¬_¬

i use every part of the cow

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 10:18:39 GMT

Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with. Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given.

[info]fistshaker chose these things about me:

1. Comics

I unashamedly love comics. When I have the time- most of the time, since i don't sleep- I keep current with both marvel and dc's main titles, as well as many independents. I also read regularly around 5-10 webcomics, and even had my own for a time. I specialize in comic-style art and layouts and have been associated with several independent comic book projects- most of which never got past the point of concept art, but who cares? it wouldn't be a stretch to say that comics have been a pretty huge part of my life.

Which is why I'll probably knife a bitch if they talk shit about comics.

2. Cigarettes

ah, my bane and my salvation, my demon and my prop. i have this incredible love/hate relationship with cigarettes. my grandmother died of lung cancer, which was directly attributable to her smoking two packs a day. and yet i follow in her footsteps... i started smoking when i was 14, stopped when i was 15, started again when i was 18, quit breifly when i was 21, and am currently trying to quit. I mainly smoke menthols, but shift brands/styles like the wind blows. seriously though. this time i'm quitting.

3. Theater

I did theatre for a while. All tech. I don't anymore, but occasionally get the itch. For a while there, my goal was to join IATSE and do touring productions for the rest of my life... that sort of thing doesn't go away permanently. for various reasons, though, it didn't happen.

4. Sacramento

I live here. For now.

5. Black and/or Leather

I'll admit it, the overwhelming color in my wardrobe is black. I was a goth for a really long time and a theatre tech after that, so, it's always going to be a comfortable color for me. The color black speaks to me on a lot of levels, and, to be quite honest? most of the time I don't feel like putting a lot of effort into wearing an outfit that looks good. Black is no muss, no fuss. I will never be able to own a white cat, but I'm not a James Bond villain. Leather is the reason I can never be a vegan. i love leather. Leather boots, leather accesories, leather belts, leather jackets... give me a guy in a black leather motorcycle jacket and i'll have a tortured on and off relationship with him for a year and a half. No, seriously.

music meme thing

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 21:28:13 GMT

I'm at Liz's reading blogs and I came across this list thing. So, thanks to wikipedia and the power of boredom, i've compiled a list of Best Album For Each Year I've Been Alive. So here we go:

1985 - The Smiths - Meat Is Murder
1986- Sonic Youth - EVOL
1987- New Order - Substance
1988 - the Sugarcubes - Life's too good
1989 - NIN - pretty hate machine
1990 - depeche mode - violator
1991 - the smashing pumpkins - gish
1992 - madonna - erotica
2993 - bjork - debut
1994 - portis - dummy
1995 - the chemical brothers - exit planet dust
1996 - weezer - pinkerton
1997 - daft punk - homework
1998 - marilyn manson - mechanical animals
1999 - NIN - the fragile
2000 - NIN - things falling apart
2001 - daft punk - dscovery
2002 - interpol - turn on the bright lights
2003 - dresden dolls - dresden dolls
2004 - the divine comedy - absent friends
2005 - goldfrapp - supernature
2006 - dresden dolls - yes virginia
2007 - daft punk - alive 2007
2008 - the presets - apocalypso (so far)

hey faggots

Thu, 15 May 2008 21:53:53 GMT

you can get married now.

burroughing

Sat, 10 May 2008 22:52:23 GMT

A paragraph from my paper

"Queer was Burrough's second novel, but it didn't surface until his fame and noteriety had exploded. Originally written shortly after the death of Burroughs' wife Joan, it wasn't published until 1985 due to its open discussion of homosexual relationships. Ironically, the book's direct dealings with homosexuality seem rather tame in the 21st century; there are no direct descriptions of any homosexual acts besides the main character, Lee, having bouts of “the adolescent lust of junk sickness” (83). What one can most take from Queer in the context of this paper is the subtext of longing permeating the entire work. Burroughs had a great talent for writing the extremes of the human condition, with a leaning towards that most familiar sensation to the addict, “want” transmuted alchemically into “need”. Addictive patterns formed the wallpaper of his life, and in Queer he went into extensive detail about the need and lust that can consume one in the throes of infatuation; “an amoeboid protoplasmic projection, straining with a blind worm hunger to enter the other's body, to breathe with his lungs, see with his eyes, learn the feel of his viscera and genitals” (36). While authors had described infatuation before, they usually kept it to either the grand overarching romantic cliché or the spurious claim that the person that was “loved” was the one they were meant to marry, procreate with, be with forever, etc. Burroughs was one of the first authors to describe it as the dirty, grimy skin-hunger that it truly is; the grasping screaming gnawing scratching obsession that is inexorably twinned with physical attraction. Bubbling just under the surface of everyone, palpably present in the rest of his canon, lust aeterna."

warm fuzzies

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 00:13:07 GMT

Arthur sent me this. Fuck drama and ennui, take three minutes out fo your day to look at an adorable kitten.

quoi

Thu, 03 Apr 2008 00:13:09 GMT

In response to Alan Shapiro's essay, Why Write:

[background: Shapiro has just been diagnosed with ADD, and the psychologist that diagnosed him with same has opined that his writing may be compensatory behavior for his condition. S. is none too pleased with this diagnosis.]

"Shapiro's reaction to the psychologist's labeling of his writing as "compensatory behavior" for his condition is similar to many people's reactions to the nihilist philosophy that life is inherently meaningless. "But there must be a reason!" they cry. "Why else are we here?".

It makes a kind of sense; the human brain is currently the fastest processor on the market- too bad it comes saddled with a ridiculously inadequate body. Why did the mind evolve to the point that it can contemplate the meaning of existence when there is no meaning?

Irony aside, the fact of the matter is that in the vast majority of cases, one's life and the actions taken in it are in fact meaningless; nobody in 5,000 years is going to care who made what wingnut in what factory before going home with with person. The concept of "compensatory behavior" is the 21st-century version of "the voice of the gods". Anything can be labeled as being caused by some neurosis or another. Eating is compensatory behavior for feeling unloved. Working out is compensatory for body dysmorphia. Fucking is compensatory for codependency. The point of this response is, everyone spends far too much time analyzing why they do things when they could be actually doing them.

Figuring out why you do things is compensatory behavior for ennui."

Also, I unlocked everything about A. that I'd written as friends-only.

calling all volunteers

Wed, 02 Apr 2008 02:06:17 GMT

My mother needs help moving things from one storage unit to her house. Any volunteers?

....

....

....

Well?

Posted using TxtLJ

Mon, 31 Mar 2008 23:13:31 GMT

MY MOTHER BOUGHT ME A PHONE WHEN SHE RENEWED HER PLAN BUT I DIDN'T GIVE HER CREDIT FOR SAME BECAUSE I AM A HORRIBLE SON. Happy now, mom?

[edit] No, she is not: IT WAS A BIRTHDAY PRESENT. will edit more as needed.

lover i don't have to all is full of love

Sun, 30 Mar 2008 00:08:08 GMT

You know what would be really interesting? A plugin for your music player, or an app or script or something, that tracked your music listening habits for say, an hour or so, and then Burroughs'd up the lyrics of all the songs you listened to, creating this pastiche-poem of the media that reflected your mood after you got fired or dumped or severely injured. Most of the time it would probably be nonsensical, but every once in a while there'd be that gem, that amazing moment where everything synced up and validated that yes, this was how you felt for that moment. Kind of like life.

It's kind of depressing when you realize you can seriously identify with Bright Eyes.

So I've finally jumped on the Of Montreal bandwagon; at this point I'll be toting Animal Collective's banner before the end of spring. My music has been in this state of flux lately, which it always is around this time. Winter, by default, is chipper electropop season, so as to create a bulwark against my low-level seasonal affective disorder, but now that it's not, well, February, I don't feel the urge to grasp at every straw in the universe to prevent myself from imploding. So, I guess now was the right time for the new Portishead to leak...

Speaking of music, I was in a bar yesterday- shut up- and god, I enjoyed myself more than I have alone in a long while. I was surrounded by senior citizens and smoke, Frank Sinatra was on the jukebox and I was just really content. I went outside, looked at the sky, put on The Divine Comedy's "Snowball in Negative" and just started misting up because i was, if only for a moment, living la belle vie. I think that kind of ties together with the last sentence of my first paragraph.

I'm inbetween obligations right now. Lately it kind of seems that I'm constantly that way; I'm not saying I don't have fun with these obligations, but honestly I kind of miss the days where I would wake up at two and do whatever I wanted. Oh well, no rest for the wicked.

degree in evil math required

Thu, 27 Mar 2008 00:34:11 GMT

As re: the music, oh my god random guy next to me if I can hear that mope-rock so clearly you are seriously blowing your eardrums out. Do you want to be deaf by 24? DO YOU?!

Uh. Achem. Anyway.

Let's make a quick post before my japanese midterm- eek, by the way.

I'm finally caught up in nihongo- all it took was the threat of failing the class if I didn't get in all the work like rightnow. So, on two hours of sleep I have done everything- everything- I had missed before. And, it's all kind of perfect, except for that one section where I had to answer those random-ass questions.

I've been v. socially engaged the last couple of nights; monday I went to the depot with Taketa and learned that yes, indeed, I *am* a cheap date, now that I'm not constantly jacking myself up with nicotine. This is both good and bad, because while my tabs will be much cheaper, this also means I might get myself into some... interesting situations. I also learned that apparently I'm over T... that only took three years or so. This came up with my suggestion that if some old troll were to hit on me, I would label T as my totally-monogamous-has-adopted-a-Korean-child-with-me-capital-B-Boyfriend. That coupled with the fact that T and I could probably kick half the people in the Depot's asses (well, besides the lesbians) would dissuade any hopefully bought drinks with a side of a) rohypnol or b) innappropriate touching. But then an "I need an adult" moment DID happen, and... I couldn't do it. The idea just seemed so ludicrous, So it turned into, just, "Yeah, this is my... yeah."

Even as late as early 2007 the idea of even having T be my ersatz boyfriend would have thrilled me to no end, and I would have taken full advantage of that opportunity to act all boyfriendy in the hopes that yes, he would see that I was in fact totally awesome and yes, he would totally date me. Obviously this did not end up being the case, but it existed in the back of my mind for so long that I never thought I would really be over it. In fact, it turned into this weird, I guess, backup crush. I was into T and then I was into Derek and then that went to its sour end, and then back to T and then Logan, usw usw usw. But yeah, I guess that's over then. "Of course, we'll still be friends..."

I followed up the night of faggotry with a night of japanese homework until Susan decided that she was going to take me for late night adventures. I lured Arthur away from his evil math and off we went. We ended up wasting a lot of time in Beto's, that place on Howe(?) and ElCa that's very quickly becoming a staple of ASZ (Also Sprach Zarathustra?) hanging out, before deciding that damned the consequences we were heading to midtown. So we did, neglecting to remember/care that it was at this point 2 AM. We passed Lipstick, the climax of last week's adventures, just as all the hipsters were getting out; again, only using the main entrance. Seriously people. Three doors. Anyway. As it was now officially beer o'clock, we the Gleesome Threesome decided there was only one more place we could really have adventures. Oh that's right. 24-Hour WalMart.

Honestly, this would be a lot more entertaining as a photoblog, but A to my knowledge hasn't uploaded those candid shots of us with cat shelters on our heads and the Fish Riding Experience. Actually, I don't know if there were shots of the FRE, but my god was it surreal. I'm sure he'll phostoblog about it and I guess I'll just post a link to that.

Oh. Speaking of crosslinking between journals...

HI NEW INTERNET FRIENDS. I'M GLAD YOU DECIDED TO SEEK OUT MY OH-SO EXCITING AND ENTERTAINING LIVEJOURNAL ON THE INTERWEBS! DOES THIS MEAN THAT ALL OF A'S CRAZY NET STALKERS WILL START TO NET STALK ME TOO? JEEPERS OH GOLLY I JUST CAN'T WAIT!

Yeah, that vitriolic post about tthhee ppaarrttyy was referenced on the county-famous Diary of Antoine Roquentin and read by several internot celebrities. It even got a comment from one of them! Neat, huh? So you better enjoy my LJ while you can, because if I say the wrong thing now, it might get hackzored by a greyhat. Or, a lolcat. Either or.

Ok. Midterm time. Wish me luck!

booargh.

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 14:30:49 GMT

Day two of not smoking and I've already regained my sense of smell. Once again, i can't help but be repulsed by humanity... The cheap perfume of cigarettes and class paranoia adorn the people surrounding me and inundate my olfactory channels.

as above so below

Sun, 23 Mar 2008 20:44:02 GMT

Quick updates before Susan gets here:

1. Everyone had fun at the party but me. So far as I'm concerned it was a fucking disaster, and disaster's name was Arthur. He was splooging all over the place about his "first love" drunktexting him and leaving some voicemail professing his undying love for A or something. Because of this, I kept getting asked if I was "okay". I fucking hate being asked if i'm "okay". If anything, being asked if I'm "okay" will make me precisely the opposite of "okay". In fact, because of all that bullshit- oh, and he spilled a mimosa on my bed, thanks asshole- I ended up having the most violent urge I've had in months and slapped him in the face. Hard. Well. Almost. I was about three inches off, because I fail at spatial perception, and ended up spilling his drink all over the wee little Katie's tits. She seemed to be okay with it.

2. A also, in between paranoiac texting of Sam about his apprehension of staying over, gave me the worst fucking gag gift ever and refuses to take it back. Let's get one thing straight: I love gag gifts. Gag gifts are awesome. I've gotten some great ones in my time; sex dreidel anyone? But I got, from A, a copy of *nsync's "pop" on vinyl. "I saw it and thought of you", he says. My real present better be astonishing, because wow, what a misstep. By way of contrast, Alaina got me an fantastic gift, a bunch of thriftstore books that look really interesting and my own copy of The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, one of my alltime faves due to subject matter. That's because Alaina is thoughtful and kind. Chip got me an Elvis Costello album, and Susan and Alyx got me an "Open" sign. Which was was very clever of them, I suppose. Mari got me an incredibly basic cookbook, which, well, let's face it, I could use.

3. I haven't gotten anything from my dad. I can't begin to list the reasons that this is depressing, and I know, I know, capitalismcapitalismcapitalism etc, but you're not me so stfu or gtfo.

4. Portishead came out with a new album! Holy shit. It's not bad, so far as I've heard it, and the first track is the most non-portishead song in p-hizzle's history. The album goes back to standard operating procedure about three tracks in but it's a nice switch-up for that nonce.

5. Oh! And I rang in 23 by sharing my bed with a 19-year old girl. I suppose that's better than the way I rang in 22- punching the air on M's couch and vomiting a lot- but still, of all the people that could have been in my bed? Lame.

Okay, S is here. Let the adventures begin.

whenever you want me

Sat, 22 Mar 2008 08:02:05 GMT

I had so much flippin' fun this week.

Monday, I stayed at home. After the experience of Saturday night, which was the height of St. Patrick's Day weekend, I really didn't want to go anywhere near downtown, so I had a quiet night of fixing Brian's computer and then lounging around on the couch.

Tuesday was a different story.

I started my evening by meeting a random acquaintance I'd made in midtown on saturday, to see if I could stand him one on one for a long period of time. About a half hour after we started hanging out, I had the distinct urge for a martini, so I suppose that's a no. Fortunately I cut it short by having Arthur come to Temple and rescue me- earlier I'd encouraged him to join my friend Elise and I at True Love, and so he did and we all settled in for a rousing game of sudden-death Trivial Pursuit. I totally won, because out of the three of us I knew the most about sports. Not saying much, but hey. After that A. and I made a botched attempt to buy Goldfrapp tickets and then hung out at the Doubletree hotel, watching ducks. I totally scooted his not-moped along the parking lot, which was fun. I actually increasingly want one of those; sure, there's no trunk space whatsoever, but they're supercute and wouldn't kill me were i to lose my balance.

We were waiting for Susan, who was up for late night adventuring. So, after I found a trenchcoat, we met up at a shell station and proceeded to head downtown. Our first stop was Press, but the place as absolutely dead. There was a distinct lack of music, a scooter parked on the dancefloor, and five people in the bar. So, we thought up other options, the most interesting of which seemed to be Lipstick. S had been there several times, but it was the first time for both A and I. And it was AWESOMETASTICAL: the second we got in we headed to the dancefloor and just couldn't stop. And we were dancing, and it was hot, and we were dancing, and it was hot, and then all of the sudden it was really hot, and I looked to my left and the club was on fire! The official story was that someone had fucked up the electrics below the stage, but either way I ended up lost in a crowd of hipsters trying to get out of the club through the main door- even though there are three exits. So, with Lipstick done with insanely early, we three compadres began looking for a 24-hour walmart, as there is nothing better to do at 3am that's not mexican food of dubious quality. That turned into an hour of driving around and singing along with various Strong Females In Love before S inevitably dropped A at his scooter and me at my house.

A left his bag in S's car, so it was my job to meet up with same and grab it before I went to his house for a taco night. You know, I have to say, it's kind of fun being the follower sometimes- the whole visit was pretty much controlled by him. "room time" "star trek time" "taco time" etc. In fact, I was so out of control that i ended up falling asleep on his couch. I kind of hate falling asleep around other people, unless other people are already asleep... unless I really trust the person. So basically I really hated that I fell asleep, because much as I enjoy A as a person and regardless of what we've done I don't truly trust people until I've known them for years. I also hated it because i missed the last half of the film "Thomas Amoureaux" which I was really enjoying before I. You know. Fell asleep.

The next night we had promised S to go to this night called Redemption, which is, as you'd expect, a goth night. Which, you know, cool, whatever, but one problem: A hadn't any makeup and I hadn't any goth clothes anymore. S came over around 5.30 or so and we bummed around my place for a bit listening to Crystal Castles' new eponymous release until it was time to go to A's. At same, we engaged in a brutally fast dressing session wherein S was exposed to more gay-man flesh than she had been in a while- I see her in various states of undress all the time, but I think this is the first time in years she's even seen me without a shirt- and, A wearing a suit and I decked out like Deckard, we headed out. S, for the record, was scandalously hot as a naughty librarian.

We entered to silence and various goths milling about waiting for something to happen, and spent about three hours that way. I had fun, but aside from discussing the finer points of Star Trek and A finally getting rid of that noxious callertune, nothing of importance happened. As eventually happens when you hang out with S for more than a day, we ended up at a 24-hour mexican joint, and that was when I got the call.

It was Brian. His new bird got out, and it was on the roof. Apparently B is afraid of heights, but he was going to have to get over it anyway, so we spent a couple minutes being Encouraging Friends and telling him to grow some balls and get up on his roof. The call was ended, the meal went on, and around 20 minutes later or so, I got the second call. B. "I can't... I can't get down", he said, sobbing. He was absolutely petrified. My first reaction, I'm sorry to say, was to crack the fuck up, but I kept a lid on it. The exchange ended when I couldn't be a good person anymore, which was when I said "Baby, darling, I'm going to give you to A", handed off the phone and dissolved into a giggling fit. A and I passed the phone back and forth because we both couldn't stop laughing, and we assured B that we'd be there. Cut to B's. I scramble up the admittedly rickety ladder to the roof and make it up in about five seconds, placing myself on the most stable section of unoccupied roof I can find. A holds the ladder and we eventually get B down, in a manner not unlike coaxing a cat. S comes up, we chat for a while, and then we leave- laughing our asses off the second the car starts. S and I drop off A, A gave me the lamp he promised me (but not the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster t-shirt; I want to be touched by His Noodly Appendage, damnit!) and I get kicked out of the car when I get home.

Work today was super fun because this constant socializing has afforded me the lack of sleep that is the only true catalyst for treating things as if they were at all times completely surreal and absurd. Which they are, but there's this strange human instinct to treat absolutely everything one does as if it were A Very Important Meaningful Thing. People wonder why I'm so apathetic about things sometimes and passionate at others; it's because of the fact that I'm constantly battling against that instinct. In 5,000 years it's not going to matter who wins this election, who's fucking who, what artist is doing what strange new thing, etc. The ephemerality of life is a beautiful thing and we spend far too much time trying to make it into this solid, unelastic thing because we avoid the concept that it's not going to be forever.

That being said, McCain is batshit crazy and Obama is looking really appealing.

Tonight I've been kind of wishing that time really was a 4-d crystal hanging in a transdimensional fluid or whatever. It would be so convenient to know where you were going to end up with people, I have to say. I had a dream the other night about tesseracting- that technique L'engle discussed where you "wrinkle" space and time t get where you'd rather be- and it really made me want to be able to, I suppose, look up the history slash future with some people. It'd make things a little more bittersweet but also much more upfront; for example, if I'd known that eventually my dynamic with Kyle was going to turn into him trying to scam me for money and bitch about things I could not possibly care about even tangentially, I wouldn't have taken our breakupnotbreakup nearly as badly as I did. Honestly I think that's why I still have the urge to contact Logan- he's the only person who ever dumped me that hasn't proven himself to be a total asshat, by which I mean a human being. He exists in memory for me, which will probably at one point change, but for the time being his only strikes are a ridiculous beard and a mtchbox twenty lyric on his myspace. Compared to some of my other exes? Not bad at all.

(A, if you're reading this, no, I'm not referring to you. You proved yourself a practitioner of asshaberdashery long before you dumped me :P)

Anyway, tomorrow is the big birthday shindig. Oh. I should probably talk about that for a bit.

So Mario is apparently done with me. He's 20, and while I can't possibly get into his head and figure out his decision making process, it probably has something to do with the face that A was sick of his asininity and decided to cut him off and I must have inadvertently "taken A's side" . Aside from stupid events that I can't do anything about, don't know the veracity of, and happened in the past anyway, I have no qualms with either of them, and think they should both stop taking the things they bitch(ed) about while speaking of each other so seriously. But nobody listens to meeee... anyway, M called me to tell me that no, he couldn't come to the party, because he'd be in SF. He then asked if A was going to be there, which he ~~better~~ will be, and then proceeded to give reason after reason why he couldn't be there, hee hee, hope you have a good time, etc. I'm okay with this. It's one less person who won't bring booze and proceed to drink all of mine, as my lovely housemate so fittingly put it. In general, he's nice and everything, but I have a ton of nice friends, nicer friends even, and they can't top Showgirls in terms of sheer insipidness (no mean feat, but somehow he did it). So, ciao M. That didn't last long.

Wow, that was the longest post I've written in months. Okay, so it's 12.58, and that means sleep time for Zero. I hope to see many of you at the party tomorrow!

elucidations

Sun, 16 Mar 2008 23:26:10 GMT

"so it's 2.43 on a saturday night and i'm posting on livejournal. awesome.

so, as regards my last post. I was in the car with mari on our way to A Few Good Men, and I noticed my scarf felt different. It didn't smell like a scarf of mine. It turned out the reason why that was is that the last person to wear that scarf was A. Which got me started thinking. As many people know, I have a problem with train of thought drift. So I started thinking about A., of course, and then I started thinking about when he wore the scarf, and the situation that was going on at the time between he and an old acquaintance of his, and then I started thinking about a similar situation that just happened to him regarding an ex of his, and then I started thinking about exes of mine, and then it just hit me:

I've never really been in love.

Now this requires some explanation. In my estimation being "in love" with someone is different than having love for them. It could be argued that I have loved many people; Mike springs to mind, as does Will, Kyle, etc. However, in the case of Mike, it was unrequited love, first off. Unrequited love isn't so much a state of being as it is a pattern of behavior which perpetuates itself due to the feelings you have for the person in question. It isn't so much love as an self-perpetuating addiction. In the case of Will... I really want to say that I was in love with Will, but I know that's not really the case. I wanted to be in love with Will because I wanted to be in love with anyone, anyone who would stick with me that is. I'm not discounting my relationship with him; a lot of growth happened while we were together. but it wasn't love. Kyle, same thing as Mike. I loved him but he didn't love me, and it turned into this bizarre pursuit rather than any kind of healthy relationship."

So, after I typed that I decided that I was going to do the only thing that always makes me happy, that being small-scale construction. I know, you thought I was going to type "booze it up", but no, I actually made a bedframe. I haven't slept on a bed with a frame regularly in about five years, and it's a welcome change. I'm uh. not quite sure how much weight it will support, but I guess I'll find out... and it's not like I spent money on it if it were to break. So yeah, am I awesome or am I awesome?

Posted using TxtLJ

Sun, 16 Mar 2008 02:27:31 GMT

You know, I don't think I've ever been truly in love.

we have 200 couches

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 23:50:15 GMT

22 march is the big birthday bash. So far, only 20 or so people are confirmed to show up, but there's still two weeks or so to pester and coerce people into celebrating the fact that i'm still alive. I've compiled about 5 hours of music for the purpose of listening to and dancing to, and aside from decorating stuff that i'll have to do the day of, that's all i really can do.

Wow, I have a headache.

I put A. in charge of the music in my room. I know, about five seconds after I proposed it I realized how weird it would be to have my ex in such an integral part of the party (the hipster room) but the fact of the matter is that since we broke up it's the best relationship i'll never have. I don't feel like I have to filter the things I tell him, or try to impress, well, anyone, now. And getting rides home on a moped is pretty super cool, I gotta say.

So, I got my bike back, but the frame is still fucked up, so I'm transportless. Hopefully it's just something simple that can be hammered out, but I need to get it fixed up anyway.... i dunno.

On the plus side? having a phone that works is the business.

as re: new phone

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 01:57:58 GMT

So, so far I like it. Kind of a lot. I'll need a couple weeks of time to determine if this is actually the case, but so far it's effortlessly sending both text and picture messages and the sound quality is miles better than my old phone. I suppose the real test will be tonight at the show...

So yeah, call me or text me and let's see if this thing has the guts

Posted using TxtLJ

Thu, 06 Mar 2008 17:34:37 GMT

Question of the day: can the philosophy of 'sound mind in a sound body' survive in burgeoning world of posthumanism?

holy fuck, i'm that guy

Thu, 06 Mar 2008 00:40:39 GMT

It suddently occurred to me in my english class today that everybody but the teacher hates me. I mean, I really should just contest the course (editor's note, after typing that line I emailed the teacher asking how hard that would be, response should be imminent) seeing as I've taken it before and know, well, everything that's going to happen. The only reason I didn't pass this course last time was due to that online schooling bullshit, etc etc, look up some old posts idf you want to find out. tl;dr.

Plus there's the fact that I'm probably one of the most well-read students in the entire department, not to mention this class.

You know what I can't wait for? When I'm the dumb one in a class I'm interested in. I absolutely adore the feeling of being around people who seem infinitely smarter and more erudite than I am, and specialize in Subjects I Find Interesting. my friendship history (and dating history) reflects that. So, I imagine once my scholastic history finally reflects that, I'll be in heaven. and have no friends.

Sweet.

Breakin' Up

Wed, 27 Feb 2008 23:35:51 GMT

So, it's officially over. I have to say, though, that if all my breakups were like this, I wouldn't be nearly as bitter as I am. We basically followed our pattern of having an argument, being all stilted, etc, and then doing something completely different. In this case, we trawled midtown for a couple hours, culminating with a stop into The Beat (record store for non-locals). And it was just seamless. We were doing all the things we did when we were together, we were acting the same ways (well, without hand-holding etc, which I actually think is kind of obnoxious in public) but we weren't. And it was just as good. I'd been dreading him breaking it off, and it was like this sword of Damocles hanging over our every interaction. Then it DID fall, and it cut through all the bullshit we'd been serving each other, and we could just "be". It was, really, everything my higher urges had been wanting for the last month, basically, and all I had to do was face my fear. Then, he uploaded like a gig of music for me. Score.

Also, Mari's scary good at predicting relationships. I'm never ignoring her advice again.

As far as my lower urges are concerned, yeah, fuck them. Who wants to help me make Anti-Sex League stencils?

on the matter of rain

Sun, 24 Feb 2008 19:57:18 GMT

It's over. It's passe. I'm really fucking tired of it.

I say this because I am (still) sick, and i really don't want to walk in this pouring disgusting scary rain. fucking buckets, pouring down, ugh.

I called in sick to shitty day job of doom for the first time on Thursday; it was pouring rain, i felt like death warmed over, etc. The next day I also felt like doom, but they "needed me" so I took the hourlong trip out there and proceeded to clean things for six hours in the rain because there were no customers. I need the money and all, but that's just ridiculous. Went to the show, ended up making my way downtown.

Mario and his friend Shawn had asked me to hit them up when I made it to an area that wasn't in the middle of nowhere, so I ended up meeting them at this place called Luigi's- insert joke about Mario/Luigi here- and then going all the way down to M.'s house and back up to Hamburger ~~Mary's~~ Patties. It was really quite bizarre; there was the three of us and everyone else seemed to be there to celebrate someone's birthday and engage in "naughty" polymorphous perverse dancing. I did my trademark bass-baritone new-wavey/heavy metal vox version of "Toxic" and they clustered around me, doing whatever stereoheterotypical persons feel is walking on the wild side. Awkward. Afterwards, we went back to M.'s place, S. left, and I crashed on the couch.

The next morning was really fun and productive, I felt. M. and I decided that in honour of his living on Whiskey Hill (no joke!) we were going to slum it for the entire day (and watch Little Britain Abroad, which is kind of like slumming it). So began a day of thrifting (found nothing we wanted, but plenty of ridiculousness), trawling the 99 Cent store for cheap shit, and of course, since M. is SUPER LATINO NUMBER ONE, a visit to the scary-ass carniceria for mexican sweetbreads and HECHO EN MEXICO Coca Cola. Which, I found, is actually kinda awesome. I hadn't had actual Coke in quite some time and it wasn't nearly disgusting as I remember it being. Funny how when you actually use sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup your drink doesn't taste like an oil slick.

After our lower-class adventures we went to Ben's to finally get my copy of Say You Want A Revolution back, and, since it was literally across the street, stopped into True Love for a minute or forty. He played with his iPhone, I made wacky out there art with the convenient True Love Markers- which would be a great name for a band- and we didn't talk much at all until it was time to drop me off at my casa.

This is where i'm going to take a quick moment to speak on the subject of how I love being silent with people. I really like, once a friendship has been established where you know you CAN talk about things, just sitting around with someone and not having to constantly engage in witty banter. Mari and I do it all the time; she'll be knitting, i'll be working on something, every once in a while one of us will pop up with some bon mot, and so on. if you never pass that stage with a person where silence is completely abhorrent, it's probably not going to end up being a terribly fruitful friendship. Please note that said silences do not work well on the phone.

Anyway.

So then I did the show again, and proceeded to have a quiet night of playing Scrabble and reading Stuff White People Like, which is apparently the new funny blog. All in all, not a bad couple of days.

Also: Goldfrapp's new album comes out on tuesday. Not bad if you, you know. Like Goldfrapp, at all.

tl; dr (essay)

Thu, 21 Feb 2008 06:47:52 GMT

The Sea Bass Is Excellent:
A Treatise On Postgenderism

Everyone has had the desire to change their identity. Certain popstars have made entire careers out of it. The desire for change rears it's head in many fields- fashion, music, art, even social mores. social mores may be in fact where the undercurrent of subversity is most obvious- even fifty years ago, the social differences between men and women were vast and myriad. the gender binary, though, is such an overarching figure that until now, any attempts to dissemble it have been the work of outcasts and freaks: drag kings/queens, transsexuals, the intersexed, all are seen as an other. Postgenderism, however, is a school of thought that seeks to destroy all social gender mores and even, in extreme proponent's views, gender itself, all of which are viewed by the school as all inherently detrimental to mass culture. The keys to this are changing cultural perceptions, child-rearing techniques, and even the human body itself.

As with many things, gender socialization begins early in life. studies have shown that given the option, most male children and female children will graviate towards “gender-appropriate” toys- girls to dolls and musical instruments and boys to trucks and guns etc.- than non-GA toys (Campenni). it is also known, though, that non-gender-”appropriate” toy playing does happen- witness the stereotype of the boy who plays with his sister's dolls, or the girl who plays softball. The stereotypical view of these people, at least the majority, is, again, freaks and outsiders, “sissies”, “dykes”, and all sorts of other stigmatic adjectives. Interestingly enough, though, it's more socially acceptable to be a girl acting as a boy than a boy acting as a girl: witness the changing nature of women's fashion to include suits, pants, and other traditionally male paraphernalia, while the men's fashion lines always tragically ignore the miniskirt. The postgenderist sees that, and many other things, as a problem.

The solution to this, according to the extreme postgenderist, is voluntary gender-option, that is, the ability to switch one's gender from male to female to anything in-between, at will. It sounds like a science fiction concept, but it's becoming increasingly real in prospect; witness the changing nature of gender-reassignment surgery. Once the butt of a joke or a chilling cautionary tale, GRS has become so acceptable worldwide that Brazil made it part of their national health-care plan (Associated Press). Many countries haven't made so far a progression, but it's still a fact that worldwide the face of the average gender-reassigned person has transformed from someone dying because their breast implants are rejecting to the person down the block who's successfully filled their need to be who they truly are.

An alternate image of the gender-reassigned person, of course, is “the pornographic actor”.

Due to the obvious sexual nature of rejecting gender norms, one way a kind of postgenderism has gained a hold in the social conscious is to creep in in established arenas. The most obvious example of this has to be pornography. Far from the hushed titters of “blue movies” and underground porn theaters, these days pornography is a multibillion-dollar industry catering to almost any taste, and it's all just a Google search away. due to the influence of the internet showing all the myriad tastes of the average individual, the concept of “mainstream” pornography, so obvious in the 80's or even the late 90's, has become as blurry as the soft-focus lenses it used to be filmed in. The concept of a transgender actress- a “chick with [a] dick” in the parlance- is nothing new, as well; in such an environment, postgenderism is incredibly easy to find, be it in the metaphorical (actors taking on male roles and female roles as they wish) to the physical (actors taking on male bodies and female bodies as they wish).

Another place the concept of postgenderism can be found and discussed in within the body-modification community. “Body-modification” is kind of a catchall term; it can be used to describe any intentional form of, well, body modification, down to a pair of earrings, or braces. However, if someone describes themselves as “part of the bodymod scene” they've probably gone far beyond that: subdermal implants1, RFID ink2, even voluntary amputation can be found by a quick look over Body Modification eZine. Some people see their mods as a purely aesthetic decision, for example someone who decides to pin their ears to look more like a Tolkien-style elf. Others see it as a transhumanist experience, as it being an activity to take control of the bodies they were born in, and of course in this sort of environment there would be an obvious overlap with transgenderism and postgenderism. BME recently ran an article with Ashley Crawford, a postgender tattoo artist that had a quote I hope will shed more light on this:

“...The basis of a post-gender identity is being aware that nothing is essentially male or female other than the reproductive organs, and that even these can occasionally be other than male or female; for example, they can be intersex. Anything else that appears to be gendered just seems that way because of stereotype and social convention.” (BME)

That quote essentially sums up the postgenderist's way of life. A postgenderist can range from simply a person who asks questions like, “Why do we refer to cars as “she”?” to a hardcore modder that's chosen to make their body exactly what they want it to be, regardless of where they started out.

With all this talk of post- and trans- etc, I feel it's important to at this point make a comment on the differences between postgenderism and transgenderism, and that's where another quote from Crawford can be used to great effect:

“Post-gender is absolutely not a transitional point between genders. That phrase implies that there are two proper genders to travel between and post-gender is somewhere you stop off on the way. The gas station of genders, if you will. Not a proper sort of place in itself.”

There's much consternation between the two groups, actually. The concept of transgenderism is based on the belief that one was born with the wrong set of genitals, while postgenderism opines the notion that there's no wrong set of genitals to have. Some transgenderists feel that postgenderists put too much of a science-fiction light on gender, and of course the whole point of postgenderism is to if not destroy at least make less important the distinction between sexes that make transgenderism possible. Of course there are still more groups that want to explore this last frontier of sexual mores- genderqueer groups, genderfuck groups, etc.- and there's bound to be, in such a currently marginalized set of collectives, personal conflicts, ties and the like.

As of now, the biggest evidence of a quasi-acceptance of postgenderism in the major social unconscious is the popularity of what could be described as womanly men and manly women. The archetype of the Dominant- a traditionally masculine term- Woman can be found anywhere one cares to look, as is the image of the suitedly submissive male. One thing's for sure: even if the hybrid-theory utopia of the postgenderist doesn't come to be for a very long time, the circles of Men and Women are steadily, if subtly, becoming a Venn diagram.

Bibliography:
BNet. "Gender stereotyping of children's toys: a comparison of parents and nonparents
." . Jan 1999. Business Library. 10 February 2008 <http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2294/is_1_40/ai_54250823>.

Wikipedia. "Transgenderism.". Wikipedia. 9 February 2008 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/postgenderism>

International Herald Tribune. "Brazil public health system to provide free sex-change operations
" The Associated Press. 17 August 2007. 10 February 2008 <http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/08/17/america/la-gen-brazil-sex-changes.php>
Body Modification eZine. 18 February 2008. BME ModBlog. 18 February 2008 <http://modblog.bmezine.com>

BME. “Ashley Crawford: Post-Gender." Body Modification eZine. 10 February 2008 <http://www.bmezine.com/news/pubring/20070804.html>.

Posted using TxtLJ

Thu, 14 Feb 2008 22:37:51 GMT

Car just jumped the curb and i had to jump out of the way to not die. Best valentine's day ever.

Posted using TxtLJ

Thu, 14 Feb 2008 00:31:19 GMT

My english teacher just accused me of 'vastly overusing the colon'. Discuss.

Posted using TxtLJ

Tue, 12 Feb 2008 16:26:14 GMT

Omg rofl. Just got popped in the jaw at SDJOD. Hahaha ow.