majority of time in Irvine, working near anonymously from my apartment, trying my best to reconcile the numerous changes taking place in my life. When work was done and my apartment became too suffocatingly hot, I would walk around the surrounding neighborhoods to cool my head.

Yesterday it seemed approapriate that I do the same and I set off toward the peak of the housing develipment directly west of my apartment. The development is called University Hills and is properly equiped with well lighted walk ways, playgrounds, dog parks, people parks and all the amenities you would expect from the ideal Orange County development.

University Hills, unfamiliar as it is with crime, petty theft and the like, has at least two grassy knolls equipped with two Adirondack Chairs. One I discovered on a previous suburban hike and the other I discovered last night. I can only assume the existence of others. It was the former I set out to find with the thought that I might sit upon that suburban throne, gaze into the oblivion of Orange County and  sort through the different pieces of my life.

However, as Tolkein would have it, it is a dangerous thing stepping out one's front door. I ended up talking to Eric Conwell, about change, relationships, developments, career growth and the difficulties of being part of the elite (iPad owners). Before I knew it I was at my destination and had yet to figure anything out.

As I sat there and watched dusk creep over the eastern horizon, a three-legged dog hopped up to me. "Don't worry she is a friendly three-legged dog." The woman was middle-aged and very kind. Apparently, I was in the dog's spot. They came there every evening.

The dog's name was Gracie and she lost her leg last May. Cancer. She was going through Chemo at the moment in the form of two pills twice a day. She was ten years old, a black lab, and the woman had got her as a puppy. All things considered, Gracie was doing pretty well and managed her handicap rather - this is terrible, but I can't think of another word - gracefully.

The conversation was wrapping up and I was struggling with what parting phrase I should use. "Nice to meet you" was wrong. We never introduced ourselves. "See you later" was inappropriate. Then, as I reached for a third possibility the woman said "Come on, Gracie," and to me, "Good evening." And it was.

Big Freaking News

Guess who is getting all of his textbooks electronically!?!?!?

It was not the best day of my life. But it was close.

A Brief Look Into My Apartment

Right now, at least it is clean. I have been living here almost four months and am just getting moved in.

It is very functional.

 

The apartment is technically unfurnished but the tables, chairs and sofa don't belong to anyone currently living here. I don't know how they got here or who they belong to but I can guess why they were left.

This is Rafa's plant. It is the one decoration he has in the common spaces of the apartment. He left for two months and asked me to water it occasionally. I told him I was not the best care giver for his plant but he said it would be ok. I took this yesterday so I guess it worked out. When he came back he told me why it is growing  up like that. No room for roots. I didn't know what to say so we just stood there together and looked down at the plant.

Down the hallway to the right is the bathroom and to the left is my room.