Sunday, August 31

It Was Just Like the Movie...well, not really

No, we didn't rent out a suite and throw a big-ass party with prostitutes, pimps, and an archenemy trying to ruin the impending marriage, but it was close. Well, not really. By and large, the bachelor party went off without a hitch and we even hit both John Barleycorns. I hate the scene and wanted to hold on to my cash, but for a special occassion such as this, we were a-okay. Hmmmm...here are the lessons:
- Jim is still on 'Jim time.'
- The bar across the street from the baseball field tries to turn into a club after the game, all the ladies showed up...and for some reason I thought it was a good idea to leave.
- Walking around with twelve drunk guys in a city where public urination is frowned upon can get tough at times. Luckily the gas station clerk didn't seem to mind that we didn't buy anything.
- The windy roof still made for a decent break for a pizza dinner....unfortunately, we didn't need to buy three twelve-packs. My 'fridge is stocked with about 20 from that mess.
- Groom was totally excited to go to the gentleman's club as early as possible.
- We showed up at the place too early, all of the employee's were snakes.
- The millionaire dancer with the glasses forced about six dances on our group. The Groom twice...uh...and I still don't know if anyone paid for that last one.
- We were there for less than an hour and people blew a lot of money.
- The groom wanted to see dancing college aged girls...then he got tired.
- The marathon finished at 1:30, but me and jim still made it out for another drink...the post 2 am bartime messed with Jim's head.
- A good time was had by all.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Thursday, August 28

The Cube

The GameCube arrived in the mail, which means my anti-social habits will be productive in the hand-eye coordination world. Well, for now. My first game is Metroid. I was always a fan of that metroid series. Especially in the first game where if you beat it enough times, or fast enough, Samus turned into a hot chick. What an ironic twist, eh? The only thing so far that I learned about the game world now is that everything works on 3D plane. I sucked at those games with my friends so this is a new learning experience for me. How valuable playing a 3D game is to my life, I'm not sure, but this will be a good way to go. Anway, the first game in any system usually has a place in my heart (besides the mario games). With NES, it was Gradus, with SNES it was Pilot Wings...and now...its Metroid Prime. Congratulation! A winner is Metroid Prime!

With the impulse spending came an impulse trip. At 7:45, tonight, I decided to run out to Best Buy to get some shit for the GameCube. The trip seemed far away and would take a while, but it only took me 80 minutes. I hauled ass while I was walking, but now I know....I can hit any big, evil chain store in the area and get back within an hour.

The weekend is near....

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Tuesday, August 26

A New Mission

On a weird impulse, I decied that I was going to learn "Classical Gas." I searched for a Tab and discovered the .ptd file. Tabs written into these files are read in Power Tab Editor. This editor gives you the ability to "create tablature scores that can be printed out and played back via MIDI.B." I'm going to say up late tonight working on learning the first half of Classical Gas. If I get anywhere to getting the whole song, I'll actually record it for you to hear.....now, when people jokingly make a Simpsons reference and ask me to play "Classical Gas". I will. This will be awesome. I've been meaning to get back to playing classical style guitar for a while...almost to the point of buying a classical guitar.

Mars is out tonight. Down here in the city, it's the only reddish dot you can see in the sky. I wonder what it looks like against a backdrop of stars....cursed city lights.....

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Monday, August 25

On Fire!

Just another late-summer day. You wake up and the temperature is in the '70's and the morning breeze is comfortable. You get on that bus and the day appears to be that of those comfortable, temperate summer days. Then you go outside for lunch and realize that its much hotter out. Then you leave the office and its boiling out. You just want to see a little rain, but it never shows up. Yep, just another late-summer day...Luckily today was a rest day. Stayin' in to do laundy with the A/C box on was the prudent choice.

Going to to the laundry room, I happened upon a sale pitch for the condos in the building. We had the salesperson, an older woman her husband, and their son and/or son-in-law. The nice salesman makes a few comments about the views from the units and the men ask a few questions. Except for the woman....who looked at me like I crawled out of the sewer. Her judgemental eyes gave the look: "oh my, they let people like that stay here?" Don't blame me for doing my laundury while wearing a sleeveless T-shirt, it was totally hot in the building. I guess she expected this place to be a sixteen story country club. My ass it is...she's got no idea. Meanwhile, all I could do was laugh on the inside...ha! ha! ha! What a bitch.

I tried to adapt this page to CSS style. I figure I'd half-ass it and do the quick fix like everything else I've done on this page. It didn't quite work out that way. Oh well, i'll figure it out eventually. Don't run away now, these tables can't be that bad. I'm not looking for validation because no one has asked me for it.

My Friendster fakester has been suspended. I assumed the alias David Lee roth and amassed almost 300 friensters. If you're familiar with the scene you'll know what I'm talking about. Well, the founder said that he would clean up all the 'fakesters' and I apparently hit the list. Curses!

The role of The Girl has been vacated. No pity, it was totally 100% mutual. However, as with all of these types of agreements, there's a bit of sadness...well, of the bittersweet kind of sadness...we can now focus on ourselves now and be better people because of this...it's time to reassess....

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Sunday, August 24

Um...You Didn't Really run 5 sub 8 Minute Miles, dude

I got up this morning and did what I set out to do. I had a consistent 'long' run of five miles. At the end, I checked my watch and noticed that I ran them rather fast. I mean, I set a goal of sub 9 minute miles, and I came in with a minute quicker pace. It didn't feel like I was hauling ass. Perhaps I'm just busting into the shape? Well, I got back in, relaxed and did the math via Yahoo Maps. It turns out I ran a half of a mile less than five. This is what I did: I ran a half mile south of the main road, turned around and headed north. When I got to the northernmost point of my route, I calculated in my head that I was 1.5 miles north of the main street. That sounded like I would have a total five when I was done. Uh...I guess judgement could get cloudy when you're in the hot sun dehyrdrated as all hell....heh.

This lazy weekend was exactly what I needed. For the next two months, I'll be running around the midwest and the country. The big events before October 31st include: Yay Area Trip, a Bachelor Partry next week, Minnesota wedding (pending), Roomservice Rehersals...Somewhere in there, I'll get to see The Girl....somehwere in there, I'll lose my head.

I got my tickets to the Bay Area today. The four day weekend will cost me less than $250 for the whole trip. How could I not go next month? I'm looking forward to it. More about that mini-trip will follow.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Saturday, August 23

The Return of the 'Fro and Wearing my BluBlockers at Night



The humidity of the summer and my recent hair farming has openend the window for me to 'fro my hair. I don't do this for work (anymore) so nobody in the corporate dungeon would recognize me. That's good since I don't really care for valuable 'networking'. Now the glasses...that's something I used to do during the summertime back in college. Add some asianman mustache shadow and I look that much more hilarious. Anyway, my buddy Mike picked me up one night, took one look at me, and said: "ha!ha!ha!ha!...you look like bruce lee in the '70's." He was kind of right....but I don't have bad chinese '70's hair...yet.

Last night we went to live band karaoke. As usual, it was a good time. The deal is this: you get the lyrics sheet, the band starts, and you let 'er rip. No cues, no prompters, just a sheet of paper and your knowledge of the song. People get on stage to belt out their favorite rock songs. Some people try to emulate the original. Others turn it into something else. I personally dig the heavyset guys who get into Iron Maiden and Ac/Dc songs. I sang Van Halen's "Dance the Night Away." With screetches and what not. Next time I sing a classic Van Halen song on stage, I'll throw David Lee Roth quotes like "That's not a microphone in my pocket, I'm just happy to see you!" or "the only band that puts apple juice in their Jack Daniels bottle is Quiet Riot!". All I was able to get out was: "Can you hear me?!" Even though only one out of a 100 would get those references...it's a must do. Yeah, total classic action.

Today's much needed agoraphoic laziness and boredom bring you, a new directory: Noche. Every so often when I head out at night, I'll take pictures. Usually they're pictures of people at bars, or people walking down the sidewalk. I jokingly thought it would be a good way for me to remember my weekend nights, but I don't really rage like that anymore. Anyway, if you take a look at the page, you will get a random shot from the nightlife. The page refreshes itself to another picture (or the same one) every fifteen seconds. Why not use a standard album? I figure it would be a boring album to browse. I mean, the collection is mostly pictures of groups of people and there exists no artistic value. In this format you get to see only a few at a time, which is all you need to see...heh...just kidding. Consider it a peek into the "goin' out version" of the 1700 to 300 world (do the math)...

Speaking of which, I've wasted a lot of time resizing my pictures for web use. By resize, I mean create a copy resized to 400x300 at 300 dpi while keeping the file size below 25k. I think i've spent a few hours total repeating the following cycle: 1) opening up photoshop; 2) opening the image file; 3) resizing the image; 4) saving it for the web. Only today did I think to myself: "Hey ed...uh, why don't you find a program that can automatically resize images?" Stupid me...I could saves minutes of my life now! So I looked around and found the Mihov Image Resizer 0.8. It can resize, convert, and rotate pictures for you with the click of a button. Once you figure out how it works, it cuts down the resize time. Not only that, if you use a good enough image to resize, you can get a pretty good copies. The Noche folder is proof.

Nintendo. I decided to upgrade my home entertainment options and I purchased a Gamecube. It was kind of an impulse purchase. At the same token, I've been planning on getting a post SNES video game system since 1997. Something told me this was the right time. Yeah, I know, I just went on vacation...so I should be holding on to my cash. Well...yeah...but...that's okay...I've promised myself that after my 25th birthday, I'll turn the screws, watch my budget, and save more money. Then I think to myself: I'm not 25 for a few months yet...uh...no, wait...I should enjoy the money before my finances get shackled with mortgage payments, property taxes, car payments, car insurance, any type of other loan, condo association fees, gas, high electricity bills and the like. I should accumulate a few toys before I can't play games anymore....and if you have a similar situation, you should too (don't worry, I've got something in the bank).

I haven't had a lazy weekend like this in a while. I'm not sure what to do with my time...but my legs are too sore to run today. Maybe an adventure could be afoot....or just that five miler tomorrow.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Thursday, August 21

I'm melting...well...not really

It's way hot. I enjoyed a long busride home in a hot bus without air conditioning. I didn't think it was that bad until I felt the chills. Wow. I thought that last week's vacation weather would prime me for the heat, but it was different today. I guess I'll have to jack that electricity bill just a bit higher. So much for a run tonight.

Last night I trekked over to my friend's house. He lives west of the loop. Well, in a span of seventy-five minutes, I rode four trains (two extra because I forgot which direction one of the trains took around the loop) and waited on a desolate corner for ten minutes for my friend to pick me up. It wasn't that 'scary' but the neighborhoods nearby are. I was in the middle of the hospital district, so that could be the best place to be. Note to self: just walk the damn three block tunnel.

Wanting to be different again, I decided to give the latest mozilla browser release a try. The previous version would always crash (I'm an XP user) and format HTML code while I was in edit mode. The early returns say this new brower may work out after all.

Not much else is going on in my head right now...

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Tuesday, August 19

Insomniahhhhhhh!

I've been up late the past two nights after getting a restful nine hours of sleep upon my return from the trip. Wha? Well, I finally found a program that automatically creates web-albums. The program also uploads the files to your site for you. Its very easy and I can avoid learning a whole new mess of code in the process. Not only that, image browsing has become much, much easier. I considered making each image directory feature the same template, but since I've been up too late these past two nights, I don't really care which one I use anymore. Some of the albums actually show the camera settings I used...heh...it probably detracts from the album, but I'm a nerd and won't be changing it. I've also wasted a lot of time resizing most of the pictures from an average of 70k to 20k. It doesn't matter for the broadband users, but I wanted to save some space. Anyway, thanks to J-Album, you can browse the images folder with ease.

Since I got sick of all the crashes and thirty second ads on my Launchcast station, I broke down and subscribed to Musicmatch platinum. I can request any artist that comes to mind, and either play the artist, or songs and music related to the artist. For example, I can get my daily David Lee Roth fix whenever I want to (it used to come on every other day at 3 on the dot with launchcast). I think it's worth the $5 a month. Then again, I could be wasting my money. Oh well...I have seven days to try it and so far...it seems like a keeper. The only drawback is that it slows down computer performance quite a bit. As a result, other applications are slowed down and I can't print the gigantic analyses I make at work. Oh well...that's the price I pay to break up the monotony of the day, I guess.

The lack of sleep and sudden appearance of allergies led to a headache today. I mailed it in and passed on my planned run today. That sucks because I should be getting on the horse with this marathon training deal. We're less than eight weeks away from the day and I have yet to run more than 4 miles at a time. Shit.

Since I stayed in, I did get to see that new Fox show they keep hyping. I think its called the OC or something. I wouldn't have gave it any mind but I read the Sport's Guy's column on Espn's Page 2. The guy talked about enjoying bad tv like this. I have to agree...its bad TV...but hilarious to watch.

Time to Crash.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Monday, August 18

Leftover chinese is back from vacation!

Yes, yes. I'm sure you missed me, but sure didn't miss sitting in front of a computer screen at all hours of the day. In fact, coming back to the city seemed harder than I thought it would. I guess getting away from the big city atmosphere was more enjoyable than I had anticipated. Perhaps I'm not cut out for this style of life. Then again, I probably just needed time away from my cubicle to enjoy the slowed down life, clean air, and tropical summer weather of suburbanesque Port St. Lucie, Florida.

Hmmm...what can I tell you for now? Well, I could waste your time telling you things like what I did each day, the things I ate, or how the plane rides were...but this isn't a diary. In Leftover Chinese style, I present you the short lessons and pointless observations I learned and made:

- As soon as we hit the beach for our first visit, storm clouds gathered and it rained. Could this have been an omen about the things to come? Nah...it was just a little rain. In fact, the weather was manic as usual. It would be sunny, it would rain, it would be sunny, it would rain, I scratch my head.
- EPCOT wasn't as lame as I remembered it. I conclude that the park is for very small kids and adults. Although the future according to the 1990's was fun, the worlds portion was much better. However, as a kid I thought the golf ball thing was cool on its own. With the evil white glove and glossy vegas style letters, it seems a bit more cheap.
- The nine screen Canada video is straight from 1982 and I hope it doesn't change. Unfortunately, me and The Girl were the only ones who actually turned around to take in all nine screens. Most folks stared at the front three. My theory is that the more you tend to look around, the wider view of the world you have. I could be on to something there.
- I took a lot of pictures,
- I'm still learning how my camera works, but the fireworks setting is fun. It makes the world appear to be on fire.
- The beach is more fun when the sun is out.
- Palm Beach has a nice City Center. Most of the streets were under construction though, I guess beverly hills east needs work every once in a while.
- A botanical garden is a nice place to visit. Everything seemed so colorful and different. I didn't realize that working in a corporate environment sterilizes everything. I felt that much more disenchanted with the corporate life. Hence, I took a lot of pictures of Flowers.
- Animals witnessed included Clams, Lizards, Pelicans, Cranes, Frogs, Sea Turtles, and a snake.
- The Frog chorus is much more soothing than the late summer cricket sounds of the midwest.
- The Golden Corral is an amazing place to eat. It's crazier than Old Country Buffet, and they have a steak buffet! Yum.
- My Aunt is very, very nice. Thanks for the hospitality.

Well, that's all I can summarize for now. Check out the album. I'll eventually figure out a way to turn it into a one of those online thumbnail album.

I'm back...but I ain't glad.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Saturday, August 9

LEFTOVER CHINESE IS ON VACATION!

Thats right, we (meaning me and The Girl) are taking a week or so off to enjoy the dog days of summer in the Sunshine State. Since I won't have a computer handy, I figure it would be a good idea to give this blog a break. So sit back, relax and comeback everyday to browse the archives, the image directory, or my awful Music. (or you could just come back and laugh at my photoshop skills.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Thursday, August 7

Breach Aborted

Scenario: Mysterious shutdowns, restarts, automatic connections to the interweb, and during the first time, a lot of information sent out in a short period of time. In the two days following, I monitored the frequency of restarts and determined that I may or may not have acquired a virus.

Last Night's Remedy: I checked with Microsoft and recently they said that there is an opening for computers to take control. I downloaded all the security updates and went to sleep. My hope was that the computer wouldn't mysteriously restart again. It did.

Today's Remedy: I realized that XP has a firewall. I turned it on for the first time since I've owned the computer. However, my sources told me that it doesn't limit information that gets sent out. They also said that there is a security hole in port 135 (which is conventionally used for pop-ups) that can be exploited. Click here to see if your port 135 is protected..mine wasn't. To remedy this, I downloaded Zone Alarm. Zone alarm is a firewall program that can limit information sent from my computer, plus it prevents any outside sources from accessing my computer. In the three hours since installation earlier tonight, 77 intruders have been blocked by Zone Alarm. I know I am on high protection, so that number could be inflated...then again, the high number could mean that I was just used as a porn server. One can only hope. Anyway, I finally got around to renewing my Anti-Virus Subscription. If I spent the mere $15 bucks anytime between December 4th, 2002 and last week, I could have avoided the two days of exposure. Anyway, I ran the updated virus scans and discovered that my computer was infected with the W32.Spybot.Worm. This 'worm can perform different backdoor-type functions by connecting to a configurable IRC server and joining a specific channel to listen for instructions.' Basically, it opens up my shit for hacking. After dilligently following the security response, I'm scanning the computer again for any more infections. Let's hope I'm rid of this.

Forecast: It took me two days to figure this mess out, and I tried to leave my computer offline only today. Unfortunately, the automatic restarts lead to automatic login's. This same thing happened to 10% of the computers at UC Berekely...Hopefully, valuable information was not taken. I give myself about 6-8 weeks of intense monitoring over what may or may not have been taken from me, if anything. Luckily I don't have too much money and I try to clean out my .dat files once in a while. I'm only angry that I wasn't protected from this type of stuff earlier.

Well, the scan is done, and I am clean...at least I have one less thing to worry about before I run off to vacation. Special thanks to Soup, Tim, and to a smaller extent, Millah for their advice.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Wednesday, August 6

Sektor 1 Breach

I downloaded a font the other night and my computer mysteriously shut down and restarted. When it reconnnected to the interweb, I noticed that my DSL modem was working really hard. After about two minutes of this, I checked my online status, and it turns out over 5 million bytes of info were sent out in a matter of minutes. It takes about a day and a half of normal usage to get that much going. Out of fear that some program had restarted my computer only to send all the information I have on my hard drive to some random user, I took myself offline, and went back online. The computer restarted a few more times before I realized that at the opening, windows couldn't find the program that ran the file 'tftp3960'. Curious, I looked up the file extension and found out that there is a security flaw in the system where a computer could possibly "compromise a computer running Microsoft(r) Windows(r) XP and gain control over it." I hope that hasn't happened yet, but I'm currently running the updates from the Microsoft website right now. This could be an XP nightmare. My bank account still has cash on it, so I'm confident that nothing valuable has been pirated. Anyway, after discovering that I am unprotected, I activated my firewalls for the first time ever. I'm not sure how effective this firewall is. It's XP provided and it better keep me from getting my shit and/or identity fucked up.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Tuesday, August 5

Intruder!

I came home to a hot apartment and everything seemed normal. As usual, the afternoon sun did its usual thing and the temperature was ten degrees warmer than it was outside. I opened up the windows a bit more, turned on the fan, and saw the intruder. A big fuckin' hornet somehow found its way into my humble abode. I hope he enjoyed his stay, because it was up to me to take care of it.

Approach #1: shoo it out of my apartment.
Rationale: Hornets have a positive value in the ecosystem. I can't tell you what that is right now, but I assume taking its life would be of no help to anything.
Drama: After it circled the apartment and came towards me, I swung my shirt at it to shoo it out of the apartment, but wound up throwing my shirt at my aquarium while the hornet flew back to the windows.
Success: None

Approach #2: stun it with a tennis racket and sweep it into the hallway.
Rationale: I'll knock it out and move it out of my apartment so it can shake off the stun and fly away.
Drama: The hornet hung out between the blinds and the window for a few minutes, occassionally it would grip the adjusting wands and try to sting it. I guess the wands did the hornet wrong some how.
Success: When the fucker came flying towards me again, I gave it a forehand and sent it flying. I didn't know where it went, but I could hear the wings buzzing. Assuming it was flying around looking for something to sting, I sheepishly stepped out of the apartment. When I located it, it flew on to my bedroom door. It was just sitting there, so I took the frame of my racket and gave it a little crack. It fell to the ground and swept it into the hallway.

Unfortunately, the webcam viewer tuned into too late to see it. The fact that this was the most interesting event of my day tells you something about how the day went.

4 Miles...good fun

My running mission today was to get through four miles today with as little pain as possible. From the start, I realized that it wasn't going to happen, but I wanted to finish the run anyway. I jogged the first mile, felt a bit too sore, and took a seat in the grass to stretch. After that, I ran two more miles at an easy pace. The soreness either went away, of I got used to it. Before the last mile, I slowed down my really slow jog to a walk and gathered my thoughts for a few seconds. The last mile featured me pushing myself harder than usual with a sprint to cap it off. The legs were sore as usual, but I didn't feel like I had been whipped in the back of the leg repeatedly. I did draw something from this run, though. I didn't feel like I ran hard enough. I recovered my breath fairly quickly and as I type this, I don't feel worn out at all. I guess I'm trying to take it easy on the legs, but the rest of my body is craving a harder run. I take that as a good sign. Perhaps the marathon attempt may happen after all.

The last paragraph probably put you to sleep, so I'll highlight the interesting things I saw.
- A dog in a carrier being pulled by his master. The dog barked at everybody jogging by. I'm not sure if the dog was threatened, or just happy to see people, but it was funny to see.
- As usual, two rollerbladers who looked like they were about to fall off the face of the earth if they hit a bump or a crack.
- A fat, tall, bald man without a shirt rolled his khaki shorts up into this thighs and groin area. I was disgusted two (2) times.
- Hot Chicks....both thin and shapely.

The Girl Got Re-routed
The Girl just called me from Minneapolis. Her flight to Milwaukee via Detroit got re-routed to Minneapolis. That makes for a longer and hectic day...not to mention an unprepared flight over this volatile midwest weather. I'm going to crack open a beer for her getting back home safe.

The Brewers are hanging with the Braves right now. I just may have another beer for a total of two (2) in honor of that, too!

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Monday, August 4

Just this once...

A conversation that transpired today...

Me: "I'd like to have these keys copied."
*man examines keys and hesitates*
Nice Man who's both a cobbler and keymaster: "Sure, I can duplicate this one for you, but this key says "do not dupilicate."
Me: "Hey, that's okay."
Nice Man who's both a cobbler and keymaster: "I don't think I can do that."
Me: "You can help me out, my plants are going to die if I don't get these keys..."
Nice Man who's both a cobbler and keymaster: "Well I guess I can do it, but it says do not duplicate..."
Me: "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone you copied the keys."
Nice Man who's both a cobbler and keymaster: "you won't tell anyone?!" *puzzled look* "uh....well...allright"

This just confirms the fact that I can't think on my feet. I just acted like it didn't even matter that it said "do not duplicate" on my key....oh well, living off the advice that no one really cares unless the key reads: "unlawful to copy", I went ahead a assumed it meant nothing.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Sunday, August 3

Eighteen Candles

That was the theme of friday night. A big hoo-haw to bring in a young woman into adulthood in Filipino circles is called a cotillion. Considering that we were in a nice country club in an affluent area in this metropolis, I shouldn't have been surprised at how lavish the event was. Lets play some word association here. What comes to your mind when I say: Open bar, skirted banquet chairs, four hundred people, two dozen roses in 4 foot tall crystal vases on each table, and a dinner with steak and chicken? If you thought wedding, then you were wrong. That was the atmosphere on friday night. This event was better than 75% of the weddings I'll ever go to in my life. It was merely an 18th birthday party and it actually dwarfed an actual wedding reception going on in the next hall. Oh well, i'm happy for the debutante. I just hope that she can now become her own person and not a cookie cutter young asian-american born of immigrant doctors. Its her script now.

Gnats!

I was talking to Jay on the phone while the baseball game was on the television and I noticed that wrigley field was swarming with gnats. Everybody was fanning themselves and the bullpen pitchers were wrapping towels over their head. I sort of laughed at the scene and wished everyone well. Well, it turned out that I was to go to Fort Awesome soon after and I walked into the same swarm. I'm over a mile away from the ballpark, but the gnats were just as bad. People were cursing the lil' things on the street and I kept getting them into my eyes, nose, mouth and all over my clothes. When I finally got on the bus, I breathed a sigh of relief while I picked gnats out of my ears, off my neck, and from my teeth. I guess the conditions were right for the mass big orgy in the air yesterday...

New 446!

Download the new 446 track. You may or may not understand some of the lyrics by one of the dudes. Unless you're of filipino descent, that is. I continue to take a long, long time to record my parts. They're still not perfect, but I guess I try to be perfectionist when it comes to dropping something. Speaking about that, I finally got a Harmon brand Wow-Wow mute for my trumpet. I can pull a re-mix project off the shelf and finish my jazzy lounge version of a song. I was looking for something to get me back to playing the brass and I didn't want to piss off nearby neighbors (if any). The chops will come back soon.

Staggered Run

This morning, it was hot and sunny. Storms are blowing up over the metropolis right now. I went for a run and it felt sort of good for a while. Then the heat and the fact that I got bombed last night started to get to me. After 1.75 miles, I turned around and walked a bit. Then I realized that I shouldn't ditch an otherwise worthy effort, so I alternated sprinting and walking in two block intervals. That was a better workout for me. I'm kind of amazed at how fast it feels like I run when I haul ass. I'm also kind of amazed that the calf pain goes away when I haul ass. I'm not amazed at the fact my calves still kill me.

Just like home

I had lunch at a little filipino restaurant named Little Quiapo. Usually, at a buffet type setting, I pick my favorite dish and spent the majority of my time sampling that dish over and over again. This time around, I had to have a little bit of everything. I guess I missed my familys filipino cuisine a lot more than I thought I did. Every dish was brought me back to my childhood, and to my roots. Food is a cultural pillar among filipino americans. I never quite understood that until today. Anyway, I can fequent this place regularly now and enjoy sinigang and rice to cleanse my pallet. I used to think paying for filipino food was a waste of money because my mother cooked it every day. I'm over that...totally over that.

Update: NEW SOUND!

This project started about a month ago, then I shelved it. Then took it off the shelf, blew the dust away, then I threw it away, then remade it...its the REMIX.

Spreewell Lounge

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .

Friday, August 1

Happy August

I had a post all ready to go and I accidently missed the button to post. Blogger asked me if I wanted to save the text, and since I had no other choice, I said "okay." I'm not sure where they saved the text, because I can't find it. What the hell is that about? If I have the paitience, I might come back and re-post my thoughts, but right now, I care not to go over it all again.

Okay...here goes. August is here, which means we begin our descent into the hellish pits of winter. If fall were one month longer, I wouldn't really mind winter...but its not a month longer, so I do mind. Although I work 9-5 now and don't actually "feel" summer anymore, I enjoy the weather too much. August usually meant the big move at college, but that's not the case anymore. I need to find a new august event.

Broken Social Scene was pretty good last night. I was especially impressed with their control of their dynamics onstage. Most bands, especially the one I used to play in, know two dynamics: loud and really fuckin' loud. This was a different case. The live versions of the songs were very cathartic. They'd start off at a nice walking pace...before finishing off in a huff. Good times. Also, Chin up Chin up and Tangierswere also good. It was defnitely worth the price of admission plus the cheeseburger I promised Dan for the ride home.

I get to hang out with my parents tonight at a family function. I'm way disconnected with this branch of the family, so it should be interesting. I wouldn't mind going to the function, but I'm dead tired from getting less than ten hours of sleep in the last two days. Oh well, I may or may not breakdown the function this weekend.

. . [~] . 0 (Grumble) Grumbles .


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